Chapter 22: Ten Gold a Mention

Mina's POV

My father sold the east pasture for the tenth time on the morning I got home.

I caught him at the gate with a stranger and a bottle.

"It's a good pasture," he said, with great dignity. "It just keeps being available."

"Papa. I've paid off the other nine."

"Then this is a fresh start for everyone."

I took the bottle, and the buyer's deposit, and the buyer, and walked the buyer back to his horse.

It was a good morning. For two hours I did nothing at all.

I sat in the attic window with my knees up and watched the rain.

I did not think about a man in a yard with a lamp.

He came in the afternoon.

I saw him from the attic, on a black horse, coming up the lane.

Bertram followed him in a hired gig, with a ledger on his knee.

My father went out on the step in his shirt.

"Your Grace! Come in, come in. Is it the divorce? I haven't the funds. I've the pasture."

"Not the divorce," said Ansel.

"Ah."

"Is my wife in?"

"She's in the attic. She's been looking at the weather for three hours."

I came down. I stood in the doorway in my old brown dress, with my arm in its sling.

He took off his hat in the rain.

"You didn't have to come," I said.

"I did. I owe you money."

"What?"

He nodded to Bertram.

Bertram opened the ledger and cleared his throat.

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