“Yes, and he might push all the ottomans at me that he likes. But what are we to do now, though?” Cordelia asked. “At such a moment, it seems as if we should…”
“Yes, we should. And yet we are confined.”
“I can hop,” Cordelia said.
“You can hop? Well I can walk slowly, as long as I do not jostle around too much.”
“We can meet halfway,” Cordelia said. “On the stairs, I am sure we can both get there.”
“You are sure? Your ankle?”
“I am sure, Harveston,” Cordelia said, laughing. “I am hopping now.”
“I am coming.”
*
Percival was notcertain if his head was spinning from his very recent brain commotion or from the idea that he’d just proposed to Lady Cordelia through a chimney and been accepted.
She was on her way to the stairs and brain commotion or not, so was he.
He grabbed a candle from a side table and staggered out of the room, holding on to walls as he went.
Percival got to the landing and saw Lady Cordelia at the next landing down. She hopped and he staggered to meet one another halfway.
She threw herself into his arms. He had not been ready for that and fell back, with her atop him. He held the candle away so as not to set her hair ablaze.
It should have been a shocking situation, but it felt entirely natural. She leaned down and kissed him.
Percival threw the candle away and held her tight.
“My perfect Lady Cordelia,” he whispered. He softly kissed her.
She nuzzled his neck and said, “I am not so perfect, but I hope your affection will make you blind to my faults.”
“You are perfectly perfect and I will not have the point argued,” Percival said. “You have made me join the land of the living again. Out of my books and into the world.”
“You are really very handsome, Harveston,” she said, tracing her forefinger down his jaw.
He kissed that charming finger and said, “But I am no Corinthian,” he said with a laugh.
“I don’t know about that. After all, when I think of it, I was most looking forward to my Corinthian carrying me up the stairs. You did that remarkably well.”
“Which I will happily do all of our lives.”
He kissed Lady Cordelia once more and the kiss went on for…how long? He did not really know. It was as if all the world had very conveniently faded away and they were just on their own. There was nothing but her and him on the stairs.
Somewhere outside of this lovely interlude, Percival vaguely smelled smoke. It did not entirely penetrate his thoughts until he heard someone yell, “Fire!”
Cordelia’s head snapped up. So did his own, just in time to see a footman running toward a section of burning carpet just below them.
The footman doused the flames with a sand bucket.
“Was that the candle you came with?” Cordelia said.
“I’m afraid so. I have a brain commotion, you know.”
Not a moment later, those people who had been in the dining room, which was most of the people in the house, were upon the stairs in a crowd.
