It wasn’t a student was it?”
“You were hurt.”
“Oh, yes,” she said, her panic immediately subsiding. “Is there much damage?”
“Only to you and your car. I don’t think you’ll be driving it for a while.”
“I should call a tow truck, I guess.” She didn’t have much money and a tow truck would take half of her gas budget for her trip to Chicago. And God knows how much repairs would cost.
“We’ll worry about all that later,” he said as if her problems were his problems. “You should eat and rest. I’ll have the boys bring your things up.”
“The boys? You have children?”
“I have sixty children.”
Her eyes went wide.
“Students,” he said with a tight smile. “Here at the Marshal Academy.”
“Small school. All boys?”
“All boys. You are, in fact, the only female on campus right now.”
“And here I am in your bathrobe. I mean, dressing gown.”
“Stay.” He raised his hand. She stayed.
He left her alone in his bedroom again, and she sat on the bed. Looking down she saw the robe had opened enough that the headmaster of Marshal had gotten more than a glimpse of her cleavage. Only woman on campus? That could either be a very good thing or a very bad thing. The headmaster—Edwin Yorke—had been nothing but a gentleman to the near-naked girl who’d stolen his bathrobe. And he was handsome. And English. And tall. And did she mention handsome? Maybe she should stop focusing on how handsome he was and get back to focusing on how screwed she was.
She ran her fingers through her wet hair to tame it. In the other room she heard voices, whispers and laughter. The laughter sounded young, much younger than the headmaster. Then the door reverberated with the sounds of seemingly a dozen hands knocking all at once.
“Who’s there?” she called out.
“Laird,” a teenage boy’s voice answered. “I’m a very nice person. I promise.”
“If you weren’t, would you admit it?” she asked.
“No, I’d probably lie and tell you I was nice,” he admitted.
“Are you lying?” she asked. “Or are you actually nice?”
“Headmaster Yorke is standing right here. He’ll make sure I’m nice. Or he’ll kill me.”
“Then you should probably come in before he kills you,” Gwen called out. “I can’t have your life on my conscience.”
He opened the door with one hand and with the other hand he covered his eyes.
“I have your things from your car,” Laird said, his hand still shielding his eyes.
“No, you don’t,” she said. “You have nothing with you.”
“I couldn’t carry the bags, open the door and cover my eyes all at the same time.”
Gwen smiled. Not that Laird could see that smile what with his eyes covered. He looked about seventeen or eighteen with dark red hair and a sweet face—what she could see of it.
“If you can handle seeing a woman in a bathrobe, you can uncover your eyes,” she said. “If you can’t, just back away slowly and I’ll get my own things.”
“I can handle it,” he said and lowered his hand. He stared at her through narrowed eyes. “Are you married?”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m not asking for me,” he said.
“No, I’m not married.”
“Good. You’re hired,” Laird said. At that an arm reached into the room, clapped down on Laird’s shoulder and dragged him bodily back out the door.
In his place her suitcase appeared.
“It was nice to meet you,” Laird called out from behind the door. “Please stay forever.”
“Nice to meet you, too, Laird.” She walked over to her suitcase and bent over to pick it up. It was then she realized Headmaster Yorke was still standing outside the bedroom door and had likely seen straight down the bathrobe. She flushed crimson and he merely looked past her.
“Dinner is in half an hour,” he said, his voice cold and strained. “You’ll dine here in my quarters. I won’t subject you to any further scrutiny by students. Yet.”
“I’ll get dressed,” she said.
“That would be an excellent idea.” He placed meaningful emphasis on the world excellent.
She dressed in the best clothes she owned—a pencil skirt and white blouse—and in half an hour she went looking for the headmaster. What she found was an elegant mahogany dining table laden with food (whitefish in sauce, celery hearts, chilled honeydew melon) and wine (red and blush). It was a feast for a king, but the king never showed. When the headmaster said she’d be dining in his quarters, she’d assumed it would be with him. She didn’t want to think about why his absence disappointed her. She wanted to talk about a job—that was why. Of course.
Disappointed or not, she still ate every bite on her plate and then some. When was the last time she’d eaten so well? Living on a TA’s income had meant living on student rations. Now sated, Gwen left the table and wandered the headmaster’s quarters.
From the window by the dining room she saw she was on a high floor of a building. She must have been five stories up. How had she gotten here? Someone must have carried her up the stairs to this place. Had it been a student? Had it been the headmaster himself?
Gwen walked from window to window as she tried to get her bearings. From her high vantage point, she could see a square stone wall outlined the perimeter of the grounds. Outside the wall the forest loomed dark and wild. Inside the wall she saw nothing but manicured lawns, walking paths and several other buildings. Gwen was clearly in the tallest of the buildings. To the left and right of her, she saw two smaller buildings of wood and stone. Another building peeked out from the back. Cobblestone walkways connected all the buildings to each other. A turret of sorts rose up from each corner of the wall. Turrets? Stone walls? Ivy? The school was far more evocative of a medieval French fortress or an old Ivy League college than a Southern high school.
What it was, if she had to pick only word, was beautiful. Breathtakingly, heart-stoppingly, daydream-inducingly beautiful. Already she sensed herself falling under the spell of the school. She could hear the heels of her shoes clicking on the cobblestones, books under her arms. She could see herself sitting on the stone bench under the overhanging oak tree grading papers. She could imagine herself here, teaching, happy.
She’d never let herself hope or dream that she’d be happy—really happy, not just not miserable—someday. Maybe when she was a kid she had assumed happiness had been possible for
