Charity Begins at Home by Alicia Rasley Page A

during that picnic lunch. She had read his hesitance to join her and his quizzing about her proposals as warnings to steer clear. And so she had, all through the picnic, all through the week. Now he was weary of the game, weary of feeling like a villain, of sensing her presence and finding her gone, of hearing her voice and having to imagine her face.
    He went out on the balcony to clear the paint fumes from his mind. As he gazed south, straining for a glimpse of the sea between the hills, he saw instead a small feminine figure cutting across the corner of the Haver Park. She squeezed through a gap in the unkempt hedge and emerged into the avenue that wound down to the village.
    From her quick light steps as much as her direction, Tristan knew this was Miss Calder. He narrowed his eyes, shading them against the sunlight, and saw that she must be returning from some homely parish duty, for a goodwill basket hung from her arm. From this distance, he could distinguish only the faded blue of her gown and sunbonnet, a pastel as subtle as today's sun-blanched sky.
    She had appeared as if prompted by his conscience. So he answered his own cue expeditiously. He changed into a pristine shirt, yanked on a coat, and bent to chip a paint spot off his Hessians. Then, mindful that the boys would soon be released from their lessons and beg to go along, he took the secret route, out the balcony. Without giving himself time to think, he swung his leg over the wall and slid down. Then he hung there for a moment, looking down at the ground a dozen feet away, contemplating the likelihood of breaking his ankle. He felt the rough stone scraping at his hands and decided better a broken ankle than a scabbed brush-hand, and let go. He landed safely on the soft, overgrown grass, dusted his tingling hands, and crossed the lawn to the elm-lined avenue.
    Miss Calder was walking briskly down the slope toward the village. With its crooked streets, white and black houses, red and yellow and green square gardens, spread out like a display in a toyshop window, it was as neat and pretty and unique as the girl who served as its mainstay and source of energy.
    He was just in time to see her quick figure vanish, as if the village's needs and demands had swallowed her up whole, like the whale with Jonah. But he knew where she must have gone, to that cross-shaped church with the deteriorating square tower, that tower whose expensive restoration so occupied Miss Calder's time.
    She was not in the hushed, dusty church, so he walked across the yard under the ancient oaks to the church hall where she had said some of the Midsummer preparations would take place.
    The hall was Tudor, like the rest of the village, far newer than the Norman-era church. As he came alongside it, he heard Miss Calder's laughter through the open casement window and knew he had come the right way. He glanced in through the rippled glass then hesitated there on the side of the hall, reluctant to call out. For on a raised platform that resembled a stage, beyond three stacks of pine boards, she was kneeling as if in prayer, her back to the room, her head bent. But then he heard another voice, raised in laughing protest.
    She wasn't praying; she was hard at work, and not alone. She raised a hammer aloft in what in a less-amiable woman might have seemed a threatening manner, and indeed, the boy in front of her, holding the corner of a wooden frame with exaggerated gingerness, was giving a good imitation of fear.
    "Crispin, you're such a coward! I promise you I won't hit you, no matter how much you deserve it!"
    Her brother, Tristan thought, recognizing that form of abuse. They were building a huge canvas, the backdrop for Jonah and the Whale, perhaps, the one she wanted him to paint. They'd do better to construct a triptych, he thought with professional interest, then the canvas wouldn't sag in the middle and the effect would be more macabre. As Miss Calder's hammering echoed in the hall and escaped