Author's note: Thank you for your note, Depp! I'm so happy you're still reading!

Trigger warning: Mary talks about her assault at the end of this chapter. Also, I've used some dialogue from the show in a couple of scenes in this chapter.

June 1914

'Oh, Mary, it was so romantic!' Sybil sighed, her face all dreamy as she recounted Matthew's proposal. 'He took my hand in his so lovingly and then he dropped to one knee.'

'And it didn't creak? His ancient old knee,' Mary teased, smiling indulgently at Sybil, who was looking impossibly young in her white, billowy nightdress and her long plait, her scrubbed face shining with happiness.

Sybil shot her sister a sweetly exasperated look, shaking her head. 'No, of course, it didn't! It was perfect.'

'And then what?'

'And then he gazed up at me with his beautiful blue eyes – they are so very blue, you know,' Sybil breathed, momentarily losing herself in the memory of her beloved's eyes.

'Yes, I know,' Mary replied, only refraining from rolling her eyes because she had on occasion quite lost herself in admiration of Tom's blue eyes in the past; eyes which were a more beautiful shade of blue than Matthew's in her opinion.

'Anyway, he gazed up at me, and I knew what he was going to do, but my heart was beating so loudly I could hear it in my ears, and I could barely breathe waiting for him to say the words and then he did. He said, "Sybil, my darling girl, I think you know by now that I love and adore you. Would you do me the great honour of becoming my wife?"'

Mary smiled as Sybil let out a great happy sigh.

'Don't you think that is just the most beautiful, most romantic, most perfect proposal you've ever heard?'

'Well, I can't say as I have ever heard a proposal,' Mary observed, mildly.

'He loves and adores me. He loves and adores me!' Sybil cried, her eyes bright. 'Me! Can you imagine?'

'Yes, darling, I can because it's been blindingly obvious for quite some time now,' Mary said, all fond patience.

'And then, oh, Mary, then after I said yes – because of course I said yes – he stood up and swept me into his arms and he kissed me! He kissed me!' Sybil said, grasping Mary's hands and squeezing them tight in excitement.

Mary smiled, responding with a squeeze of her own, her sister's excitement completely infectious. 'And did you like it?'

'Oh, Mary! It was… it was perfect, wonderful, just delightful! I can see why you like doing it so much. It was just… just so, so lovely. His lips were so soft. And it was so exciting. It was romantic and exciting at the same time. I know that sounds strange, but do you know what I mean?' Sybil asked, her happiness shining from her.

'I know what you mean,' Mary confirmed, thinking back to some of her kisses with Tom.

'Yes, I suppose you do. I just… well, I simply can't wait to kiss him again. I can't! I want to kiss him all the time!' Sybil cried, letting go of Mary's hands and touching her fingertips to her lips. 'It is simply divine.'

Mary watched her sister with amusement as she apparently relived her first kiss in her mind.

Sybil wrenched her gaze from somewhere in the middle distance and looked back at Mary, her face a picture of excitement.

'I'm engaged, Mary!'

'I know.'

'To Matthew!'

'Yes, you are.'

'I didn't expect it, you know. His proposal came completely out of the blue.'

Mary raised a disbelieving eyebrow.

'It did!' Sybil insisted. 'I was so shocked when he went down on one knee because I really hadn't expected it to happen. Not yet anyway. I wasn't sure he would ask me at all, and I thought perhaps even if he wanted to, Papa might say we had to wait because I've only just turned 18, but the only thing we have to wait for is the end of the season and that's nearly here!'

'It certainly is.'

'I'm going to be Matthew's wife!'

'I'm so happy for you, darling,' Mary said, catching hold of her sister's hand.

'Thank you,' Sybil breathed, beaming at her sister. 'Thank you! It's wonderful to be engaged to the man you love. To know you're going to marry him and spend the rest of your lives together.'

Sybil caught a sudden flash of sadness flit across Mary's face, there and gone in a second, and suddenly she felt guilty that her love affair was proceeding down an avenue it seemed Mary's own romance couldn't follow.

'Oh, darling, I wish it could be the same for you,' she whispered, tightening her fingers around her sister's.

'Don't be silly,' Mary replied, smiling brightly. 'This is about you, not me. And I'm thrilled for you, I am. You and Matthew are going to be very happy together. I know you are.'

'Oh, Mary, I'm so happy!' Sybil sighed, pulling her sister into a hug. 'I just want you to be as happy as I am.'

