Free HartsLove by K.M. Grant Page B

promptly tripped. The whalebones rose above her head like a heap of petrified snakes. Despite herself, Rose began to laugh in a very unfairylike manner, and Columbine, not to be outdone, ran into the closet and leaped into a huge black silk taffeta, all flounces and bounces.
    â€˜You look like a giant spider,’ Garth said.
    Whipping out a voluminous cambric undersleeve, Columbine plonked it on Garth’s head and curtsied deeply. ‘Garth, King of the Closet,’ she said.
    Garth whisked up a shawl and wrapped it round himself. ‘No King of the Closet, me,’ he said. ‘I’m the Emperor of Siam. May I have the pleasure?’ He whirled Columbine round until her skirt, heaving like the sea, knocked them both over. Helplessly, Columbine began to giggle, and Garth, head poking out from beneath the flurry, felt a burst of laughter bubble up from a place he thought had withered away.
    Then, quite forgetting why they had come here, they began pulling everything on in ridiculous combinations. Garth found a pair of frilled drawers and a half-crinoline,which he tied round his waist. Attaching a plume to his head, he pretended to be an impatient coach-horse, neighing and scraping his feet. Clover and Columbine, their faces veiled like Persian sultanas, announced they were off to the opera. Rose pulled on a ballgown with matching high-heeled shoes. Only Daisy tried nothing on, though she longingly stroked a pair of Polish boots with leather tassles. In the end, pressed by Clover or Columbine, she wore a brown velvet nightcap with thick earmuffs which, after some disputation, they agreed must have belonged to an old man whose wife snored.
    In the end, Lily outdid them all. As the laughing, arguing, jostling and jangling rose to a pitch, she appeared framed against the closet in the candlelight. The dress she wore was of blue-white satin warmed by a filmy froth of lace tumbling layer upon layer from wrist and neck. The skirt flowed from her waist like milk, and under its shadow peeped two narrow, pointed shoes sewn with pearls. She had pinned up her dark hair and set a silver comb above it. From the comb drifted a veil of wide-spun net, fragile as Garth’s chestnut leaf.
    â€˜Oh!’ whispered Daisy, but nothing more, for at that very moment the bedroom door was thrust open and first Gryffed, then Charles appeared. Charles’s hair was rough, his shirt only half tucked into his trousers. His boots were unlaced and he was holding a pistol, raised and cocked. He stopped dead when he saw his children. ‘You!’ he exclaimed,stunned. ‘Thieves! I thought thieves –’ Then he spied Lily. For one moment he stood transfixed, then he dropped the pistol. It went off with a loud retort. Daisy gasped. Charles did not seem to notice. His face lost all its colour. ‘Clara?’ he whispered. ‘Clara?’
    There was nothing but petrified silence. Rose went to him. He jumped when she touched him, but he never took his eyes from Lily. ‘It’s Lily, Pa,’ Rose said. She could feel her father’s muscles tight as springs.
    â€˜Clara?’ her father repeated, then suddenly his face purpled and Rose was hurled across the room. ‘How dare you!’ Charles cried. ‘HOW DARE YOU!’ He rushed at Lily. ‘Your mother’s wedding dress. Take it off! Take it off this instant!’
    Lily tried to reverse through the closet door, but her crinoline was too stiff, and she found herself splayed against the frame like a moth against a window. Charles raised his hand. Garth catapulted forward. ‘Don’t, Pa! Don’t you dare lay a finger on her!’
    Charles hit Garth and in the same movement seized the comb from Lily’s hair and tossed it aside, snagging the net veil on his jacket buttons. He pulled the veil off, then caught at the collar of the dress and tore it from top to bottom. The ruins fell about Lily’s feet with a small sigh and she