But be careful of what?
The moors were dark beyond the window. Acklan was quiet around her. Tomorrow she would walk the north boundary with a man who kept a great deal very close, and Cait knew something that she didn’t, and Mrs. Fairleigh had watched her all evening with those blue eyes that Cori could not read.
She lay awake for a long time.
Step Two
Chapter 6
Kitchen Garden
Acklan Castle
The kitchen garden at Acklan was walled on three sides and open to the moors on the fourth. Just after dawn, it was rather a wonderful place to explore. The vegetables grew in tidy rows in the greyish morning light. The espaliered fruit trees along the south wall went about their business with quiet determination. Somewhere amongst the apple trees, one blackbird was making its views known to the world while a second blackbird disagreed most vehemently. It was, Cori thought, a very good garden. The kind that got on perfectly well without anyone paying attention to it.
Upon her arrival at Acklan, she’d discovered the garden by following the smell of damp earth and herbs, and she’d visited it more than once since that time. She was, after all, unable to remain inside when there was so much to experience out of doors.
The air in Yorkshire had a freshness to it that Cori had come to associate with the moors, something clean and cold that felt, after so much time in London, like breathing properly for the first time.
This morning, however, she was hoping for a bit of clarity after she’d spent the night with her mind whirring on the previous day’s events. Linthorpe’s invitation to walk the north boundary. The way Mrs. Fairleigh had watched her and whatever it was she’d said to her brother. The fact that Cait knew something she wasn’t telling Cori. Her mind was once again focused on these matters as she went through the motions of exploring the herb beds along the east wall.
That’s when she heard it…
A very small sound, coming from beneath the low wooden planting frame at the base of the wall.
Cori crouched to see what had caused the sound, and wedged between the wooden frame and the stone wall, in a gap that was slightly too small for it was a chubby hedgehog.
The little fellow was not, upon closer inspection, in any immediate danger. He was simply stuck. The poor thing had apparently investigated the gap with great gusto but discovered that confidence and geometry were not necessarily the same thing. He was expressing his displeasure in a series of urgent huffing sounds as he tried to free himself.
"There now," Cori said, in the calm matter-of-fact voice she used for anxious creatures. "Hold still."
The hedgehog did not hold still.
He attempted, with considerable energy, to go further into the gap, which was not a direction that was going to help him. So, Cori got her hands underneath the little fellow and cupped him gently, which resulted in him expressing some rather strong opinions.
"I know. I know," she said soothingly. "I’m aware. But you’re going to have to trust me. Not long, just for thirty seconds."
Hedgehogs, however, did not speak English and so her promises fell on deaf ears.
Still, Cori worked carefully anyway, easing him back from the gap with patient deliberateness. Haste, after all, would only make everything worse.
The hedgehog huffed in indignation. Cori shifted her grip a bit and got her hand properly underneath the little fellow, supporting his small and frightened frame. Finally, with a last beleaguered huff, he stopped fighting her.
"Good," she said. "There we are."
She drew the hedgehog free and sat back on her heels in the dirt, the little thing cupped in both of her hands. He was regarding her with small dark eyes, suggesting he might’ve revised his opinion of her, after all.
"You’re welcome," she told the little creature with a smile.
"Is this," said a deep, familiar voice behind her left shoulder, "a habit of yours or a talent?"
The duke!
Goodness!
Cori cringed at the thought of what she must look like, once again, to Linthorpe. There she was, crouching in his kitchen garden, just after dawn with dirt on her skirts and a hedgehog in her hands.
She braced herself, then she turned to face him.
