Free With Heart to Hear by Frankie Robertson

 
     
    WITH HEART TO HEAR
     
     
    Cumbria, England
    Summer, 1860
     
    She hadn’t lied to her father—not exactly.
    The carriage wheels crunched over the rough road as Elise reminded herself that she had dutifully called upon her cousin Susan and her husband William, Lord Crandall, just as she had promised. They’d been somewhat surprised when she’d told them her father had no objections to her camping alone in order to pursue her nature studies, but she hadn’t lied to them either. She’d merely omitted the detail that her father remained ignorant of that part of her plans. When he’d assumed that her tent was for the purpose of providing a respite from Cumbria’s interminable drizzle during her day outings, she had not disabused him of that notion.
    William had grumbled that no good would come of such laxity on her father’s part, that a man had an obligation to put down the foolish notions of the women for whom he was responsible. Fortunately, Lord Crandall’s gout kept him from venturing very far from his library to exercise his protective male prerogative. In any event, Elise had little care for his good opinion.
    Susan fussed that no respectable woman would sleep in the field like a Gypsy. What kind of reputation would she have? What respectable man would marry her, after such outrageous behavior?
    “My dear, at eight and twenty, I am essentially ‘on the shelf,’ as they used to say.” Elise had smiled, not troubled by the thought.
    “It is long past time you let go of your childhood fancies, Elise,” Susan said. “You must embrace the real world, as I have done. You only give grief and misery to yourself and those who love you when you resist and run from your responsibilities.”
    Elise expected such words from her cousin, but they stung, nevertheless. The days when Susan had shared her wild longings and dreams were long past. While Elise’s childhood fancies had grown into a scientific curiosity about the flora and fauna of the natural world, Susan had risen to the demands of the ton’s social whirl. Elise had cultivated herbs and drawn “her brambles,” as her father called them, while Susan had accepted the need for an advantageous marriage and had made one. She had embraced the real world. As Elise had done.
    Elise had exchanged her fantasies of exploring the world for the attainable pleasure of learning the intricacies of Britain’s flora. It had not been a great sacrifice. The natural world of England was both orderly and riotous. An oak was no less interesting than a banyan, despite its familiarity, and a shrew was as vicious as a tiger, for its size. But such things no longer held any interest for Susan.
    It came as no surprise to Elise that the friend who had shared her childhood games and youthful dreams had transformed into a compassionate near-stranger. So why did she grieve as for a death?
    “Is the ‘real world’ you embrace a warm one, Susan?” Elise shook her head. “To me, your world is only a shadow of the real one. I don’t want to live in it.”
    “You live in it whether you wish to or not, Elise. And camping alone is neither acceptable nor safe. Tramp about all you like during the day, but sleep here in the house.”
    “I will lose too much time traveling back and forth, and certain things may only be observed very early or very late in the day. Don’t worry so. I’ll be on Lord Crandall’s land, very nearly in sight of the house, clearly under his protection. Surely, I have little to fear on your husband’s property.”
    Susan had abandoned safety as an argument and continued to cluck about the impropriety of Elise’s plans, but in the end she subsided without taking any action to impede her cousin.
    On the morning of Elise’s departure, Susan made one last sally. “If word of your outrageous behavior gets out, no proper family will receive you.”
    “Then we shall have to keep my outrageous behavior to ourselves, shan’t we?”
     
    *
     
    The incline