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Some hours later, Caroline looked around the full dining room table. As this was a special occasion, she had permitted Will and George to dine with them instead of with Maisie, with dire threats to them both if they even considered misbehaving.
The table was laden with savories that rarely made an appearance in the Reeve’s larder. There was fine wine instead of small beer, soft bread made with white flour instead of coarse rye, and lamb instead of mutton.
“Thank you for having us to dine, Miss Reeve.” Mr. Taylor smiled at her from across the table.
“We have much to celebrate with your arrival, Mr. Taylor. I hope you do not mind being part of the family celebrations?”
“We have a cake for dessert!” George piped up with a look of longing toward the kitchen, and they all laughed.
“A fine occasion, and much deserving of cake,” Arabella said to George. They shared a love of chocolate, with Arabella sneaking biscuits and sweets into the Reeve pantry as often as she could while Caroline pretended to turn a blind eye to where they came from. The children loved the ruse.
Caroline gazed at her across the table, and they smiled at each other as their eyes met. She hoped Arabella would see her side of things by the end of the meal. It meant more to her than she could say to have her support.
“You certainly have much to celebrate,” Mr. Jones said. “And I am sure you shall have many happy occasions to celebrate in the near future.”
“I suppose,” Caroline said, uncertain what he meant.
“Forgive me, Miss Reeve, but I was speaking of upcoming nuptials. With three such beautiful young ladies in your family, permit me to say that you shall have no trouble on the Marriage Mart.”
“Two, to be sure,” she said sharply. “I would be most happy to see Betsy and Susan settled.”
“Young Jacob is the heir, and has the title, the estate, and most of the money,” Mr. Taylor said as he speared a piece of lamb with his fork. “But I believe Mr. Jones explained this afternoon that each of you have been left with a dowry—a not inconsiderable sum, I may add. You are a family of heiresses.”
Caroline blinked. She hadn’t followed all of what had been explained earlier. “We each have our own fortune?”
“Why—yes. Miss Betsy and Miss Susan have five thousand pounds to their names, and as the eldest, Miss Reeve, you have a tidy ten thousand. A very nice sum. Any man would be happy to have your hand in marriage.”
“I shallnotbe among the green girls on the Marriage Mart hanging about for a husband.” The idea filled her with horror.
“But of course you should seek to marry. Whyever would you not?” Mr. Jones blinked and rubbed his hand over his chin.
“I am content to make matches for my siblings and help them to settle into their new lives. My own is out of the question,” she said briskly. “Now, gentlemen, can I offer you tea and cake?”
After the men departed, taking Jacob with them to celebrate with a drink at their hotel, the girls curled up in the parlor to gossip and the boys worked off their high spirits by running through the house and whooping up and down the stairs. Caroline and Arabella went to the kitchen.
Caroline put a cauldron of water on the fire. Arabella scraped waste into a pail, then piled dishes on top of each other. She filled the basin with the hot water and picked up a rag and scrubbed it with soap before attacking the dishes, having told long-suffering Maisie to seek her bed.
“Is this the last time we shall do chores together?” Arabella grabbed a clean towel and bumped her hip against Caroline’s as she dried a plate. Her tone was light, but Caroline knew her well enough to hear the thread of wistfulness in her voice.
Caroline swallowed. “I never wanted things to change, Bell.”
Arabella pushed her spectacles up her nose and dried another dish before setting it on the table behind them. “Be that as it may, change has found you regardless. I cannot imagine Jacob lording it over an estate. Surely you will all remove to Somerset, instead of staying in Inverley.”
“I shall never leave Inverley.” She stared into the soapy water and gripped the plate in both hands.
“At the very least, you will leave this house. The leaky roof and draughty windows will be behind you at last.”
She didn’t want to give up her house. Not after a lifetime of treating skinned knees in this kitchen, or hearing the creak of the third stair from the top of the staircase, or doling out sweets in the sitting room to the boys and their friends before walking them to the seaside.
“Perhaps.”
She turned to face Arabella, staring deep into her brown eyes, taking in the short fringed sweep of her lashes, wanting to grasp her by the shoulders and to hold onto both her and this moment forever.
Perhaps.
Perhaps this was the last moment she would have in her old life, before everything changed forever. If only she could capture it somehow, press it neatly between the pages of one of her novels, to be opened and stared at later to relive the crackle of anticipation and worry and awareness. The knowledge that soon, everything would be different.
But for now—she could have one last taste of life as she knew it.
