Page 39 of Trouble

‘I think he’d like me better if I was a horse,’ said Grace. Emily was caught so off guard that she snorted. Grace smiled tentatively back, but it soon slipped. ‘I know he loves me .?.?. I just wish he’dtalkto me. When we sit down to eat he says exactly two things – “How are you, Grace?” and “How are you, Aster?” – but I don’t think he even listens to our replies, and then that’s it for the next hour. Silence, unless I talk, and then usually only Aster replies. Mamalovedto spend time with me. We used to go to the beach together, or plant flowers, or play with this doll’s house up in the attic – sometimes we’d be up there for hours, hiding from everybody else, when Aster got older and started acting as if she was above playing. I’d almost rather Fatherdidn’tlove me, but did enjoy my company.’

This was too sad, even for Emily.

It was an awful thing for a child to be so astute; better to be foolish and happy than tonoticethings, and have your life made forever worse by that knowledge.

‘No more of this. Buck up and stop being so maudlin. Weren’t you going to paint my portrait?’

‘All right,’ Grace said. ‘But you cannot glare at me the entire time in that odd way of yours. The portrait will turn out too Gothic, and I will have to burn it.’

Emily finally caught a glimpse of Aster after luncheon. She was standing in the entrance hall, looking exhausted and sullen, having a conversation with Captain Edwards, who looked as stern as always but was at least talking softly. They had matching dark circles under their eyes; their shoulders sloped like puppets on threadbare strings. They seemed very alike, standing in profile, the captain looking down at Aster and Aster looking down at the floor.

Emily wondered if they had argued, or if the captain had found avoidance preferable; whatever had happened, they seemed to be over the worst of it now.

Grace came in wearing a blue silken bonnet and practically skipping, apparently in high spirits again, and Akia followed behind holding an armful of coats.

Emily hadn’t meant to linger for so long. She was halfway to the kitchens when she heard somebody behind her, and turned to find that Captain Edwards had followed her.

Much like a dog chasing a pigeon, he did not seem to know what to do now that he had caught up.

He cleared his throat.

‘I am taking the children out. To see .?.?. relatives. My cousin.’

Emily nodded, and then waited, wondering if there was to be more. He really did look very tired.

‘We will be gone all afternoon. So .?.?. your lessons will be postponed until the morrow.’

‘Well,’ said Emily. ‘All right.’

‘I can only apologise if this inconveniences you, Miss Laurence.’

This was odd. What did he care of her inconvenience? They were his children, to do with what he wished. She could see no logical reason for him to follow her just for this awkward, stilted interlude. Perhaps he wanted some sort of gold medal for voluntarily spending more time with his own offspring, and was looking to her to bestow it.

‘It is no inconvenience to me,’ Emily said. ‘I hope you .?.?. enjoy your time together.’

‘Yes,’ said Captain Edwards. ‘I think .?.?. Yes.’

He hovered for a moment more, and then seemed to consider this strange interaction at an end, because he nodded to her and then turned and walked briskly away.

Emily waited until the bustle in the front hall had ceased and then went upstairs so that she could watch them from the first floor window. Aster climbed into the carriage first, as if eager to get this all over with, and then Grace took her father’s arm so that she could be helped up, chattering melodically like a bird all the while. It was obvious how thrilled she was that her father had deigned to take them out, her delight written so plainly on her face that it was almost painful.

Captain Edwards was, as ever, harder to read, but when Emily caught a glimpse of his face he looked almost nervous, as if being trapped in a carriage with his children was tantamount to being interviewed for a job or undergoing a cross-examination in a court of law.

If Emily wasn’t very much mistaken, he wastrying.

Not that she cared. If they were going to be away all afternoon, the only thing she cared about was stealing something baked from the kitchen, taking a book down from the schoolroom shelves and hiding with it in a corner where nobody could ask her to do a thing.

Unfortunately, Akia was in the schoolroom, tidying; Emily was obliged to hand over one of the raisin-studded biscuits she had pilfered and then make a vague effort to help.

Meera found them there twenty minutes later, while Akia was reading snatches from an etiquette book aloud to Emily and Emily was trying not to laugh.

‘Shall we go down to the beach for an hour or so?’ Meera said, surprising Emily, who had been expecting a rueful request for help in some other part of the house. ‘Captain Edwards will not mind, and we can catch up by the time they return. Joe won’t come – he’s busy doing something very violent to a rack of lamb. But I caught a glimpse of sun earlier, so we ought to throw ourselves at it while we can. And Amy hasn’t properly seen the beach yet.’

Emily thought this quite a tactful way to avoid discussing the time shehadrecently spent on the beach, seeking a drunk child in the company of a reticent man.

Meera packed a small picnic – mostly wine and fruit, with a few crumbly pieces of cake wrapped in paper – and they set off towards the cliffs. Oliver lagged behind them, hands in his pockets, looking artfully pale and hungover and noticeably avoiding Emily. It really was very sunny, although the wind kept chivvying clouds along and casting fast-moving shadows on the ground; the tall grasses rippled back and forth as if pulled in warring currents, and it was all so bright and bracing that Emily felt a bit stunned, like a bat exposed to a lamp. They reached the chalky, sandy path that switchbacked its way dramatically down to sea level. Seeing it in daylight, Emily could hardly believe that she and Captain Edwards had made it down there without breaking their necks, let alone back up with Aster draped in her father’s arms.

Emily had glimpsed the sea from atop the coastal path, and she had heard it rushing ominously nearby in the dark, but she had never stood and watched the waves rolling in, exhausting themselves against the shore and then gathering their strength to do it all over again. She found herself mesmerised by the rhythm of it, steady and inevitable, and only snapped out of it when Oliver said, ‘Oh dear, she’s got the sea madness’ in his nastiest little voice.