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“‘When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden Daffodils;’”
She twitched an eyebrow and he cleared his throat.
“My mother’s favourite,” he excused in a deep voice.
With a suspicious eye, she nodded and wandered over the rugs.
His daughter also enjoyed this library but remained too young for many of the writings – philosophies, histories and some ancient bawdy plays he’d unearthed in a trunk. All these treasures he’d piled here when the construction works for the Academy had taken place, and only when those had been completed had he sat with a cabinet maker and pencil, sketching designs and scouring library plans.
Central to one wall was a magnificent oval window overlooking the park, allowing plentiful light to fall upon the chesterfield reading sofa. Slanting away and protecting the contents from that same light, shelves of chestnut at differing heights were crammed with books.
The cabinet maker had stated that locked glass doors were all the dash, but Seth could not contend with the idea of thrusting books behind barrier and key, as though too precious to touch and read.
Miss Griffin perused the shelves with an enchanted eye, until turning. “May I…borrow this one for my chambers? I promise not to damage it.”
His eyes flickered to the book clenched tightly in her hands as though he might wrest it from her at any given moment.
“Certainly. Take anything here you can use or read.”
“Thank you. I…I do believe, Mr Hawkins, that serendipity herself was guiding me when I wrote my application letter to you. I’m so glad its verbosity gained me an interview.”
He opened his mouth to explain that actually he’d been as desperate as a flower girl with a cart full of blooms at six of an eve, but Miss Griffin beamed, book now pressed to her bosom.
Serendipity indeed.
