100. A Rose In Jeopardy by Barbara Cartland

turn around, Rosella waited.
    She heard footsteps running through the wet grass and then a hand touched her shoulder.
    “Lady Rosella?” a soft Hampshire voice said.
    It was Thomas, the gardener’s boy.
    “Oh, Thomas!”
    Tears of relief sprang into Rosella’s eyes.
    “Please, be quiet. No one must know I am here.”
    She explained, the words spilling over themselves in her haste, that she must leave New Hall at once or marry Mr. Merriman.
    Thomas’s eyes were round with amazement.
    “But Lady Rosella, you must not.”
    “No, Thomas. I cannot marry him. But I have to leave and secretly or they will come and force me to go back. They – they locked me in my room.”
    “My Lady, wait, and I’ll go with you, I have to take some of the fruit from the garden into Winchester for the market and that’s why I’m up so early. No one’ll see us, they’re all still a-bed.”
    “Thomas, you will get into trouble.”
    The boy shook his head.
    “I’ll find an old coat for you in the stables and a basket of eggs. If anyone sees us, the’ll think you’re one of the girls who works in the dairy goin’ to market.”
    Rosella was so overcome at his kindness that she almost forgot herself and would have given him a hug.
    But something flapped in the leaves over her head, sending sharp drops of water showering on her.
    She blinked the water out of her eyes and peered upwards.
    “ Hello ! How are you ?” a small voice spoke up and the leaves rustled as a shadowy form fluttered down from the branches to land on her shoulder.
    “It be Lady Beatrice’s bird!” Thomas cried.
    Pickle was looking rather wet and bedraggled, but his eyes were bright as he gazed affectionately at Rosella.
    “Oh, Pickle! I am so glad you are all right,” she whispered. “But whatever am I going to do with you? I cannot take you with me.”
    “ May I have a nut ?” Pickle asked, in his most polite voice. He did not seem to appreciate the seriousness of the situation.
    “My Lady – there’s an old birdcage at the stables. I saw it when we were sweepin’ out the loft over the harness room,” Thomas said. “The gardener told me it belonged to the little parakeet that her Ladyship had before she bought the parrot. I think he’d fit in it.”
    “Oh, Thomas, I don’t know. How will I carry it?”
    “It’s not as big as his usual cage, my Lady. And – it can rest in my wheelbarrow on top of the fruit as we go to Winchester. Wait here.”
    He ran off, his feet sinking into the wet grass.
    Pickle nodded his head as if in approval.
    “ Chop, chop, hurry along there !” he muttered to himself, sounding just like Mrs. Dawkins speaking to one of the maids.
    Rosella laughed at him.
    She felt very touched that he had chosen of his own free will to come down out of the tree to her. How could she think of leaving him behind, however hard it might be?
    She scratched the feathers on top of his head and watched for Thomas to return and he soon came hurrying back with a laden wheelbarrow.
    She wrapped the old coat that he had brought round her shoulders and took a last look at the beautiful frontage of New Hall.
    The moment had come when she must say goodbye to her old home forever.
    “Will you be all right, my Lady?” Thomas asked her, as they stood together on the platform at Winchester Station to wait for the London train.
    “Of course I will.” Rosella forced herself to sound bright and cheerful. “You must go back, Thomas, or they will wonder where you are.”
    “But my Lady – what will you do in London?”
    “Oh, I have a little money. I shall be fine.”
    Rosella tried not to worry about the unknown City, crowded with strangers that waited for her at the end of the train journey.
    “Do you have a place to go to?”
    “No, but I – shall find some lodgings. And then, I will look for some kind of work – ”
    With every word she spoke, she felt more doubtful and afraid.
    Thomas now asked if she had a pencil and paper.
    “My sister