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answer. Of course, he had to have heard her. But just as Mr. Rafe Randel had taken the hint quickly, so did she. She didn't ask about him again.

Chapter 3

    "You're not sick then?"
    "Fit as a fiddle," he said with a pat to his ample stomach.
    "Were you sick when you wrote the letter?"
    He chuckled, deep and long. "It would be quite the miraculous recovery if I had been."
    "Then what am I doing here?" She paced the drawing room, sparing only quick glances for the old dog lying at her uncle's feet and the untouched tea tray that sat on a small table. She felt immensely foolish.
    "I can easily tell you what you're doing here. You're visiting your uncle, who isn't sick, but who wanted to meet you just the same."
    "But why the lies? You could have told me the truth and I would have come anyway." She realized that her words highly contradicted the scene Hugh had made when she'd decided to leave. If she hadn't done what she had, she wouldn't be in Cornwall. Sick uncle, dead uncle, or buried uncle, she'd still be lying abed dreaming of where she'd go if she had her freedom.
    "That letter is just something your father and I used to do. It's a kind of code we worked out. Surely you spoke to your parents about it all?"
    She had to sit down. "You don't know?"
    "Know?" He leaned over to run a hand down the hound's graying back of fur. "Don't tell me, Victoria. I don't think I want to hear it." He must have heard the dismay in her voice.
    "They died within weeks of each other." She found herself studying the dog as seriously as he.
    "Who went first?"
    "Father. And then I think mother just died of a broken heart."
    He swallowed hard. "How could she?"
    She couldn't avoid the emotion any longer by pretending that the dog interested her more than her uncle's sad eyes. Their gazes met across the room. "My mother felt she had lost everything."
    "But she still had you, Victoria. If you were my girl, I'd be so proud." His expression was of the utmost sincerity.
    Then she had to look away. But she didn't run to the other end of the room. She slumped into the other wing-backed chair, even though she knew the etiquette of such an action was lacking. Not that any of that was important to her. "Dear uncle, I hate to say it, but you hardly know me. I'm not sure you would feel the same way if you did."
    He guffawed, shaking his head in a way possible only by a very healthy man. "Nonsense! I'm a very good judge of character."
    She laughed, but before she could respond, she lost her cool veneer of careless relaxation. A tear slipped down her cheek. "This character is a murderer."
    He leaned forward. "Come again?"
    She felt secure in her decision to confide in him. "I suppose if you hadn't heard about my parents, then you couldn't have heard about Hugh Clavering."
    "Did you kill him, darling?"
    "I suppose I did...but it was an accident! Truly. I put arsenic in the brandy, but I only intended to make him ill. I was shocked when he was found dead the next morning."
    "Then you're not to blame."
    "I think you're being a little biased. I'm completely to blame." Forgetting her manners a second time, she wiped her eyes with the edge of her sleeve. "I only told you the circumstances to assure you that I'm not as cold-hearted as my actions would indicate."
    "You can't blame yourself." He stood up and stepped over the sleeping dog.
    Her ashamed gaze fell to her lap and she felt a heavy hand on her shoulder a moment later. "Why shouldn't I blame myself? I don't know how I'll feel in the future, but this isn't something I can move past so quickly. Actually, it's not something I should even try to ignore. I need to pay for my actions." Her voice broke on the last words. "I shouldn't have come here."
    "But I'm so glad you did. This dilemma of yours isn't something you should decide immediately. You should think it over...overnight."
    "Maybe they're looking for me. I can't stay in Cornwall, pitying myself, while an inquest is being undertaken at Blackmoore."
    "Will there