Chapter Seven
As she let Edie into her room, Cosima tried to compare the brand-new and confusing emotions detonating inside of her body to any other feelings she had ever had before.
She failed so miserably that she reverted to her adolescent self, leaning in the doorway with her phone while she pretended to be cool and unbothered.
“There’s the box,” she said. “I need to send a few texts.” She leaned in a manner she hoped seemed insouciant.
“That’s too bad, because I was going to ask you to film the unboxing for me. Oh! Too late, I’m in.” Edie dug through the tissue paper.
With a deep breath through her nose, Cosima did as Edie had suggested and sent off a quick explanation about the guest book to Duncan, with pictures of the coded page and her notebook.
He wrote back immediately, though it was ungodly early in California.
Fascinating! Your thinking of the Cistercian monks was absolutely brill. You have your mother’s luck with vacations, my love. Enjoy the magic.
Duncan’s text made her throat go tight. With love.
With guilt inspired by Morag’s not-so-veiled question.
Cosima was the shepherdess, smashed apart, looking for what part of her mother was inside of her to tell her what to do.
She was an adventurer, trying to solve puzzles and ciphers and needing Duncan to tell her it was okay.
“Oof.”
She looked up from her phone at Edie’s muffled grunt. It took a long moment to process the sight of Edie pulling her oversized, faded sweatshirt over her head, revealing a ribbed tank that bunched up over her belly. She had a pierced navel with glittery jewelry.
“I don’t think these sleeves will fit into the jacket,” she said by way of explanation. Her long hair lifted in static in some places and poured over her now-bare shoulders and between her breasts in others.
Edie took the jacket out of its tissue paper and slid her arms into the soft, gray-green hemp tweed. Cosima would have gotten wool, but she knew Edie was vegan. It fit perfectly, darted in the right places, pockets at the hip, the collar framing her face as Cosima had imagined.
Without thinking, she crossed the room, stepped behind Edie, and swept her hand under her nape to free the long ribbons of her hair from the jacket.
When she tugged them out, the sensation was silk-on-silk against her hands.
She smoothed the long, dark length of indulgently soft hair down Edie’s back.
Edie shuddered. Probably anyone would at the feel of their hair being lifted and pulled at their nape. But the small shudder shook Cosima … awake.
Edie turned around and smoothed her hands down the front of her jacket. “Well, I know I haven’t ever worn anything so pretty. I’m so glad I asked you to take a walk.”
This would be the moment to tell her that the jacket wasn’t transactional. That she’d felt a lot of pleasure shopping for it. Buying it. That she was glad Edie was here.
And so, of course, Cosima grabbed her own jacket from the end of the bed. “Are you ready?”
Edie grinned, and, for now, the too-big feelings dissipated in the excitement.
Cosima was glad to be in the big outside, tromping and squelching their way across this field. Soft, wet spring grass soaked the cuffs of her jacket when she reached down to touch it. The sky was low over the softly rolling hills, the grass at mid-calf, the weather perfectly cool and sunny.
Another world from Los Angeles. A different life.
But she didn’t hate it.
“It makes sense that we’d have to go through fields to find a stile.
” Edie’s voice broke through the almost frantic layers of birdsong.
“But don’t you think there’s been a lot of walking through fields?
If I had walked this far through any field in Wisconsin, I would’ve already been shot.
Or at least barked at by a poorly trained dog. ”
Cosima stumbled over a stone. “I can never tell if you’re serious.”
“Why? You live in America. Be careful, there’s a lot of those big stones now that the grass is thicker. Also, does it smell like sheep? Is it this jacket?”
“Of course not, it’s—”
“—holy fucking shit!”
Edie went down in the grass, and then there was an enormous flurry of movement and an improbable, complaining baaa-aaa-aa.
“Edie!” Cosima parted the grass in front of her with her hands.
A black-faced sheep looked up balefully from its position on its side next to Edie, who was on her ass on the ground, trying to avoid being kicked by the sheep as it attempted to right itself. “It just came up on me! Right against my hip! Goddammit!”
Edie hiked herself to her feet just as the sheep hopped up, and then it turned and butted her in the stomach.
“Hey! Hey!” She backed up. “I did nothing. This is your field, right? Look where you’re going!”
The sheep backed up again, pawing at the ground with one of its front hooves, and put its head down. Cosima grabbed her arm. “Run, Edie! Run!”
She dragged Edie beside her, stumbling over the wet, stony earth through grass that grabbed and tangled at their wellies.
