Captive Magics

2 - Caroline

It was a Thursday. For most people this Thursday was a lot like the Wednesday before it, and the Tuesday before that. Alternatively, perhaps, you might compare it to the previous Thursday instead, which had similar overcast weather and little of interest in the national newspapers beyond gossip on known themes. For Leander it was unlike any other day, because it was the day he started realising things.

Two nights prior, Gunny's period of leave had come to an end, and as was traditional he and all the other officers had assembled in the club rooms and toasted their return to war until the wee hours of the morning. Leander, now decommissioned, had caroused alongside them. He returned to the club the following day and found to his shock he recognised no one there, though why this was a surprise he couldn't quite say. The unfortunate result of two days of excess, one with friends and one pitifully alone amongst the horror of loud strangers meant he had woken late in a sweaty tangle of sheets, barely recognising himself in the mirror when he rose, and scraped together some semblance of respectability. His first revelation was that he was horribly alone and his eyes, searching for something not awful to think about, picked up the invitation to James Fawle-Horley's party which he had yet to discard, and immediately returned his mind to its pinpoint focus on Miss Elspeth Harper. He had been thinking of her a lot.

He was still thinking about her when he passed through the paradise gardens on the cold top floor of a public omnibus an hour later than planned, the sluggish vehicle coughing out coal smoke and rattling on the cobbles as the turrets, domes and colonnades of the Grand Pavilion sailed slowly by in the edge of his vision, and he realised with a jolt that he hadn't even tried to notice the pretty young women seated opposite. Blinking in surprise he looked at them, wondering which stop they had got on at. On the street below a newspaper seller was hollering about the latest updates on the adulterous love letters which had disgraced the married Duke of Coss and the three girls craned over, chattering, to see, oblivious to his startled gaze. Leander looked away wondering at his own total apathy. His army colleagues – former army colleagues – would have laughed at his obliviousness, but all that interested him was Miss Harper. Was he in love? He must be. What if he never saw her again?

The journey he made across the city was to see Caroline, closest to him of all his brothers and sisters, and his young nephew whose development he was curious to see. The eldest two of the Perilloe siblings, they had enjoyed a close relationship right into adulthood, and around the time Leander had applied for his war service, Caroline (aware she was becoming a burden on her parents) had met and married a respectable man after a whirlwind courtship. That and the army had kept Leander and Caroline apart, but he was back now.

Nobody knew the ins and outs of society better than his sister, and nobody had her memory for the errant details which had seemed so unimportant when Leander was a child of ten. There wasn't anything in particular he wanted to ask her about. Of course not. But her reminiscences and anecdotes were entertaining. An hour or two in her calm domestic setting would be splendid. Besides, there were very few other people in the capital for him to visit.

Caroline was angrily poking the coals of the kitchen range fire when he entered.

"My sister! You sent your serving girl to open the door to your own brother, are you unwell?"

"If this range were fixed I could have come and met you myself!" She angrily pushed loose strands of hair under her cap only for them to fall out again. "He will not get it fixed. Men!"

"Ah, but I am not like all men, am I? Dear sister?" he cajoled, and warmly embraced her. She hugged him back, at first grudging and then in earnest.