The Dowry of Miss Lydia Clark (45 page)

“What is it?” Noelle managed through a raw throat after wiping her face upon the hem of her gown.

“Are you all right, ma’am?” Sarah’s voice, filled with concern, came through the other side of the door.

“I’m fine. Go away, please.”

She spent the rest of the day atop the covers of her bed, with no appetite for meals nor company. Mrs. Dearing knocked once and called out to her, and later Mrs. Beemish came to see if she was in need of anything. She ignored both. Her thoughts moved frantically from image to image, her mind a stage upon which scenes of the past three years were played—scenes where she had angered Quetin with some foolish observation or complaint, scenes of his surely being bored to death by her prattling on and on about the latest fashions, and so many images of her holding her hand outstretched for money.

And then another scene took center stage. Herself, playing
Speculation
with her only three women friends. Meara Desmond, with her amber cat-eyes, so smugly solicitous of her predicament. So unruffled, even though her means of support would be coming to an end any day. What had she said? Noelle strained her mind to remember.

“
At least you’ll have the other lodgers to keep you company
.”

“How did she know?” Noelle rasped into her sodden pillow. She went over every detail of that night and could not recall mentioning anything about her new living arrangements before Meara made her remark.

With dreadful clarity now, she could see why she was here. Perhaps Averyl Paxton was in London, perhaps not. But Quetin, with his repugnance for altercation, had found a way to cast her aside.

Gresham woke to a hazy sky on Thursday, and by noon the first black clouds had begun creeping in from the northwest. Three o’clock seemed more like seven as Harold reined Dan and Bob onto Church Lane, but still he was surprised to find a half dozen carriages and wagons queued in front of the grammar school, and Mr. Raleigh helping children into them.

“What happened to archery practice?” he asked Jack when he and Edgar appeared with lunch pails and books under their arms.

“Just look at the sky,” Jack replied, staring as if Harold had said something ignorant, while setting his books and lunch pail into the wagon bed.

That’s the trouble with all that schooling
, Harold thought.
Too big for their britches
. “Well, it ain’t rainin’ yet.”

Edgar, climbing up the wagon spokes, shrugged. “Mr. Raleigh didn’t want us to get caught up in it.”

Harold ground his teeth. This wasn’t good. Miss Clark wouldn’t be by for another half hour yet, and he had no excuse to lurk around the school yard. With the archery tournament in just two more days, these fine opportunities for ignoring her would come to an end. Ignoring the questions of his brothers, he jumped from the wagon seat and stalked over to Mr. Raleigh, who at this time was helping Trudy Meeks into a wagon hitched to his two horses—and already crowded with Meeks and Kerns.

“What if it don’t rain for hours?” he demanded of the schoolmaster’s back.

Mr. Raleigh turned to him with a puzzled look. “I beg your pardon?”

“Hello, Mr. Sanders,” Trudy Meeks called from the carriage.

“Hullo yourself,” Harold replied over the schoolmaster’s shoulder.

“How are we gonter win that tournament if we don’t practice? It’s only two days away.”

“I didn’t know you were interested in archery, Mr. Sanders,” Mr. Raleigh said, crossing his arms.

“Well, my brothers are on the team, ain’t they?”

“They’re our biggest assets, actually.”

Harold narrowed his eyes. His brothers might be full of themselves since they got educated, but nobody who wasn’t a Sanders had the right to call them names. Only by the look on Mr. Raleigh’s face, he didn’t seem to intend any spite.

Warily Harold asked, “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that they’re excellent marksmen.” Mr. Raleigh glanced overhead, unfolded his arms, and took a step back toward his carriage. “Look, we’ll have to discuss this later, Mr. Sanders. I’ve still to get to the other school and try to deliver these children home before the sky falls out.”

Resignedly, Harold was about to turn to leave when Mr. Raleigh’s words found their way through his felt cap. “The other school?” he asked as the schoolmaster climbed into his carriage seat.

Mr. Raleigh picked up the reins. “To fetch Phoebe Meeks. Miss Clark knows to keep her there if the weather is threatening.”

“Good idea,” Harold declared and took a step closer. “But why don’t I take the Meeks? I’ve got plenty of room in the wagon.”

“I don’t think—”

“That way mebbe we both can get back home before the rain.”

“May we please go with Mr. Sanders?” Lester Meeks asked his schoolmaster.

Harold could have kissed him.

Ten minutes later he was reining the horses to a halt in the lane outside Miss Clark’s school. “Want me to fetch her?” Mark asked from the back.

“I’ll do it.” Harold was already handing the reins to Jack, who sat on the bench beside him. “And you’ll have to move when Miss Clark comes out.”

“But I thought we were here for Phoebe,” Edgar said.

By then, Harold was halfway to the porch. “Her too.” Once inside the schoolroom, however, he realized he had forgotten how unreasonable Miss Clark could be.

“Thank you, but my father will be along shortly,” was her reply to his offer, even though she had smiled sweetly and thanked him for coming for Phoebe.

“Don’t you wonter save him the trouble?”

