Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
“Thank you again. I shall see you next week,” Gerald said, holding a damp cloth to his hand and massaging his fingers. Clara had almost noticed, and that wouldn’t do. It wouldn’t do at all.
“Who was that?” Eleanor asked. Gerald quickly clasped his hands behind his back, the damp cloth locked between his palms. He offered a forced smile, hoping she wouldn’t see the tense crinkling by his eyes.
“I thought you were visiting your friends in Richmond?”
“Poppy had to reschedule, but I am going this afternoon. Was that Clara? Did I miss her?”
“No, but I’m just about to get ready to go and visit St. Margaret’s,” he said. Eleanor stared at him, waiting for him to answer her question. When he didn’t, she furrowed her brow.
“Why won’t you tell me who was at the door?”
“It was nobody, just a business matter. It’s nothing you need to concern yourself with. Make sure you are home in good time tonight, and I shall see you for dinner,” Gerald said, marching away to escape the conversation before Eleanor could press any further.
He deftly moved his hands in front of him as he turned his back to her, making sure he kept his secrets to himself.
“How is everything coming along, Mr. Gleeson?” Gerald called out as he entered the grounds of St. Margaret’s. Mr. Gleeson jumped up and gestured to the men around him to rise as well. They had all been lounging on sacks of bricks and piles of stones.
“All’s well, Your Grace. Ev’rythin is proceedin’ as it should,” he called back, the look on his face suggesting that he had been caught taking an unscheduled break.
“Very good. Please continue. I have been impressed with your work ethic so far,” Gerald said, making the point that he would be watching Gleeson and his men carefully, and would not be content to have them steal time from him.
The door to St. Margaret’s had been left ajar.
Gerald knocked and pushed the door open.
There was no response. He called out Clara’s name, so he assumed they were in the garden.
He passed by one of the sitting rooms and saw that Agatha was draped over the couch, snoring softly.
She had a hat clutched in her hands, one that had clearly suffered at the Duke’s teeth.
As he ventured into the garden, he stepped into a world of sweetness and warmth. The sounds that greeted him were joyful. Duke rushed around, chased by the stream of four children.
Clara was sitting on the grass nearby, watching intently.
Her legs were tucked beneath her body, and one hand lay across her thigh, while the other leaned against the ground.
A few strands of hair escaped her pins, and the gentle wind tugged at them.
Gerald’s heart stilled, although he then tensed every muscle around the core of his body, wanting to rid himself of this sorcery.
Growing closer, he noticed that a blanket was laid out.
Sophia noticed him first and waved, but her gentle greeting was quickly overwhelmed by the others.
Teddy and Emily rushed up to him and grabbed a hand each, dragging him to the blanket.
Duke bounded around him, sensing the children’s excitement and wanting to be a part of it.
Oliver was already making him a plate of food.
Clara turned softly, a hesitant smile upon her face.
When he looked at her, he couldn’t help but think of the moment in the maze when she had been so close to him, when his fingers brushed against her cheek, and he had been lost in her eyes more desperately than he had been lost in the maze.
“You’ve come just in time for the picnic!” Oliver exclaimed.
“There isn’t much left. The children have seen to that, but you’re welcome to join us,” Clara said.
“I’d be happy to,” Gerald replied, sinking to the ground near Clara. Duke came up to him and started licking his cheeks. The children found this incredibly funny. Even Clara was chuckling. They soon started running about again, none of them able to stay still for very long.
“I don’t know which of them has more energy.”
“They all bring out the best in each other, or the worst, depending on your point of view,” Clara said with a wry smile.
“Will you come and pick wild berries with us?” Emily asked, her gaze darting between Gerald and Clara. They shared a glance. Clara quickly reminded them which berries were safe to eat and which ones should be avoided.
“And don’t let Duke eat any of them. He’ll get very poorly if he does,” Clara said.
The children nodded dutifully and raced off to the thick woodland area that stood at the base of the property.
Sophia carried the now-empty picnic basket, and the others started to pluck berries from the bushes.
They sang as they went along, Emily boasting that her height would allow her to pick the most berries.