Mary nodded, hugging her sister back, suddenly unable to speak, blinking back the unexpected tears prickling the back of her eyes.

'You could have knocked me down with a feather, Cora. With a feather!' Robert said, still unable to keep the smile off his face. 'Matthew and Sybil! Sybil! I confess, I did not see that union coming. I had thought he would marry Mary if he married any of our daughters.'

Cora reached out, patting her husband's leg as he sat beside her, both of them propped up against the headboard, contemplating the events of the evening.

'No, I must say I didn't think that Matthew and Sybil were quite as taken with each other as they obviously are. I've taken my eye off the ball there rather,' she admitted.

'Did you not guess at all?' Robert asked, curiously. 'You're usually so astute about these things.'

'Well, apparently, I'm not. Not about this It quite passed me by. I knew they were fond of each other, of course, but I assumed it was in a fraternal kind of way, not a romantic way. I mean, I had noticed Sybil swooning over him a few times, but I didn't think much of it because she's so young and Matthew is quite good-looking. If I'd realised that Matthew was quite as similarly smitten, I might have handled things a little differently.'

'Oh, I don't think we need to think about that now, not now everything has worked itself out so beautifully. Matthew and Sybil, well, I never,' Robert repeated, shaking his head in disbelief.

'I suppose I've been that taken up with worry about Mary and her position and what it might mean for Edith and Sybil's prospects, that I didn't see what was happening right under my nose,' Cora said thoughtfully, still quite unable to believe that she had not noticed her younger daughter and the heir to her husband's earldom falling in love with each other.

'Well, it's certainly made a few things easier. One, we don't have to worry about Sybil's prospects anymore. She will be the next Countess of Grantham. And two, your money will stay both within the estate and within the family. It's the perfect solution,' Robert said, delighted with the way things had turned out.

'And it strengthens Matthew's connection to Mary and Edith if they do not find husbands,' Cora said quietly, feeling relieved that her two elder daughters now had a higher degree of security but also a twinge of guilt about what she was beginning to increasingly suspect might be news that would shake the foundations of Matthew's - and now Sybil's - future.

'Oh, I doubt Matthew would have seen them out on the streets,' Robert said with an air of great confidence. He knew in his bones that his heir was a decent man, who would never have seen his girls in dire straits.

'No, but now they will be his sisters-in-law. That will make it substantially more difficult for him to refuse them aid should they need it.'

'Oh, really, Cora. You do have a flair for the dramatic. And besides, things are not as bad as all that. Surely, they will both find husbands,' Robert said, glancing at his wife.

She shrugged. 'I hope so, I really do. The rumours are still circulating about Mary, but they do seem to be less all-consuming than they were. And this development with Matthew and Sybil certainly means I will feel less pressure about finding just any willing suitor for Mary.'

'And Edith? We never really talk about Edith's matrimonial prospects, do we?' Robert mused.

Cora sighed. 'I rather suspect Edith may be the one looking after us in our dotage, my darling.'

'Poor Edith.'

Robert exchanged a look with this wife, reaching out to clasp her hand on top of the bedspread.

'Matthew and Sybil. Who would have believed we'd be returning to Downton after Sybil's coming out season with Sybil engaged to be married? And to Matthew of all people!'

Cora nodded, her other hand sneaking over her abdomen, hidden from her husband's sight by the bedspread. If she was right about her condition, everything could be about to change very soon.

18th June 1914

Downton

Yorkshire

Mo chuisle,

I can't tell you how much it gladdens my heart that you miss me. I had wondered if perhaps you might be too busy with all the bright lights and late nights in London to think about me too much. I know you had a full diary of engagements with it being a special season for Lady Sybil.

That is good news about her and Mr Crawley. I think they will be well suited. Please give her my warmest congratulations.

You ask if I have missed you. What kind of a silly question is that? Of course, I have missed you, my beautiful girl. There is no woman in the world who can hold a candle to you in my eyes. No maid, no farmer's daughter, no duchess, no queen. You are all my heart desires. All my heart will ever desire.

I dreamt about you last night. We were walking through the woods, and you had flowers in your hair, looking as beautiful as you always do, and then Mr Carson was there, standing next to a table laden with food right there in the woods, and he seated us both and we drank soup with your mother. It was quite surreal. I remember feeling worried in the dream that her ladyship would order me away from you, but instead, she conversed quite pleasantly with us both. Mr Carson even told me to kiss you, so I know it was definitely just a dream. A lovely, impossible dream.

