Page 91 of The Winter Companion

Clara had difficulty absorbing Simon’s words. “Is that what he said? That it… That he’d made me his flirt?”

“And that he’d kissed you in the meadow behind the cottage that day. All the things you told us that we didn’t believe.” Simon lowered his cup. His face filled with brotherly regret. “I’m sorry for that. In hindsight, I can see he was a villain. My only excuse is, at the time, I idolized the man.”

A chill, as bitter as the winter snow outside, settled into Clara’s veins. “So did I.”

“You’ll be pleased to hear that I blacked his eye and knocked out several of his teeth.”

“Why on earth would I be pleased to hear that? I get no satisfaction from your having beaten him.”

“I do. It was the most satisfying thing I’ve done in ages. And something I should have done four years ago.” Simon paused, his gaze turning wary. “I say, Clara, you can’t blame Mama and me for believing him over you. How were we to know—”

“Because I told you so.” And she’d continued to tell them so, insisting on her version of the truth, until…

Until she’d stopped believing it herself.

“Yes,” Simon said, “but he denied it. Most vociferously. And you were always horning in on my lessons. Making any excuse to spend more time with him.”

Her battered spirit railed at the accusation. “That isn’t true. I wanted to learn, just as much as you did. It had nothing to do with what I did or didn’t feel for your tutor.”

“No one wants to study who doesn’t have to.”

“I did,” she retorted in a burst of whispered vehemence. “And I still do. Why else do you suppose I’ve been so keen on receiving your lessons?”

“Yes, I know that. Which is why I agreed to send them, even though it’s taken up heaven knows how much of my time organizing my notes and writing them out—”

“Did you even write the last lesson? The entire packet was a word-for-word duplicate of one you’d sent six months before.”

He grimaced. “Was it that obvious? I’d hoped you wouldn’t notice.”

“Who—?”

“One of the lads. I paid him thruppence to copy an old lesson and send it on to you. I was away for a week on field trip and hadn’t the time to come up with anything myself.”

She’d suspected as much. The admission nevertheless brought her up short. “You could have simply written a few notes on what you were studying at the moment. The way you did in the beginning. It’s all I ever wanted. Not regurgitated scientific rules and maxims. The last six months of lessons have been no lessons at all.”

Simon’s lips thinned. “University isn’t what you think it is, Clara. We don’t stand around with laurel wreaths on our heads, waxing on about the classics. This isn’t ancient Greece. A real naturalist must go out into the world. Into nature. He must observe creatures in their natural habitat.”

“Is that what you were doing when you ran up bills for a pair of engraved cufflinks, and a set of horseshoes for a horse you don’t even own?”

He had the grace to turn a dull red. “I won’t apologize for socializing with my friends. It’s part of the university experience. Surely you don’t expect me to remain in my rooms with the curtains drawn, studying by the light of a single candle?”

“I expect you to show some measure of respect for the sacrifice Mama and I have made to keep you here. Can you imagine my surprise to receive a stack of tradesman’s bills for such fripperies, when I’ve been obliged these four years to wear thrice-darned stockings and gowns that are years out of season?”

His color deepened, whether with embarrassment or anger, Clara couldn’t tell. “If you must know, the cufflinks were for a ball, at which I met Viscount Wrexham, who is keen to finance an expedition. And the farrier bill was for a hunter I rented who threw a shoe when I was riding to the hounds. All activities which have a bearing on my future as a naturalist. I gain more notice socializing than in sequestering myself like a monk.”

Her mind latched onto one phrase. “An expedition? To where?”

“Nothing has been finalized yet. And it needn’t concern you, in any event.”

“Of course it concerns me. I’m to be your secretary.”

Simon’s gaze slid guiltily to his coffee mug. He made no reply.

A growing sense of numbness built in Clara’s chest. It slowed her heart and breath, making her feel as if she were gradually being turned to a block of ice. “Aren’t I?”

“As to that…”

“You promised me, Simon. You said I’d have a role in your work. That you’d make a home for me when you came down from University.”