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Gram sat up, blinking up at Mabel with no recognition.
“Shall I escort you upstairs?”
“I would not like the core of a pear, Mabel. That is utterly nonsensical.”
Mabel nodded. “Of course.” She raised her voice, leaning in slightly. “Shall I help you to your room instead?”
“I am tired,” Gram snapped. “Come, help me up.”
Mabel took her grandmother’s delicate arm and hoisted the woman softly to her feet. Wrapping Gram’s arm around her own, she crossed the floor, bidding the others farewell as she made her escape the best way she knew how. They made their way quietly up the stairs, arm in arm, as Gram leaned on her walking stick more than she leaned on Mabel. The older woman was stubborn—a likely source for Mabel’s inherited trait. The thought brought a rueful smile to her lips.
“You will not let that woman come in here and take over Pippa’s learning.”
Mabel halted at the top of the stairs, turning toward Gram, whose chest heaved from the climb. “What do you mean?”
“The companion,” Gram said, her white eyebrows rising on her forehead. “She wants to come in here and take your position, Mabel. She wants to marry off those wanton ladies to the two available men and insert herself into the role of Pippa’s governess.”
Mabel was stunned. First, her position? Did Gram view her as a servant? She shook the thought away, for surely Gram had only meant it regarding Mabel’s authority over Pippa. Those thoughts aside, Mabel had not considered Charles’s guests to be anything near wanton…let alone cunning and calculating, as Gram implied. And besides, there were two Pemberton sisters, were there not? Charles could not marry both women. And neither could they marry their brother. That only left…
“You think Miss Sophy has her eye on Mac?”
Gram managed to create another crease in her brow. Was Mabel blind?
“I need sleep,” Mabel said.
“Indeed.” Gram nodded as they set off toward her bedchamber. “You have those wretched dark circles under your eyes, Mabel. You must correct that if you plan to snatch a man for yourself.”
Mabel could not help but laugh. “We are in no danger of that, I assure you.”
“You will not play my nursemaid forever,” Gram said with surprising bitterness. “You will wed.”
Then who would play Gram’s nursemaid? And what of Pippa? Mabel refused to send her sister to school. It was not as though she believed institutions to be inherently bad, but she could not send Pippa away, not when the girl already suffered for lacking a mother. Mabel was determined to fill that role as best she could and support her sister.
Gram reached forward, pulling Mabel’s hand into her own. “It is not selfish to think about oneself on occasion, Mabel.”
“I know that,” she defended, though Gram’s expression spoke to her disbelief. “Goodnight, Gram,” Mabel said when they reached the door.
Gram’s eyebrows drew together. “Will you not send for my maid and prepare my tea?”
Mabel could not help but chuckle. No, her Gram did not want her to play nursemaid, indeed. “I will send for tea right away.”
