“It must be her odd notions of a woman’s place in the world, then.” She nodded mournfully, as if greatly grieved, before giving him a brilliant smile. “But, truly, I’m certain if you’re patient you can turn that right around.”
“That’s right, Buckley,” Mr. Pickering pronounced. “You’re a man of the world, and can surely nip such behavior in the proverbial bud.”
Ash saw red. “I assure you,” he gritted, “there is nothing at all wrong with Bronwyn. Not in the least.”
“Newlyweds,” Mr. Pickering said in a knowing aside to his wife.
“We are so relieved to hear it, Your Grace,” Mrs. Pickering said, giving Ash a knowing smile that said she did not believe him one bit.
“You may not be relieved when you learn the true purpose of why I wished to speak with you,” he growled.
At once the couple appeared alarmed, their smug complacency of a moment ago gone.
“I…I don’t understand, Your Grace,” Mr. Pickering stuttered.
“You shall in short order,” Ash replied, his voice as tight as the hold he had on his quickly growing anger. “Bronwyn, as you know, has a deep interest in entomological studies.”
The attitude of the pair before him shifted once more, this time to acute discomfort. But he was soon to learn it was not because of any guilt they might feel at attempting to stifle their daughter’s talents, as any parent worth their salt would have felt. No, it was quite a different reason.
“We know we have failed in purging her of any of those more unladylike interests, Your Grace,” Mrs. Pickering said in an almost whine, her hands gripping the windowsill tight. “We indulged her for too many years, allowing her oddness to run unchecked. But I am certain, if you continue where we left off in gently redirecting her interests to those that are much more proper for a woman of her years and station, she will soon see reason and abandon those unfortunate pursuits.”
Ash, however, had heard enough. Drawing himself to his full height, he glared at the duo. They blanched and reared back within the carriage interior, their faces going as white as the belly of a fish as they blessedly fell silent.
“You know nothing about your daughter at all,” he bit out. “She is your own flesh and blood, and yet to you she is merely a piece of clay to be molded to align with your own likes and preferences and designs. But she is a person, and a brilliant one at that. One who has incredible talent, who has hopes and dreams and aspirations of her own.”
“I say,” Mr. Pickering managed weakly, looking to his wife in confusion, “I don’t know where this is coming from—”
But Ash wasn’t about to let them turn this conversation around. “Did you or did you not discard Bronwyn’s scientific equipment and specimens?”
The Pickerings paled even further. “It was necessary—” Mrs. Pickering tried.
“Necessary to what purpose?” Ash demanded. When they continued to look at him in stunned muteness—a blessing, really, for he could not take much more of their selfishness and inanities—he glowered at them. “Why would you destroy those things that were so very important to your daughter?”
“But we didn’t destroy them,” Mrs. Pickering burst out, turning a sickly green when Ash turned his glower her way.
“We told Bronwyn we destroyed them, of course,” Mr. Pickering added. “How else could we keep her from searching out her things and using them again? We would have been back to square one with the girl. No, we stored them in the attic.” Then, in an aside, and obliterating whatever crumb of goodwill Ash might have felt for the man, Mr. Pickering said, “They were much too expensive to destroy. Better to recoup the money from reselling them, after all.”
How was it, Ash wondered as he stared at these two people who should have loved their daughter unconditionally yet had always made her feel less than, that Bronwyn could have come from such a union? Lowering his brows, he glowered at the couple.
“Hear me, and hear me well. You will return home immediately and fetch Bronwyn’s things from the attic, and you shall have them delivered here tomorrow afternoon. Is that understood?”
They both gaped at him, and for a moment he thought he might have to repeat his order. Finally, however, they both nodded. Knowing that if he continued this conversation with them, he was bound to say something he would regret, he nodded curtly and, stepping back, indicated to the driver that he could now go. Within moments the Pickering carriage was trundling down Caulnedy’s drive and out the gate to the darkening road beyond.
Ash stood in the drive, taking deep, cleansing breaths of the fresh island air, letting the briny scent of the ocean and the greenness of the trees and the richness of the earth fill him up. How had Bronwyn grown up surrounded by such people and still retained her incredible individuality? The more he learned about her, the more impressive he found this woman he had married.
A warmth blossomed in his chest then as he turned and gazed up at Caulnedy. Before he could think twice about it, he strode back to the house. Perhaps he could steal a few moments alone with Bronwyn before dinner…
***
It was late afternoon the following day when Bronwyn and Ash returned to Caulnedy. But they had not spent their time together visiting the sights or riding over Synne’s rolling hills, as Bronwyn had expected when they rode out for the day. No, much to her surprise, Ash had insisted they visit the meadow.
She had gaped at him. “Surely you don’t wish to sit and watch me study insects.”
But he had smiled. “I would like nothing more.”
Bronwyn had not needed further urgings. There had been a time, after all, when she had feared she would never be able to return to that place, when first her parents’ decrees and later their intention to send her away from Synne had threatened to forever put an end to her research. And so she and Ash had traveled the short distance to the meadow. While Bronwyn sketched and observed to her heart’s content, Ash had propped himself against the trunk of an obliging tree, alternately reading and watching her sketch and asking questions about her work.
There was still that voice in her head that told her he didn’t truly care, of course, that he was merely placating her. But as the afternoon marched on that voice grew quieter and quieter until, by the time they returned to the house, it was merely a whisper. And then, at Ash’s suggestion, they visited the library, and that whisper was completely silenced.