I frowned a little. I needed expansion? I already felt as if my heart and mind had been wrenched open.
But as we paddled, my irritation faded. He was the lone person who could understand a measure of my angst. As well as the opportunity at hand. “I…I’m afraid that I’ll spend so much time negotiating my struggles,” I said, nodding toward the three canoes ahead, “that I won’t have time to truly embrace those opportunities.”
He laughed lowly, and I let the warm sound settle around me like a gentle hug. It rang of friendship and camaraderie and understanding, and in that moment, he again made me feel not quite so alone. “Cora, I ask you to trust me in this. Regardless of whether or not the Kensingtons and Morgans accept and include you, I will ensure that your trip is nothing but enlightening, an experience of a lifetime. You shall come home transformed.”
I looked over my shoulder at him. “That is quite the audacious promise.”
He gave me a mischievous smile that lit up his brown eyes in a way I found utterly charming. “Indeed.”
“I must confess I hadn’t thought of you as the audacious sort, Master William.”
“Then, Miss Cora, you have not yet begun to know me at all.”
I smiled and turned around. Perhaps not. Perhaps all before me is not preordained. I can make this what I want of it. I looked up to the mountains. Let me see what You want me to learn along the journey too, Lord, I prayed. Please, please, make it not one long trial from beginning to end. Just a measure of civility from them is all I—
“Ahoy!” called Felix, when we were but ten feet away. “The tutor and the new student decided to join the rest of the class, eh?”
“After a brief detour, yes,” Will said. “Felix, are you perspiring?”
“A bit, yes,” Felix said, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief. “It’s terribly hot this afternoon, don’t you think?”
“Let me assist you,” Will said, ramming his paddle against the surface of the water. A perfect arc jumped across the remaining gap between us. Lillian shrieked as most of it hit Felix, with a small amount splattering over her.
“Why, you!” Felix cried, a grin splitting his handsome face. He immediately took aim at Will, but instead sent a spray of water that squarely landed on my torso.
I opened my mouth in shock at the cold surprise.
“Oh, Cora!” Felix cried, his eyebrows lifting in apology.
But before I could think of it, I laughed and immediately took aim. Most of my water sprayed at Lillian, and across their canoe onto Andrew and Vivian.
It was my turn to be aghast. “Oh! I’m so sorry! I only meant to—”
But Hugh and Nell jumped into the fray, splashing back at me, and behind them, Andrew and Vivian. We screamed and shouted, and for a good three minutes, we were nothing but a group of splashing geese in the middle of the lake, honking in outrage and laughter. When we finally paused, I was out of breath and utterly soaked, my hair falling from its bun, around my shoulders, my skirts clinging to my legs.
Never had I looked worse.
But never had I felt such relief.
In spite of all the posturing and digs, in spite of the tension, for a few precious minutes, we were nothing but barely grown children, connected, laughing.
And in those moments, I caught a glimpse of what it might be to be one with them. A family.
PART II:
CROSSINGS
CHAPTER 13
Cora
Our parting with Mr. Kensington, at the harbor in New York, was awkward. I was torn between my desire to keep him with me for one more moment, as a buffer between me and my reluctant siblings, and my desire to finally be free of him. He was the constant reminder of my deepest hurt, the secrets he and my parents had conspired to keep.
I stood a few steps away as he tenderly hugged and kissed the foreheads of Vivian and Lil. The girls teared up. He moved on to Felix, shaking his hand and holding it as he shared a stern word of warning. He patted his son on the shoulder, then leaned closer to say something else, as Felix threw back his head and laughed. Then my siblings turned and joined the Morgans—the youngest girls squealing and jumping up and down in their excitement, pointing up at the vast ship that loomed above us—and Mr. Kensington turned toward me.
I felt faint. From the steps I was about to take? Or from the prospect of leaving him? I knew not. He opened his arms, offering a hug, but I gave him a sad, rueful smile. I did not belong in those arms. He was no more my father than any other man I might’ve met a few weeks prior.
