Page 30 of Colour My World
Charlotte paused. “You are very quiet today, Eliza.”
Elizabeth glanced down at her sewing. “I have been thinking.”
“That is never a good sign.”
Elizabeth chuckled, but her thoughts pressed against her throat. She wanted to tell Charlotte. She wanted… The words died before they could rise. How could she explain something she did not understand herself?
Before she could speak, Mrs Bennet bustled in, lamenting that the new drawing room curtains would never arrive in time for Christmas visitors. Mrs Hill set down a tray of tea and biscuits, then followed her mistress from the room.
The moment slipped away.
* * *
It was not until later, when the bustle of the household had ebbed, and the others had scattered—Kitty chasing Lydia upstairs, Jane assisting their mother—that Elizabeth and Charlotte found themselves alone once more. Halting piano scales floated from the next room.Mary.
Charlotte sipped her tea, watching her. “You are thinking again,” she said lightly.
Elizabeth set down her cup. She folded her hands in her lap. This time, she would not retreat. She took a breath. “I see things.”
Charlotte lifted a brow. “Things?”
“Colours.” Elizabeth forced herself to meet her friend’s eyes. “Around people. Sometimes bright, sometimes faint. Sometimes…nothing at all.”
Her brow furrowed slightly, but Charlotte’s gaze did not waver. “You are certain?” she asked charily.
“I am certain I see them. I know not what they mean.”
Charlotte set her cup down with great deliberation. She leant forward. “Show me.”
Elizabeth shook her head. “It is not something I summon. It is simply there. Like a scent or the feeling of rain before it falls.” She related everything she had seen of her parents and her sisters. The ladybirds. The aftermath.Please, please believe me.
“You must not fight it, Eliza.”
Elizabeth blinked. “What?”
“You have always been perceptive. You see the world as it is rather than as people wish it to be. I do not think this is something unnatural.”
“It is not natural either.”
“Perhaps it is simply a different way of understanding.” Charlotte stood. “May we go to your father’s library? There is something I would like to show you.”
Elizabeth glanced towards the window. Her father and SirWilliam Lucas were walking the drive, far from earshot. “Of course.”
She led Charlotte to her father’s study. Elizabeth settled into her favourite chair while Charlotte searched the shelves. A minute passed. “Precisely where it ought to be,” she said, easing a thick volume from the shelf.
Elizabeth sat forward. “What have you found?”
Charlotte held up Chaucer’sThe Canterbury Tales. She read aloud:
“Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth—”
“Am I to suppose the Lord gave my new sight to me?”
Charlotte laughed. “Not quite. But you claim to see before you understand.”
“How?”
