Nobody said a word, but the impulse to move back a few inches was almost comically palpable.
She realized now that Hugh’s patience had been little by little abrading all afternoon. His quiet, confident contempt for their way of life, the things they loved, thatsheloved—was scarcely veiled now. Hugh had declared war. Whatever grip he’d had on patience and civility was lost, and what was worse, she couldn’t blame him. And she knew that when he decided to fight, he went all in.
And yet. She’d begun to shake with something like anger. How dare he make all of these people seem frivolous in her eyes? Seem somehow less real than he was?
Everythingseemed less real than he was.
“Mr. Cassidy lost his father and his brother in that war,” Lillias’s father said quietly.
Hugh still refused to meet Lillias’s eyes.
It seemed almost a breach of etiquette to bring up their deaths on a sunny day on the flawlessly manicured lawn unfurling like a great carpet toward the huge home. But what was war if not death? Britain had paid its own terrible price in Europe.
No matter. It was as though Hugh hadn’t heard. He still had Giles in his sights.
“A country only officially born in 1776, a country about as old as Lillias’s father, has twice beaten back a nation with about nine centuries of conquering experience. Twice. I’ll bet you your ancestral seat against mine, Bankham, that England won’t make a third attempt. No empire remains an empire forever. Just ask the Romans.”
Giles was white about the mouth now. The right scathing rejoinder was clearly eluding him, but then, one couldn’t practice scathing rejoinders at Mantons. He was so naturally amiable. So usually gentle. He might know how to shoot brilliantly, but he didn’t quite know what it was to fight.
And there was no denying the truth of everything Hugh had just said.
But she also realized that no one else could see it because they were layered in privilege as shiny and slick as silver. Everything reflected. Everything slid right off.
“We love our country every bit as much as you love yours, Mr. Cassidy,” the Earl of Bankham said quietly. It sounded a bit like a gentle warning. And now all eyes were on him.
Lillias wanted to tell them to leave Hugh alone; he’d had enough pain. She wanted to tell him he didn’t need to fight with anyone anymore; the war was over.
But she also knew he would always fight for what he cared about.
A strange pressure welled, filling her chest, her head. Her heart felt twined with thorny vines. She could not quite grasp an end of them to unravel it and get at the purest truth. Her own truth.
“Clearly,” Hugh said gently. “There would indeed be no America without Britain. Remarkable, extraordinary Britain. I’m honored to call it home from now on. And there would of course be no Lillias without it, and that, as far as I’m concerned, is its finest accomplishment.”
Lillias found herself propelled to her feet. She stood, rather blindly for a moment.
And then she turned and began walking. And walking. Toward the oak forest. She distantly heard her name. It was like so much wind in the trees.
And once in the trees, the walk became a trot, and then she was running like her life depended on it.
She knew Heatherfield; she knew all the trees, the knots in their trunks, the patterns of light that fell between them; they whipped by out of the corners of her eyes, and they might as well have been a ballroom full of people standing. It was all a blur now, all of her life, her past. All the same. She furiously ran as though if she just got far enough she’d come upon the Lillias she once was. The one who’d been so certain of what she wanted and how her life would be.
“Lillias.”
Hugh was fast. He was already upon her.
She stopped abruptly and turned.
They stared at each other.
The wind ruffled his hair and tossed his coat out behind him.
“How dare you?” she said finally. Coldly. She was breathing hard.
“Care to elaborate?” he said calmly.
“You’rebarelydisguising your scorn for people I care about. And what gives you the right to scorn what I want? After all, it’sexactlywhat you want.”
He barked an astonished laugh. “I want to be married to Lord Milquetoast and live in an echoing mausoleum and do the same things, day after day, year after year, and let my family’s ancient money feed me like a fatted lamb.That’swhat you’ve gleaned from our association so far?”
