Skylark (14 page)

“Yes.” Laura lifted out a neat pile of shifts and passed them to her irrepressible sister.

“It is rather wonderful, isn’t it?”

Laura caught her breath. “Yes.”

“Oh, poor Laura. You must miss Hal dreadfully.”

“Really, Ju!” Laura laughed, but she knew she was blushing.

“For more than bed,” her sister protested. “But for that, too.”

Laura abandoned stoical pretense. “I’m certainly young to enter a nunnery.”

“Don’t be silly. You’ll marry again.”

Laura took out a gray dress and laid it in a drawer, wondering what to say. For now she might as well stick to the unchanged situation. “I doubt it. I can’t leave Harry, and Lord Caldfort won’t let Harry live away from Caldfort House.”

“That’s horribly unfair.” Juliet was putting away stockings. “Don’t you have any pretty ones?”

“I’m still in mourning, remember.”

“Oh yes. I still think it unfair that they’re trying to trap you at Caldfort House until you’re as gray as your wardrobe. No lilac, even?”

“Voila!” Laura took out her lilac dress. “If you’ll remember, purples never suited me. Black does better, but lurking in black for twelve months would have been excessive.”

“Lurking at Caldfort House for decades would be even more so.”

“Ju, I have no choice. And Lord Caldfort is correct. Harry should grow up there. He could even be viscount soon. Lord Caldfort isn’t well.”

“Then perhaps you could marry a man who’d be happy to live at Caldfort. A scholar, or even a gentleman with no significant property of his own.”

Laura stared at her. Juliet had always liked to find solutions to every problem. “A possibility, I suppose. I don’t see how the Gardeynes could make any objection. But I’m not sure I’d want to marry a penniless man.”

Juliet put away the lilac dress, looking pleased with herself. “He doesn’t have to be penniless, just without a property. A nabob from the East, even. There, see. Now, what other problem can I waft away?”

Laura smiled at her, close to tears. “Oh, Ju, I have missed you. Do you solve all Robert’s problems, too?”

“Whenever I can. So?” Juliet cocked her head. “I have the impression that something is weighing on you.”

“Is it as obvious as that?” Laura closed the lid of the empty trunk, realizing that her words admitted there was something. “I can’t tell you at the moment. Perhaps later.”

“Is it a man?”

“No!”

“It’s a reasonable assumption. The Gardeynes don’t want you to marry, but you’ve fallen in love. Romeo and Juliet . . .”

“I’m Laura, remember? Petrarch’s beloved, adored from afar. No balcony kisses, but no death, either.”

“To avoid death is to avoid life,” Juliet stated, reverting to their lifelong debate about their namesakes. Their sisters, Beatrice and Olivia, both some years older, had claimed smugly to have more normal fates; Beatrice with her Benedick in
Much Ado About Nothing
and Olivia with her Orsino from
Twelfth Night
, a duke, no less.

Laura was in no mood to play, especially when the fate of saintly Laura seemed to fit her all too well these days.

“Let’s unpack for Harry,” she said to escape, and led the way to the smaller nursery bedroom where he’d sleep with Megsy. His things were soon put away there and Laura went to find him.

He was in the kitchen with Megsy and his grandmother, happily covered in flour and shaping dough into rolls, adored by the servants preparing dinner. He smiled at her, but he didn’t seem to have missed her at all.

It hurt.

Her mother said, “He’s no trouble, love. Go into the drawing room and have a nice chat with Juliet.”

It was as good as a command, but Laura said, “Let’s stroll around outside, Ju. Sitting in a carriage for two days leaves my legs feeling neglected.”

They rambled the garden and orchard and then into the farm proper.

“There are kittens,” Juliet said as they strolled by the stables. “Harry will like that.”

“He’d like a cat, but Lord Caldfort doesn’t like them.”

“He’s a sour old despot, if you ask me.”

“He’s a sick and bitter old man, but it is his home.”

“It’s yours, too.”

“Not really.” It came out because she was relaxed, and because she was tired of saying the right thing all the time. “Where’s your home?” she asked Juliet as they passed through a gate to walk along the edge of a stubbled field.

