I can’t explain why, but you must stay away from Nightingale Hall. For the sake of our friendship, stay in London even if I never return.
Julian reread the warning he had written. He was tempted to add more, but it was probably best he keep the missive short. The only thing that mattered was that Francis stayed in London. As long as he did that, the future would be altered so that his dear friend wouldn’t hang.
He dipped the quill into the inkwell and addressed the missive. He had no way of knowing if Francis would ever receive this, but he had to try.
He had just sealed the missive when Willow came in through his bedchamber and entered the small room. He tried not to stare at her like a gentleman who’d never seen a lady before. He had members of the fairer sex in this manor, so it wasn’t like he hadn’t been around them for all of these centuries. But they were maids.
Willow was different. She had inherited the estate in her time. That made her his equal in station. Also, none of the maids in the estate had curves as lovely as Willow did, nor did they have Willow’s natural beauty. She looked much better in a gown than in those strange clothes she’d had on before.
When he realized she was talking, he forced his gaze off of her breasts and directed his attention to her face. He could only pray she didn’t know what had been going through his mind just now. It wasn’t the slightest bit gentlemanly.
“The small room off to my bedroom isn’t what it was in my time,” she said. “There’s no toilet or shower in there. I have no idea what toilets are called in this time, and I don’t know where they are in a place this big. At the risk of sounding crude, where do you relieve your bladder around here?”
It took him a moment to figure out what she was talking about. “Oh, right.” He rose to his feet and picked the missive off the desk. “I’ll summon the maid to bring a chamber pot to your bedchamber.”
She frowned. “A chamber pot?”
“That’s what we use in this time.” He figured it was probably similar to a toilet, given the subject of the conversation. “The chamber maid will place it by the bed. When you take care of things, you do it in there, and she’ll empty it out when you’re away from your room. You have nothing to worry about. She’s discreet.”
“Don’t you have some other way of doing this?”
“This is the most efficient method we have. You could go to the small building outside, but usually the gardener and stablemaster use that. I recommend the chamber pot. It’s more private, and it’s inside.” He noted the way she shuddered and chuckled. “I don’t know what the inconvenience is. It’s not like you spend all day relieving your bladder. The task is really just a small and insignificant part of the day.”
“It’s more complicated for me because I’m a woman. I can’t just stand and go anywhere I want.”
Amused, he said, “I don’t go just anywhere. I’m not an animal.”
She groaned. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just mean that if you wanted to, you could pick a bush and let it go.”
“I’ve never done anything of the sort. I’m an earl, not a vagabond. I either use my chamber pot or, if I’m outside, the privy.”
She didn’t seem completely convinced but nodded as if she intended for him to think he had proven his point.
Well, he didn’t know what else he could say on this topic, nor was he exactly inclined to discuss this at great length when he had more important things to tend to.
“I have to send this missive to my cousin,” he said. “After that, I’ll make sure you get a chamber pot, and then we’ll get something to eat. I assume you eat in the future.”
She blinked in surprise. “Of course, I eat. Everyone needs to eat.”
“Do you eat at a table while sitting in a chair?”
“Is there a different way to eat?”
He couldn’t help but smile at her bewildered tone. “I didn’t think so, but I didn’t think the matter of a chamber pot would shock you as much as it did. It’s nice to know that everything in this time won’t offend you.” He waved for her to join him, and they left the room. “We walk up and down stairs, too.”
She smirked. “There are some stairs that move in the future. They’re called escalators. But, I will admit, these are in places like airports and malls. You won’t find them in homes, even in ones as fancy as this.”
Intrigued, he asked, “Really?”
“Yep. And there are elevators that move you from one floor to another. It goes up and down, and it’s in the shape of a rectangular box.”
“Are these all run by magic?”
“No, they move by cables that are similar to rope.”
That was fascinating. “What other things do you have in the future that isn’t in this time?”
“Electricity,” she replied as they reached the stairs. “You don’t need to light candles there. You just flip a switch on a wall or turn the knob on a lamp, and the whole room lights up.”
“Do they work better than candles?”
“Much better. With candles, you have to light a lot of them to get the whole room lit up, but it only takes one lightbulb to do it.”
“I wish I could see that.”
“Unless there’s a portal around here to go to the future, I don’t think that will be possible.”
