“In practice as well,” Albina said, and the smile arrived then, the real one, and Elias received it with the expression of a man who had been hoping for exactly that and was glad to have it confirmed.
Temperance looked at her mother and felt something warm and uncomplicated settle in the middle of her chest.
Then she felt Harper beside her.
He had crossed the room at some point, quietly, and was standing close enough that she was aware of him with the specific awareness she always had, and she did not look at him and he did not say anything, and across the room Albina and Elias were talking and Joseph was telling Biscuit something ina low voice and Midge had relocated to Temperance’s feet and Soot was on the refreshment table again.
“So,” Harper said, very quietly.
“So,” she said.
“Talbot was never interested in you,” he said.
“Apparently not,” she said.
“I sent away a great many men,” he said, “on the basis that they were not good enough for you.”
“You did,” she said.
“And the one man I permitted,” he said, “was in love with your mother.”
She pressed her lips together. “Yes.”
“I find,” Harper said, “that I am not especially sorry about that.”
She turned to look at him then, and he was already looking at her, and the ballroom was warm and the candles were burning down and her mother was laughing at something Elias had said, and Joseph was watching his father with the small, contained expression of a child who was very pleased with how the evening had turned out and was trying not to show it.
“Neither am I,” Temperance said.
“Though I have to say,” Harper was delighted now. “This derails your plans a bit.”
“Does it?” Temperance looked back at the duke, who gave her a coy smile.
“We will find out.”
“So,” Temperance said, “what do you think of him?”
Albina did not pretend to misunderstand. She set down her embroidery, which she had not been making any progress with anyway, and looked at her daughter with bright, considering eyes.
“I think,” she said, “that he is the most interesting man I have spoken to in thirty years. Possibly longer.”
“That is quite the assessment.”
“It is an honest one,” Albina said. “You asked what I thought and I am telling you. I am too old to be coy about things that matter.”
Temperance smiled. “And does it matter?”
Albina looked at her for a long moment. Outside the window, the morning was doing what it did at this hour, the garden catching the early light, the lavender beginning its slow spread past the path’s edge. She had looked at this garden for three years now and she still found something new in it every morning, which she considered a hopeful sign about most things.
“Yes,” she said simply. “It matters very much.”
Temperance said nothing, which was the right response, and Albina appreciated it. She had not wanted to be argued with or redirected or gently cautioned about the wisdom of feeling things at her age. She had simply wanted to say the truth of it to someone who would receive it properly, and Temperance had always been good at that.
“He sent a note this morning,” Albina said.
“Did he?”
“Very short. He said that he hoped I had slept well and that he was looking forward to calling on Thursday.” She paused. “He also said that he had been thinking about the conversation we had at the picnic about the south end of the garden and that he had some thoughts about the space near the old bench if I was interested.”
