There was so much askew with the world and Trevor’s life had gone completely mad. The only thing he could do was focus on the facts.
He had been stealing – pick-pocketing mostly – and then he had been captured. He’d been given new pants and a collar, his shirt taken away, and then a rich-looking woman had stopped what she was doing to stare at him. He’d been taken home and fed, strange food but tasty, and that had somehow gotten the rich woman in trouble.
And now a maternal-acting woman had fed him even more food. “Her timing is a little bad,” she fussed, “but that isn’t your fault. You’re a skinny thing, aren’t you? Here, have another tart. Herself won’t eat things like this, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make them even when She’s visiting.”
The fussing went on. Trevor took in what he could and filed the rest for later study. He was fed, he was given a place to sleep, he was given clean clothes for the second time in two days, and he’d been admonished not to run off, as if they’d done anything to suggest he ought to. If anything, they’d given him too much to keep him there.
When Elva, the matronly woman, found him an hour later, he was naked save for the collar – which, it turned out, didn’t come off – and napping on a large cushion at the foot of Lady Catherine’s bed. “What?” he asked, at the raised eyebrow Elva gave him. “It’s her birthday, too.”
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