However, Oliver was an industrious boy, and he didn’t mind suffering a few scratches in search of the berries. While Emily reached higher, Oliver reached deeper than all of them and found the most abundant clusters of ripe and juicy berries, much to Emily’s dismay.
Gerald and Clara walked behind them for a while until they reached an old oak tree. Its roots emerged from the ground in certain places, and the long branches offered shade from the sun. Clara smoothed her dress beneath her legs and perched upon a thick root. Gerald did the same.
“They’ll be racing around these woods for hours. I don’t think there’s any need to chase after them for the moment,” Clara said.
The laughter, rustling, and yapping became a distant sound.
“I’m not sure I can recall the last time I had nothing important to do on an afternoon.”
“Have you ever allowed yourself one?”
“I don’t believe I know how. When I’m at rest I feel guilty. As though I should be making better use of my time.”
“Sometimes resting is the best thing to do. We all need moments to reflect and compose ourselves. If we are constantly in motion, then we never have time to appreciate our surroundings.”
“You are quite right, of course, yet it is one thing to know this, and another to understand it. I have been this way for so long that it has become a habit.”
“Habits can be unlearned, even though it can be difficult.”
“I’m not sure I want to unlearn it. If I have too many afternoons like this, I don’t know what I’d do with myself.”
Clara laughed softly and placed her hand along the root, moving her fingers along the gnarled wood.
“The point is that you don’t have to do anything. You can simply be. It is no bad thing to be alone with our thoughts,” Clara said.
Gerald nodded sagely.
“Unless our thoughts are troubled,” he murmured, and immediately wished they hadn’t slipped between his lips.
“Are yours?” she asked, because of course she did. Clara never wasted an opportunity to test him, but he was not inclined to share his thoughts on this occasion. Instead, he decided to change the subject.
“Did you always see yourself spending your life at St. Margaret’s?”
“Not always, but when I learned the importance of it I decided that I was in the best position to help Grandmother. My aunts were willing, but they all have children of their own. Beatrice is not yet old enough to realize that things like this are important. It helped distract me from the ton.”
“Ah yes, because a lord of high rank did not come and sweep you off your feet,” Gerald said, intending to tease her, although it seemed to have the opposite effect. Clara drew her hand back to her lap and looked down, a serious expression coming upon her face.
“I never wanted a grand title. I never even wanted a large estate. All I wanted was a family to call my own. You may find this silly, but when I grew up there were so many children being born. I held them all, watched over them all, cared for them all, but the thing that struck me most was that I always had to hand them back. I loved them dearly, but they were never mine and I just wondered, for once, what it would be like to hold a child that I did not have to return to someone else.”
“That doesn’t strike me as silly at all. It seems entirely rational. It’s good that you found a family here,” he said.
Clara smiled, but it was a forlorn one. “Even that is only temporary.”
“What do you mean? The lease has been extended. St. Margaret’s will not be closed,” he said, wondering if there had been a significant misunderstanding on her part. Clara sighed and shook her head, then looked up. She placed both hands on her knees and gazed at the leafy foliage above.
“The lease has been extended, but their childhood won’t be. Either they will find homes, or they will grow old enough that they will have to find their place in the world. One day they will all leave.”
There was a tremendous sadness to her voice. It struck a chord in Gerald’s heart, and all he wanted in that moment was to move beside her and put his arms around her.
Clara had such a big, loving heart. It was a brave thing to let so much love flow in her direction because it meant that inevitably she was going to be crushed.
It was a cruel irony that she had spent years finding families for others, yet had been prevented from finding one for herself.
And now he was contributing to that, taking up so much of her precious time.
“Clara,” he said, about to say something foolish again.
Her gaze fell. Their eyes met. A tingling sensation danced down the back of his neck. He had never been more acutely aware of the distance between them.
Every instinct in his body wanted to close it, wanted to pull her close again just as they had been when they were dancing, when they were standing on the bridge, and she had almost fallen.
So many moments they had stolen, yet they weren’t enough, not yet, not when he was yet to taste the sweetness of her lips.
There was so much burning inside him, and he could not keep it contained.
He could not control it.
It was all going to burst out, and he would have to damn the rules and damn propriety because-