“It will be brief, I swear it, Mama,” Fern pleaded. “And besides, I would like to pick up something else for Papa for his birthday. He is so good to me, after all.” Her mother was likely to drag her into helping prepare for the party, and if she was lucky Rommel, one of the senior footmen well-accustomed to Fern’s idiosyncrasies, would accompany her.
Fern softened her face—she and Rose had practiced in a mirror, memorizing how it felt to put on a pleasant expression. “Mama, I will bring Rommel. He will let me know when it has been exactly thirty minutes, and then I will return.Withoutmaking a scene.”
Lady Redborne sighed once more.It can’t be healthy for her lungs to do that all the time,Fern thought. “You may go,” her mother said severely. “But you must be home by luncheon, no later.”
Fern jumped to her feet. “Thank you, Mama!” Fern’s grin split her pale face in two, and stayed bright long after she had departed in the carriage and made the bumpy return into town. The trip seemed almost interminable as her excitement built. When the carriage finally rolled to a stop on Catte Street, she burst out the door onto the cobblestones, the intoxicating feeling of freedom rushing through her veins like a potent drug.
“Thirty minutes, Miss Fern,” Rommel reminded her, his voice taking a mock-stern tone. “I am going to the bakery but will wait for you here.”
“Of course,” she said with a mischievous smile. Rommel had stopped just down the street from the university campus, knowing how much she enjoyed walking around the hallowed institution of learning. “And thank you.”
He tipped his hat before striding in the opposite direction. She walked with purpose down Catte Street until she could see the soaring dome of the Bodleian Libraries looming over the surrounding medieval buildings, soaking up history with each step. Walking up to the gargantuan wooden doors, she swept inside on a wave of students clearly too concerned with their own academic pursuits to notice the young woman in their midst.
Envisioning the diagrams she had committed to memory, Fern knew the exact path to her destination, despite having never set foot on its premises.Up the main stairs, down the hallway to the left. Two rights, andthere!She stepped into a cavernous, if dusty and somewhat dank, room. Arched stone ceilings soared over scratched wooden tables as though guarding the knowledge in the shelves and shelves of books stretching in every direction. On a Saturday morning, it did not surprise her to find the mathematics library deserted.
Greedily she ran her fingers over the titles. The names of classical mathematicians danced before her eyes. Euclid. Pythagoras. Euler. Leibniz. She envisioned her own name among these volumes.Someday. The selections nearly overcame her as she pulled out titles by Cardono and Hypatia before picking modern selections by De Morgan and Cayley.
The pile on the library table had grown to teetering heights when a title on a high shelf caught her eye. A dusty copy of Descartes’Meditationswas tucked between several volumes of Newton. Her eyebrow quirked, bothered by this flagrant misclassification of material, but her heart thumped in anticipation. She had heard of theMeditationsbut had never read them, her father having declared metaphysical philosophy “deeply unsettling.”
Fern reached for the forbidden fruit, desperate for the knowledge it would bring. But she couldn’t quite reach. She tried to climb up the shelves, but her blasted skirt kept getting in the way. She pushed a chair in front of the shelf and stood on it, but the spine remained beyond her touch. Glancing around to make sure she was truly alone, she unbuttoned her boots (the bottoms were slick and terrible for climbing, as she had learned one unfortunate day in the neighbor’s orchard) and pulled them aside. She pushed one of the heavy tables over toward the shelves, cringing at thescreeechit made as the legs scratched across the floor.
Climbing on the table, she perched her toes on the edge of the surface and leaned. So close, she could practically smell the aged, musty smell of the pages.A bit…further…
“What are you doing!”
She started, twisting to see the source of the reprimand.
And then she fell.
Chapter 3
AlexanderCarroway’sheadwasburied in his own work, dissecting the collected anthologies of Carl Friedrich Gauss. ThePrinceps mathematicorumwas nearly committed to memory, as Alex would present his doctoral dissertation on the subject in four weeks’ time. Focus was of the utmost importance. Too much of his future was riding on his presentation to allow for distraction.
A curious sound from the main hall of the library broke Alex’s fierce concentration. He perked up. No one was ever here on a Saturday morning, as most students were still sleeping off the previous night’s escapades.
Alex scratched at his notes, blacking out several words before trying again. And again.Keep your focus.Persistence was a strong suit. His tutors praised this trait so frequently that he considered it his defining characteristic, challenging his precocious mind and instilling in him a great sense of pride in his abilities.
And he was well on his way to achieving his dream. At twenty-seven years of age, he was far and away the top mathematics scholar at Oxford who had not yet joined the faculty. This achievement had not come without sacrifice. He lived the life of a monk instead of a typical university student, devoting his life to his studies. His friends nagged him constantly, urging him to come out and share a pint or chase local girls. He allowed many friendships to wither away in the wake of his studies, mourning the loss but understanding it would eventually lead to a larger gain.
Of course he had regrets. At this very moment, his best friend Henry was most likely sleeping off a wild night of debauchery or possibly returning to his own room after spending the night in the arms of a local shop girl he fancied. Henry had the luxury of enjoying social life in Oxford and in London, sparing enough of his hours to attend the bare minimum of lectures to maintain student status.
It was not as though Alex lacked opportunities to experience life at its fullest, or at least fuller than the library alone. He was aware he was a reasonably good-looking man. His wavy auburn hair, bright blue eyes, angular features, and long, lean frame earned enough appreciative stares to convince Alex that he was at least passably attractive.
But he could not afford the distraction of women. Goals required sacrifice. Unlike most of his peers, he did not have a family fortune to inherit or a lucrative business he would run after term ended. Oxford was far from a haven from responsibilities, but the place where he would prove his worth. He had to create his own future, and he would make a name for himself without assistance. And he couldn’t make his name satisfying his basest desires.
There was the sound again. The distinct noise of furniture scraping on the ancient wooden floors echoed in his ears. Alex stood, his jaw clenched, intent on weeding out the cause of this flagrant interruption.
He stepped into the main corridor and froze. There was a girl—agirl!—standing barefoot on a table laden with books, leaning precariously towards the shelves. A green dress, far finer than what he typically saw amongst women in town, hung off her slim form. Wisps of light brown hair escaped the knot at her neck. Her face twisted in concentration as she stretched one arm out.
Alex couldn’t hold back his exasperation as he cried out. “What are you doing!”
The girl twisted in mid-air, her eyes wide as she lost her footing and tumbled. He reached her side in two quick strides, just in time to block her fall, sending both of them sprawling into a heap of skirts on the hard library floor.
Alex sat up as best he could as the girl, a young woman upon closer inspection, pushed herself off his chest. His arm had wrapped around her waist and he pulled away, propping himself back up to his feet. He glowered down at her. “Who are you and what are you doing here?”
She looked as though she was thoroughly annoyed with his rescue, brushing off her arms and narrowing her gaze. “I’m reading. Why else would I be here?”
He stood dumbfounded and more than a bit perturbed. Alex Carroway did not enjoy feeling dumb, and he certainly did not appreciate the distraction. The library wassacred. He had spent the past eight years of his life in this space, and he was not about to let it become a tourist attraction for local girls. “You’re not supposed to be in here. This library is for mathematics students only.”