The butler approached them as they reached the bottom of the staircase.
“Is the coachman done checking on the carriage?” Julian asked him. It’d been a long time since he had gone outside to see what was going on around the manor. He couldn’t remember what the coachman did this time of the day.
“I believe he’s still doing that,” the butler replied.
The butler glanced at Willow as if he wasn’t sure what to think about having her there without being introduced to her at the front entrance of the house. Julian was sure the butler assumed he had snuck her in here during the middle of the night to engage in all kinds of wanton behavior, but, being a servant, he kept his thoughts to himself.
“Do you wish to go with Miss Knudson to London?” the butler asked.
“No,” Julian replied. “I want the coachman to go to London and deliver this to Mr. Francis Azazel. His address is on the envelope.”
The butler took the missive. “I’ll take this to him. Is there anything you would have me do before I go?”
“Yes, tell the maids that they are to get the bedchamber adjoining mine ready for Miss Knudson’s stay here.”
The butler didn’t seem all that enthusiastic with the idea, but he said he would do as instructed then headed down the hall.
Willow’s eyebrows furrowed. “Am I imagining it, or does he want me gone?”
Julian took her by the elbow and led her to the drawing room. “He thinks you’re my lover, and you’ve come here for a secret affair.”
She gasped.
He grinned. “I don’t know what they’d think of this in the future, but it does look sordid. You came here out of nowhere, and you have no chaperone.”
“Why would I need a chaperone? I’m twenty-five, not a child.”
“In this time, every unmarried lady does well to have a chaperone when she’s in the company of a gentleman who’s not a relative.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Well, besides the whole chamber pot thing.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. It’s just the way things are in this time.”
“I have a lot to learn,” she said under her breath.
He supposed he would be saying the same thing if he had crossed into her time. Imagine moving stairs, a switch that brightened rooms without the aid of candles, things called toilets, and ladies wearing breeches as if they were gentlemen.
He escorted her to the drawing room and gestured for her to sit on the settee. He walked over to the cord that was on the wall and pulled it. “Do you drink tea in the future?”
“Once in a while, but I mostly stick to coffee or juice,” she replied as she sat down.
“Coffee. That’s an American drink, isn’t it?”
“I’m from America.”
That explained why she sounded strange when she talked. He’d thought it was just something that happened to people’s voices when they were in the future, but if she was from another country, she would sound different even if she’d been born in this time.
“Does America have a good relationship with Great Britain in the future?” he asked as he went over to her.
“Yes. We’re allies.”
He settled beside her. “Our countries don’t get along so well in this time. We just came out of a war with your country.”
“I didn’t know there was a war in this time. I thought the Revolutionary War was the only one America had with Great Britain. That’s the one where we fought for our independence in the 1700s.”
“Yes, I’m aware of that war, but I mean the one where Great Britain was trying to defeat Napoleon. Napoleon posed a great threat to all of Europe. I don’t think those of you in America realized just how serious things were over here. He had to be stopped. But while we were doing our best to stop him, America felt it necessary to declare another war on us. I’m just glad that everything with Napoleon is over.” He glanced her way. “It did end with him at Waterloo, didn’t it?”
“I don’t know much about the history of Europe, but Napoleon never took over all of Europe.”
Good. At least there was one good thing that had happened in the future. All he had to do was prevent Francis from coming out here. Then, if tomorrow did end up repeating itself, he could rest knowing the coachman was able to get off of this property today. It seemed like everyone who wasn’t on this land was able to move forward in time. That gave him hope.
“Well, in my time, our countries get along very well, and we also get along with France,” Willow said.
His eyes widened. “We do?”
She nodded. “It all worked out in the end.”
He wondered how that was possible after so much fighting. He’d been sure that the tension between the countries, especially France, would always be there.
A maid came into the room, and Julian rose to his feet to tell her to bring in some tea and scones. After she left, he returned to the settee.
“Have you had scones?” he asked.
“No,” Willow said.
“It’s a pastry with fruit in the middle and sugar sprinkled on top. If I don’t ask for a change in fruit, Cook picks blueberry. I hope that’s all right.”
“I like blueberries.”
“I do, too, though over the years, I’ve gotten tired of them. But since Cook makes them best with blueberries, I thought you would enjoy those.”
