Chapter 39 - Dahlia
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE- DAHLIA
Weeks passed. Every day, William arrived promptly at the start of visiting hours, bearing an outlandish arrangement of flowers. There was always an expensive gift tucked inside—jewelry, fine Parisian sketchbooks, an entire spool of aquamarine silk-satin ribbon, a pair of kid gloves.
Sometimes the gift was too large for him to carry, so it was delivered after he'd left. So far he’d sent a beautiful drawing desk with a wheel on the side that allowed her to change the angle of the desktop for her comfort, a collection of French fashion catalogs, and a stack of books on garment construction.
William sat amongst the other gentlemen who'd come to call, sometimes delivering withering set-downs, sometimes politely participating in the conversation. Every once in a while, Dahlia would offer him a biscuit, and another gentleman would leave and never return.
As time wore on, Dahlia began to regret her stipulation that William wait until the final ball of the Season to officially propose. At the same time, she held a private fear that he’d find some fault in her and wouldn’t ask when the time came, after all.
“For heaven’s sake,” Rachel said one afternoon after William had quit their parlor. “Just tell him you’ll marry him already.”
“That’s not how these things work, and you well know it.”
“As if your courtship has been at all typical since the start. Do you forget that you kissed the man before you knew his name?”
Dahlia pleated the silk satin of her skirts between her fingers and blurted her biggest fear. “What if he’s changed his mind?”
Rachel scowled, sat up rigidly, and winged her book at Dahlia’s head. She shrieked and dodged as it narrowly missed; it hit the wall behind her with a loud thump. Dahlia stared, open-mouthed at Rachel’s fearsome glower.
“Is everything all right, miss?” Bernard said from the door.
Rachel snapped, “No. I fear my sister suffers from incurable idiocy.”
Dahlia closed her mouth and waved the man off. “Everything’s fine. You may go.”
Bernard gave one last uncertain look between them before retreating. Dahlia opened her mouth to say something, though she hardly knew what.
Rachel stabbed her finger in Dahlia’s direction forcefully. “If you say one more stupid thing to me, I’ll scream. I’ve sat here for weeks watching you both. The man loves you, and you love him.”
“Do you truly think so?”
Rachel cast about as if looking for something else convenient to throw. She’d just grasped a tasselled pillow when Dahlia held up her hands.
“Please, stop.”
“He’s told you as much. His actions certainly prove it. What does he have to do to make you believe him?”
The question caught Dahlia by surprise; she thought about it. “I suppose I never really thought I’d find love. I expected to find the things on my list, to have mutual respect and friendship. I never thought that love would be so consuming.”
“It’s understandable that you’re frightened,” Rachel said with a precise nod. “You’ve always been in control of your relationships—if you can even call them that.”
“I never cared about the outcome of any courtship before. With William, I care very much.”
It was perhaps the understatement of a lifetime.
“Don’t you think it’s time you told him that?”
Dahlia nodded, chewing her lower lip.
A sly smile crept over Rachel’s face. “Good thing the final ball of the Season is tomorrow evening, is it not? Since I’m an excellent sister, I’ll even make it easier for you.
I’m not kidding when I say I can’t live like this any longer—if you don’t tell him by the end of that evening, I will.
And I’ll do it in full hearing of everyone. ”
Horror gripped Dahlia in its icy claws. “You wouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t I? What do I care if I go out with the proverbial bang? You forget that this is my first and very last Season.”
With that dramatic proclamation, Rachel strode from the room.
The following day, Dahlia waited in the parlor just prior to visiting hours. Nerves swirled within her, escaping through the tapping of her fingers against the carved armrests.
At five minutes til, Rachel walked in, a book tucked under her arm. “Goodness’ sake, whatever is the matter?”
“Nothing. I’m very well.”
“You’d better tell that to your bouncing knee.”
Dahlia’s eyes widened slightly and she froze; she hadn’t even realized she’d been doing that.
Her sister took her customary spot in the center of the sofa, leaving ample room on either side of her, nearly daring a gentleman to sit.
Dahlia was reminded suddenly of the monster Scylla from Homer’s epic—for if any unwelcome man got too close to Rachel, he might be rendered screaming, too.
“Really Dahlia, is something wrong?”
“I’m just nervous.”
“Does it have anything to do with why your trunk full of drawings is suddenly missing from your room?”
“You really must stop snooping, Rachel. Someday, it’s going to get you into a load of trouble.”
“On the contrary, it’s only brought me delight. Don’t deflect the question—where did all your sketches go?”
Suddenly, she was glad to have someone to tell. Besides, Rachel might be nosy, but she could keep a secret better than anyone Dahlia knew.
