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“You were buying something for yourself, and not just any old thing, but a small treasure, something you used to love. Perhaps it was the only through line to your old life.”

For a moment, he feared he had overstepped, but she said, her voice a mite shaky, “I hadn’t thought about it that way, but that feels true.”

Encouraged, he dared to say more. “Perhaps it was an act of rebellion, too, but not of the childish, petulant sort. It was an assertion of agency. An insistence on the import of beauty in and among suffering.”

She held a hand to her heart, searched his face. “My goodness.”

He shrugged, feeling that while he may not have overstepped, had exposed too much of himself. “Stonely tells me that beauty is important, that it feeds the soul.”

“You say that as if you are a skeptic.”

“I am not a skeptic; I am just not as good at seeing beauty, and finding it, as Stonely is.” He nodded at the ribbon she still held. “Or as you are, given your secret collection.” He cleared his throat. “So not skeptical, Diantha, so much as inexpert.”

She smiled, and if he had thought, before, when she’d been towering over him, that she was passing judgment, he must have been mistaken, for he had the sudden, absurd thought that if she was dispensing anything, it was absolution.

Oh no. She was crying. Well, she was attempting not to cry, but he could see her efforts, because he could see beneath the surface of her. “I am sorry, I—”

“Do not be sorry,” she interrupted, “for saying such kind, wise things.” She swallowed.

He tamped down the impulse to exhort her to continue. He was always having to do that around her, but he did not want to be the sort of man people spoke to because he commanded it, especially people who were saying important, fragile things.

It took her a few moments to gather herself. “I have wondered, over the years,” she started slowly, “if my fondness for ribbons is a folly I ought to rid myself of. Am I being like my father, spending money he doesn’t have in ways he ought not to? I tell myself no, since I spend pennies and I’ve still managed to save. Still, what is the point of a drawerful of ribbons?”

“Perhaps the point is solace.”

“Yes,” she said quietly.

“Would you show me your collection sometime? When we all find ourselves back in Town?”

She flashed him a small smile. “If you like.”

Though he didn’t know when such a demonstration might occur. It was one thing for them to converse when he called on Lady Harcourt, for her to leave to collect a book to lend him, quite another for her to run and fetch her ribbon collection. Especially if Archie was present. As he always was. That last visit had been an aberration.

An alarming, unwelcome thought landed in Simon’s head: After this holiday, he would never again have occasion to speak to Diantha alone.

“Miss Brown!”

Simon and Diantha looked toward the voice. It was Olive, beckoning.

“We are going to play Pass the Slipper! Come join us! Both of you! You’ve done enough huddling and talking of novels. Come!”

Diantha stood immediately. Simon was more circumspect, reluctant to leave their têtê-à-têtê.

But Diantha was already gone.

Polly, the housemaid, was making a circuit of the room as the others arranged the furniture so everyone could sit in a circle. She passed by him, her hands full of discarded glasses. He wondered what time Polly finished her evening duties. An idea formed.

“Polly,” he said, rising, wondering what had come over him, “allow me to assist.”

15

The Opposite of Fright

Diantha was beside herself with nerves when Lord Harcourt asked her to remain back as the others retired for the evening.

It took what felt like ages for everyone to make their good nights, and Diantha spent the time fretting over what he could possibly want.

“Miss Brown,” he said after they were finally alone, “I should prefer to have this conversation in my office at Mollybrook, but I felt it could not wait.”