It was tempting to keep her distance from Matthew. But she did not want to be constantly dithering, and she did not want to be forever shaping her behavior to what other people expected of her—as she had done all her life until very recently. She had decided on the last day they had spent time together, just before Owen arrived home, that from now on she was going to live the life she wanted to live and cultivate the friendships she chose, regardless of general expectations. She had come home from her parents’ house yesterday encouraged that they supported her wholeheartedly. If Matthew had decided differently—was that why he looked as he did this evening?—then she would accept his decision.
Some of the guests were wandering into the drawing room. Clarissa went there too with Eluned Rhys and Mrs. Holland and looked around. Owen was over by the window in the midst of an animated group that included Clarence, Ariel, and Edwina and James Rutledge, younger son and daughter of the Hardingtons. Marian and Charles Ware were seated to one side of the hearth, in conversation with Lady Hardington.
“Shall we join them?” Eluned said.
But Clarissa could see that Matthew was coming into the room, his hands empty, alone for the moment. He looked about at those gathered there with his usual quiet, amiable expression, and it wasprobable no one but Clarissa realized that tonight for some reason he was out of sorts. She stayed where she was, not far inside the door, as Eluned and Mrs. Holland made their way over to join Charles’s group.
She turned and smiled at Matthew, leaving him room to nod pleasantly and join one of the groups if he wished. He hesitated, but then he came toward her.
“Clarissa,” he said, and immediately she felt a change in the atmosphere around them. It was nothing dramatic. Conversations continued, apparently without interruption, and no one turned to look specifically at the two of them as they moved away from the door and went to stand beside the grand pianoforte in the corner beside the window. But Clarissa did not believe she was imagining the sharpening of interest from those around them.
“You were right,” she said. “The table is a bit of a monstrosity, though the skill with which it has been carved makes one largely unaware of the fact. It might also be called magnificent without either irony or bias. Besides, you have made Prudence very happy indeed. I have never seen her so…ebullient.”
“Any self-respecting ancient Greek would have an apoplexy at the mere sight of it,” he said, and they both laughed. Heads turned their way with unabashed curiosity.
“I am so glad to see you this evening,” she said. “It has been almost a week since I watched your last archery practice and showed you where I hope to have a dower house built. Owen arrived, and we were unable to take a proper leave of each other and arrange another meeting. Assuming you wished for another, that is. Have you practiced archery since?”
“No,” he said.
“I am sorry about that,” she said. “Tomorrow is Thursday again.Will you practice and then come to the house to take tea with me? If the weather is warm enough, I will have it brought out to the rose arbor in the courtyard. The roses are beginning to bloom, and the scent of them is heavenly.”
He frowned, and it seemed to Clarissa that he was not paying full attention to what she was saying. Was he finding it so difficult to say no?
“I will not come to the poplar alley to distract you,” she said. “And I cannot promise that Owen will not join us for tea. But I refuse not to invite you for that reason. Matthew, what is it?”
“Mmm?” he asked. “What is what? I am sorry, Clarissa. It is noisy in here.”
There was a hum of conversation. It was no noisier than usual for such social gatherings, however. Besides, they were standing a little apart from any other group. Clarissa waited until he closed his eyes briefly, inhaled audibly, and then looked fully at her for the first time.
“It was all Reginald’s doing,” he said without any clarifying explanation.
“Ah,” she said. “His son was to call upon you yesterday, was he not? You mean it was your brother who sent him to see you? Or…stopped him from coming?”
“He came,” he said. “Philip, that is. His wife came with him. Emily. No, I was talking about thirty years ago, after I had left home and gone off to Europe. My grandmother’s will, leaving everything to me instead of to Reginald as she had always intended and my father and brother had always expected. It was not her idea to change it. She must have been openly hostile to doing so, in fact. Reginald not only had to ask her to change it, he pleaded with her. More than half my life has been built upon a lie I told myself—thatnone of them cared, that none of them truly loved me. Reggie gave up his most prized and enduring dream for my sake.”
“Oh, Matthew.” She squeezed his hand, remembered where they were, and released it again.
“How am I ever going to forgive myself?” he asked, gazing at her with intent, troubled eyes and looking very like the boy she remembered.
Unfortunately this was neither the time nor the place to continue this conversation.
“I will expect you for tea tomorrow,” she said. “Practice first and then come. We will talk.”
She smiled at him before turning away to join Alan Roberts, the schoolteacher, and his wife, Sally, Cameron Holland’s sister. When she looked a minute or so later, Matthew was part of a group with Colonel Wexford and the Reverend Danver and was looking, outwardly at least, his usual placid, cheerful self.
—
Matthew had intended to make a start on the crib for Ben Ellis’s baby the following day, but he found he could not concentrate or make up his mind about a few details of the design. Should he carve the elephant in relief on the footboard, large and complete and smiling and jolly? Or should he have it peeping over the top of the footboard? But from the inside the child would see only the ears, the eyes, and the trunk. It might look funny, but it was possible the peering eyes might disturb the child’s sleep.
Stupidly, he was paralyzed by indecision. Yet he had to decide that one detail before he could feel ready to start on any part of the project.
He spent most of the morning dithering and allowing his mindto wander in a dozen different directions. He went early to the poplar alley in the afternoon. He felt in desperate need of the archery practice to restore focus to his mind and peace to his being. He shot twenty rounds of arrows. A disturbing number came nowhere close to the bull’s-eye. A frustrating number came close but not close enough. At least one arrow in each round did not even make the target.
He ought to have given up, he decided wearily, when, after ten or fifteen minutes, he had failed to get himself to that place or nonplace of no-thought he needed to be before he shot his arrows. His mind steadfastly refused to get out of his way. The smiling elephant of his earlier imagination had turned into a leering gargoyle.
After the twentieth round, he picked up one of his arrows from the ground where it had landed and snapped it in two. He had even been counting rounds, he realized, something he never did because counting was an activity of the conscious mind.
He was in no state to take tea in the courtyard of Ravenswood Hall, in a rose arbor of all places. He would be better off at home with his door shut and locked, drinking his overstrong tea and eating a slice of the fruitcake left over from Philip and Emily’s visit. Except that he was not hungry. Or thirsty. More reasons he ought to go home anyway instead of up to the house.
