Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
Harry found she did her best thinking just before and after luncheon.
Therefore, she guarded her late mornings and her afternoons fiercely.
Yes, she had also long been in the habit of working late into the night, but most of her evenings in the aerie did not advance her work.
She did not know why that might be. She only took a few sips of wine at dinner.
Strangely, the nights Thomas spent in London were enormously productive for her. Her thoughts would flow in an unconstrained manner, and she made the most astounding connections. She even found a flaw in Euler’s proof for Fermat’s conjecture for an exponent value of three.
One night at dinner, Harry asked Thomas, “What do you do of an evening, my lord?”
“I drink. I drink far too much.”
“What else?”
“I wait for dawn.”
“I think it odd you do not go to London more. Your friends are there. And there are plentiful . . . amusements.”
“Yes, well, I want to make sure the estate is on a sound footing.”
“I do such exceedingly good work when you are away,” Harry said thoughtfully.
Thomas laughed. He laughed a little too loudly, too heartily. Had she hurt his feelings?
She watched him take a swig of wine and thought it unlikely. And then she thought it strange she would like to know she could hurt his feelings.
“Do I disturb you when I’m here?” he asked.
“No, of course not. You are quite good about letting me be and not fussing when I am in my aerie.”
Although, now that Harry thought about it, he did disturb her.
When she sat in her aerie at night, she could feel his presence in the house.
A solid presence. Warm. And . . . comforting.
But if it was comforting, why did it disturb her?
Because her thoughts would turn to him and she would lose the slippery train of thought about what might happen if none of the bases were divisible by the exponent in question, and she instead thought about his new saddle for Octavius or how he had promised to teach her to fly a kite.
Or how he had one time held her hand, lying on his bed, looking at her.
“Why should I fuss?” Thomas said. “You have been good about following Dr. Andrews’ recommendations in regards to exercise and food.”
Harry looked down at her slice of cake, now only crumbs on the plate. “Yes.”
When she and Thomas left the dining room, he to go to the library, she to go to the aerie, she laid her hand on his sleeve. “It’s regrettable you spend so many hours drinking. Surely, you could find some other way to pass the time.”
“Shall I take up Patience? Or embroidery, my lady? You know I have not the mental power for your type of fun.”
She could hear something in his voice. She took her hand off his sleeve. “I find it strange you do not read.”
“What would you have me read? Archimedes?”
Harry looked down at the carpet. She shrugged and began to walk towards the staircase. She had no weapons in her arsenal for this type of discussion. She sensed he had the power to upset her very quickly, and she did not want him to upset her.
She also did not want to upset him further.
“Why do you retreat?” He followed, covering her five paces with two of his.
She began to climb the stairs. “I think you are vexed, but I don’t know why. So goodnight!”
The next day was gray and cold, but there was no rain falling from the clouds. Harry ventured out for her morning walk, dressed in her warm, red cloak, and as she crossed the gardens, Thomas came around the corner from the stables.
“Good morning, Harry.” He fell into step next to her.
“Good morning, Thomas.”
They lapsed into silence. For Harry’s part, it was a companionable silence.
She had no emotion attached to yesterday’s exchange.
She had said something wrong—she knew she had a tendency to do that—and yet he was here and they were friends again.
She concentrated on lengthening her stride and avoiding muddy spots.
She had a thought or two about whether or not the sum of fractions in their lowest terms is not an integer if the denominator of each fraction has a factor not dividing all the remaining denominators.
She observed Jackson had not shaved Thomas this morning as carefully as he usually did, and there was a lovely little bristly bit under Thomas’ chin.
She wondered if there would be beef for luncheon.
Thomas cleared his throat. “I read something interesting last night.”
Harry skirted a puddle.
Thomas continued, “I do not love a man, except I hate his vices, because those vices are the enemies, and the destruction of that friend whom I love.”
Harry leaned over to brush a clinging burr from her cloak.
“John Donne,” Thomas said.
“I’m surprised you were reading his sermons,” Harry said. “He has some rather bawdy verse.”
Thomas smiled a little. “Well, I suppose that might be what I will read tonight.”
Quite without meaning to, Harry said, “Perhaps we might read together.”
That is how Harry found herself opening her bedchamber door that very evening to Thomas, who had Alexander Pope’s translation of the Iliad under his arm. Harry reflected that Thomas had likely thought better of Donne’s rather intimate poems. Not fit for a man and his virgin wife.
“I remember from my boyhood that the Iliad is very good stuff, indeed. You might like an epic, Harry.”
She did.
So Harry gave up her evenings in the aerie in favor of a cozy fire in her bedchamber, a glass of cordial, and listening to her husband read. Some nights, the Iliad. Some nights, a collection of verse and Shakespeare’s sonnets. Thomas asked Harry to read to him, but she demurred.
“My eyes are tired after a day in the aerie,” she said.
And she liked to sit in her chair and let Thomas’ voice wash over her. Of course, she remembered every word he said, but she found she also experienced pleasure from just the sound of his voice. Velvet, she thought, with a little coarse sandiness on the edges. Just like how he looks.
What she didn’t like were the dreams she had afterwards. She didn’t understand them. She didn’t like what she didn’t understand.
The last weeks of winter were mild. Dr. Andrews no longer came to see Harry regularly. She was so well, and he was exceedingly busy as there were still so many cases of pneumonia and influenza in the environs of Sommerleigh.
Instead, Thomas joined Harry on her morning walks.
Once or twice, she stumbled so he might catch her, and her body would be against his, if only for a moment.
His hands on her waist, her chest brushing his.
Perhaps it was more than once or twice she did this.
In truth, she limited herself to once every other day.
Or only twice out of every three days. Certainly, never twice in the same day.
She did not want him to worry she was developing a disorder that made her clumsy. She also did not want to fall.
But he always caught her.
Harry worried aloud that Octavius was neglected, but Thomas promised he rode the stallion faithfully every day near dawn and in the afternoons.
“I see. A large part of the life of an earl is making sure the inhabitants of his estate get adequate exercise.”
“Yes.” Thomas laughed. “That is my principal function.”
Sometimes they talked over what he had read to her the night before. Sometimes they talked of the woods and fields and birds they saw. They did not discuss mathematics as she did with the doctor. She knew he had no interest. Or no understanding. One or the other.
But one morning, she said, “When next you go to London, will you find me a book on the calculus by Lacroix? There is a translation by Babbage and Peacock and Herschel. I very much want it.”
“Yes,” Thomas said. “I have not been to London in many weeks. But the next time I go, I promise I’ll look for the book.”
Then she stumbled, and his large hands and strong arms caught her.