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Samia bit her lower lip. “There’s a kind of wiggle here near the beginning. A big change in her life maybe?”
The old woman bent to look, nodded. “Remember what I said.”
“Watch their eyes when you speak, but don’t let them notice,” Samia replied. “You will see when you have hit upon a true thing. I forgot.”
“And Miss Finch has had a change, I think.” Mistress Elena’s smile was sly.
“You saw that in my eyes?” asked Harriet.
The old woman’s smile broadened.
“Or I just told you so.” Harriet shook her head. “Do you just make it up?”
“We find a story together, engraved in the hand.”
“Isn’t that fooling people?” Harriet didn’t believe in fortune-telling, but she had thought those who did it would pretend to, at least.
“It is not,” replied Mistress Elena crisply. “Many people have no one who pays close attention to them. Not a single comrade. I watch and listen and encourage their thoughts. They can learn much, if they wish to.”
For some reason, Harriet thought of her mother. But that was silly. She did listen to her.
“Your Heart line is very strong,” said Samia. “It goes all across your hand. And look here, near the beginning, it crosses your Life line. Some great thingdidhappen then.”
When her father had died, and she thought her heart would break. Harriet shook her head. They were simply playing on her imagination. “I must go back,” she said. If she was caught outside the gardens, her grandfather would prevent her from ever returning.
Samia gave up her hand reluctantly.
Jack walked with her toward the path to Winstead Hall. She thought of questioning him further about the letter, but somehow her thoughts drifted back to the idea of kissing him. He was right here, at her side. They’d come under the trees, so no one could see. But how did one go about it? One didn’t simply throw oneself into a man’s arms. What if she tripped? He would catch her. And then… But what if he didn’t wish to kiss her? The possibility made her cheeks burn.
Jack put a hand on her arm, making her jump. Had he read her thoughts somehow?
“Your grandfather has set watchers,” he said.
She hadn’t been paying attention. Without Jack, she would have walked right into the man posted on the border with the Ferrington lands—one of the Winstead Hall gardeners, she thought. On the other hand, if Jack hadn’t been there to distract her, she would have seen him. She was usually quite observant!
“This way,” he murmured.
He showed her a way to evade the patrol, through a thicket that had an open space down the center. It was perhaps better than the hidden route Harriet would have taken on her own. A little.
When they paused at the end of the bushes to make certain the way was clear, he said, “Could you come back tonight? There’s to be a bit of a festival.”
“After dark?”
“I would wait in that shrubbery by the house to escort you. And bring you back as well, of course. Not too late. It will be a fine evening.”
An automatic refusal rose to Harriet’s lips, born from a lifetime of genteel poverty and its precarious social position. She’d always known that the least breath of scandal would ruin her, as it would not a better-placed young lady. She could make no missteps, even as a certain sort of man saw her as an easy mark. She’d built up a wall of cool distance to fend them off, and her defenses had served her well until a few months ago at the start of the London season. Then, suddenly, Harriet was expected to welcome the attentions of a host of young men. She was to be flattered and sweetly accessible. Even her best friends hadn’t understood how difficult she’d found this. Some nights Harriet had seen her suitors as a kind of ravening horde vying for—not her, but her grandfather’s money. At those moments, she’d simply wanted to run.
“Miss Finch?” said her companion.
This thicket in the woods wasn’t society. This politely charming rogue knew nothing of her dowry and cared less. No one would know what she did in the Travelers’ camp. “I will try to come after dinner,” she heard herself saying. “I can’t be sure I will be able to get away.”
“I’ll wait for you where the path forks into three.”
He said it as if he meant he would wait forever. Speechless, Harriet raised her hand in a half wave and hurried away.
She made it into the garden and then inside, finding no sign her absence had been noticed. It would be harder tonight, but Harriet made up her mind to find a way.
***