She leaned forward, her eyes bright. “I’ve had them delivered to William first thing this morning.”
“Whatever for?”
Dahlia should have seen the question coming. Perhaps she was a bit overwrought not to have thought of it. This part of William’s secret wasn’t hers to tell, and she wouldn’t betray his confidence in the matter, not even to her sister.
“They’re for his sisters,” she lied. “To show him that if he’s only courting me to retain access to my talents, he needn’t do so. Now he has all the designs they could ever possibly need.”
Rachel rolled her eyes. “What a ninny falling in love has turned you into. I never would have guessed it at the outset, but here we are—me and my ninny of a sister.”
Dahlia was easily able to ignore her insult, for just at that moment, William appeared in the doorway. Although it was familiar, the sight of him never failed to steal her breath just for a moment—a hitch in her breathing that she covered with a smile.
Today he was clad head to toe in a navy so deep it was nearly black—like the line of ocean that meets the horizon in the far distance. He held a massive bouquet of dahlias and hefted them into one arm with some effort before bowing.
“William,” she said. “What a pleasant surprise.”
Rachel snorted and flipped her page.
“Rachel, Dahlia. Always a pleasure.” He crossed the room with several long strides, a twinkle in his eye, and laid the flowers in her lap. “These are for you.”
“How thoughtful.” She pretended to frown. “Why, these feel extraordinarily heavy for flowers.”
Rachel huffed something under her breath across the room.
“How strange,” he said lightly as he took his customary chair right next to her. “Perhaps you should inspect them.”
Tucked in the center of the arrangement was a book, of all things. The sea-foam green cloth hardcover was unmarred, the binding uncracked.
“It was only just published. I thought you might enjoy it.”
“Wait just a moment,” Rachel said, her brows drawn together. “You brought her a book, and not me? That’s equitable to feeding one of your hungry children in front of the other—hardly fair at all.”
William laughed. “There’s a stack for you in the hallway—they were too large to carry in along with the flowers. The footman had to do it.”
Rachel was up and out of the room with alacrity. William glanced over at Aunt Janie—who was forever writing at her desk in the corner, and hardly paying attention—and took the opportunity to press his knee to Dahlia’s.
Dahlia pursed her lips to conceal her smile and shook her head.
With anyone else, she would have swatted them away or removed her person.
But this was William. The heat of his knee soaked through her peach silk skirts.
It was a heady thing, that slight contact.
She wondered, slightly dazed, if anyone had swooned from knee-to-knee contact.
Rachel walked in, struggling under the weight of a stack of books that nearly reached her chin. “That’s quite enough of that.”
She was a far better chaperone than Aunt Janie was. Dahlia sighed as William shifted ever so slightly away.
“Next time I shall buy her the whole damned bookshop,” he muttered.
Dahlia smiled and turned her book round in her hands. “Thank you. For the flowers and the book, I mean.”
“You’re more than welcome, though it’s I who should be thanking you this morning. I received your very generous gift, and your note.”
She murmured lowly, “I thought you could use them until our mutual acquaintance returns.”
“Thank you, Dahlia. Truly. That will help immensely. I have Abeer sorting through them now.” He swallowed and raised his eyes to hers.
His face was nearly stricken with the intensity of the emotion.
“I cannot tell you what it means to me, to be able to share that with you, to feel that I have a true partner.”
“I’m sure you have many business partners.” Her words insinuated she’d missed the central point, but the breathiness of her voice betrayed her.
His answering smile was slow. It sent a thrilling emotion through her—the closest she could come to defining it was an enticing mixture of pleasure and just a hint of panic. As if she were atop a runaway horse and yet completely safe, all at the same time.
Dahlia cleared her throat. "Speaking of business…”
"Were we?" he murmured. "Speaking of business? I thought we were speaking of something far more enjoyable than that."
She teasingly chided, "Please focus. I had a further idea for the problem."
"Oh?"
“The sketches in the trunk will only suffice for so long.” Here she made meaningful eye contact with him. “If your sisters require specialized gowns that aren’t contained within those I gave you, perhaps I could sketch them myself.”
He sat back. “You’d truly be willing to do that?”
“As long as no one knew, just as before.” Dahlia took a deep breath and forced herself to say the next, though heat stained her cheeks and it was difficult to meet his eye. “For you, I would.”
William swallowed, blinked. “The final ball of the Season is tonight.”
To anyone else, it might have seemed an abrupt change in conversation, but they both knew of what he spoke.
“Yes,” she said.
“I look forward to it more than you possibly know.”
“As do I.”