I awoke this morning before my alarm, and do you know what the first thing I did was? I reached for you, my love. My heart quite sank when I felt only space in the bed next to me. That space beside me is made for you. The weight of your absence was profound.

When you come home, I will book you in for an afternoon 'errand' and take you back to our glade, where I intend to make you shiver until you can barely breathe, mo chuisle. Until you can remember nothing but my name and how wonderful I can make you feel.

As I write this now, I can think only of the softness of your skin under my hands. The beating of your pulse under my lips. The taste of you on my tongue.

Never wonder again if I miss you when we are parted, my love. You are everything to me. Without you, I cannot breathe. Without you, there is nothing. Without you, I am nothing.

I am counting the days until you come home, until I can hold you in my arms again and kiss you to my heart's content. Every ounce of me, every part of my heart, my soul and my body misses you. I long to be with you again.

Tà grà agam duit, mo chuisle.

Your besotted and devoted lover,

T

xxxxx

When Tom's letter arrived, Mary went to her room and devoured it, reading and re-reading it, hearing his voice in her head speaking the words he'd put down on paper.

After reading it over and over, she carefully hid it, tucking it into a spare handbag at the bottom of her wardrobe. She sat down on the stool in front of her dressing table and stared at herself in the mirror, not really seeing anything, just thinking about things.

After witnessing how full of bliss Sybil was, she couldn't help but feel envious of her open, untroubled happiness about her engagement to Matthew. She recalled her parents' joy at the news that Matthew and Sybil were in love and wanted to get married. Everyone in the house had celebrated the happy if unexpected news of Sybil's engagement to the man she loved.

Sitting there, she felt sadness overcome her that her own engagement could never be such a joyous occasion. She would never be able to marry Tom, never be engaged to him. No-one would accept that. Not her parents, not her peers, not even Carson. She knew that beyond any doubt. An engagement to the family chauffeur would be met with outrage, anger and much gnashing of teeth. No, it would never happen.

And if she became engaged to another man, others around her might be pleased by the news – her parents would definitely be relieved after the bout of spiteful rumours about her – but she would not be in love with her fiancé, and so the celebrations would automatically be muted. She wouldn't be able to radiate the same happiness that Sybil currently was simply because she would not be marrying the man she loved but entering into a marriage of convenience instead.

Focusing her gaze on her face, she realised she had a sheen of tears in her eyes, tears for her and Tom and what their relationship, as passionate as it was, could never be. For the first time, she realised how difficult it would be for him to watch her marry another man, even knowing that it was him she loved and not her fiancé. If the boot was on the other foot, she knew she would not be able to countenance him marrying another woman, even were they to remain lovers after the event.

Suddenly, the hopelessness of their situation pressed in on her, taking her breath away and a tear slid down her cheek.

She wanted what Sybil had – the freedom to love her man openly, to let the world and its wife know how much she loved him and how much he loved her, to show everyone how happy he made her. But it was impossible. No matter which way she looked at it, a marriage between an earl's daughter and a servant was never going to be possible.

As another tear fell, Mary put her face in her hands and cried for her and Tom and the cruel twist of fate that would not let them be happy and live their lives together as so many other couples in love were allowed to do. It was so unfair.

'Mr Evelyn Napier is here to see you, milady,' Carson informed Mary while she was alone in the house one pleasant afternoon a few days after Sybil's engagement to Matthew.

'Really? Then show him in, Carson,' Mary replied, rising to her feet and smoothing down her skirt. 'And would you bring us some tea, please?'

'Evelyn!' she cried as her friend entered the room, delighted to see him. 'What a lovely surprise! How are you?'

Evelyn crossed the floor, beaming at Mary. 'I'm well, thank you. And you?'

'I can't complain. Things are less fraught during this visit to London than the last one. It seems that people may at last have found something other than me to gossip about,' Mary said, dryly.

'Ah, that's one of the reasons I'm here,' Evelyn confessed, the smile falling from his face.

'Really? Please don't tell me I've spoken too soon,' Mary said, dread coiling in her stomach.

'Not quite. You know I promised you I'd look into finding the source of the rumours about you and Pamuk?' Evelyn said, looking decidedly uncomfortable.

