Dreaming of the Bones

homeward. Glancing at her son’s still-averted face, Vic sensed that she hadn’t yet reached the heart of his distress. What mattered to him so much that he couldn’t say it?
    Slowly, she asked, ”Did Miss Pope make you angry because you feel I’m not paying you enough attention?”
    Kit jerked his head in a nod. His lips were pinched so tightly together that they’d turned white, an effort, Vic guessed, to keep them from trembling. Damn Miss Pope, she thought, and damn Ian, damn them all. But she knew she was shifting blame, that Kit’s security was her responsibility alone, and she had fallen down on the job.
    She’d been a fool to get involved with Nathan. Aware of Kit’s vulnerability, she’d still put her own needs first, and now she wasn’t sure she could bear the thought of giving Nathan up.
    And Lydia ? Was her obsession with Lydia Brooke worth hurting Kit more than Ian had hurt him already? Perhaps Duncan had been right, and she should let it go, but she knew that was impossible even as she thought it. But she would have to tread more carefully, making sure it no longer took first place in her life.
    ”I’m sorry, Kit,” she said, giving his shoulders a squeeze. ”I’ll just have to do better, won’t I?”
    He nodded and gave her a swift upwards glance before his face relaxed into a ghost of a smile.
    Vic hugged him again. ”What do you say we start with a fire, and some hot chocolate, and a serious game of Monopoly?”

8

    Dear, we know only that we sigh, kiss, smile;
    Each kiss lasts but the kissing; and grief goes over;
    Love has no habitation but the heart.
    Poor straws! on the dark Hood we catch awhile,
    Cling, and are borne into the night apart.
    The laugh dies with the lips, ”Love ” with the lover.

    RUPERT BROOKE,
    from ”Mutability”

    The hall clock chimed six as Margery Lester fastened the pearl stud in her ear. Her dress was new and rather successful, she thought, silver with the faintest hint of green, a high collar, and a row of tiny pearl buttons down the back. She’d had to ask Grace to do up the buttons—that was one disadvantage to having outlived one’s husbands; they were occasionally useful.
    Yes, the dress would do, she thought as she gave it one last survey in her dressing table mirror. She avoided pinks and blues and lavenders—old-lady colors, she called them, although she certainly couldn’t deny that she had crossed the threshold of that category. But there were still occasions when she caught a fleeting and unexpected glimpse of herself in a mirror and thought, Who is that old woman? Surely not little Margery!
    Margery was lithe and brown from tennis in the summer sun, Margery drove open cars a bit too fast, Margery laughed and took lovers... But die boundaries between life and fiction had blurred with the years, and she wondered now if she had ever been that girl, or if she had constructed her in memory as she would a character in a book.
    She heard Grace’s heavy footsteps in the hall, then a moment later her face appeared, reflected in the dressing table mirror.
    ”Madam, the guests will be arriving any time now and you should be down to greet them,” fretted Grace as she crossed the room to flick imaginary particles of dust from Margery’s shoulders. A frown added extra creases to her already furrowed face.
    ”I’m coming, I’m coming,” sighed Margery. ”You’re such a tyrant, Grace,” she added, and gave the hand on her shoulder an affectionate pat. ”I promise I’ll be down before the bell rings.” She’d given up years ago trying to stop Grace from calling her Madam, for Grace was getting on as well, and seemed more determined with each passing year to turn herself into a parody of an old English family retainer.
    Grace met her eyes in the mirror. ”You know these parties are too much, you’ll be exhausted tomorrow. Did you remember to take your tablets?”
    ”Oh, don’t fuss so, Grace,” said Margery, splashing a bit of scent on her throat and wrists. ”I’ll be perfectly fine.” In truth, it was Grace who would be exhausted tomorrow, even though Margery had insisted she get help with the cooking and serving. But Margery had had a little weak spell recently, and Grace had been hovering like a mother hen ever since. Margery stood and gave herself a final once-over in the three-way glass, then followed Grace obediently down the stairs.
    Her dinner parties, and Grace’s cooking, were renowned, but although she would never