CHAPTER THREECecilia waited while Mrs. Jones was summoned from the kitchen to show her up to her room. She was badly disconcerted and needed a few moments to get her breath back.
She had counted on finding old Mr. Dale, a man who had once been kind to her and she was sure would have remembered her. But now he was dead and his son was not here. There was only the young man she had met downstairs and he was the manager of the Paradise Hotel.
She had to admit that he was pleasant and helpful. He had allowed her to remain, despite her suspicious lack of a maid. All was not yet lost.
He was good-looking too, she reflected – tall and upright, with the air of a soldier rather than an hotelier. And his face was so handsome that he might well have been the Knight in shining armour she had once d
