Chapter 30 #3
Her father laughed, and Rosalind kissed his cheek once more before hurrying from the room.
She had to find Isabella. There were some things a woman simply could not be expected to keep from her dearest friend, and the knowledge that William intended to propose was unquestionably one of them.
Rosalind had reached the upper gallery when movement beyond the windows caught her attention.
She stopped beside the balustrade and looked down at the broad stretch of lawn behind the house.
Isabella Hartwell appeared to be attempting to murder Gabriel Frost with a stick.
Rosalind leaned farther over the railing and discovered that the situation was actually more alarming than she had first assumed.
Isabella had two sticks, one in each hand, while Gabriel had armed himself with a single branch and was defending himself with considerably more skill than she would have expected from a man who generally regarded unnecessary exertion as a personal insult.
Isabella struck with one hand, forcing him aside, then immediately followed with the other. Gabriel caught the second blow against his branch, and the crack of wood carried all the way to the gallery.
Rosalind covered her mouth to keep from laughing.
“You are cheating,” Gabriel called.
“I am fencing.”
“With two tree branches.”
“You have one.”
“Yes, but mine is clearly inferior.”
“That is because you chose poorly.”
Gabriel managed to block another strike. “I was distracted.”
“By what?”
“You.”
The answer caught Isabella off guard for barely a second, but Gabriel noticed. His grin was immediate.
Unfortunately for him, Isabella recovered just as quickly.
She caught his branch between hers and knocked it from his hand. Gabriel stared after it as it landed several feet away, then looked back to find Isabella advancing on him with one branch pointed directly at his chest.
“I did warn you that I knew how to fence.”
Gabriel glanced down at the makeshift weapon pressed against him, apparently considered his options, and collapsed dramatically onto the grass.
Rosalind laughed aloud.
Neither of them seemed to hear her.
Isabella stood over her fallen opponent with unmistakable satisfaction. “Mr. Frost?”
Gabriel remained perfectly still.
“Gabriel?”
Nothing.
She nudged his boot with hers. “Are you dead?”
“I cannot reply,” he said without opening his eyes. “I am dead.”
“That is inconvenient.”
“Tragic, really.”
“A pity. I had intended to tell you that you may court me properly from now on.”
Both of Gabriel’s eyes opened.
He sat upright so quickly that Rosalind wondered whether he had learned absolutely nothing from William’s recent example.
“You what?”
Isabella examined one of her sticks with suspicious nonchalance. “I said you may court me.”
“I heard you. I merely wanted to make certain death had not affected my understanding.”
“It appears not.”
“In that case, I withdraw my previous statement.”
Isabella finally looked at him. “Which one?”
“I am no longer dead.”
“How fortunate.”
“Extremely.”
Gabriel climbed to his feet and took a hopeful step toward her. Isabella promptly raised one of the sticks between them.
“Do not become overconfident.”
He stopped.
Rosalind laughed again and quietly stepped away from the balustrade before either of them discovered they had an audience.
Sunlight poured through the tall windows of the gallery, warm and brilliant against her face. She closed her eyes and stood in it for a moment, thinking of everything waiting for them beyond this peaceful house.
Tomorrow they would return to London. There would be questions and scandal, and her mother would undoubtedly weep when she finally held Papa again.
William would have to face what remained of his family after secrets buried for decades were dragged into the light.
Some wounds would take years to heal, and others perhaps never would.
Nothing would be quite as it had been before.
Rosalind found that she did not want it to be.
Once, freedom had looked like the painting in the Sinclair gallery. An endless road beneath a strange bright sky, with no one waiting at the end of it and no one who knew the traveler well enough to tell him who he ought to be.
She had thought being unknown was the same thing as being free.
Now her father knew the woman she had become. Isabella knew nearly every secret she possessed. And upstairs was a man who had seen Rosalind at her most stubborn, frightened, unreasonable, and determined and apparently intended to marry her anyway.
Perhaps freedom was not disappearing beyond the horizon where no one could find her.
Perhaps it was being known completely and still choosing the road for herself.
Rosalind opened her eyes.
Another laugh floated up from the lawn, and she glanced toward the windows.
She had, after all, come upstairs because she needed to speak with Isabella.
And considering what she had just overheard, it seemed they both had news to discuss.
Rosalind smiled and headed for the stairs.
Gabriel had enjoyed quite enough of Isabella’s attention for one afternoon.