As they reached the end of the shops and cottages that ringed the village square and crossed Westcote Bridge, heading toward the farms and homesteads dotted about the countryside surrounding Little Kissington, silence stretched between the sisters.
It hadn’t been all that many years since Gemma was the same age as Lucy, although in many ways it felt like another lifetime.It was odd to find herself so uncertain how to broach a conversation with her own sister now.
As they walked along the hard-packed dirt road, Gemma remembered the cheerful little whirlwind Lucy had been as a toddler.She used to run after Gemma and clutch at her skirts to be included in games and pursuits she was far to small to enjoy.Nothing had deterred her, and Gemma had always given in with a laugh, pulling the much younger girl up on her horse with her, or showing her how to bowl the ball across the lawn so that it hit the jack on the first try.
Then Gemma had made her debut.She’d learned what Society thought of a girl born to a scandalous union between a duke and a nursery maid.And shortly thereafter, she’d devoted herself to scandalizing the Almack’s patronesses while dazzling the racy set into crowning her their unofficial queen.She’d barely been home for more than the time it took to sleep and dress since.
In an attempt to bridge the silent chasm between them, Gemma asked, “Have you heard much from your friends back home yet?”
“No.”
Gemma frowned.“I thought they were meant to be sending you those gossip pages you love to read.”
Lucy shrugged a sullen shoulder.“Why should they?I haven’t written to them.”
Gemma was starting to remember another characteristic she herself had also exhibited at this age.Intractable sulkiness.“Why on earth not?”
Shrugging again, Lucy ignored her in favor of settling her bonnet more firmly on her head.The early afternoon sun trickled through the brilliantly green branches with their profusion of new leaves and buds, arching over the wide road like a cathedral.
“You should write to them,” Gemma advised as she stepped around a deep rut, glad that she’d worn a pair of sturdy kid half-boots rather than silk slippers this time.“You’ve been working so hard.You’ll feel all the better for remembering you have a life outside of this place; that is what will make all these difficulties worth the trouble, in the end.”
“I don’t want to write to them.”
Patience thinning, Gemma shook her head to dislodge a buzzing bumble bee from the brim of her caramel-colored straw hat .“Fine.Then don’t.But then do not be surprised when you continue to feel miserable.”
“I’m not miserable!”
“You certainly aren’t happy.”
“Ugh, I’m fine, Gemma!Not everyone can be happy all the time!”
“Certainly not with that attitude.”Gemma huffed.“I’ve always found that happiness takes a lot more effort than most people wish to expend.”
“Is that what I should tell Mama?”Lucy snapped, crossing her arms over her stomach.“I’m sure she’d love to know that she needs only work harder to make herself happy, rather than wasting away in that room.”
The ever-present worry for her mother raked claws of guilt across Gemma’s heart.“That’s different.Mama is grieving.”
“Well, so am I!”
Gemma sighed, shoulders slumping.“I know.Between Ashbourn throwing us out of our home and all the work we’re doing here, we’ve hardly had time to mourn Father.”
“I don’t mean for Father,” Lucy burst out, then flushed.“I mean, of course.For Father as well.But I’m also quite angry with him?Which feels…awful.But how could he do this?How could he leave us like this, with no way to live?Why didn’t he take care of us?”
Did we mean so little to him?
Gemma flinched at the words Lucy didn’t say, as they echoed through her mind as loudly as anything her sister had cried aloud.It was passing strange to hear her own thoughts on Lucy’s lips, the things Gemma had grieved and fretted and silently cursed over in the dead of night.
The pressure of saying the correct thing to help her sister through this weighed on Gemma’s tired shoulders.“Do you remember how much Father loved to dance?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“He wanted us to love it too.Remember?”
An unwilling smile tugged at the corner of Lucy’s mouth.“And when our dancing instructor was caught dallying with one of the scullery maids, Father took over and taught us himself.”
Gemma breathed out, recalling the afternoon sunlight slanting in through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the empty ballroom at Ashbourn House, clapping and laughing as Lucy stood on the toes of their Father’s shiny Hessians and let him whirl her about.“He cared for us deeply, you know.In his own way.”
“Sometimes I wish his way had been a bit less fun and a bit more practical.”Lucy sniffled.