But I had to offer him something, so I held out my hand, dragging my eyes upward to meet his, hoping it’d be enough.
He gave me a soft smile, his blue eyes tilting upward too—and yet laden with a barely concealed layer of grief—and then took my hand in both of his. His fingers were thick, like sausages, and his palms warm and dry. “Cora, sweet Cora,” he said, holding on to me as if I might pull away. “Have a good journey. Know that you are not as alone as you feel. Alan and Alma did right by you, girl. They gave you what you need to make it, come what may. I’ve only given you the means to go.”
I was grateful to him, honoring my parents that way. “I thank you for the opportunity, Mr. Kensington.”
At my words, he lifted his chin slightly. Still, he held my hand, and I resisted the urge to yank it away. “This is but the first step for us, Cora. Once you’re home and return to school, I wish to come and call upon you occasionally. I wish to know you, Cora, and you, me. Someday, perhaps we’ll be at ease in each other’s presence.”
“Perhaps,” I said stiffly.
“Perhaps,” he said, nodding and giving me a real smile then. He lifted my hand and quickly brushed his mustached lips over my knuckles. “Take close care, daughter. I will pray for you every step of the way.”
Pray. My father prayed? The thought startled me.
“Oh, and this arrived for you this morning. A telegram from your mother.” He smiled as he reached into his coat pocket to extract it. His eyes twinkled, as if he already knew it contained good news.
“Thank you,” I managed, taking it from him. And then there was nothing more to say. So I turned, picked up my valise, and followed the merrily waving Morgans and Kensingtons aboard the long, steep gangway up to the enormous ship.
At the rail, I paused, looking down to the dock and the city beyond it, my last glimpse of America for some time. I tore open the telegram.
Papa faring better –STOP–Under best care here –STOP–Bon voyage dearest –STOP–We love you–STOP
“Bon voyage, Mama,” I whispered. “Take care of him.” Then I tucked the telegram inside the vest of my traveling suit, directly next to my heart.
It took me days to stop fretting that we were on the sister ship to the Titanic, which had so tragically gone down the year before. Like the rest of the country, we’d devoured every detail about the horrible accident. But Will and his uncle, as well as my father, rushed to explain that the Olympic was as trustworthy as she was beautiful—and White Star had worked diligently to add more lifeboats and adopt emergency procedures that would keep the tragedy from being repeated. We’d gone through several drills, each passenger moving to their assigned lifeboats, which lined the decks. I’d seen crewmen testing each rope and pulley that would allow the boats to descend to the water, hundreds of feet below.
“No one wants to avoid another tragedy more than White Star,” Will had said, at my side.
But it remained in my mind nonetheless. The first few nights, I’d awakened in the middle of the four-poster bed in my luxurious first-class stateroom, crying out, thinking of children drowning in the corridors of the third-class decks below. It didn’t help that Felix delighted in bringing up stories of the Titanic, trying to scare the younger girls, Lillian and Nell, who shrieked in horror and hit him on his arms with their fans. According to him, waiting relatives of those who went down with the ship awoke at 2:20 in the morning, after dreaming of their loved ones drowning. The exact time the big
ship sank.
I’d thought it to be nothing more than a ghost story until Will shrugged and reluctantly nodded. “There were reports of that happening, yes,” he said.
There was murmuring all around the table, wondering at such a mysterious event. It made me think of arriving home in Dunnigan and knowing something was wrong.
“Is it true that you can smell an iceberg?” Andrew asked Will as we sat around a table in the Grand Dining Saloon, nearly identical to the one that had been on the Titanic. We had a private alcove which held one massive table where we could take all our meals together.
“Pish,” Vivian said dismissively.
Will lifted an eyebrow toward his uncle.
“I believe it’s possible,” our elder guide said, sitting back and stroking his gray beard. “The icebergs break off of great glaciers. The minerals inside give off a distinctive odor as the iceberg melts. When we get to the mountains, we’ll visit an ice cave. You shall know then of what I speak.”
