His Lordship's True Lady (True Gentlemen #4)(6)
“My papa is dead. That means he’s in heaven, except he was put in a box when he died. Does the box go to heaven? Like a package?”
Why did this topic have to come up now, without warning, in public, in conversation with a young lady whose company Hessian found a good deal more bearable than most of her kind?
“Perhaps now is not the time—” Hessian began.
“Daisy, do you remember the story about Moses?” Miss Ferguson asked. “He made the sea step aside so he could take his people to safety?”
“I remember.”
“Well, the sea doesn’t normally have such accommodating manners, does it? Something unexplainable and wonderful was involved, like dragons breathing fire without scorching their tongues. Getting to heaven is something like that. You needn’t drag along the part of you that got sick, and had megrims, and suffered nightmares. The forever part of you slips into heaven like Moses dashing right across the sea.”
“Wonderful, but we can’t explain it,” Daisy said, petting Ham’s withers. “Only good people go to heaven.”
Miss Lily guided her mare around a puddle, and just as the trees overhead were mirrored on the puddle’s surface, insight reflected off of Daisy’s comment.
Good people went to heaven; therefore, bad little girls did not go to heaven, and they thus avoided ending up in a wooden box beneath the churchyard.
No wonder Daisy saw monsters in the night shadows. Quite logical, from a child’s point of view.
“Daisy, have you ever had a good dream?” Miss Ferguson asked. “One where you could fly, or glide up the steps without your feet touching the carpet?”
“Yes. I dreamed I was a kite, and I could see all of Cumberland like a bird. It was very beautiful, and I wasn’t afraid at all.”
“You’re an astute little girl,” Miss Ferguson said. “You know that was a dream. When you were dreaming it, did you know it was a dream?”
This was all tiresomely abstract—Hess couldn’t recall when last he’d dreamed of anything more interesting than a well done roast of beef—but as the horses clip-clopped along, Daisy appeared to consider Miss Ferguson’s question.
“I thought I was a kite. I didn’t know it was a dream when I was in the sky. When I woke up, I was sorry it was over.”
“That is what heaven is like,” Miss Ferguson said, “but it’s real. When you dreamed, you forgot all about the part of you that was kicking at the covers, or a little chilly for want of an extra blanket. In heaven, you get to keep the good parts—the love, the joy, and the laughter—but you don’t have to carry along any of the hard parts.”
No vicar would explain death and heaven to the child thus, and Hessian wouldn’t either. The words sounded right to him, though, and he appreciated that Miss Lily was making the effort.
Appreciated it greatly.
“Does my mama still love me?”
Hessian could answer that. “Your mother loved you and loves you still, the way Ham loves his carrots. Even when the carrots are stored away in the saddle room, Ham loves them. Even this minute, far from his stall, he’s enthralled with the notion of his next carrot. Your parents love you, always, ten times more than that.”
Carrots. Not his most inspired analogy. Miss Ferguson hid a smile under the guise of adjusting the drape of her habit over her boots.
“My mare adores a big, crunchy carrot too,” Miss Ferguson said. “I’m not that fond of them myself. What about you, Daisy? What is your opinion regarding carrots?”
The ladies chattered back and forth about vegetables, rabbits, and dragons who ate toasted rabbits, and all the while, Hessian wondered how long it would have taken Daisy to ask him about heaven. They ambled beneath the maples, until the horses approached the gate onto Park Lane.
“I have very much enjoyed today’s outing,” Miss Ferguson said. “My thanks to you, Lord Grampion, and to you, Miss Daisy. You will remember to pull the curtains back, won’t you?”
The reminder was for him, though directed at the child.
“We will remember,” Hessian said, “and thank you, Miss Ferguson, for bearing us company.”
He inclined his head and nearly steered Hammurabi across the street, except he could feel Daisy lapsing back into a silence too brooding for one of her years. With Miss Ferguson, the girl had actually chattered, and if ever Hessian longed to hear a female chatter, it was Daisy.
“Miss Ferguson,” he said, “might you pay a call on us Tuesday? I would not want to impose, and I know the Season is demanding of a lady’s time, but—”
“Please say you’ll come,” Daisy said. “Please?”
The smile came again, the soft, sweet, slightly mischievous smile. “I would love to see you on Tuesday, Daisy. I will count the hours until we meet, and I’ll want to hear about your dreams then, so be sure they are grand.”
“I’ll be a kite again,” Daisy said. “Is Tuesday soon?”
Well, no. Tuesday was four entire, long, dreary days and nights away. “Soon enough,” Hessian said. “My thanks again for your company, Miss Ferguson.”
And for aiming just a bit of that dazzling smile at him too.
*
“What sort of sister dies as the Season is about to begin?” Roberta Braithwaite asked as she paced the confines of her private parlor. “Most inconsiderate of dear Belinda, but then, she was a trifle on the self-centered side.”