“He’s likely halfway here already. Besides, your taking me home would increase the chances of you getting caught up in it.” She actually shooed him out of her schoolroom as if he were a guinea rooster in her garden. “You had best hurry, Mr. Sanders.”

Harold’s thoughts were as dark as the clouds overhead as he escorted Phoebe out to the wagon. Or rather walked in front of her, for he was so vexed that he took long fast strides.

“Is Miss Clark still coming?” Lester asked, craning his neck to see past Jack’s shoulder.

Harold flung the boy a look that silenced him. In fact, none of his passengers said another word until he reined the horses onto Arnold Lane, and then only to reply to his question about the location of the Meeks’ cottage.

“It’s the first one, Mr. Sanders,” Mark offered while from the distance came the rumble of thunder. “I’ll show you.”

Soon he was letting children out of the wagon in the carriage drive of a weathered cottage. There were no cattle in the pasture, but the barn door was closed, and he reckoned that the children’s mother had penned the animals inside for the approaching storm. He didn’t think he had ever met her, not even in town.
It’s a shame that a woman had to tend children and this farm without a man
, he thought. Dairying was hard work.

“Thank you, Mr. Sanders,” the three children said almost at the same time after Jack and Edgar had assisted them to the ground.

Harold merely nodded, but then because Trudy was looking at him with expectant green eyes and it wasn’t her fault that Miss Clark was so stubborn, he followed with a gruff, “You’re welcome.”

The thunder rumbled, this time louder. “Now take yourselves on inside before you get rained on,” he ordered.

“And there it is,” Lydia announced, crossing the front parlor to collect her father’s pipe from the criss-cross table that held his palette, assorted jars of paint, a bottle of linseed oil, and brushes and rags smudged with dried paint. Rain beat a continuous tattoo against the windowpanes, which rattled with every clap of thunder. From the easel the Worthy sisters’ likenesses stared, as if to say,
We could have told you where his pipe was if you’d only asked
.

Holding the lamp closer to the finished portrait, Lydia wondered where her father would hang it once it was framed. It wasn’t enough that the sisters’ watchful eyes took in almost everything that went on in the village—now they would gaze at her from one of the cottage walls.
But it could be worse
, she thought as two other faces came into her mind. Immediately she chided herself for the uncharitable thought—for Mr. Towly had left her alone since the altercation at the crossroads, and Harold Sanders, except for today’s offer of a ride, had been considerate enough to ignore her for over two weeks now.

She was heading for the stairs when a tentative knock sounded at the door—so low that for a second she panicked, thinking that Jeanie had somehow been let out into the storm. Only she then remembered seeing the cat upstairs, curled in her mother’s rocking chair. Crossing the room, she opened the door and raised her lamp. “Mr. Pitney?”

“I realize it’s late, and it’s not our usual meeting night….” Though the porch provided shelter from the rain, he was holding an umbrella aloft, and his words spilled out in an uncharacteristic rush, as if he feared she would slam the door. “But I saw your lights were still burning, and I remember your saying that you stay up late—”

“Do come in.”

“Oh, I shan’t stay but a minute….”

“I can barely hear you for the rain, Mr. Pitney.” Lydia stepped back to allow him entrance. “Please?”

A blush, obvious even in the lamplight, rose to his cheeks as he closed his umbrella and propped it just outside the door. “I’m not usually so impulsive, Miss Clark.”

“Life wouldn’t be as exciting if we thought out everything,” she offered affably, to show that she wasn’t annoyed by his appearance. On the contrary. She just wished she was wearing something besides her faded-but-too-comfortable-for-the-rag-bin chenille wrapper, and that she had not been so hasty about taking down her hair, for she looked like an Amazon woman with it hanging loose about her shoulders.

“Lydia…my pipe?”

Begging Mr. Pitney’s pardon, she stepped over to the door leading to the staircase and rest of the cottage. “In a minute, Papa!”
No sense in pretending to be genteel in this household
, she thought. In the course of taking the few steps back to her visitor, she realized with an aching heart what this unexpected visit had to be about.
The lessons worked
.

“I couldn’t wait to tell you that the lessons were successful,” Mr. Pitney declared. “Miss Rawlins and I chatted for what seemed like hours last night about the three novelettes you and I studied. And the reason I couldn’t come here earlier is that we sat in the library after supper and continued the discussion. She even apologized for telling me that I lacked imagination.”

“That’s wonderful, Mr. Pitney,” Lydia told him, and in a way she was truly happy for him, for he radiated a confidence that she had not seen during his three visits. But then a sad thought occurred to her. Her services were no longer required. “If you’ll wait here, I’ll fetch that other book.”

Brown eyes uncomprehending, he said, “But we haven’t discussed it.”

“I thought…”

Fear flooded his handsome face. “Oh, but I’ve already told Miss Rawlins I plan to read every book she’s written. I would never be able to understand them on my own. Please, Miss Cl—”

“Very well, Mr. Pitney. I assumed I was being dismissed.”

“Dismissed?” He shook his head adamantly. “I should never have had the nerve to speak with her again without your help. You
will
allow the lessons to continue, won’t you?”

“Of course.”