“There was a lady aboard who said the evening smelled strange,” Felix pressed. He lifted his nose in the air and frowned a little. “Do any of you smell something odd now?”
“Oh yes, I do too.” Andrew frowned.
“As do I,” Hugh said, feigning as if to rise in alarm and flag down an officer.
Nell and Lillian grew pale as they looked to their elder brothers. Then Vivian said, “Are you three quite through with your game? If you don’t stop, both of these girls will end up in my stateroom bed tonight, and there is not enough room for all of us!”
The young men laughed, and the girls immediately relaxed. Lil slapped Felix on the arm, and Nell threw her napkin at Andrew.
“Perhaps you gents should ease up on the Titanic talk,” Will agreed. “Or we might all find our sleep disrupted by nightmares.”
“Don’t tell me you fear going down with the ship, Will,” Felix said, eyeing the girls again to see if they’d heard.
“You’re just working them up,” Will chided. “You know as well as I that we aren’t going to sink.”
“These waters would make our lake in Montana seem like a warm bath.” Felix shivered.
“Master Felix,” the bear intoned.
Felix gave him a guilty smile. “All right, all right,” he said, raising his hands in surrender.
Our meals were served à la carte by circulating waiters who offered eleven courses from giant silver platters. Such meals unfurled over a languid two to three hours. I stayed largely quiet during those dinners, electing to watch and listen, learn what I could of each person, and engage at just the right moment. After our rough start, I was hoping we were making incremental progress. But they still all treated me as someone they had to tolerate more than welcome.
After dinner, the women usually retired to the lounge to play cards and do needlework while the men went to the smoking room. I had no idea what they did in there; I only knew that getting within fifty feet of the doorway set me to sneezing and coughing. Each night, instead of joining the ladies, I made my excuses, returning to my stateroom to read.
After my terrifying dreams of the previous nights, I was exhausted and eager to escape the confines of protocol. To strip off my long gloves and clinging corset and icy blue evening gown and attempt a good night’s sleep. I’d decided that being a woman of society meant that you dedicated half your life to dressing for the next event. Never in my life had I changed clothes so often, nor owned so many, and after the novelty had worn off, I longed for the simplicity of the farm, where a girl could wear a dress she could breathe in, move in. Where I could do as I pleased. But as we finished our raspberry sorbet—a delicate, icy treat I’d never had before—I learned there was to be a dance in the first-class lounge.
The younger girls were all atwitter about the opportunity, hoping certain gentlemen they’d seen would be in attendance. I scraped out the last of the melted raspberry liquid from the bottom of a crystal glass so fine I worried I’d break it, and I closed my eyes, remembering picking raspberries off enormous, thorny bushes with Mama last summer. Of baking Papa a pie, with the perfect crust…
“May I take your plate, miss?” asked a steward.
I opened my eyes to discover that most of my companions now stared at me.
Even Hugh stared at me with curiosity in his eyes. For once, there was no trace of lust. “Your face, Cora,” he said in a gruff whisper. “A fond memory?”
I felt the burn of a blush and studied the napkin on my lap. “A good memory, yes.”
He gave me a small smile and then, when I offered nothing further, looked to his sister, Nell. “There shall be no dancing with any gents aboard ship unless you grant me the first.”
“And me the second,” Andrew said, with nothing but brotherly care in his green eyes.
I smiled, looking at Nell, who loved her doting brothers. It had been the first thing I’d discovered about the Morgans that I could sincerely appreciate. They genuinely loved one another. And I adored how the older brothers watched after Nell when her own father rarely seemed to take notice of her. It made me long for brothers of my own, or for my papa. Would I ever feel connected to Felix in that way?
“Whoa,” Hugh said, shifting his eyes from Nell to me again. “What happened to the fond memory?” I was surprised at his kindness—and his awareness.
I lifted my gloved hands to my cheeks. Was I so easy to read? I had to find a way to hide my emotions a bit more if I was to negotiate day-to-day life with these people. I forced a smile to my face and pictured Papa in my mind, strong in his saddle, reaching down to lift me up to sit behind him.
