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Arabella, who knew her better than anyone, who had been by her side since they had been children, who had held her hand as she wept over the loss of her parents, would understand.
* * *
Arabella sat on the double-sided swing in the back garden and pushed it into motion with one foot against the wooden stand. She heard the familiar crash of waves pounding against the shore, and crickets chirping from the bushes that surrounded their square of lawn, but she didn’t trust that her ears were working properly.
They couldn’t be.
If they were, then it meant that Caroline had told her something that made no sense whatsoever.
Arabella gave the swing another push. “I don’t understand.”
Byron jumped onto her lap and she ran her hand over his sleek grey fur, trying to find comfort. He purred as he curled into a ball.
Caroline leaned in, her face bright, and pulled Byron onto her own lap. “I don’t understand it either! It’s a mystery to me how Mr. Taylor couldn’t find us sooner. I hadn’t imagined my father hiding his whereabouts from his own family. I always thought that they wanted nothing to do with us after his marriage.”
“No, that’s not it.” Arabella bit her lip. “I don’t understand why you aren’thappyabout this.”
Caroline had rushed into her garden where Arabella had been reading her novel. She had been about to offer tea when Caroline had started pouring out this extraordinary story.
Caroline sat back on her side of the swing, pushing it a little higher, a cloud passing over her face. “I’m happy enough about it.” Her words were clipped, and she averted her eyes.
Arabella shook her head. “You’ve been handed what may well be a fortune, and Jacob now has atitle. This is beyond all wildest imagination.” Her mind reeled at the implications of what this meant for the Reeves. “Why, all of your problems are solved, Caroline.”
There was a bitter taste in her mouth as she said it. Would that her own problems could be so easily fixed! But for all her dreams and fancies, she had never contemplated the jaw-dropping possibility of someone swooping in and handing over everything she had ever wanted, with no strings attached. She drew her reticule onto her lap and popped a sweet in her mouth. “Ginger comfit?” she asked.
Caroline took one and nibbled on it. “My problems aren’t solved. I swore that I would take care of my brothers and sisters until they were settled in life, and I meant it. Fortune or no fortune. Title or no title.”
“That is noble of you. It always has been.” Arabella paused, searching for the right words. “But this makes all of it so much easier. Money and influence always does.”
“Does it? I don’t know the first thing about wealth.” She sighed. “Maybe we can give it all away.”
Arabella hated confrontation, even with Caroline, who knew almost every feeling she had ever had. But she was too surprised to keep her thoughts inside. “I can’t believe you are saying this. You, of all people, who have been forced to scrimp and save for years to get by. Now you have enough to purchase anything you have ever dreamed of, and you aren’t happy with it?”
Caroline shot a foot out and stopped the swing. “It’s complicated, Bell. How am I supposed to trust this man who has appeared out of nowhere to tell us that our troubles are over? Doesn’t that seem in the least suspicious to you?”
“It’s unusual,” she allowed. “But if I had someone tell me I no longer had to rely on Matthew, and in fact I could now choose my livelihood—then I would be ecstatic.”
Arabella heard the flatness in her own voice. She was happy for Caroline, dash it all. This wasn’t about her life and her issues.
Herjealousy, if she could stomach owning up to the truth.
“You think me selfish.” Caroline scowled down at the grass.
“No, of course not,” she said, stung.
“I can hear Will and George coming home from their lessons with Reverend Thomson. I must be off to tell them.” She stalked off toward her house.
Arabella sat for a while in the swing, Byron napping on her foot.
She had always yearned for her independence. She was saving up her coins to eventually move into a little cottage. If she could have all the profits from her watercolor paintings, instead of giving so much to Matthew, then she had a chance at an independent, if modest, living.
But even in these dreams, she would still be working. She would need to continue to paint and sell her seascapes to survive.
It wouldn’t be handed to her, like a miracle.
She couldn’t understand Caroline’s reaction. If it had been her, she would be crying with joy.
She was thrilled for Caroline, she truly was. Shelovedher—of course she wished for her happiness and security. But they were both nearing thirty, and neither of them had ever married, so she hadn’t thought that their circumstances would change much. Whenever she thought of the future, it was growing old in a thatch-roofed cottage with the sea salt rusting the hinges on the shutters, watching visitors come and go as Caroline helped herself to a cup of tea in her parlor.