'Yes, of course, I do. Have you discovered something?' Mary asked, perking up, eager to know who had been so intent on maligning her reputation.

Evelyn nodded. 'I have. The rumours seem to have come directly from the Turkish Embassy. From the ambassador himself. And his wife.'

Mary frowned, confused about how such an exalted personage as the ambassador could have known anything about what occurred at Downton Abbey when Kemal Pamuk died. 'The ambassador? But I don't understand. Is it just because his countryman died under the Downton roof? Who told them there was any connection between me and Mr Pamuk?'

Evelyn bit his lip, looking even more uncomfortable. 'This is the hard part. When I discovered the answer, I debated whether I should relay it, but in the end, I feel you ought to know.'

Mary gazed at him, unease prickling under her skin. 'Goodness. That sounds ominous. Well, you'd better tell me, Evelyn. The suspense is killing me,' she said, aiming for a light tone.

Evelyn took a deep breath, resolving to bite the bullet and simply say the name of the person responsible for Mary's woes. 'It was your sister, Lady Edith, who wrote to the ambassador. That's why people accept the story.'

'Edith?' Mary repeated, her initial astonishment fading quickly into cold, hard anger.

'It's very hard to believe,' Evelyn said, awkwardly.

'Harder for you than for me,' Mary said wryly, finding it quite easy to believe that her sister would deliberately do something so spiteful and underhanded.

'Really?' Evelyn said in surprise. 'Your own sister?'

'We're not close, Edith and I. Surely you must know that.'

'I'm afraid I don't know Lady Edith all that well.'

'Then you should count yourself lucky,' Mary responded, her fury towards her sister mounting.

Evelyn looked at her in concern. 'What are you going to do?'

'I don't know yet.'

'Are you going to confront her about it?'

'I… I need to think about it,' Mary said, with a sigh. 'I don't even know why she would do such a thing.'

'Does she know anything about what happened?' Evelyn asked, delicately.

'No. Not a thing. Not to my knowledge. There were only three of us involved in the events of that night if you exclude Mr Pamuk himself. I did not confide in Edith and I am certain neither of the other two involved did.'

They fell silent as Carson arrived back in the room with a tray of tea things.

'Thank you, Carson. You can leave it there. I'll pour the tea,' Mary said, determined the butler would not be privy to any of this conversation.

'Certainly, milady,' Carson said, placing the tea tray on the table and taking his leave.

'Tea?' Mary asked, rising to cross to the table.

'Thank you,' Evelyn said, getting to his feet to follow her. 'What makes you so sure neither of the other two people has said anything to Edith?'

'Well, one of them was my maid, who is loyal to a fault,' Mary said, adding a splash of milk to the teacups. 'And the other was my mother, who most definitely has not breathed a word about any of this sorry business to Edith.'

'Oh. Right,' Evelyn said, trying to keep the surprise off his face that the Countess of Grantham had been involved in any of this unsavoury business with Pamuk. 'Your mother? Really?'

'Yes. Precisely because she would never say anything.'

'So, do you think Edith was just making up a rumour?'

'I don't know,' Mary said grimly as she handed him a cup of tea. 'But I intend to find out.'

Over dinner that night, Mary gazed at Edith, wondering what had prompted her to write such a malicious letter to the Turkish ambassador. They had never been close, that was true enough, but this was a move that could only have been motivated by spite.

It was not an accident. She hadn't simply mentioned Mary flirting with Mr Pamuk to an acquaintance in passing. She had put pen to paper and composed a letter to a man she did not know accusing her own sister of impropriety with the dead man and perhaps even insinuating she was involved somehow with his death.

And how had she even linked Mary to Pamuk's death in the first place? For the life of her, Mary could not see how Edith would know the truth or even an approximation of it. She had certainly not confided in her. Anna would never have breathed a word to Edith, not least because she knew how the sisters did not see eye to eye on many things. And Mama would have died before telling Edith that Mary had been foolishly compromised as she initially believed or assaulted as she now knew to be the truth. So how did Edith know anything?

All she could think was that Edith didn't know anything of the true circumstances and that she had based her accusations on Mary's flirtation with Mr Pamuk during the hunt and dinner that fateful evening.