“There now, that’s better,” he said. Hugh rose and pulled out my chair. “Save me a dance, Miss Cora.”
“I’ll only stay for a little while,” I hedged. “I’m dreadfully tired.”
“And I’ll be terribly disappointed if you slip away before I show you my prowess on the dance floor.”
Nell looped her arm through Hugh’s and glanced back at me, pride alight in her brown eyes. “He is quite good. He wins the annual ball award every year.”
“Well, at least the last few years,” he said.
“I’ll do my best to linger,” I said, pretending to be won over. Anna had tried to teach me the basic steps of a waltz and others, but I had yet to try them out with a man. I hoped I could escape before the Morgans and Kensingtons finished their first dances and looked around for me.
I was making my way to a chair on the edge of the parquet floor in the sprawling, grand room, which was modeled after Versailles, when Will took my hand. “May I have the first dance, Cora?”
“I, uh…I am rather new to dancing,” I said.
He gave me an encouraging smile that lifted the corners of his eyes, and I nodded my assent. He reached for my dance card to sign his name next to the first of eighteen songs.
“I am rather experienced at tutoring,” he said. He let the leather-covered card fall back to my side, hanging on a cord over my elbow. “In all subjects,” he added with a nod.
“All right.” We immediately turned toward the floor to join the other waiting couples. Anna had told me there would be frequent dances in the months to come. Almost nightly, when we reached Europe. The sooner I learned how to navigate them, the better.
“You look lovely tonight, Cora,” Will said in a whisper, looking down at me. “One would never guess you hadn’t been haunting grand saloons like this all your life.”
“All a part of my elaborate mirage,” I said, waving my fingers in an arc like a magician performing a trick.
He chuckled, and I smiled. He offered his left hand, and I slipped my right into it, then settled my left on his shoulder as he put his other hand on the small of my back. It was quite different to be in his arms, rather than Lorrie’s, the only other man I’d ever danced with. For one, Will was much taller. Broader. Substantial. Lorrie had been strong, but slight, and only about my height.
I studied the musicians in the corner, watching as they tapped a be
at and began the song, wondering how many counts it would take to finish the dance. How many counts there would be before I could make my excuses and depart.
But Will pulled me along, uttering directives that only I could hear. After a couple of minutes, I stopped counting and began to feel the rhythm of the music within. I paid attention to the nonverbal cues he gave. His fingers pressing, arms tightening, the subtle turn of his body. I tried to match each stride, to stay on my toes, to float, as Anna had taught me. But I’d never understood what she meant when she said that it could simply flow, be as natural as drifting with a river current, until I danced with a man who knew how to dance.
I looked up at him as the song ended and smiled. He smiled back at me. “You’re a natural, Cora,” he whispered, lifting up my right hand, allowing me to ease away from him, then turn under his arm and end in a demure curtsy as he bowed.
“And you’re a fine tutor,” I said.
My smile faded as I saw a shadow cross his face. He seemed to force a casual smile as I followed his gaze toward Hugh, who approached us, ready for the next dance.
I accepted Hugh’s hand and looked for Will over his shoulder when we turned, but he slipped between two couples and disappeared in the crowd at the edge of the floor.
“Do you know the Castle Walk?” Hugh looked at me with honest interest, not in judgment. And his eyes held no trace of the inappropriate advances that had shadowed our earliest encounters. Had I misjudged him?
“A bit. Dancing is rather new to my life,” I confessed.
“Happily, it’s not new to me. Just follow my lead.”
Hugh was almost as tall as Will—over six feet—but thinner at the shoulder and waist. And as soon as we began to move, I knew why he won the dance contests. He was built for it. Powerful, but lithe. If I’d begun to feel the current of the dance with Will, I knew what it was to float on clouds, following Hugh’s lead.
I grinned when I completed the half turn and dip, without his cue, and saw the measure of suspicion and surprise in his eyes.
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