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She was very glad she had not realized that at the time.
“It was just a friendship,” she assured him.
“Was it?” He looked into her face.
But they had rounded the corner onto Daniel Street, and Claudia and Susa
“Frances!” A
“Lucius and I are just back from the Continent,” Frances, the Countess of Edgecombe, told her, “and came to Bath on our way home to see if one of you would like to spend the final two weeks of the holiday with us at Barclay Court. Susa
Frances had found love in a snowstorm when her carriage ran into a snowbank, driven there by the reckless driving of the earl and his coachman as they overtook it. It had been hate at first sight-and love ever after. For some time after Frances’s wedding the three remaining friends had looked at life with more hope, though they had not admitted as much to one another.
“I would have hated missing you,” A
But she turned back to the doorway before going inside and could see that David was right up in Joshua’s arms out on the pavement, his arms wrapped tightly about Joshua’s neck, his face buried against his shoulder. Joshua had one hand spread over the back of the boy’s head and was kissing the side of it.
A
Why did everything wonderful have to be left behind? she wondered. Why was life so heavily punctuated with good-byes?
Joshua set David down, cupped his face with both hands, kissed his forehead, and turned to A
“You have done a fine, fine job with him, A
She set her hand in his as David darted past her into the school, not pausing to greet any of the ladies or even Keeble, one of his favorite people.
“Thank you again,” she said.
“A
“I can look after my own son, Joshua,” she said stiffly, withdrawing her hand. “But I do thank you for being so kind to him.”
“I’ll write,” he said, shaking his head, clearly in frustration.
“Good-bye, A
“Good-bye,” she said, and watched him until he had turned the corner and gone out of sight.
But there were different kinds of good-byes, she thought. This one was not heart-wrenching for her, though it clearly was for David. She would see Joshua again-perhaps as soon as Christmas.
She would never see Sydnam again.
Not ever.
Susa
She was back home and it was good to be here.
But never was an awfully long time.
By the time A
“Mama,” he admitted after she had told another episode of an ongoing bedtime story and tucked him in for the night, “it is good to be back. I like having my little room all to myself.”
Yes. It was good to be back. And there would be much to do in the coming days. Susa
It was good to be back.
Tired as she was after the long journey and the teeming emotions with which she had left Glandwr, A
A
They talked about Frances’s travels and singing successes on the Continent, about A
It did feel good to be back.
A
Two weeks passed with busy holiday-time activities, including walks and picnics and games in the meadow beyond the school and treasure hunts within the school itself. Sometimes A
And finally Susa
Claudia was engaged to dine that evening with the parents of one of the new day pupils. A
“I hated to lose Frances when she left here two years ago to marry the earl,” Susa
“And he is as much in love with her as he always was when he pursued her so relentlessly,” A