Page 70 of Time for You
“I can take you,” Maggie suggested. “I want your opinion on a few things.”
“How about supper, then?” George suggested.
“I’ll have Cook draw up a menu. Would you want to invite anyone else, ma’am?” Shepard asked Lydia.
“No one else yet. I’ll put out that he’s back from his trip to America, but that we want to wait a few days before throwing an official soiree.”
“My trip?”
“In case you did come back,” Maggie said with a shrug. “We knew you weren’t, or I guess we thought we knew you weren’t, but since we didn’t know for sure—”
“Mama didn’t want Uncle Stephen trying to run the business again,” Anne interjected.
“Hush,” Lydia said.
“Your bedroom is still made up, Mr. MacDonald,” Shepard said. “We let Higgins go after—ah, your disappearance, but I could wake a footman.”
Higgins was Henry’s valet, having been hired just a few weeks before he traveled. “No need, let them sleep.” He’d been dressing himself for months, and it would take some time to get used to having servants do that for him. “Did Higgins find a new position?”
“I could ask around, but I believe so, sir. We did give him an excellent character reference, of course.”
“Of course. But for tonight, I’ll see to myself, and we can handle that tomorrow.” The habits of being a rich man in the 1880s were slowly coming back to him, but they felt like an ill-fitting pair of boots, too stiff in places and too loose in others.
“Just so, sir. Let me get you a candle, and then I’ll see Mr. Campbell out.”
Lydia came over to give him another tight hug, and Maggie did the same. Anne was absorbed in the medical text, brushing her chin with the end of her braid in an achingly familiar way. “Annie, dearest. We’re off to bed,” Lydia said gently.
“Can’t I—”
“Tomorrow. Whatever that book is, it will still be here tomorrow.”
Anne sighed and reluctantly closed it, but she didn’t leave it on her chair. Henry knew that if he knocked on her door in an hour, she’d still be awake, curled next to her fire, reading voraciously. “Good night, little sister,” he said, and kissed the top of her head.
“Good night, big brother,” she echoed with a sweetly innocent smile. Oh yes, she was definitely staying awake the rest of the night.
Henry bade George goodbye and followed his family upstairs. His bedroom was neat, having been kept in good order by the maids, but it still felt foreign.This will pass,he reminded himself.Just as the future felt odd for weeks, this too will seem strange until I’m reaccustomed to it.
But everything felt wrong. His nightshirt was too scratchy, the sheets cold. The mattress was soft but lumpy, nothing like the glorious clouds they slept on in the future. Even having a fire going in the grate was odd, the noise abruptly unfamiliar. A log cracked and hissed and Henry turned over, wishing above all else for Daphne’s warmth beside him.
The past, as it turned out, was a lonely beast.
The air near the docks felt familiar, although it did little to lift his spirits. Henry had awoken confused, only to remember that yesterday—yesterday, but also nearly one hundred and fifty years in the future—he had said goodbye to Daphne. Now he was home, where he belonged, and had to go back to his responsibilities. His sojourn to the future had been a lark, an interlude in his life, but it was done and best to put it behind him now.
Maggie, on the other hand, had a spring in her step Henry had never seen before. “Miss MacDonald!” called a dockworker, standing near a stack of barrels. “The captain of theFine Ladysaid he saw theRobert Burnsjust a day or so ago, going slow but steady. She’ll need some repairs but should make it safely.”
“Oh good, I’m glad she’s intact,” Maggie said, drawing to a stop. Henry had never seen his sister interact with anyone outside their social station, aside from servants, and he was struck by her ease almost as much as the practical work boots she had on under her petticoats. “With the storm last week, I feared the worst.”
“Aye, I know. But like I told ye, it’s nothing she hasn’t handled before. Captain Hanson is one of the best.”
“Thank you, Peter,” Maggie said, and they kept on walking, Peter apparently not having recognized Henry. In fact, he’d barely spared Henry a glance at all, and to be fair, Henry didn’t recognize Peter—perhaps he was someone who had unloaded for them in the past, but he only knew the foremen at the docks, not every individual worker. At the time he’d felt like a fair-minded businessman, but he could see Daphne pursing her lips and shaking her head at him.
As he and Maggie walked to the warehouse, that scene repeated itself several times, each man eager to share with her a bit of news. Two more men told them theRobert Burnswas on its way, while another stopped her to let her know the shipment of timber from yesterday had some flaws, and he was worried she was being taken advantage of by their Norwegian supplier. “I’m well aware of the flaws, John, but I didn’t buy that timber for shipwrights. It’s bound for a paper mill, and structural flaws don’t matter much when it comes to paper.” Rather than being chagrined at being gently chastised, John had nodded respectfully and returned to his work.
“A paper mill? We don’t have any paper mill clients,” Henry observed.
“We didn’t. We do now,” Maggie said. She unlocked the door to the office that Henry had come to dread, but it looked different. Brighter, somehow. “I cleaned the windows,” Maggie explained with a toss of her dark head. “You let it get frightfully dingy in here. You’ll ruin your eyesight if you let it get like that again, so mind that you don’t.”
Henry nodded, taking it in. Most was as he’d left it, but with Maggie’s mark left everywhere—the neat stack of papers on one table, and a large map now pinned to the wall behind him, tiny colored tacksscattered across the ocean. “I keep track of the ships, based on expected travel times and any weather events. There was a storm four days ago, and even despite that, theRobert Burnsshould have made it to berth by yesterday evening, so there likely is some sort of damage, even ifFine Lady’s crew says she looked whole.” She moved one red tack a few inches to the left, bringing it closer to Edinburgh.
