"I promised your mother you would finish your verbs today." Helping with the eight-year-old boy's education was the least she could do to repay her sister-in-law's hospitality. After her brother married Julia and left Oporto to reside in the country, Anne's mother closed their townhouse to stay with friends in London. Anne had moved to the vineyards, and Quinta do Vesuvio's picturesque scenery had become home. Sure, this should be the year she made her debut in polite society, but who needed a schedule filled with exciting balls, glittering court receptions, and carriage jaunts at Parque da Estrela?
Anne exhaled and caught her locket, pressing the heart-shaped jewelry between her thumb and forefinger. The necklace was a replica of the one Prince Albert had given to Queen Victoria when he proposed. It helped Anne remember no matter where she was, her dream suitor, who would love her selflessly, was already there, somewhere in the world. As long as she kept her heart open, a higher force, not unlike the mysterious pull of magnets, would bring him to her.
Tony grumbled and pushed away the notebook. "Why do I need to learn this? I bet Vasco da Gama would beat these Greeks senseless if he had the chance."
Anne didn't gush about the classic works of Aristotle and Plato's dialogues or Greek playwrights like Aristophanes. It would only make the boy groan. "An explorer can only profit from learning languages. Why, if you find yourself stranded on some remote island—"
"Your brother is teaching me English. Is it not enough? Why is your Portuguese different than his? You don’t sound as if there is a frog in your throat."
Anne chuckled at the slandering of her brother’s pronunciation and the boy’s blatant change of subject. "When Griffin came to live here, he was an adult, but I was not yet your age. Plus, my best friend is Portuguese."
"I thinkmamãis his first Portuguese friend."
"I guess you are right."
Before Griffin fell in love with Julia, he was the most stalwart peer of the British community in Oporto. Made of port wine traders and their families, they inhabited a separate society in the city, with different schools, clubs, churches, and even bathing spots at the beach. Anne disliked the transparent walls between the British and the Portuguese. But thankfully, Griffin now embraced this country as if it was his own.
"Soon, I will go to the Indies, like Vasco da Gama. I will have my fleet and go exploring new worlds. If you drop the Greek, you can come," he said, his voice solemn.
Anne placed a hand over her heart. "I will be delighted to accompany you, Mr. Ferreira, after you finish your verbs."
He rolled his eyes, scribbling furiously. "Aninha?"
"Hmm?"
"What will you be when you grow up?"
How to explain she was a grown-up woman? Girls her age were married or with children —she was eighteen, after all—and her dreams were more fluid than his aspiration to explore the world and its frontiers.
She had a great idea of who she was... not. She was not a prudish English lady, nor a meek one waiting for a convenient marriage, not a bluestocking and not a coquette. She wasn't a winemaker like her brother and new sister, nor religious like her Portuguese friends, and God forbid, she wasn't ambitious like the Crofts.
Anne exhaled and toyed with a fallen pine leaf, making round circles over the grass. "Since I cannot make you memorize the verbs, I must rule out teaching."
"I would finish the lesson much quicker if you picked me some pine nuts," Tony said, caressing his tummy and gazing at the wooden buds poking from the pines' branches.
Anne loved the waxy nuts and eyed them with longing. "A lady does not climb trees."
Back in Oporto, she used to scale her tree all the time. It gave her the perfect spot to peek at their neighbors' garden swing. While Mr. Nogueira sent his eight children frolicking to the sky, she would close her eyes, pretending the breeze kissing her cheeks was from her turn at the swing.
Tony sniffed and turned away. "My father used to pick me pines. He was the best tree climber in all the Douro, but since he died, no one bothers."
Anne's chest tightened, and she patted Tony’s back. Being an orphan, she was no stranger to the ache of growing up without a father. Her brother had adopted Tony, teaching him all kinds of manly stuff. Still, he couldn’t replace Julia's first husband in the boy's heart. "Oh, don't cry. Please, if you stop, I promise to get you some pines."
After a quick glance at the house to assert they had no audience, Anne removed her slippers. Her feet fit on the bark's grooves, and she used her arms to propel her weight up until she reached a horizontal branch. The umbrella pine's crown was alive with drones and chirps and tweets. Midway to the top, pine’s flower pollen stuck to her nose, and she sneezed, startling a swallow into frightened flight.
Tony observed her, shielding his eyes. She could not see his expression but could bet her quick progress had amazed him. A little winded, Anne twisted a bulky pine from its branch and threw it in the boy's direction. The wooden flower landed on a tuft of daisies. "You better rush, Tony, or you will miss them."
Tony shoved his hands in the pockets of his short trousers and shrugged. "Never mind. Pines taste like sawdust."
Anne sucked in a breath. "What?"
He blew a raspberry and whirled to leave, laughing like the little devil he was. "I'll be at the stables... not studying."
He had fooled her! Brushing hair away from her face, she watched as the boy swaggered out of the tree's shade. His trick would work with his disgruntled nanny, but not her. Anne stretched over a sturdy branch and hugged it with her legs, crossing her ankles below her. Ha! She would give him a scare he would not soon forget. Spurred by giddy mischief, Anne dropped to the side and let go of her hands. With a swoosh, she went upside down, hung by her crossed ankles.
"Argh! Help. Somebody help!" Anne swung to add to the effect, and her bonnet fell. Her blonde hair swept the daisies below.
Tony halted mid-run. Anne clamped her mouth shut to keep from laughing as shock, fear, and a heavy dose of guilt played on his boyish face.
