Mary was already in the room with Georgia when Malee knocked on the door and pushed down the handle bar. She saw Mary and Georgia having another round of discussion, must have been an important one, for they didn’t even looked at the door to see who was coming in. Malee closed the door quietly and sat down by the nearest chair so as not to disturb the discussion. It was a while before both of them got up and walked towards the door. Mary signalled Malee to follow them and walked out of the room with Georgia tailing her closely.

On the way, they saw Michael arranging pots of flowers on the entrance to the main house. He looked upon them briefly and went back out of the house for which Malee assumed was to get more flowers. They also saw several servants coming into the house carrying pails of water on one hand and cut clothes on the other. Malee knew most of them from the servants’ house, but she had never seen the rest. She quietly followed the two in front of her into the dinning room, where another row of flowers were waiting for them on the table. It was empty.

“Where is he?” asked Georgia.

“Can you go to George’s room and see if he needs help?” said Mary to Malee who nodded and quickly left the room, trying to avoid Michael on the way, who was carrying another pot of fresh flowers. She walked up the stairs and turned the other direction from Georgia’s room to reach another set of the door to the George’s drawing room. She knocked on the door but there was no response so she opened the door by herself to find it empty. Where was George, she wondered aloud?

She looked around the room several times to ensure George wasn’t in the room before turning back towards the door. Perhaps George had already left the place or Mary had made a mistake of where George was at. But she hadn’t seen him anywhere in the house and she had been walking up and down the floors several times within a short time. He couldn’t have been hiding anywhere in the house, especially since everyone had their eyes on him for the coming occasion the next day. There was only one place in the house that Malee had not seen, because she had never been there, his inner room.

She stopped her hands from pushing down the handle as soon as she realized the blind spot that was the inner room and moved towards the second door in the room. She held up her hands to knock on the door, but she quickly put down her hand as soon as she realized that George wasn’t in the room because he didn’t want it. No amount of knocking would make him reply to her or let her in. The only choice available to her, if what Mary said about George being in his room was right, was to open the door herself. She took a deep breath in pushed down the handle and barged into the room.

Her eyes focused on George, who was sitting on the bed with his body bent and his hands supporting his face, once she was in the room. He was wearing a plain t-shirt with loose pants. Malee wondered if he even had a good afternoon nap from the look of the smooth bedsheet on the bed. George briefly looked up to see Malee holding the handle of the door opened but sunk back into his palms. Malee walked towards George and sat beside him without knowing what to say. They sat there for a while before George spoke.

“Are they waiting for me?” whispered George. Malee could hardly hear his voice coming from between his palms. Malee couldn’t be sure, but she thought she heard George sobbing softly between his words.

“Yes. Both Mary and Georgia in the dining room.” replied Malee softly. Malee stood up and bowed.

“I will wait outside.” said Malee. She wasn’t sure how to handle the situation and thought leaving the room would be a best choice in a such scenario. As Malee turned her body and walked down the door, George grabbed her hand.

“Don’t leave me.” said George, looking up from his bed.