Portrait of a Scotsman by Evie Dunmore

Chapter 36

April 1881, Southern France

Spring days in the Camargue had the same warm, treacle-slow feel as August afternoons in England. The classroom’s sheer linen curtains billowed lazily whenever the salt-infused breeze blew across the plain through the open windows. Summer here at Mytilene Ville would be sweltering hot.

She turned her attention back to her class. Fifteen expectant pairs of eyes were on her, an eclectic group of young and older women hailing from all corners of Europe was waiting for her next instruction.

She pointed at the blackboard. “Take a few minutes to copy the formula, please, then we shall have a discussion about the process.”

As fifteen pens scratched onward, her attention, almost habitually now, strayed to the nearest window again. The brown dirt road winding its way through the marshland was empty. It always was. The sun was high in the sky and the ponds below glittered like mirrors. Yes, sweltering. She would stay until the lavender fields were in bloom, then she’d move on to Paris, or perhaps Italy. Or perhaps, Scotland.

She cleared her throat. “Now,” she said to the class. “What do we do once we have the brominized collodion? Miss Esther?”

“We drop it into the solution,” Miss Esther said shyly. “One drop at a time, and we mustn’t forget to stir.”

“Like rum essence into batter,” said Mademoiselle Claudine, who had not a shy bone in her body. Giggles erupted.

“Quite right,” Hattie said when silence was restored. “And what is the result?”

“Silver bromide?”

“An emulsion of silver bromide. How long until it can be used? Mademoiselle Claudine?”

“There is no set time, but it has to sit until the consistency is like cream, which usually takes fifteen hours.”

“Bravo.”

Seeing her pupils’ heads bent in concentration and watching their pens fly filled her chest with warmth. She knew now why they called it getting a big head, or getting too big for one’s boots—with every swell of teacherly pride, every elation over a small success in her makeshift laboratory, she could feel herself stretch and grow beyond her old delineations. Old fears were relinquishing their hold on her; ever since her word blindness might have saved her life by pointing Lucian the right way, the terror associated with academic learning had begun to ease. She had simply recruited Miss Esther for checking the numbers in her formulas so she didn’t accidentally teach instructions for explosives, and her pupils never remarked upon it. Very few questions were asked here at the enclave. Most of the women arrived under a false name, and personal information filtered through only as mutual trust grew. It was freeing, not being known. She was a blank slate, and could sketch whatever she wished.

Life slipped by pleasantly in Mytilene. She taught from morning until noon, and in the afternoons, they set out on group walks through the marshlands with their cameras and tried to capture the wildlife. The most popular subjects were the wild white horses that freely roamed Camargue and the flocks of flamingos dotting the shallow waters. The bright pink of the birds inspired Hattie to keep experimenting late into the night with different carbon pigment ratios in bichromate gelatin to bring out the color on the plate.

On Sundays after chapel, she read novels and essays and drank dry cider in the walled orchard. She wrote many letters. To receive mail from Scotland took unnervingly long. In case you wish to pursue your plans of becoming a soap maker, the women’s trade union office in your region now offers business loans for female entrepreneurs, she had informed Mhairi soon after her arrival in the Camargue. She knew this because she had put part of her separation settlement to good use. PS: Can you forgive my hasty departure? The answer came weeks later on thin paper: Rosie Fraser says all will be forgiven if you return and finish what you started. Madam, I won’t be a soap maker. Hamish Fraser asked my hand in marriage and I accepted …. I’ll be a miner’s wife … or a novelist’s wife, should he ever finish his edits ….

Now and again, she wondered how Lucian’s political machinations and his plans to communalize the mine progressed. She tried not to think of Lucian himself. And during her busy, laughter-filled days, he let her be. At night, when she was alone in her spartan chamber, he claimed his space—in her dreams and in her bed, and she would wake with the lingering sensation of his hard body against hers and an echo of his whispers in her ear.

Easter approached, and her class was stenciling Easter eggs, which she planned to use for a study of contrasts and texture. As she wrote instructions on the blackboard, the class was restless behind her.

“Madame,” said Claudine. “There is a man.”

Alarmed, Hattie looked out the window. Indeed, there was a rider on the dirt path, moving in a cloud of dust. A sharp, quick emotion squeezed her heart. The broad set of the man’s shoulders was recognizable even from a mile away. She realized she had her hand pressed over her chest, dusting her green bodice with chalk. Brushing at it made it worse.

“Worry not,” she said, her voice sounding thin. “I know him.”

Relief rippled through the room, then the women crowded around the windows, speculating whether he was handsome.

“Allons-y.” Hattie clapped her hands. “Mesdames, attention on the blackboard, if you please.”

By the time the class was finished and the students dismissed, her face felt feverish. She stood next to the teacher’s desk with its scattered papers and the riotous collection of flasks and jars and pieces of chalk and waited. How she had waited.

