She nodded and took a bite of sausage, enjoying the fat exploding on her tongue.
“Henry, the snow will pick back up,” his father said. “Leave now and you’ll be stranded.”
“We’ll take the risk. Mrs. Hull’s mother is ill and there’s not a cloud in the sky.”
Henry’s father slammed his knife and fork down on the table, rattling the glasses. “Henry, don’t be foolish. The weather is going to turn. I feel it in my wrist.”
“I’m not foolish,” Henry snapped, stretching to his full height. “Nor am I willing to further delay Mrs. Hull’s journey over the paganish superstitions of your wrist.”
“Well I shan’t be coming after you when you find yourself trapped in a storm, you fool-headed boy.”
“I should imagine not,” Henry said. “Good day, sir.”
He marched from the room before his father could say another word. Alice snatched the last of her sausages off her plate and scurried off behind him.
“What a right prick,” she muttered, when she caught up.
And despite her cursing, he laughed.
But she could tell he was still upset as they drove away from Bowery Priory a quarter hour later. Henry appeared to invest great effort into seeming unperturbed, fixing a smile on his face and holding it there so stiffly she thought his mouth must hurt. But his fingers gave him away. He twisted them around the reins like he was trying to strangle the leather.
“Are you all right?” she ventured.
“I’m very well,” he murmured. “’Tis a lovely day for a drive.”
“I meant about your father.”
He sighed. “I’m sorry. He is coarse to speak so bluntly before guests.”
“He is a rotten cur to speak to you that way, never mind the guests.”
Henry glanced at her with pained amusement. “What shall I do without you to do my cursing for me, Alice Hull?”
“Tell the bastard off yourself!”
He laughed, shaking his head. “Thank you for your words in my defense.” He paused, and she realized he was blushing. “About … the ladies. I should not encourage lying but I won’t pretend I did not welcome that particular untruth.”
Oh, Henry Evesham, you dear, stupid man. “If what I said was not precisely true in the particulars, it is surely true in general, Henry. I saw the way the young women looked upon you when you were preaching yesterday. Religious admiration cannot account for that much sighing.”
He blushed, and she liked it immensely. Now that she knew he was the man from the journal, the poor fellow who found such fault with himself, she wanted to spoil him with praise. And now that she knew he was not promised to another woman, she felt quite entitled to do exactly as she liked.
“You are very handsome, Henry. I am quite an expert in these things, you know.”
He flushed even darker. She wished to run her fingers through the hair that fell over his ears—she knew, from the journal, he visited the barber sparingly as an economy—but instead, she told him something else she wished for him to hear before they parted.
“And your father is a brute.”
His eyes darted over to the trees, to the horizon, looking anywhere but at her. “Don’t say that, Alice.”
“He is cruel to you for his own amusement. And he’s wrong. You deserve better than to suffer abuse from a man like that. You are kind.”
His eyes finally glanced at hers, and she saw tears shining in them.
It made her chest constrict.
“Oh, Henry,” she said. She took his hand and squeezed it. She expected him to pull away.
But he didn’t.
“It’s humiliating to me that you witnessed his temper, Alice, but I am grateful for your kindness. I don’t know how I can possibly return it.”
“You already have. Hate to make you big with flattery, but you have been a perfect hero as far as I’m concerned.”
He squeezed her hand and grinned. “A perfect hero. ’Tis unspeakably vain of me, but I rather like that.”
And then, as if realizing he was flirting with her while holding her hand, he dropped it and his face went rigid.
He was so unpracticed at such games that he was adorable. Still, she doubted it would get him very far with women less odd than herself. She resolved to do what she could to give him lessons. Her own small thank you for his service, so that the poor man could find a wife.
Besides, she enjoyed flirting with him, and she didn’t know when she would next have the opportunity to enjoy herself.
She inclined her head demurely, gave him an inviting, womanly smile. “You’ve spent days driving in all weather in an attempt to get me home. And you’ve been such a comfort in my low moments.” She softened her voice, remembering his face when he’d prayed with her in the staircase. “A girl could get accustomed to having you about.”
He winced, but she could tell he liked it.
He turned to her shyly and said, “Alice, if you flatter me like this I may decide to keep you as my captive rather than driving you home.”
Please. I’d like nothing better.
“It’s not flattery. It’s true. Without you I would not have a hope of saying goodbye to my mother.”
All at once, her flirtatious mood deserted her. She had not meant to say those words—they had come out accidentally. It was the first time she’d acknowledged aloud that this was what awaited her in Fleetwend: her dear, difficult mother, dying. The person who loved her with a ferocity that was like a compass, showing her what was north. Gone.
For all their disagreements, she could not imagine life without that love. It was like a furnace that blazed and blazed but never ran out of coal. Even if she could not feel its warmth on her skin, she’d always known it would be there when she came back to it.
In a way, it made her brave. For she knew that the strength of that love was enough to overcome whatever Alice might do to cause her mother disappointment.
It was so fierce, she had taken it for granted.
“Don’t fret, Alice,” Henry said softly, misreading her sudden silence. “We’ll be there soon. Two hours at the most.”
“I’ve not been good to her, Henry,” she whispered. “I’ve treated her as a nuisance.”
He looked at her with a deep sympathy in his eyes. “Don’t condemn yourself. It’s clear how much you love her. And you have this drive to think of what you’d like to say to her. I have seen many a parishioner who misses the opportunity to say farewell.”
“I don’t condemn myself,” she confessed. She said the words that had been troubling her for days: “In a way, I feel I am not nearly sad enough. I am angry this has happened. For myself. I don’t want to go home.”
It was a shocking sentiment. The words felt bitter in her mouth. She could not bring herself to look at him, knowing what he would think of her for airing such thoughts.
He reached out and touched her hand. “It’s more common than you might imagine, to feel angry.” His tone was gentle, and not the least bit judgmental. “I’ve been at many funerals, many bedsides. There is no right or wrong way to feel in the face of loss.”
Surely, her way—blistering pity for herself and resentment at what her life would be—was not the right one. Henry would almost certainly be appalled if he could see inside her heart.