“And hours away,” Amelia added.
“And rural,” Caleb repeated, justifiably so.
Ottersock frowned with bewilderment. “How did you not realize ‘the countryside’ would be rural?”
“I assumed you were talking about somewhere like Greenwich. I can’t go toCumbria. I’m a great indoorsman; too much fresh air upsets my digestive system.”
“Besides, term starts in a few days,” Amelia said. “I have lectures to present.”
“Me too,” Caleb said, although in fact his plan for this term’s lectures currently involved presenting a table clock that wasn’t actually an antique, he just hoped his students would fix it for him, and taking a field trip to Jabbercoffee café to “study its old windows” while he drank a cappuccino.
“Pish!” Ottersock interjected. “Associate Professor Capping will take over both your lecture schedules. She can easily do so in addition to presenting her own lectures, holding tutorials, providing pastoral care to students, keeping up with her administrative duties, and captaining our faculty badminton team.”
“Be reasonable, man,” Caleb urged. “It’s far too much to put on anyone, expecting them to go toCumbria.”
But Ottersock had long ago sacrificed being reasonable on the altar of faculty management. “It’s decided, Sterling.” He jammed the lid on the willow-bark jar like an exhausted student putting a full stop at the end of a dissertation. “Miss Tunnicliffe will accompany you to the Harroways’ estate in her capacity as a…well, a receptionist, I suppose…and as achaperone, since obviously a man cannot travel with a woman to whom he’s not married.”
“But traveling with two of them is acceptable?” Caleb asked wryly.
Ottersock ignored that. “Go home. Pack your bags. You leave today, eleven o’clock sharp!”
This dramatic announcement inspired a moment of stunned silence. (That is, apart from the papery rustle of the moth that was industriously spinning a cocoon in his hair.) Then Amelia said, “That gives us only an hour to prepare.”
“And leave how?” Caleb asked suspiciously. Knowing Oxford University’s approach to budgeting, he expected to be walking part of the distance.
“I’m supposed to be attending a family dinner this weekend,” Amelia said.
“I don’t have suitable shoes for the countryside,” Caleb added.
Ottersock exhaled forcefully. The willow bark was causing his pupils to constrict, but this did not prevent him from scowling at both professors. “Your train departs at eleven o’clock. On—” He jabbed the desktop with his pointer finger. “The—”Jab.“Dot.”Jab.“Be on it or your jobs will be history!”
“Er…” Caleb said. “Strictly speaking, our jobs already are hist—”
“Go! Now!”
Being as they were notcompleteidiots, they went.
—
As Amelia emergedfrom Ottersock’s office into Balliol’s Garden Quadrangle, she angled a hand over her eyes, shielding them against the morning light and hiding her frown. Cumbria! In autumn! With barely any warning! For an undeterminedperiod of time! Just as term was beginning! And various other concerns that were comparatively minor but nevertheless also warranted exclamation marks!
Never before had she been so frazzled—and that was saying something, considering her job involved such things as time-warping clocks, ghost swarms, and undergraduate students. She faced catastrophe on a weekly basis. Usually a bit of glue fixed it. But there was no fixing this. Once again, Ottersock had overturned her life.
I should have accepted that offer from Heidelberg University,she told herself dourly, ignoring the fact that not only could she barely speak a word of German, but her mother had threatened to suffer a nervous collapse should she move to “that backwater”—i.e., Europe. And yet, she really couldn’t bear to leave Caleb, who’d been her dearest friend since their early days at boarding school, when he found her crying in the dank shadows behind the dormitory and told her jokes until she laughed. The idea of life without him was a bleak one, and made the sacrifice of her gentility for their fake-hating scheme worthwhile. Albeit only just.
He came up alongside her, having paused to greet a random cat. His hands were in the pockets of his black plaid trousers, an improper habit from his childhood that no one had been able to break in him. A breeze tousled his hair into a state of uncontrived gorgeousness. Any passersby glancing at him would see only casual ease, but Amelia recognized the shadow in his eyes as he stared across the Quad, where cold sunlight gleamed on the rustling autumnal trees and immaculate lawns. She knew what he was thinking: that this represented the exact amount of nature he wanted in his life, thank you. Her own thoughts turned to a pair of new students loitering on the path. Theywere holding maps but nevertheless looking around with helpless bewilderment, and Amelia had to hold herself back from going to direct them. Getting lost at the start of term was essential to ultimately finding oneself by the end.
“Cumbria,” Caleb grumbled. “This whole situation is—”
“Infuriating,” she chorused with him in an identical tone of aggravation. They began walking side by side toward the Library Passage. As they went, Amelia felt inordinately conscious of Caleb’s masculine presence beside her, and of the way students glanced at them—perhaps wondering if they were a couple? (Or perhaps, judging from the wary looks, aware of their explosive reputation.) Indeed, she had to press her hand against her stomach, for the flutters had commenced again.
So ridiculous! She’d walked beside Caleb a thousand times before. She’d stood beside him as head girl and head boy in secondary school, and shared a stage to present joint lectures. He’d been this much taller than her for years. This much stronger. There existed no good reason for her to suddenly realize he was strong enough to toss a woman over his shoulder and carry her away…
Hm,her body murmured.
“Ottersock is being completely unfair,” Caleb said. “You do realize that it’s autumn, yes? There’s going to be mud. And rain.”
“This is England,” Amelia reminded him. “There’s always rain. Make sure you pack the mackintosh I bought you last winter.”
