Page 105 of Charlotte

She finished the dance because she could not in courtesy do otherwise, and thanked the laughing oblivious boy, then excused herself. She stood in the empty doorway where Cecil had been standing, looking out into the dark where he had vanished, and felt the whole bright evening turn to cold ash in her mouth.

“He’s not angry with you,” a quiet voice said at her shoulder.

Lottie did not turn. If she looked at Cornelia, she might cry, and she had already laughed too brightly once that evening. She would not add weeping in a doorway to her list of mistakes.

Cornelia came to stand beside her, close enough her sleeve brushed Lottie’s. “Whatever you are thinking, set that part down. He is not angry.”

Lottie stared into the dark where Cecil had vanished. “Then why did he leave?”

“Because he saw you dancing with a man who could give you the very thing he believes he cannot.”

The words went in clean.

Lottie’s throat closed.

She had wanted Cecil to mind. Only a little. Only enough to make him step forward instead of forever stepping back. She saw it now. The awful shape of what he was feeling. He had not looked at Tucker and seen a rival.

He had seen proof.

Cornelia’s hand settled on her arm. “Be careful now. A frightened good man can do a great deal of harm while trying to be honorable.”

Lottie pressed her fingers against the doorframe until the wood bit into her skin. “I hurt him.”

“Yes,” Cornelia said gently, “but he was already hurting.”

The music inside turned merry again, bright and thoughtless, and Lottie could hardly bear the sound of it.

“He was supposed to come after me,” she whispered.

“I know.”

“He was supposed to choose me.”

Cornelia squeezed her arm once. “Perhaps he still will, but not tonight.”

Lottie stared into the dark and felt the truth of that settle hard in her chest.

Cecil had not left because he felt nothing.

He had left because he felt too much, and every bit had convinced him she would be better off without him.

Chapter Sixteen

July 1, 1886 — The Parsonage and the Lakeshore

The next morning, Val Sutton came to the meeting hall while Lottie was trying to decide whether patriotic books required their own shelf or whether Mrs. Schulte had finally done lasting harm to her judgment.

Val did not come smiling.

That told Lottie enough to make her set down the ledger.

“Has something happened?”

Val stood just inside the door; her hands were folded in front of her. She looked like a minister’s wife, a matchmaker’s escort, and a woman who wished very much that someone else had been sent to do this errand.

“Preacher Sutton would like to speak with you at the parsonage.”

Lottie’s fingers tightened around the edge of the table.