Elize appeared at the doorjamb, her face stern beneath her security officer cap. “There is a visitor for you, madame, a man who says his name is Blackstone.”

The sound of his name settled hotly in her belly. “Yes,” she said. “I wish to receive him.”

Elize contemplated her. “Monsieur is keen to see you at once. Here.”

She could only nod.

When he entered, solemn and with his hat under his arm, the classroom vanished like Scottish hills into mist. She felt lifted from her own body as she watched him approach.

He halted at a respectful distance. “Good morning, Mrs. Blackstone.”

His clothes were dusty. His dark hair was curling into his collar.

“Lucian.” It came out as a croak.

He stepped closer, and she smelled horse and travel, but mostly she smelled everything she loved the most, and her knees trembled.

“I apologize for my appearance,” he said. His gaze moved over her face, his gray eyes appraising. “You look very well.”

So did he, more handsome than in her dreams. But this was real. He was here.

He took in the formulas on the blackboard, her collection of chemicals on the table, and the results of her color photography experiments on the wall across.

“Your classroom?” He sounded impressed. Looked it, too. Impressed and proud.

“Yes,” she said. “I teach photography. And painting, but mainly photography. I built a lab, too.”

His crooked smile brought back the memories of the red-hued mountain slopes, of a day by the sea, of lying naked and safe in his arms on a creaky mattress in an inn.

Her mouth turned dry. “What brings you here?”

He placed his hat onto her desk. “I’ve had something on my mind ever since we last saw each other.”

The dreary courthouse steps. She shuddered involuntarily.

Lucian looked her in the eye. “When you left, you said you loved me,” he said.

“Yes.”

“And the last time I had seen you before that, you said you wished to be courted and wooed by the man you love.”

She nodded, her pulse drumming a hopeful, fateful beat in her ears.

He hesitated. “Are you presently spoken for?”

She thought of the dark-eyed French boys who brought her flowers and chocolates and competed over who would be allowed to carry her camera equipment, no matter where she wished to take her class in the marshlands.

“I regularly correspond with a Monsieur Louis Ducos du Hauron,” she said. “He has greatly widened my mind.”

Lucian’s face looked set in stone. “Du Hauron,” he repeated.

“An inventor,” she said. “I have decided to work on color photography, and he is the pioneer in the field. However,” she added, “I don’t consider this being spoken for.”

The tension he had been holding in his shoulders since he had walked in eased.

“And what of your captor?” he said, watching her closely. “Still unwillingly attached to him?”

“No,” she murmured. “But I still have tender feelings for the man I once married.”

Lucian let out a shaky sigh. “Then I wish to court you,” he said hoarsely. “And woo you.”

“I’m so glad you have come.” It had burst from her like a sob. She had hoped he would, though not expected it, despite the lifeline she had extended on the court steps. “Now I notice how much I wished you would.”

He gave her a wary look. “It took time to locate you. And you were very clear that you wanted to be let alone, so I didn’t think you’d appreciate me showing too soon.”

How had he spent the past six months? Had he been lonely? Flirted with other women?

“How did you do?” she asked, suddenly anxious.

“Well,” he said. “I now own a dog.”

“A dog! What kind of dog?”

“A small whippet,” he said, looking harassed. “A prissy thing. Not sure she knows she’s a dog.”

She couldn’t help but laugh. “Lucian, why a whippet?”

“I thought you might like her,” he said. “Well knowing you were gone.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t rational.”

A lump formed in her throat. “How did you do?” she repeated softly.

His gaze locked with hers and hid nothing, not an ounce of his raw, deep yearning. “I did all right,” he said. “Half agony, half hope.”

She blinked. “You … read Persuasion?”

“I’ve read them all,” he said, his tone faintly amused. “I like North and South best, but either way I’ve learned many fancy words for properly courting a lost love.”

She moved closer to him, until the tips of their boots touched and she could breathe him in. “How,” she whispered, “how would you say it in your own words?”

His eyes bore into hers. “I miss you,” he said. “Come home.”

She buried her face in her hands.

Through her fingers, she saw his still starched and folded handkerchief. She took it and pressed it to her nose just to gorge on his scent.

“I’d wait another eight years and a half for you, too, ye ken,” she heard him say.

Her head whipped up. “No. Please, begin wooing me posthaste.” She pulled at the silver necklace she never took off, lifting the wedding ring and the love spoon from her bodice.

Lucian’s eyes widened.

“Posthaste,” she repeated.

“Well then,” he murmured. “There’s a tavern at the road junction. It’s romantic. There’s flowers in baskets and carved hearts on the window shutters.”

The first tear was already rolling down her cheek.

He held her face and brushed gently with his thumbs. “Mo chridhe. Would you accompany me to a lunch?”

She clasped a hand around his nape. Felt his warmth and strength beneath her fingers, and the loosening of some tension at her center which would forever come with touching him. They could not turn back time, but they could begin again.

“Yes, Mr. Blackstone,” she said, and leaned in.