And again and again, she circled back to the fact that Edith must truly hate her to have done such a thing. The depth of that hatred surprised Mary. While they had never got on, and they had spent a lifetime needling each other, Mary had never and would never have done something like this that not only sullied her reputation but which also threatened to drag the whole family down into the mire. And potentially more than that. Should the Turkish ambassador have chosen to take the matter to the police and demanded a thorough investigation into Mr Pamuk's death, it could have had serious consequences for the three women who had moved his body. Mary had little idea about the legalities of such a thing, but it seemed a distinct possibility.

Edith had done this out of hatred, spite and jealousy. But the depths of that hatred, spite and jealousy staggered even Mary, who knew full well there was little love lost between them.

When Edith excused herself for a comfort break, Mary followed her, lying in wait in one of the corridors of the upper floor. As Edith passed her as she was returning to the drawing room, Mary stepped out of the shadows, surprising her sister.

'Is it true you wrote to the Turkish Ambassador about Kemal?' she asked, hoping for a few futile seconds that Evelyn had got it wrong.

Edith stilled, her face flushing slightly, a fleeting look of guilt instantly replaced by a steely unrepentance. 'Who told you?'

'Someone who knows what you did.'

'Then why are you asking?'

'Because I wanted to give you one last chance to deny it.'

Edith gazed at her, malice glittering in her eyes. 'And what if I did? He had the right to know how his countryman died. In the arms of a slut.'

Mary gasped, the blunt statement, the insult twisting in her gut.

Edith spared her sister one more glance, delighted to see her arrow hit its target, and walked away, satisfaction flooding through her that Mary finally knew who the architect of her social downfall was.

How she got through the rest of that evening was a mystery to Mary. She knew she'd conversed with various people, including her grandmother, Matthew, Sybil and her Aunt Rosamund, but what she'd spoken about with any of them, she could not have said.

All the time, Edith's words and the insouciance with which she'd admitted writing the letter that had caused so much trouble churned in her mind. Thinking about it, it wasn't just insouciance – it was pride and satisfaction. Edith was happy that her letter had thrown Mary's life into disarray. After all, hadn't that been the point of it?

The fury that had first raised its head when Evelyn told her who the culprit was rose again inside Mary, seething and twisting inside her, a dragon stirred to wakefulness. The injustice of it all burned at her.

So, when the evening ended and the family retired for the night, Mary waited impatiently for Anna to leave after helping her change for bed, and then stormed over to Edith's room, determined to have it out with her.

She opened the door without knocking, striding inside.

Edith was sitting up in bed, a book in her hands. She looked up in surprise her face hardening when she saw who her visitor was.

'Oh, what do you want?'

'I need to talk to you about what you did.'

'Why?'

Mary stopped, thrown by Edith's question. 'Why?'

'Yes. Why?'

'Why did you do it?' Mary cried. 'I need to know why you did it!'

Edith narrowed her eyes and then tossed the book aside, threw back the bedsheets and scrambled out of bed, coming to confront Mary.

'Why did I do it?' she cried, anger sparking off her. 'Because you are a nasty, selfish, entitled cow, who thinks she can do whatever she likes and get away with it! That's why!'

'What utter rot!' Mary retorted. 'Was it simply because you were jealous that Kemal flirted with me and not you?'

'Jealous? Jealous? Why would I be jealous that he didn't so much as notice me because you were putting it all on a plate for him?! You practically invited him to your room!'

'I most certainly did not!' Mary shouted, that accusation hitting a nerve mirroring as it did what Pamuk had said to her when he arrived in her room that night.

'Yes, you did! You behaved like the slut you apparently are!' Edith flung at her.

'I am not a slut!'

'But he was in your room, wasn't he?' Edith accused, convinced she was right.

Mary gaped at her, her mouth opening and closing.

'Ha! So, he was! I was right! And you did things with him, didn't you? You let him do things to you, didn't you? So, you are the slut I said you were!' Edith crowed, triumphantly.

Mary shook her head, hair escaping from her plait with the force of it. 'No! I am not!'

Edith gazed at her and laughed, stepping back away from her. 'Yes, you are. You're a dirty, filthy, wanton little slut, who let him have his way with her.'

Mary saw red, anger ripping through her. She careened forward, pushing Edith backwards, slamming her against the wall, her forearm pressing her flat, trapping her.

Edith grunted and struggled against her. 'Let go of me!'

Mary pinned her in place, anger pushing her to use strength in her forearms she'd honed from wrangling a huge horse like Diamond to help her to overwhelm her sister.

