“He’d never complain about that.”
Charlie grabbed two brushes and handed me one. I led Scout out of his stall and tied him to a rail. Charlie went right towork brushing down Scout’s neck, and Scout’s skin quivered in response to each stroke.
Scout bumped me with his nose and I started on the other side. We worked silently for several minutes until we reached Scout’s back. “How long have you been riding?” I asked, curious about this young man and how he’d been raised.
“I’ve always ridden,” he said. “Father had me up on a horse from the time I was a babe.”
Just as I’d thought. “Your sister as well?”
I leaned over Scout’s back so I could get a better look at him and caught him shrugging. “Who knows?” he said. “She can ride well enough.”
That was certain to be an understatement. If General Blackwell had taught her to shoot like a soldier, it would follow he would have taught her to ride like one as well.
“Have you ever ridden past Applewood?”
“That ragged ol’ place? Lots of times.”
“That’s my home.”
Charlie’s brushing stopped. “Oh. Sorry. I thought it was deserted.” He hadn’t said anything wrong, but he tried to redeem himself. “It is nice in the spring before the weeds really start growing.”
Deserted. What a terrible word. “No, it’s not deserted. It’s simply resting until it can be woken up again.”
“Don’t you think it has rested long enough?”
I laughed. “I do. I’ve already started waking it. After this house party is over, I hope you will ride there and visit. I can show you my plans.”
“Evelyn will make me bring her. She always wants to ride to Applewood.”
It was my brush’s turn to pause. “She does?”
“She doesn’t like how it is resting.”
Of course she didn’t. Had anything about me ever been pleasing to her? My invitation, which had seemed harmless enough a moment ago, now held a different weight. It was one thing to picture Charlie walking into Applewood and the two of us discussing different ways I was planning to improve the house and lands, but to invite Miss Blackwell to do the same? She was already too entrenched in my life. I didn’t need the ghost of her haunting the halls of Applewood like she haunted my memory of that shepherd’s croft.
“She might not want to come if I am there. I don’t think your sister likes me at all.”
“She does.” Charlie’s voice rose in my defense. “She sat with you at the waterfall, didn’t she?”
“Only because your parents forced her to.”
Charlie coughed out a short laugh. “My parents can’t force Evelyn to do anything she doesn’t want to do.”
My lips quirked into a grin. At least I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t control her. “Don’t tell your father that.”
“He knows. Everybody knows. Evelyn lives her life exactly as she pleases. So she must like you a little, otherwise she never would have come.”
Could that be possible? If so, she had a strange way of showing it. Life would be much easier if she did in fact like me a little—if she could like me enough to trust me to care for Harriet as she deserved. “If I wanted your sister to like me more, what should I do?”
Charlie’s brush stopped again and this time he walked around the front of Scout so he could look me in the eye. “I don’t think you candoanything. She will either like you or she won’t. She is rather fixed in her opinions once she has them.”
Blast.
Charlie must have caught the fall of my face. He bumped a fist into my shoulder. “But I like you,” he stated. “You take good care of your horse.”
I laughed again. Hearing the honesty of a child was a joy I’d been deprived of for too long. “Well, if you happen to let that fact slip to your sister, I wouldn’t complain.”
Charlie pulled his lips to one side and his eyebrows furrowed. Concern rimmed his irises. “Are you trying to court Evelyn?”