The sheep tramped along behind them, neither slow nor fast but huffing alarmingly, udders swaying.
Cosima was just beginning to wonder if the combined strength of two American women who were not at the peak of fitness would be sufficient to outlast one nettled English ewe when she heard a long, low whistle.
Turning toward it, she spotted a shape arrowing at them through the grass.
It burst into view, a black-and-white sheepdog circling the ewe to come to a stop in the space between them, where it got low to the ground and laid its ears flat.
Cosima heard another whistle. The dog feinted toward the ewe. She ran away, bleating with irritation.
A woman appeared, walking toward them from the direction the dog had come from. She gave them a jocular wave. “Don’t mind her!” she shouted. “She’s been a bit terrible since having her lambs.”
The person was as tall as Cosima, with salt-and-pepper hair cut blunt along her chin. Her fossil of a blue sweater had darned elbows. She put her pinkies in her mouth and let out another sharp whistle. “Linda!”
Another disturbance in the grass signaled the dog’s return, and then there Linda was, dropping to the ground and putting her head between her paws at the feet of the woman.
“That was amazing,” Edie said, still out of breath from running. “What a great dog!”
“Oh, well. Linda does all right. Her mum, now, Linda Senior, was something else. Swear she read my mind.” The woman put her hands on her hips. “You two must be Morag’s guests. I’m Thorberta Fernsby, but everyone calls me Bert, of course.”
“Of course,” Cosima found herself whispering. Edie had moved half a step in front of her. Whether this choice was due to Edie’s extroversion or an attempt to prevent Cosima from being recognized, she couldn’t be sure.
“Sorry I crashed into your sheep,” Edie said. “I didn’t even see her!”
Bert laughed, crossing her arms and bending over as if Edie had the wit of the ages.
“Bert, I hope we’re not trespassing.” Cosima stepped beside Edie, extending her hand and being rewarded with the brief clasp of Bert’s firm, powerful grip.
“I’m Cosima Frank, and this is Edie Whitelock.
You’re correct, we’re guests at Gregory Place.
Morag assured us it was permitted to walk through the fields. ”
“Oh, that’s right, isn’t it?” Bert didn’t react in any way to Cosima’s name.
“These fields belong to the sheep, as you found out for yourself. Won’t be long before they can’t sneak about in the grass with their lambs.
They’ll have it grazed down, and summer will have begun in earnest, poppies crimson and showy in the ditches like ribbons along the roads.
” Bert let out a short, happy sigh. “Lincolnshire at her finest.”
Neither Cosima nor Edie had a ready response to this unexpected poetical reverie, but Bert seemed satisfied to listen to the birdsong and enjoy the light breeze for a moment. Both of them jumped when she suddenly clapped her hands together. “You’ll be looking for Hermione’s Stile.”
“How did you know that?!” Edie exclaimed. “Who told you?”
Bert only crossed her arms and threw her a broad wink.
Cosima wondered if it made her a bad person that she’d so quickly had her fill of Bert. She wanted to get back to the part of this day that was just her and Edie and the open countryside. “Would you be able to point us in the correct direction?”
“The map wasn’t exactly specific,” Edie added.
“There was one of those tiny rulers to measure the space and convert it to how many miles to go, but I don’t really understand how to measure the distance for yourself once you’re in the place and not using the map.
I think we’ve been walking across this field for a half mile-ish. ”
“Edie’s navigating has been quite helpful,” Cosima said, because she didn’t want Bert to get the wrong impression. “I think we only need a last point to get us there.”
Bert’s smile showed off the glint of gold crowns. “In the end, you might need a bit more than a point. That’s what I think. But I reckon you’ll find quite a bit of what you’re looking for, and maybe more than you can believe possible.”
“Do you mean the treasure?” Edie stage-whispered. She gazed up at Bert with eyes that had gone so green, they matched the grass.
“For heaven’s sake.” Cosima pressed both of her palms to her temples. “Hermione’s Stile?”
Bert gestured to a wide-limbed tree hulking over a low dip in the field some fifty yards away. “You’ll have seen that on your map. Harrington’s oak, it’s called.”
“We’re close!” Edie exclaimed. “On the map, the stile is only one length of the tiny ruler past the tree!”
“About that,” Bert agreed. “Lucky for you, the weather will be nice and clear all day in the event you may need to venture a bit farther.”
“We should go, then,” Cosima said. “Bert, it was lovely meeting you. Thank you for your help.”