“I would have to leaveyou,” Agnes said.
Dora looked over her shoulder at her.
“I am a big girl,” she said. “And I was alone here for a number of years before you came.Whydo you hesitate? Does it have anything to do with Mother?”
Agnes’s knees almost gave way beneath her—for the second time in one day. Theyneverspoke of their mother.
“Of course not,” she said. “Why should it?”
Dora continued to look at her without turning fully to face her.
“You must not consider me, Agnes,” she said. “I chose my course in life. It ismylife. I have done with it what I have wanted to do, and I am happy with it. I was happy before you came, I have been happy since you came, and I will be happy if you should ever choose to leave. You haveyourlife to live. You cannot live mine too—and you do not need to live Mother’s. If you love him...”
But she stopped without completing the thought, shook her head, and turned back to what she had been doing. Agnes suspected there might be tears in her eyes.
“I should have come back here instead of going for coffee,” Agnes said. “You have not left any weeds for me.”
“Oh, look again tomorrow,” Dora said, “or even later this afternoon. One thing this world is never short of is weeds.”
***
It was Imogen’s turn that night. It did not happen often. She was always very well in control of her thoughts and emotions. Almost always, anyway. People who did not know her as well as her fellow Survivors did might assume that her marble exterior went right through to her heart. And even to them she did not reveal much of herself these days except an undying affection for the six of them and an unwavering readiness to support them in any way she could. It would have been easy to assume she was healed, except that none of them ever made that mistake. Of all of their wounds, hers went deepest and were the least likely to heal. Ever.
“I hope,” she said, “I did not make an utter idiot of myself this morning.”
“Everyone assumed you had tramped about and stood about for too long, Imogen,” Hugo assured her. “Everyone loves a frail lady.”
“What a ghastly image,” she said, but she looked relieved nevertheless.
Apparently, when they had stopped outside the gamekeeper’s hut this morning to listen to the estate manager’s account of something or other, Imogen had collapsed to the ground in an insensible heap, and various persons had gone running for a chair and water while Hugo scooped her up in his arms and Ralph fanned her face with a large handkerchief.
“The door of the hut was propped open,” she explained. “Anyone might have got inside. Children...”
“But the gamekeeper was right there,” Ben pointed out.
“And he always keeps the door locked when he is not,” Vincent added. “One lock is at the very top of the door, well out of the reach of any child. I have a firm policy on safety. Everyone knows it.”
“I know, Vincent,” Imogen said. “I am so sorry. Iknowyour employees are not careless. I really do not know what came over me. I see guns all the time. I have made myself see them. I have even been out shooting. George has taken me three times now, and one of those times I actually fired my gun.”
She shuddered and covered her face with her hands.
“I looked at those guns this morning,” she continued, “and I suddenly saw them pointing at my face with no one behind them. They were just waiting for me to reach around and take hold and fire.”
She was gasping for breath, and Flavian walked up behind her and set a hand against the back of her neck while Vincent, seated beside her, fumbled for her knee and patted it.
“Will Ineverforget?” she asked. “Willnoneof us ever forget?”
“No, we will not,” George said, his voice quite cool and matter-of-fact. “But neither will you ever forget that he loved you, Imogen.”
“Dicky?” she said. “Yes, he did.”
“Or that you loved him.”
“Did I?” She tipped her head downward, and Flavian massaged her shoulders lightly with both hands while Vincent patted her knee. “I had a strange way of showing it.”
“No,” Vincent said. “It was thebestway anyone could possibly show love, Imogen.”
She made a choking sound but then pulled herself together and lowered her hands and looked as calm as ever.
