“Ah, he was one who always knew more than he said. Kept himself to himself, and you never guessed at what rivers ran inside him, or how deep. Bookish, some thought, but if you want to know my mind on that, he was waiting with a dreadful patience to grow up. As if there was something waiting for him. If there was, we never knew of it. He was content to stay by Miss Olivia and keep her spirits high when the pain was hard. But if you looked into his eyes when he stared out at the sea, you knew there was a roamer inside him. Not like Master Richard, but a man who saw distant places in his soul.”

“How did you come to know the Trevelyan family so intimately?”

There was roguish laughter in her eyes as she stared back at him, giving a bawdy twist to his words. “Even the mighty use bedpans, like ordinary mortals,” she told him. “I nursed the living when needful, and laid out the dead. Dr. Penrith sent for me when Miss Olivia had the crippling disease and was like to die. He didn’t trust the London nurses they wanted.”

She seemed today to be clear-minded and aware of what she was saying. Testing it, he repeated, “You laid out the dead?”

A wariness moved behind her eyes, though her expression didn’t change. He took a chance and asked her, “Was there a killer in that house?”

But her eyes clouded as he watched her lined face, and she said, “I told you there were a Gabriel Hound in that house, and you’d hear him running some nights, before something bad happened. Running through the rooms, in the dark, looking for his soul. On those nights, the wind howled in the trees and rattled the windows, and I kept the coverlet over my head. Miss Olivia warned me once, when I spoke to her of it, and I knew to heed her. I’d die too if I told what I heard or saw. Which is why I’ve outlived them all but two, and Miss Susannah’s safe enough in London.”

“What about Cormac FitzHugh?”

“He’s not a Trevelyan, is he?” she asked. “There’s no Gabriel hound wants anything he has.”

She walked off before he could ask her what had brought her to the Hall on this particular evening. Or what she knew of a fire built out on the headland. But her mind was already slipping away again, and he wasn’t sure he’d have gotten a straight answer anyway.

Still, he listened again to what she’d said. “Miss Olivia warned me once, when I spoke to her of it, and I knew to heed her. I’d die too if I told what I heard or saw.”

Miss Olivia.