'I didn't let him do anything!' she shouted, her face right up close to Edith's.

'Get off me!' Edith yelled, succeeding in pushing Mary back a little.

Mary shoved her back into the wall again, pinning her in place, refusing to budge.

'He raped me!'

Edith frowned, still struggling against Mary. 'Raped you? What does that mean?'

Mary stepped closer, flattening Edith against the wall, using her superior height and strength to make it so Edith could barely move.

'It means that he pinned me to my bed, shoved my nightgown up and pushed his manhood inside me without my consent,' she growled, sparing Edith none of the details.

Edith stilled, her struggles ceasing as she stared at Mary in shock. 'What?'

'You feel how you can't move now?' Mary asked, her voice shaking with fury, her forearm still clamped over Edith's chest. 'That's what he did to me. Except he held me down on my own bed, pinning me so I couldn't move, and then he pulled my nightgown up and he touched me between my legs.'

'You mean you let him touch you!' Edith accused although she was no longer so sure of her version of events as she listened to Mary's description of what had happened to her.

'I let him pin me down?' Mary demanded. 'I let him touch me like that?'

'Well, I don't know, do I?!' Edith snapped.

'I let him shove his penis inside me and take my maidenhead? Is that what you think?'

'His pe-penis?' Edith stuttered, shocked by the graphic description Mary was giving her.

'Yes. You know what a penis is, don't you? You've seen one on statues, haven't you?' Mary bit out, still holding Edith tight against the wall.

'The… the little, floppy thing between a man's legs?' Edith ventured, hardly believing they were talking about such a thing.

Mary gave a hard, bitter laugh. 'It's not little and floppy when a man is aroused, Edith. It's big and hard. Like an iron rod.'

'An iron rod?' Edith gulped, her eyes wide, frightened by the look on Mary's face.

'He pinned me down and told me if I screamed everyone would know my shame. And then he raped me even while I was saying no,' Mary said, relentless in painting a vivid picture for her sister.

Edith went completely still, staring up at Mary with shocked eyes.

'That's what happened, Edith. That's the truth of it. That man raped me, and you told the world I was a slut because of it,' Mary hissed, pushing her sister hard against the wall once more before releasing her and stalking across the room, anger churning inside her about the injustice of it all.

Edith watched her, silently digesting everything Mary had told her.

'Did it hurt?' she asked, tentatively.

'Do you care?' Mary snapped.

Edith eyed her nervously. 'You said it's like an iron rod. It must have… it must have hurt.'

'Well, it wasn't without pain. He was lying on top of me, and I couldn't move,' Mary said, not willing to describe the occasion any further.

'He… he really attacked you?' Edith asked, trying to reconcile this drastically different version of events with how she'd assumed it had happened.

Mary whirled around, her eyes blazing with anger. 'Don't you believe me?'

'I… no, I do. I do believe you,' Edith said reluctantly, surprised to find that she did.

'How did you know he'd come to my room that night?' Mary asked, suspiciously.

'I didn't. Not until much later.'

Mary frowned. 'What do you mean? I thought you must have known something about it.'

Edith shook her head. 'No, not until Daisy spoke to me.'

'Daisy?' Mary repeated, puzzled, picturing the mousy kitchen maid and wondering what she had to do with any of this.

'She came to me saying she'd seen something the morning Mr Pamuk was found dead in his bed and it was weighing on her mind.'

'What did she see?'

'She saw you moving what looked like a body across the house,' Edith said, her curiosity flaring about what else had happened that fateful night.

Mary gawped at her sister, thinking back to that night and trying to recall seeing anyone else up and about in the wee small hours.

'She just saw me?'

Edith nodded. 'Why? Who else could she have seen?'

'Anna. And Mama. They helped me move him.'

Edith's mouth fell open in shock. 'Mama?'

'Yes.'

'No. Mama wouldn't have… no,' Edith said, shaking her head, unable to believe her delicate mother would have helped Mary transport Pamuk's body across the house.

'Of course, she would if it would avoid a scandal,' Mary said, derisively. 'And so, she did. Do you really think she would have let the whole house wake up to find a dead man in my bed?'

'I… I…' Edith floundered, staggered by what Mary was telling her.

'Although, we needn't have bothered hoicking his sorry carcass across the house, need we? Not when you were so busy sharpening your poisonous quill,' Mary snapped.