“Wherever Robert is.” Then Juliet pulled a face. “Well, not Denmark. Or at sea, which is probably where he still is. But yes, our London house is home. Perhaps it’s because it’s ours, not his father’s.”

“That would make a difference.” Laura picked a rose hip from the hedge and broke it open to look at the seeds. “As it is, I feel . . . transient. The vessel for the next Lord Caldfort, but no more than that. Of course, when Hal was alive we didn’t spend much time at Caldfort House. Or before Harry was born, at least.” She shrugged. “Hal was not rooted anywhere. Home was where his horses were.”

Too late she realized that sounded as if he loved his horses more than her.

“I always thought it a love match,” Juliet said.

“It was, but love . . . changes.”

She saw a protest form on her sister’s lips and be suppressed.

“Not for everyone,” Laura said quickly. “I believe in true love, lasting love. But I think it’s hard to detect at the beginning. Like knowing gold from gilding. It has to be tested. Scratched—”

A bird burst up out of the nearby stubble and shot into the air, singing.

“A skylark!” Juliet said, shielding her eyes to watch it climb.

Laura did the same. “It can’t have a nest at this time of year.”

Memory stirred despite her effort to suppress it. Poor Stephen, but at least they were friends again now. She and Stephen had lain down to watch. They couldn’t do that—

Then Juliet did. Right there on the rough ground. “Come on. Let’s watch it return.” She looked at Laura. “Come on! One advantage of wearing dismal clothes has to be that you don’t care if they’re stained.”

With a laugh, Laura sat. “I’ve never thought of mourning clothes like that before.”

She lay down, shifting away from some stubble that was digging into her back. The sky wasn’t a perfect blue today. It was mostly cloudy, but the clouds were high. The ground was chilly beneath her, but at least it was dry.

When had she last lain back to look up into the infinity of the sky? Perhaps that last time with Stephen. It was a shame. Everyone should do this and be aware of . . . She contemplated it. Of the grandeur of the universe, in which mere mortals moved.

“That bird sees more of the world than we ever will,” she said. “Perhaps that’s why it flies so high.”

“I think it flies and sings because it can. Out of sheer joie de vivre. Here it comes!”

First as a dot, then growing larger, the bird plummeted down, wings tucked, only spreading them at the end to circle around. It was as if the bird knew they were watching him.

Laura sat up, hugging her knees. “Can you imagine doing that? Deliberately falling from the sky, knowing you’ll be safe?”

Juliet sat up, too. “Sounds rather like you-know-what.”

“Ju!”

“Or the appeal of danger. People do take risks just for the thrill.”

“Like hunting,” Laura said softly, and quoted, “He left life leaping,” perhaps understanding it for the first time.

Juliet reached over and took her hand, but Laura’s doubtless grim expression was for another reason. The same passion that sent men into battle and over fences could drive a man to kill.

The letter arrived the next morning. Laura’s father came into the breakfast parlor with the postbag and sorted through the correspondence.

“One for you, Laury-love,” he said, studying a letter before passing it on. “From Somerset. Didn’t know you knew anyone in Somerset.”

Laura managed her part, even though she felt as if
liar
must be written all over her. “It must be from my friend, Eleanor Delaney. I wrote to her hoping we could meet while I was here. We haven’t seen each other since we became mothers.”

Was she explaining too much too soon?

She read through the letter, expecting to have to lie about the contents, too, but it was a clever imitation of a letter between old friends, including bits about supposed shared acquaintances and their two children.

It made it easier to produce her next lines in the play. Better to think of it as a play rather than as lying to her parents.

“Oh, dear. Eleanor says they’re to travel north soon.” After a moment of supposed thought, she suggested, “If I’m to see her, I must go soon. Will you mind, Papa, Mama? Harry and I are here for a month.”

Her father’s bushy gray brows rose, but he said, “No, no, love. If now’s the only time to visit your friend, now it must be. You’re thinking to go for a few days, then?”

“If you don’t mind. I can’t make it there and back in a day and have time for a proper visit.”

“Of course we don’t mind, dear,” said her mother, passing around a platter of eggs and urging more on everyone. “It’s such a treat to have you here for so long that we can afford to share. I don’t think I’ve heard you mention this lady, though, have I?”

