"I know, and there is no clear answer. For now, let us focus on what we can decide; what to put in our presentation." Father paused, and there was a rustle as he fetched paper from his desk. "Perhaps when Aurora gets back, she will feel up to the discussion."
There was more to the conversation, but Aurora had already tuned it out.
The front door was unlocked, as it always was, so she wandered outside to enjoy the sunshine. The weather never betrayed her, for she loved all kinds; sun and rain, snow and thunderstorms. Today, though, it was pleasantly warm with a touch of clouds to take the glare from the sunshine. It was roasting hot like it was some days, but the perfect in-between temperature that was just right.
As she wandered, Aurora had to wonder just what her coughing fit had meant. She still felt the tug at the back of her throat, making her chest ache with the strain. It had been so long since she had coughed this badly; fast and shuddering, and then over just as quickly as it started. Usually it was a slow-building thing, no worse than the sort of cough brought on by a cold.
Aurora ran a hand through her loose curls, hoping to ease some of her tension. The repetition of the move was soothing, but not nearly enough to calm her ragged nerves.
She wondered what Lord Winters and Father were discussing now. Were they still talking about her? Or had they moved on to other things?
The garden looked beautiful in the sunshine; it made everything brighter, more vibrant and colorful. Aurora loved how the green of the grass turned a dark emerald, the splashes of light almost golden-yellow in comparison. She loved how the lavender rustled in the breeze, and how the scent of the herbs carried across the entire garden.
She wandered aimlessly, with no real direction in mind. Sometimes, it calmed her to just walk and see where it took her; she had been doing this a lot since Lord Winters appeared in her life.
She had done it, too, when Christopher had been around. It had been the only way to keep her nerves under control, those first few weeks after he betrayed her.
She and Christopher had never courted. Not officially. At least Aurora had been spared the embarrassment of seeing the man she was expected to marry abandon her, for their relationship had never gone beyond flirting. Perhaps, in hindsight, that had all been by design too.
It had been Aurora's first time at the meeting as a real presence, not just 'Mr. Washam's daughter'. She had her presentation all planned in detail, her notes written in a brand new notebook Father had bought her for the occasion. Aurora had been naive, excited for the chance to prove herself worthy of these men’s attention.
Aurora and Christopher had known each other only for a few weeks, the length of time he'd been visiting London. Yet in those few weeks, Aurora had become fond of him, close with him. It sounded silly now, but she would have trusted him with anything.
Her first mistake had been discussing her ideas with Christopher like old friends. Her second mistake had been to leave her notes on the table of Father's desk and left the house, while Father and Christopher spoke in the next room.
By the time she returned from her errands in town, her notes were gone and Christopher had returned back to the inn he had been residing in.
Aurora bit down her lip to keep from coughing. Her chest still burned from before, and she couldn't take another outburst. She wanted to be sick, too, but stuffed down the urge. Not thinking about it was easier. If she ignored the tickle, it eventually faded away. Yet today, that wasn't working.
"Just focus on happier things," Aurora instructed herself; but it was too late, her mind was already returning to Christopher.
He'd stolen her work. Claimed her notes on herbal plants as his own, and presented it to the entire meeting of fifteen botanists. Her work on echinacea had earnedChristopherso many compliments, such praise, as he had explained in detail how versatile its uses were.
He had been reading straight from her notebook. Aurora knew, because there was an ink stain on the corner of the leather cover in the exact place she had spilled her pot just a week ago.
Nobody believed that it was her work, however, when she had interrupted him to point out her notes. It was word for word, or near enough, what she had written earlier.
Aurora didn't like to think about it, because it made her chest ache in a way not caused by her cough. It brought with it a sense of heaving dread, to think about the possibility of this all happening again. With Lord Winters.
It hadn't mattered that the notebook had been in her handwriting, or that the botanists all knew that she had planned to present a section of herbal remedies. It didn't even matter that Father, the Duke's personal botanist, had supported her claim.
How could a woman have done all of this research on her own? How could awomanhave thought of such genius uses for echinacea? As far as her fellow botanists cared, she was lying. Not a single soul other than Father had believed that the notebook was hers, even when she tried to prove it by revealing things in the notebook not even Christopher had spoken about.
She was deemed a liar, trying to claim Christopher's great work as her own.She wants the attention,Mr. Buckley had claimed,wants to feel like one of us.
How ridiculous!
It had only been hours after, when Aurora had finally stopped crying and coughing, that Father had made a decision. She didn't know what conversation happened between Father and Christopher; but the next morning he had her notebook returned in pristine condition, and Christopher was packing to go home.
She hadn't seen him since and didn't want to, but Aurora sometimes wished that she'd faced him herself. Perhaps it would have given her closure, if he had admitted just once that he'd stolen her work.
Aurora paused by the roses, unaware of how she'd gotten here. Hadn't she been going towards the herbs? Still, the presence of such bright and beautiful flowers was soothing to her, a reminder that not everything in the world was ugly.
Father had been working on a new variety before their angel's trumpet project began. Small, dainty roses that looked more like wax sculptures than the real thing; they were so delicate that their petals were almost translucent.
Aurora brushed a careful hand across one, feeling the thin petals sweep past her fingertips. Some were a pale pink while others were almost white; Father hadn't perfected the color yet.
She didn't remember, of course, but Father always said that these roses were for Mama. They were her favorite for their variety of colors, and because of their distinctly perfumed scent. Some considered roses overpowering; but Aurora agreed with Mama's sentiment. Their scent was heavenly.