Page 36 of Hearts of Locke Hill

“It’s just me, miss.” The gardener, a wiry-built man not quite fifty years, turned with a nod. He kept his voice hushed. “Take care ’round those corners. Y’never know who you’ll happen upon at this hour.”

Violet dropped her hand from her chest and looked around, her voice just above a whisper. “Are you training the hares and the owls as well, Trent?” Mr. Trent and his wife had come to Kinthwaite several years previously, and Violet had taken an immediate liking to the cheery couple.

“Och. The hares? They’ve enough speed built right into them. And the owls have you beat for stealth, that’s for certain.”

“I was silent,” she said, her whisper adamant.

He crooked a brow in her direction and finished gathering his assortment of flats. “You might want to have young Miles take some oil to the kitchen door.”

She made a mental note of it as she followed him around to a long wagon box filled with pots and the dark outlines of stumpy forms with budding leaves. A soft glow lit the area from the gas lamps inside the hothouse. “What are you planting?”

“Mrs. Whittemore requested the geraniums be brought out, and I’m readying them for the beds.”

Of course. All spring and summer, dozens of geraniums poured out of giant urns and lined the stone wall of the circular drive fronting Kinthwaite Park, and every autumn, Trent and a team of undergardeners dug up the plants, removing them in pots to overwinter in the glasshouse. In the spring, they were broughtback out and planted again. It occurred to her that she’d never asked how long a geranium could live.

“Trent, how old is our oldest geranium?”

He removed his hat and scratched his pale-blond head. “I’ve no idea, miss. Perhaps you could make one of your charts and track ’em.” He grinned.

She shook her head. Making charts was something she’d done since she was a girl. A way of keeping all her thoughts and ideas managed. Sort of.

“I’m tempted,” she said.

He gave her a nod, handing her a lantern. “I know it.”

She stifled a laugh as he disappeared with a flat into the hothouse.

Left to herself again, Violet frowned. She removed to a low wooden bench, set down the lantern, and slipped her caftan off her shoulders with a small shiver. Leaving it neatly folded, she began a series of stretches, relishing the unconfined movements, the sweet, cool air on her arms and neck. She needed this to clear her head and strengthen her heart. Bolster her determination. Last night, Father’s decision had been a blow. That she’d had to throw down her challenge to be seen at all, well … her ego would survive.

Trent returned with a loaded flat of pots and added them to the wagon. “How goes the new school? They make you headmistress yet?”

She didn’t allow the sudden dip of her heart to affect her. Much. “Not entirely. Leadership will be divided up at first.” She bit back the details of what had taken place with her father. “We’re discussing specifics today.”

Trent nodded. “School opens in a few weeks, correct?”

“That is correct.”

“I’m right excited for you, miss. With all your hard work.”

“Thank you, Trent.” Her father had never said anything close to that. What a strange, mixed-up world. “May I help you?” Violet asked from her position on the packed ground. She drew her knees up in front of her, having just stretched to her toes.

“You finish your warm-ups, then I’ll let you help me. We’ll count it as conditioning. But be sure to mind the dirt on your hands. If your mother gets wind of this—”

“It’ll be your head, I know, I know.”

He nodded, sobering. “It would be far more thanmyhead, Miss Violet.”

She paused, his words touching her with the dread of truth even as she gritted her teeth in frustration of the absurdity of the rules of society, of class, and of women. She breathed a sigh, pushing those thoughts away with it, and continued to run through her stretches. Ankles, calves, knees, hips, side bends for her waist, then shoulders, and finishing with arms.

She’d asked Trent, when they’d started this experiment of hers, why she needed to stretch her arms if her legs were doing all the work. Trent had made her run with her hands clasped behind her back and then again with her hands in motion at her sides. The simple test had answered her question.

After working quietly to fill the rest of the wagon, Trent and Violet walked to the edge of a groomed path that encircled all of Kinthwaite Park, including her father’s golf course and a hunter’s cottage deep in the woods. The path continued, weaving around meadows and pastures, the lake, informal and formal gardens, tennis courts, then back here. Some twelve miles in all.

She hadn’t the time, nor the stamina, to run the entire path. Yet. But she did have time to run a good section of it, cutting across the bridge through the golf course instead of taking thepath into the woods. Which was just as well since the woods were very dark at this hour.

Trent pulled out a stopwatch, and her stomach tightened with anticipation. She bounced on her toes a bit and swung her arms.

“Remember to breathe. Relax. It’s not a race.”