“That’s nice of you to pick blueberries for that reason,” she said with a smile.
He returned her smile. It was nice to have someone he could have a real conversation with. With the servants, it had been like dealing with actors who were put on a stage with certain lines to say. He’d never developed a connection with any of them. Willow, however, was different. And different was very nice.
“I know the last thing you ever wanted was to be stuck here with me, but I’m glad you’re here,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “I realize it’s selfish of me to say that. I should be doing everything I can to find a way to get you back to your time instead of keeping you here to have tea and scones with me.” Not to mention getting a bedchamber set up just for her.
“I already searched the entire place. There is no other portal. Everything else I could see my reflection in was normal. I couldn’t put my hand through anything except that strange mirror in the hall.”
“It’s funny that you saw a mirror and all I saw was something that made me think of a painting. For the longest time, I thought it was a painting of a white sheet. It wasn’t until the other day that I saw my own hallway. I couldn’t see my reflection or the reflection of any of the servants. Now I realize that was because I was looking into the hallway in your time. We didn’t exist there.”
“Yeah, the whole thing is so strange,” she said. “I don’t know what to make of it.”
“It was a great error on my part, but I’m sure the missive I burned in the fireplace has something to do with all of this.”
“Missive?”
“A message. I haven’t read it since June 16, 1817. It came in the evening. At the time, I didn’t think it was important, so I threw it in the fireplace.”
“That’s a long time ago.”
“If it had occurred to me that I’d be stuck in an endless loop forever, I would have written down what was in it the second day I woke up and it was still June 17.” He shook his head. “I didn’t even think there might be a connection between all of this and that missive, but now I’m certain there was.”
“Did all of the missive burn?”
“Enough so that I can’t make out anything that will help me.”
A thoughtful expression came over her face before she asked, “So there are fragments from the missive still left?”
He nodded. “The fragments are there. I can take them out, and they’ll return there before I wake up the next morning. Everything goes back to being the way it was on the original day I woke up on June 17. I can destroy everything in this room, and tomorrow when I wake up, it’ll look like this. Though,” he amended, “that might change now that you’re here. I’m not sure what your arrival means.”
“If things are going to be different because I’m here, maybe something will be different with that missive. Maybe there will be some clue you didn’t notice before.”
Would it be possible? Could her being here change more than the day he’d wake up in tomorrow? Could it also change other things around here?
The maid came into the room with the tea and scones. He remained silent until she was gone.
“I burned the missive in the library,” he said as he poured tea into their cups. “When we’re done with this, we’ll look in the fireplace.”
After he gave her a cup and scone, she asked, “In the future, most of the rooms in this place have the furniture all covered up. This room wasn’t one of them.” She scanned the area. “It looks like all of the furniture is still here. The lawyer said everything was kept in its original condition as much as possible. I don’t know if it was to give this place an old-fashioned appeal or if people were afraid to update things beyond the plumbing and lighting.”
He suspected the plumbing had something to do with her earlier inquiry about where she could relieve her bladder but had no concept of how one might use anything but a chamber pot, so he decided not to ask about it. The lighting reference made more sense since he was familiar with candles.
“In my time this room is called a sitting room,” she said.
“I call it a drawing room,” he replied after he swallowed his tea. “But it makes sense why you call it a sitting room. We are sitting.”
She chuckled then bit into the scone. “Do you draw in this room?”
“No. I’ve written missives on occasion, but I mostly use this room to entertain visitors. Not that any visitors have been here in two centuries. If I write, it’s in the library, but again, I haven’t needed to write anything in a very long time.”
She studied him, and he caught the sympathetic expression on her face. “What have you done all of this time?”
“Nothing, really. I’ve just been going from day to day and hoping that I’ll wake up and tomorrow will be June 18.”
“That’s awful. I would go crazy if that happened to me.” She took a deep breath. “I suppose I might find out what it’s like if tomorrow is June 17.”
“I hope it’s not. I hope it’ll be the 18th.”
“Me, too.”
He wasn’t sure she’d even be here if he did wake up tomorrow and find it was still the 17th, but he kept the thought to himself. He had to hope that tomorrow would be different because if it wasn’t, he might just give up.
They continued to eat and drink in silence.