Rosie, a moment later, hand still tangled in her own lock of hair, managed: “The meadows are so inspiring.”
“And yet, I cannot help but notice you are not painting them.” Otto looked over the canvases on the easels, both of which were filled with apples. He leaned forward with an extended fingertip, as if to test the paint’s wetness.
“Nature is inspiring to one’s senses,” I called, my tone a reprimand, “no matter the focus of the piece. Is it not?”
Otto straightened and turned to Simeon. “We’ll lose daylight.”
“Good gods.” Simeon sighed, pushing himself up off the carpet. “The carriage will take them.” He turned to me, conspiratorially. “I’m afraid we seem to have upset dear Otto’s plans, but then Otto is invariably upset by almost everything I do. If I were to do as he suggested, every one of my days would be boring. I’m afraid you’ll have to settle for a ride in my carriage. And I will see you all at the ball.”
I matched his tone. “There is nothing boring about a ride in a prince’s carriage—even if he is not inside of it.”
Otto grunted and turned on his heel.
Making promises of having our chaise returned to us—Arno was led by an attendant who was to follow—Simeon himself handed us up into his carriage, which was every bit as opulent inside as its exterior. He paused for a moment at the open door, offering his well-wishes, which we accepted and returned with our thanks, and then a moment later the door was closed and we lurched forward. I stoppedRosie and Mathilde from speaking by raising a finger to my lips. We clutched one another’s hands and squeezed—grasping, grasping, at our wonderful turn of fortune. There was a world of riches and splendor, inaccessible to most, that shone so brightly. But we had just touched it—Rosie was still twisting that same lock of hair—and could see the sheen on our fingertips.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
We repeated our story breathlessly to Wenthelen and Alice and, I am sure, individually picked it apart and wove it again as we lay in our beds that night, each with our own details to hold and examine. How the sun caught on a golden carriage. How a lock of hair shone when twisted around a finger. How the air itself shifted and melted, reducing the entire world down to the size of one carpet.
During our picnic, as I watched the prince alternate between teasing each of my daughters, I had asked myself what either—or any woman—had to intrigue a man in his position. Beauty was a given, but even the most splendid trifles can lose their allure when countless trifles are on offer. My girls had no money, but a prince needed none. An accomplished woman—one well read and properly trained and polite and virtuous—was appealing in words but perhaps not in flesh. But I had seen—had felt—a flash of interest in his eyes. The way he had fingered Rosie’s hair.
Perhaps it was only the removal of life at court. The placement of two women in pretty dresses in an empty field. It had also occurred tome, as Simeon moved his attention from Rosamund to Mathilde and back again, that it might have been the very contrast, the tension of two, the attention of two, that had worked in their favor.
Either way, my instincts were right. Two days after the picnic, a gift arrived.
All of us were in the hall: In one corner, Rosie pinned Mathilde’s hem. At the table, Wenthelen tied little bundles of herbs with a ball of twine beside Alice, who was repairing a basket. Even Elin, who had made herself scarce since we’d had words, was nearby, kneeling at the hearth and using a scoop to fill her ash box.
“The other thing,” Rosie said, apropos of nothing, “is that he handed us into the carriage. He did not have to do so. He might have had one of his footmen do it, but he chose to help us himself.”
“He didn’t gift you his carriage; he just held your hand as you climbed into it.” Mathilde frowned down at the top of Rosie’s head.
“I think he seemed lonely.” Rosie ignored her sister. “A kind of sadness about his eyes. But it detracted from his looks not a little.”
“Maybe it’s that he doesn’t know who to trust,” Mathilde mumbled.
“Yes!” Rosie agreed. “Exactly.”
Mathilde turned so Rosie could get to the next section of the hem. “What with everyone fawning over him everywhere he goes.”
“He knew he could trustusbecause there was no artifice,” Rosie protested. “He stumbled upon us in a field!”
“No artifice,” snorted Alice, without looking up.
Wenthelen paused her bundling and squeezed Alice’s knee. “Let them enjoy it.”
“Thegirlshad no artifice.” I paused the stitching in my lap and narrowed my eyes at Alice.
She returned the expression, placing one of her hands on top of Wenthelen’s. “You gained a prince but lost a chaise. What now?”
“A trade anyone in their right mind would make.” I stabbed my needle into the cloth in front of me.
“And what will that right-minded lady do next Thursday, when there is no chaise to take to market?”
Over at the hearth, Elin let out a sneeze, sending a cloud of dust into the air. Mathilde stepped backward, into Rosie, to protect her dress. “Watch yourself!” she exclaimed, as Rosie let out a yelp of pain.
“I cannot help it!” Elin cried.
“If you did not make such little scoops,” Wenthelen suggested, “you might finish sooner. Just as I showed you.”
