Page 27 of Romancing the Scot
As Hugh watched her, he wondered if she was searching for something that might bring back her forgotten past. He moved to her side.
“Jo tells me you only remember the time inside the gondola. And even those memories are scattered and limited.”
“Limited in every respect.”
It wasn’t his imagination that she was becoming paler. “I’m pressing you.”
“What stays with me being trapped in it is my response to what I thought was certain death,” she went on. “I suppose wishing for the end to come, praying that each breath would be your last, is too powerful an emotion to forget.”
“I’m sorry that an instrument of my avocation was the cause of your ordeal.”
“I might not remember the past, but I’m certain neither you nor this basket are responsible for any of it.”
Slowly, she turned and glanced around at the other equipment.
“Are you a balloonist?”
“Guilty. As you can see, flying is my passion,” Hugh told her.
Moving past barrels and piles of netting, she paused and looked at the knotted ropes dangling like nooses from the rafters.
“And that balloon is the only thing that keeps you up in the air?” she said, pointing up at the deflated silk.
“It’s called the envelope. But yes, that and the gas that will fill it.”
“They say there is a fine line between courage and madness.”
“So my sister tells me,” he replied, smiling.
“Humans have been earthbound since the Garden of Eden.”
“That’s true. Man has been aloft for scarcely more than thirty years. But we’re learning more and more about flying every day. In this modern age, Daedalus and Icarus are no longer mythical beings; men are taking to the skies and dueling with the stars.”
“And of course, what a better way to die.” Grace looked at him with the hint of a smile.
Her comment took him by surprise. Hugh couldn’t stop himself. He laughed out loud.
He followed her to a work bench, where she picked up a small block-and-tackle pulley. As she turned the wheel, his eye was drawn to the delicate curve of her ear, the soft shadow playing along her throat, the white ribbon of her bonnet lying lightly on the swell of her breast.
“I envy you,” she admitted. “So what is it like to see the world from that vantage point?”
He was charmed by her interest.
“When you’re up high, all you see is the beauty. The fields and woods are like a cotter’s patchwork quilt. You see a vast pattern of geometric shapes, bordered with fringe, rolling away to each horizon. Myriad shades of green and golden-brown greet the eye.”
“It sounds quite beautiful.”
He gazed into her eyes again. He’d only seen this shade of blue in the morning sky above the Eildon Hills.
“Are you ever afraid?”
“Only a fool feels no fear when it’s warranted. It’s reckless to ignore the risk of imminent death. At the same time, living in fear is a kind of death. It needs to be conquered,” he told her. “We cannot stop living life to the fullest simply because death awaits us somewhere in the future.”
Hugh stopped, realizing he was talking to himself as much as to her.
“‘If it be not now,’” she murmured, “‘yet it will come.’”
“The readiness is all.”
