“Quite. I was always in my father’s tools. So much so that he finally determined it would be easier to teach me to use them safely than to leave me to lose a hand or eye or what have you. Not”—she held up her hand with the too-small finger—“that knowing saved me from all injury.”
Atlas shivered. “I thought it did not bother you.” Perfectly fine for him to carry pain in him like a bone, but for her? Never.
“It does not.” She patted his hand, and he trapped hers on his thigh. He’d keep it for now. To pretend before his mother.
That woman looked at where he’d pinned Clara’s hand to his thigh, quite pleased, before lifting her gaze to Clara. “What is the first project you took on? Furniture? Something else?”
“A birdhouse. A small, delicate thing. Quite simple. My father had been commissioned by a woman to build entirely new pieces for her parlor that led out into a small garden. I wanted to help, but I was still learning, and he could not risk my still-shoddy work on a commission for such an important lady.”
“Important?” His mother hummed. “Who was she? Perhaps I know her.”
“I cannot remember. Fancy clothes and a fancier London address. My father brought me with him one day to view the space, so I could see how he evaluated the size and shape of a room to determine what the pieces should look like. I’d never seen a space so… clean. Cleaner than our workshop, and that was the cleanest thing I’d known until then.”
“The workshop? Clean?” Atlas asked. This woman Clara spoke of sat sour with him. He did not think he would like her should they meet.
“Oh, yes. Our flat hardly mattered. But the room we rented next to it, where we kept our materials, that must be pristine. I never understood why until I saw that woman’s house, her parlor, even her garden. It was because the pieces we made were going into places like that. And they might be rejected if soiled with so much as a single speck of dirt.” Her gaze dropped to her lap. “I suppose that woman thought my father a speck of dirt. Me as well, naturally.”
“Oh, Clara dear, no,” his mother crooned.
The only comfort Atlas found himself capable of offering a squeeze of her hand, moving an inch or two closer to her.
Clara smiled. “I know. Thank you. My father never acted like he thought himself, or me, lesser. He wore his skill and talent like the richest coat, made for a king—with pride. So do I.”
She didn’t look up, though, didn’t dare meet the gazes of those around the table. Someone had shredded her pride once.
He wanted to hand her the needle and thread to sew it back together.
Nudging her arm with his elbow, he flipped her hand so they were palm to palm and threaded their fingers together. “You take space into account? When building furniture?”
Now she lifted her chin, her eyes glowing. “Yes. And the people who will use it.”
“What do you mean?” his mother asked, her voice quieter than before.
Clara rolled her other hand at the wrist, as if she were unspooling her explanation into the air before them. “People use the furniture, do they not? My father thought,I think, that we must take those who use it into account. Their size, but also their mannerisms. Are they hard on their possessions? If so, they need hardy, strong pieces. Are they delicate in size? If so, any large and hefty furniture pieces will overwhelm them. Do you see?”
His mother clapped. “I do see. How marvelous. I wish we’d known of him before my husband died. He would have made a wonderful addition to our house parties. Just as you, Clara dear”—his mother stood and rounded the table to place a kiss on top of Clara’s head—“make a wonderful addition to this family.” She winked at Atlas and threw the front door wide open. “Alfie!” she called, disappearing into the sunlight.
Atlas turned to his wife. A woman of talent and heart and courage. He raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. She deserved better than him, better than a man who couldn’t ride across the countryside without aching for hours after, who couldn’t sleep without sweating and swallowing screams.
She was sunlight and courage and song, and she would be better off when he finally left.
He slipped his hand out of hers, made his way back upstairs, and continued to rip up the rotted floorboards. Work that made him sweat, but in the end, an easy hole to mend, unlike the one in his heart.
Twelve
The impression of an arse on a paint-splattered canvas always drew Clara closer. She stood before it in the hour before dinner, as she did every evening, and studied it. The haphazard painting, had, apparently, won Atlas’s younger brother Zander his inheritance. Seemed unlikely, but Franny had explained it had been the unusual method of its creation that made the canvas a masterpiece and not the actual technical difficulty. Which was… none.
“It’s an excellent thing,” Franny said from across her personal parlor where she stretched out across a small couch, “that Fiona and Zander are in London at the moment. Dear Fee might take issue with your staring at her husband’s ar?—”
“Franny.” Matilda looked up from the book she read in a corner. “I thought you possessed an aversion to discussions regarding your children’s various unmentionable parts.” She propped one elbow on a chair, holding her book up before her face. It dipped below her nose now, though, as she considered Franny over its edge. Her other hand settled, as it usually did these days, on her growing belly. In the right gown, she could still hide her condition. Four months with child had not swelled her belly to the same proportions it had for Clara, but whenMatilda sat back into a chair, her skirts draped lovingly over the slightly swelling curve.
“I’ve mounted it on the wall, dear. Zander’s backside is now a clear focal point of conversation. Not that we should discuss its size or shape.”
Clara tilted her head farther. “Both of which remain unclear. It’s more of a blur than anything.”
Franny clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “You look not with the eyes of love. You best not look at all. Your husband will return home shortly, and he may object as strongly as Fee would.”
Atlas and Raph had left to look at the dairy early that morning, and Clara had worked alone all day, focusing on patching and reworking the upholstery for the dower house’s furniture. He’d kissed her forehead before leaving the bed, and she’d rolled over into his warm, abandoned spot, inhaling deeply.
