Nobody expected a soldier to worry about social niceties and hurt feelings, did they?
Chapter twenty-one
Ormdale
Violetmanagedtoslipback to Gwen’s old bedroom to top up her night with a few more hours of sleep before Una woke up.She didn’t want Una catching her sleeping outside the nursery door again.
Even though Una was clearly no longer a mere slip of a thing, Violet couldn’t quite cure herself of the notion that Una ought to be protected.
“You must try very hard not to hurt Una,”Gwen used to say to her when they were children.She said this to Violet quite regularly.And Violet did try, really she did—the problem was that Una was so veryhurtable,like a snail without a shell, and Violet often did not realise she had hurt her until it was too late.
Over the past two years, Violet had occasionally told herself that her leaving must prove a good thing for Una—that Una would blossom and expand without Violet to bother her.
But coming down to breakfast and finding Una already there with shadowed eyes and a plate of untouched food, Violet could not stop herself from wondering if her sister had slept or eaten properly since the brutal attack on her by a stranger.She was, in fact, amazed that her sister had sprung back so quickly from it.
Their father had been of a different mind than Gwen.He used to roar and shout at his daughters to toughen them up.In his view, there was no place for ‘shrinking violets’ at Wormwood Abbey (a statement that had made Violet burst into ill-judged laughter).
Una’s toast with its thin smear of jam lay untouched.Oolong eyed it from Una’s lap.Violet was exasperated at herself.What business was it of hers if Una ate her toast or not?
“I half expected you to be gone this morning,” Una said over her teacup, and Violet realised she had been staring.
“You keep saying things like that,” Violet observed.“Is it a hint?You know I’m no good at hints.”
Una broke her toast into pieces and fed it to Oolong.“Yes, I remember.”
She could hear the irritation in Una’s voice, and something more that Violet hadn’t the first idea how to name, much less fix.
Violet picked up a plate from the sideboard to serve with food.She wasn’t good at fixing things.It was easier to just keep moving and trying new things.
But behind it all, Violet had always believed that she could come back to Ormdale and simply pick up where she had left off.
It had taken only two days to knock that idea out of her head.
“I should warn you that Uncle George got back from Windsor late last night,” said Una.
Violet jumped and gave a wild look round the room.
“He’s not hiding behind the urn,” said Una.“He’s waiting in the library for you.”
All at once, Violet lost her appetite for the great mound of scrambled eggs she had accumulated.
“Best get it over with,” she mumbled.
She left the plate and the dining room.
Halfway down the passage, she stopped.What if she just went out to the stables, purloined a pony, and made off with it?The pony could be left at the station in Embsay with a note.Then a ticket to anywhere—a new place with new people who didn’t look at her like Una did.Like Uncle George soon would.
Violet could almost taste the wind on her face.
Then she remembered the dark undercurrent beneath Una’s brittle words, and Violet knew that if she did run away again, she could never, ever come back.
Violet forced herself to go up the stairs to the library.
What was the use of knocking?She opened the door and stepped into shafts of morning light, dancing with dust.
For a moment, she saw her uncle suspended in time, his hands knotted together on the desk, eyes closed.
“I—I’m sorry,” she stammered, and then added stupidly, “you’re praying.”