Edith narrowed her eyes, back on the defensive. 'Did you kill him?'

'No! He had an aneurysm! You know that!' Mary shouted, her anger rising up again.

'But why did he have an aneurysm? Was it something you did to him?'

'I don't know why he had it! I'm not a doctor! Maybe something was weak inside him! I don't know! All I know is that one minute he was pounding away on top of me and the next he fell forward as dead as a dodo, squashing me into the mattress!'

Edith blanched as she took that in. 'He died while he was… um…'

'Raping me?' Mary bit out, raising an eyebrow. 'Yes, he did.'

'Oh, heavens,' Edith murmured, clapping a hand to her mouth, her eyes round with shock, shuddering at the thought of a man dying on top of her.

'Heaven had nothing to do with it,' Mary snapped.

'And Mama really helped you move him?'

'Yes.'

'Goodness,' Edith said, slumping back against the wall, trying to take it all in.

'Why did you write that letter, Edith?' Mary asked, getting to the crux of the matter. 'What have I ever done to you that was so awful you'd write a nasty poison pen letter to a stranger about me?'

Edith glared at her sister, pushing off the wall. 'Are you seriously asking me that?'

'Yes, I am! Because whatever fallings out we may have had, I didn't deserve that!'

'Didn't deserve it? You are horrible to me, Mary! All the time! You are nasty and mean and dismissive. You take potshots at me all the time! You make fun of me and belittle me!'

Mary stared at Edith, her mouth falling open. 'You wrote that terrible letter just because I hurt your feelings a time or two?'

'A time or two? A time or two? Are you being deliberately obtuse? You are a complete cow to me all the time,' Edith snarled.

'And you thought you'd even up the tally by writing to the Turkish ambassador to tell him I'm a slut, did you?' Mary flung back. 'Do you know what you've done? Do you know what you've put me through? What you've put Mama through?'

'I don't care what I've put you through! You deserve every last piece of contempt that comes your way! You are a horrible, horrible person!'

'Says the girl who has thrown her own sister under the wheels of the autobus without batting an eyelid!' Mary returned, fury overwhelming her again. 'Don't you appreciate what you've done? How you've dragged the whole family into the mud in your attempt to blacken my name?'

'Oh, please! Don't be so melodramatic,' Edith snapped, rolling her eyes. 'It's not as bad as all that.'

'Isn't it? Well, that could be famous last words, Edith, because you may yet be hoisted by your own petard,' Mary retorted, her anger congealing into a cold hard lump in her chest.

'What's that supposed to mean?'

'Mama's already told you, hasn't she? You must revise your marital expectations downward. Significantly downward in your case, and all because of your own nasty, spiteful nature,' Mary said, noting the apprehension appearing on Edith's face.

'I don't believe that's true,' Edith said, stoutly.

'Well, Mama does and she's had far more experience of these matters than you,' Mary said, beginning to enjoy the increasing doubt she saw in her sister's eyes.

'Well, you won't get any offers either!' Edith cried.

'Yes, but the difference is, I'm not desperate to walk up the aisle like you seem to be. All that simpering over that old fossil, Strallan. Do you know how ridiculous you made yourself look?' Mary said, snidely.

'I did not!'

'Yes, you did. You reeked of desperation. How do you think it looks? A young woman of 22 fawning all over a man older than her father? You're pathetic,' Mary sneered.

'See? And you wonder why I wrote that letter! You're a mean, nasty wretch!' Edith shouted, all her feelings of inadequacy rising to the surface as Mary's barbs sank into her.

'Well, just you wait until Mama finds out that it was you who wrote that letter,' Mary said, silkily. 'You won't be so pleased with yourself then, not after all the trouble and worry it's caused her.'

Edith paled. 'You're not going to tell her?'

'Am I not?' Mary said, casting Edith a filthy look as she headed for the door.

'You wouldn't!'

'I would. But I'm not quite sure yet when I'll tell her. I might just leave you on tenterhooks about the whole thing,' Mary said as she opened the door. 'I don't see why you shouldn't walk on eggshells for a while, wondering when I'm going to drop this in Mama's lap.'

'Mary, don't!' Edith pleaded.

'I hope what you've done keeps you awake at night, Edith.' Mary threw another glare at her and slipped out of the door, banging it closed behind her.

Edith glared at the door, her heart thudding in her chest. Her mama would not take the news of her misdemeanour well. She was certain of that.