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“Sorry, ah, what?” Laurence blustered, turning his eyes back down to his plate. “Well? Yes, well…I’m sure I don’t know.” Alicia began to pick at a fingernail as she saw a blush spread across his cheeks.
“Oh, come now, it’s as plain as the nose on my face. Or the nose onyourface, to pick something a bit more obvious.” Mary-Anne gestured broadly to Alicia, who was suddenly filled with the desire to flee the table. “Miss Ramsbury is virtually glowing. Her skin is not half so ghostly pale as when she arrived just a few days ago. No offence meant, of course.”
“Of course,” Alicia said quietly, covering her face discreetly with her napkin.
“You don’t mean to say you haven’t paid any attention at all to the condition of our guest?” said Mary-Anne to her brother in a wicked tone, tossing a wink and a smile in Alicia’s direction.
Laurence grunted noncommittally. He helped himself to another serving of turnips though his plate was still mostly full.
“Has there been any news of Mister Place, Miss Alicia?” Jenny piped in as she popped another morsel of chicken into her mouth, evidently unaware of the tension she was cutting. “Did Miss Grace have anything to say in the letter about getting us home?”
Alicia winced. “Oh…no, I’m sorry, Jenny, I don’t know. I’m afraid I haven’t read it yet.”
A little later,she said to herself.I will read it after supper. Let this day be finished so Grace does not take it from me. Let her ruin the night instead.
* * *
Inevitably, later came. Supper was concluded, and the occupants of the Gillingham household retired to their separate corners: Mary-Anne to her book in the parlour, Jenny to her knitting in her chair, Laurence to his library. Despite her desire to put off reading the letter, Alicia felt too consumed with worry about her activities with Laurence being discovered to seek out any companionship, so instead, she sat in her room to spend the evening fretting.
This is ridiculous,she would say to herself, frustrated at her inaction.The letter will be the same if you read it now or in an hour. Why not simply get it over with? Surely it can’t be all that bad—it’s not as though Grace can hurt you with one little letter.
That the question had a simple answer did not stop Alicia from asking herself again and again. She knew that once the letter was opened and read, her normal life would resume in some form or another. She could no longer go on thinking only of her wants in the moment, of how good it felt to enjoy the sights and sensations of nature with Laurence. As soon as she opened the envelope, all that would be intruded upon by Grace’s furious criticism, by endless proposals from feckless social climbers, by the filthy air and stifling salons of London. And for all the people who surrounded her, she would once more be terribly, desperately lonely.
Her candle was half-burned when it occurred to Alicia to seek something for her nerves. Mary-Anne had mentioned a decanter of apple brandy that was kept in the downstairs parlour for just such an occasion. “I’d finished near half a bottle myself by the time my poor Edward decided to cut short his visit to the countryside,” she’d said with a laugh.
Nothing wrong with a sip of Dutch courage, she said to herself, already rising from where she had collapsed upon the bed.A small glass, and then I shall open the letter.
Evidently, it was later than she realized, judging by how thoroughly Jenny had fallen asleep in her chair in the room adjoining Alicia’s. She smiled as she looked at her faithful companion.We’ll get you home soon, Jenny, don’t you worry,she thought, patting the middle-aged woman on the shoulder gently as she walked by. As expected, Jenny’s snoring was briefly interrupted, but she remained fast asleep as Alicia continued to tiptoe towards the staircase.
“—think it’s cruel?”
“Cruel? What are you talking about?”
Alicia froze in place at the top of the stairs. Voices, coming from downstairs. Not raised, but speaking in a tone that suggested they were engaged in a hushed argument.
“Really? You may not be unintelligent, brother, but sometimes you are the stupidest man I have ever known.”
“I don’t have any idea what you mean.”
That’s Mary-Anne and Laurence,she deduced from the higher pitch of the first voice and the low baritone of the second.But what on earth could they be talking about with such vehemence?She did not move a muscle, fearful a single twitch would cause a floorboard to creak.
“You know this cannot go on. Before you know it the man will be back and this whole episode will be over for good.”
“Do you really think I don’t know that?”
“And do you expect her to come back for a visit with all her money and her fancy retinue? Will you write to her? Travel to see her? My god, Laurence, you really are dreaming if you think there’s any future for you.”
“You’re wrong, Mary-Anne. That’s not what I’m thinking at all.
“Then whatareyou thinking? More importantly, what are you doing?”
A brief silence was filled with a soft, regular thumping sound, as if someone were beginning to pace back and forth. “It’s…nothing. Nothing at all.”
“So just what do you think is going to happen if you go on doing ‘nothing’ as you have been? Look beyond yourself for once and think about how she will feel when all this turns out to be nothing. I tell you, it’s downright cruel, Laurence, and I won’t stand for it.”
“Then don’t. You don’t have to stand for a thing.”
The sound of angry footsteps stomping towards the staircase sent Alicia flying back to her room, closing the door hurriedly behind her. Her heart was racing, breath coming fast as she rested her back against the closed door.
