The Virgin's Auction Read Online Free PDF

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    The day dragged endlessly onwards. Melissa tried to keep busy. Time and again she found herself staring blankly into the middle distance. Her mind was churning through the same thoughts, desperately seeking some other solution; any sort of reprieve.
    She found nothing.
    Mr Beaseley came and went. She stayed out of the way as much as she could. He created all the stir she could have wanted, ordering his staff members around and running up and down the stairs, poking his head and the rest of himself into any room, overseeing the loading of wagons out in the street and generally being a nuisance.
    Peter emerged from his bedroom to ask what was going on. He took in her explanation about selling off furniture to pay bills with a vague frown then drifted away again. She was glad he didn’t see Beaseley in the small library, taking notes and pursing his lips as he contemplated the shelves. 
    Melissa paced. Through the halls, the stairwells, the emptying rooms she walked, over and over. She couldn’t settle to any task. Her restless mind drove her body to move. She stopped at mealtimes, for appearances sake ate a few bites and pushed the rest about her plate. When Peter left the table so did she.
    Tonight. Tonight. Tonight. It was a chant in her head. She balled her hands into fists and rubbed them into her eye sockets as if to grind it out of her ears, but she could not.
    Tonight. Tonight. Tonight.
    Shadows shifted across the carpets until the carpets too were taken. The day dimmed. Night arrived. Mr Beaseley gathered up his minions and departed with a final load. He had been unexpectedly effective. The house was more than half empty.
    But then the furnishings had been scant to start with. Not much of value had survived Father’s slide into the arms of Bacchus.
    Melissa’s footsteps echoed oddly, raising little puffs of the dust disturbed by all the removals. Dust from a house inadequately tended by a single maid and herself. She would have cried about the loss of everything, freighted with so many memories of a lifetime, but there was no room for sentiment. They were just things, and she would not need them where she was going.
    She poked her head into Peter’s room, vaguely surprised to find everything here untouched, just as she had ordered. His candle burned by his bedside and he lay sprawled inelegantly across the bed, tilting his book towards the light to read.
    “Time you were asleep, love,” she chided gently.
    “Perhaps, but this is interesting. Shan’t be much longer, Lissa.”
    “Good night.” She stroked a curl back from his eye, then stooped to lay a kiss on his temple. He smiled up at her. Her heart turned over with love for him. Dear Peter. He must be kept safe, at all costs.
    She left his room with leaden feet, went back out into the silence of the still house. Hetty and Cook were already abed; or at least in their rooms.
    It was almost time.
    She w alked to her bedroom. Like Peter’s everything was still in its place. She paused on the threshold, took a deep breath and entered. She was dry-eyed and numb, yet her heart was beating oh, so fast.
    With her mind carefully blank she took out her pretty white dress, with little sprigs of flowers scattered across it; stockings, plain white cotton small clothes. She laid them out on the bed, smoothing out the wrinkles over and over again. Then she stood and stared at them.
    Finally she dressed herself, forcing each limb to move as it should to complete the accustomed task. It was difficult. The leaden weights of her hands refused to cooperate. When it was done she bundled her hair into a loose knot at the nape of her neck, hardly caring that it immediately began to escape from the poorly placed pins.
    Downstairs she went, to the entrance hall. She sat on the lowest step of the staircase and waited. Each minute was an eternity.
    At last came the fateful knock on the front door.  Melissa answered it. Mr Tell was there with an expression she could not