“Better.”No point in pretending she didn’t know.“He sought treatment from a surgeon for his wounds, and he is better.He is able to walk without pain.”
Mrs.Harding’s eyes were avidly attentive now.She didn’t interrupt.
“Let me put you at ease,” Georgiana went on, “so you don’t need to follow me home.Mr.Mallet has agreed to serve as my tutor.As you so obviously know, I sought training at his home while he was ill.Now that his health has improved, he attends me at Helsington.Is that what you wished to know?”
Georgiana swelled to her full height, chin up and eyes blazing.A more intelligent woman might have cowered; Molly Harding did not.
“Oh my, dear, I didn’t need to know anything.There are those, well, that intrude and gossip, but I always say what a man does in his home is his own business.Unless, of course, he wishes to be… But it doesn’t matter.No offense intended.”
“No offense taken, Mrs.Harding.I’ll be on my way now.Enjoy the harebells.Good day to you.”
There was always talk, and it shouldn’t have surprised her.She could simply ignore it.The implication for Andrew, however, distressed her.What men did in their own homes was, as Molly said, their own business.“Unless,of course, he wishes to be..”What?Respected as a scholar?
When Andrew so sarcastically implied that his reputation would suffer when she demanded his help, she hadn’t paid attention.She never considered that he might have meant his standing in the scholarly community.Dunning said he had work from Selby.Now she wondered what had become of that?
Georgiana stopped abruptly, struck dumb.In truth, she hadn’t considered the cost to him at all.When they made their bargain, her only concern had been her own need.She felt like an idiot.
She brushed aside low hanging branches and ducked under them when the path took her closer to the river.Would the wagging tongues of Cambridge find her presence in his house to be the biggest scandal, or, if they knew about it, the nature of the work?Before she began to study with Andrew, her work garnered mostly derision, notoutrage.If he wished the respect of the University community, he had good reason to avoid involvement with her.That derision would make any pretense of scholarship impossible.
She walked faster now.John footman ran to keep up.Why should my work, my private business, outrage anyone?Georgiana gave a rock on the path a very unladylike kick.It flew into the river with a satisfying splash.She picked up another and threw it.It felt good to make an impact on the river.
John footman stood an appropriate distance away and tried to seem invisible.It would, of course, be reported in the servant’s quarters that Lady Georgiana acted peculiar.
My life is exactly like that,she thought.When it is invisible, it is greeted with silence and quietly ignored.When I make an impact on the river of life, it is greeted with shock, horror, and outrage.She picked up a larger rock and flung it as hard as she could.The splash was truly splendid.
“See me?I am here.I am alive!”She shouted into the wind.That would most definitely be talked about below stairs.
Determination gave force to her steps.I will do this work,she thought, turning back across the fields toward home.Determination also gave vitality to her thoughts.There is no one else who cares to draw together the women of ancient Greece.I care, and I will do it.She kicked at a tall clump of grass.“I will do it!”she shouted.
Deep inside, a quieter voice warned, “With Andrew’s help.”
Georgiana tripped and almost tumbled; a hand immediately appeared at her elbow.The ever-present servant.
She felt like she could do anything with Andrew’s help, but she didn’t know how long he would continue.Fear that he might quit became a canker inside her; she needed him.She needed his access to the libraries and resources of Cambridge.She needed the workings of his mind.She needed his confidence in her in order to do her work.
Georgiana’s face turned upward, struck with the realization that she needed him like she needed sun and air.The realization buffeted her like the winds.She thought perhaps her questions should be “How long will he continue to help?How long before he disappears from my life again?”When he left, and he would leave eventually, she would sink back into the half-life she had before he returned to Cambridge.
Helsington lay ahead of her, burnished yellow by the sun that dropped low in the sky, flashing light off the empty windows.Without Andrew, it would gape like an open tomb.Today she had work, and in the work, there was life.Tomorrow he would come.She wouldn’t look beyond that.
* * *
Andrew enjoyedneither sunshine nor visitors that day.He responded to a command of a different sort.He had work to do.
Andrew had at long last translated a slight passage from Proclus, the obscure Neoplatonist philosopher whose work Geoff Dunning brought him weeks before on behalf of Wallace Selby.He worked on it at odd moments during the previous week.It had been trivial, two evenings’ work at best, but he sent it off with an apology for lateness to Selby.
The great man himself had been too busy to join Andrew and Dunning for coffee or, more likely, too self-important.Selby had come to dinner only once, and Andrew suspected the opportunity to inspect his father’s exquisite library had been the primary attraction that night.When Andrew became ill, invitations ceased.
Selby’s response to Andrew’s work on Proclus, as welcome as it was poorly timed, came while Andrew introduced Georgiana to Great Helicon and choral poetry.It sat unopened by his door.Grateful for whatever wisdom led him to cut his hours at Helsington short, Andrew replied immediately.
Selby approved of the work he sent.There would be more work to fill his evenings, work his father would have admired.Proclus loomed ahead of him, a portent of future success.He wished that he looked forward to Proclus and the Neoplatonists with as much joy as he did Korinna and her sisters.
* * *
“The Korinna translations are complete,or as much so as we can make them.Is it your intention to publish merely the poems and poem fragments or a commentary as well?”
Georgiana froze; terror forestalled coherent thought.Publishing had never entered her mind.It seemed far beyond the realm of possibility.
“Lady Georgiana, did you hear me?”The gentle voice came from far away.His dark eyes, when she finally looked at them, were wrinkled with concern, the tiny lines in the corners of his eyes deep.
