Page 15 of The Number of Love
Was itherfault that girls her own age were more often than not so silly they made her itch? That the only people she’d ever found who let her be herself were among that motley collection of academics in Room 40? Still. She smiled now at Dot and didn’t at all mind that the Lord had finally given in to Maman’s prayers onthis score. “If at any point you want to leave, please believe that we won’t be offended.”
Generally speaking, Dot did fine enough once she was out. But Margot had also learned that there came a point in the day when she was justfinished. When the world got to be too much and she had to get home before the anxiety clawed her to bits.
On the average workday, that time came about ten minutes after her usual dismissal time. Margot certainly didn’t want to be the cause of it springing upon her on a Sunday, the day she usually holed up in the safety of her flat after the hour at Mass.
“Your niece is precious.” Dot’s focus had gone to where Lukas and Willa stood chatting with someone, little Zurie positioned happily on her mother’s hip, fingers hooked in her mouth. She’d inherited Lukas’s dark hair and eyes, set in a face shaped more like Willa’s. She was indeed a pretty little thing, which wasn’t surprising. Lukas was as beautiful in a masculine way as their mother was in the feminine, and it stood to reason he’d pass the family beauty along to his children. Though Willa got a glint in her eyes anytime someone praised her daughter’s beauty. She had a prejudice against being calledpretty—and apparently didn’t like it applied to her little one either.
Zurie blinked and followed an invisible something or other with her eyes, tilting her head back to watch it. A midge, perhaps, or a dust mote. Or something no one but she could imagine. Whatdidbabies think about all day? Try as she might to recall, Margot hadn’t many memories from before she was two. On the one hand, it seemed babies’ worlds must be very boring—nothing but food and nappies and the same rooms day in and day out. But, on the other hand, everything was new and yet to be discovered, which may indeed be the most interesting experiences of their lives.
If so, then it was rather a shame she could remember only fleeting glimpses of it.
Movement beyond Zurie caught Margot’s eye—Mrs. Neville, a busybody forever trying to arrange a meeting between Margot and one of her many grandsons. Given the current ratio of men to womenin England, she hadn’t any idea why the woman insisted on botheringherwith nearsighted Thomas or London-stationed Richard when there were any number of young ladies happy to vie for their attention, but Margot didn’t much fancy ruining yet another Sunday with the argument.
She gripped Dot’s elbow and steered her away from the door. “Mrs. Neville at two o’clock. Hurry and perhaps someone will waylay her before she can catch up to us.”
Dot laughed and made no objection to the increase of pace. “Aunt Millie was always complaining of her. Might we begin walking to your brother’s?”
“I daresay no one will object.” Even Maman understood the desire to flee Mrs. Neville’s clutches. She never made any attempt to hinder Margot’s escape.
They hurried around a group of chatting parishioners and caught Maman’s eye. Margot gave her the prearranged signal for the gossip’s approach by checking the watch on her pendant, and Maman gave her a twinkling-eyed smile and nodded toward the street.
It was all the approval she needed. She and Dot hurried away. Clouds obscured the sun, and the wind whipped down the street, but it was a warm wind, and Margot felt no need to complain. With Dot still chuckling at her side, they turned left and increased their pace still more.
“Shall we walk or take the tube?” Dot darted a glance over her shoulder. Apparently there was no Mrs. Neville hunting them down, given that she faced forward again without comment.
“Walk. It won’t take us long.” And she had a key to the townhouse Lukas and Willa let, so even if their housekeeper wasn’t back from her own church yet, Margot could let herself and Dot in.
Once they turned the corner at the first intersection, they slowed their pace and Dot let out a happy little sigh. “We’ll walk by the park going this direction, won’t we?”
“Yes.” It wasn’t much of a park—neither large nor grand nor a draw from other parts of the city. But it was the nearest one to both her flat and Lukas’s house, not to mention the church, so Margothad spent a fair amount of time on its walking paths and benches over the last three years.
“My father used to take us to a park near our home when I was a girl. There was a little pond at the time, and a family of ducks lived there. I used to love to feed them and tease my brother about how he must be a duck too, being named Drake as he is. Though of course he insisted it was fordragon, not for a male duck.” Dot anchored her hat to her head when a particularly strong gust of wind tore down the street, her eyes alight with memory.
Margot smiled. “I didn’t realize that was the word for a male duck in English.” No matter how fluent she thought herself, it seemed she always found out something new each day. There was always more to learn. New discoveries to be made.
Dot’s gaze remained fixed on the little sliver of green that would eventually unfold into the park. “In Spain, my grandfather and his servants actually call my brotherDragón. They refuse to useDrake—they still bear a grudge against Sir Frances Drake there, you know.”
Margot nearly choked on a laugh. “Are you quite serious?”
“Mm. The Spanish aren’t very fond of foreigners in general, and many are anti-British in particular. I daresay our mother agreed to name him that solely because she thought it would be a great joke—though it was a family name on my father’s maternal side. She was always laughing and playing jokes on us.” Dot’s sigh combined wistfulness with contentment. “I’ll never forget that about her.”
“She sounds wonderful.” Margot said no more after that. Dot went silent, her mind probably sifting through memories, and Margot saw no reason to interrupt it.
Another three minutes and they were at the park, both of them turning onto the walking path without any need for discussion about it. That was something she’d come to greatly appreciate about her new friend in their month-long acquaintance—they had the same inclinations and didn’t often have to discuss such simple things.
Eighteen. The number flashed into her mind again, for the eighth time since she first decoded that update from Thoroton for DID. She sent her eyes heavenward, along with a mental smile that didn’t touch her lips.Lord, if you call this fellow to mind every time he’s in danger, then he courts it far too often. Perhaps you ought tonudge him into a different career.But she said a prayer for the agent, as she did each time his number came to mind.
“Is everything all right?”
“Hm?” Margot blinked and realized only then that her feet had come to a halt and that her knuckles had fisted in her dress. Another blink made the itch at the back of her neck come into focus. Something wasn’t right in the scene before her. “I don’t know.”
She felt her body settle into the stance that Maman always calledtoo still. Each muscle was at rest but ready to move if the situation called for it. She stared straight ahead, but in such a way that she could better attune her attention to the periphery. Her fingertips pressed into the fabric over her legs.
After a minute—or perhaps several minutes, she didn’t bother marking time as it passed in these moments—she turned her head to the side.There. The man seated at the little wrought-iron table was wrong. As was the game set up before him.
Her legs feeling heavy, she left the path and moved toward him.
It could be nothing. A newcomer to the neighborhood. It shouldn’t bother her, Maman would say. Gregory didn’townthe table, Lukas would have put in. The new bloke wasn’t hurting anyone, she could imagine Willa insisting.