Squirming inside, Laura gave the story she’d prepared of a London friend who was now mostly a friend by correspondence.

“How nice to meet again, then,” her mother said. “I’m sure it must have been dull for you at Caldfort after dear Hal died, so letters will have been a solace. But a real meeting is so much better. And Mrs. Delaney has a child, too, you said?”

“Yes. Arabel. But she’s over a year younger than Harry.”

“Still, someone for him to play with.”

“I’ll arrange a chaise for you?” her father asked.

“Yes, thank you, Papa.”

Talk moved on to the best road to take, and Laura thought it all done. She hoped she was imagining a speculative look on Juliet’s face.

After breakfast she packed again, but only a valise, since they would be away for a short time. When the post chaise arrived from the George in Barham, she went to find Harry. He was in the stables with his uncle and Megsy.

She took his hand. “Come along, Minnow. We’re going for another little journey.”

He stared at her, then ripped his hand free. “No. I’m not going!”

“Harry! Don’t be foolish. Of course you’re coming. You can’t stay here.”

“Well, he can,” said her brother. “He’s no trouble.”

Laura glared at the traitor, took a breath, and knelt to explain. “It won’t be a long journey, Minnow, and the Delaneys have a little girl to play with.”

Harry’s face set in mutiny and he shook his head.

“There’ll be plenty of animals along the way.”

He just scowled.

She couldn’t believe it. He’d never behaved like this before.

Laura glared at her brother again, but as usual he was dense as a rock. “Leave him here, Laury. The traveling’ll be easier alone and you can enjoy a holiday.”

Holiday!
She didn’t need a holiday from Harry. Of course, Ned didn’t know that Harry’s life was in danger. She stood and grabbed Harry’s arm. “Harry, you are coming. We’ll be back in a few days.”

He didn’t protest, but he became a dead weight and she saw tears trickling out of his screwed-up eyes.

She let him go. “Harry, what’s the matter with you?”

If Harry wouldn’t come, she couldn’t go, yet she had to. She had to find out the truth in Draycombe and make sure everything was done properly, but she couldn’t explain to him or to anyone else.

Laura glared at her brother. “Ned,” she mouthed. “Do something.”

He shrugged. “He probably thinks you’re dragging him off home. Every other time he’s been here, he’s climbed into a coach to go back to that house. Leave him. We’re happy to have him here.”

Laura went back on her knees, finding a bright smile. “Sweetling, we’re not going back to Caldfort! We’re going on to another house.”

But Harry had reached a state of mutiny that was impervious to reason. “I’m staying
here
. You stay here, too.”

Laura recognized a crucial moment. Apart from her need to go, she couldn’t let Harry dictate her movements to suit himself.

She got to her feet. “Very well. If you really don’t want to come, you can stay here.”

He grabbed her skirt. “No, you
stay
!” He even stamped his foot.

Controlling an urge to return temper for temper, she said, “That can’t be, Harry, but you can stay here.”

He glared at her in a way that could break her heart, but she didn’t waver. In the end he let go of her skirt. “Stay here. Stay with Megsy and Uncle Ned and Aunt Margaret and Grandma and Grandpa.”

Laura fought not to show her shocked betrayal. She’d never believed that in the end he would choose others over her. When she could speak through her tight throat, she said, “Very well, love. I won’t be gone many days, and I’ll write you a letter every day.”

Perhaps he, too, had thought he’d win, for his lips trembled. “With drawings?”

Laura blinked away tears as she hugged him. “With drawings. You’ll be good, yes?”

He nodded.

Laura realized that she was still waiting for him to change his mind, to declare, now he saw that she wouldn’t falter, that he’d come with her. But he didn’t. Instead he wriggled free, said, “Bye-bye, Mama,” and ran back into the stables.

After a moment her brother said, “There’s kittens.”

Laura couldn’t find anything to say to the traitor, so she turned and stalked back into the house, wavering, wondering if she shouldn’t go after all. Stephen would go in her place. He could report back.

But a letter would be two days to and from, and matters could turn urgent.

Her parents and Juliet were waiting by the door to wave her off, and she had to explain the change of plan.