Waiting for a Scot Like You EPB by Eva Leigh

Author:Eva Leigh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2021-02-23T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Beatrice surprised him continuously.

The mail coach jounced sharply on the muddy road, and the eight people crammed inside it slammed against each other. A baby in a fair-haired woman’s arms began to wail. One of the male passengers kept pulling hard-boiled eggs from his pockets, sprinkling them with pepper, and shoving them into his mouth. The smell of sulfur clung to the interior of the vehicle as though it was a portal of Hell.

It was by far one of the least comfortable rides Duncan had experienced as a civilian.

Yet Beatrice engaged every single passenger in conversation, with the exception of the infant. She did, however, ask the baby’s mother if she could hold the child, and when given permission to do so, she gently rocked it in her arms. The baby made soft noises as it grabbed for the ribbons on Beatrice’s bonnet. All the while, she continued to talk to the others in the mail coach.

“I’ve never been to Hartlepool,” she said to a middle-aged Black couple who said they hailed from that town. They had introduced themselves as John and Lydia Maye. “It must be lovely with the sea just outside your door.”

“It is, madam,” Mr. Maye answered eagerly. “Why, when we were courting, I took her for walks all about to look at the sea. Do you remember Seaton Snook, my love?” he asked his wife, who blushed.

“Well, I . . . that is . . .” Lydia Maye murmured.

“Clearly, you remember,” Beatrice said with a laugh, and the Mayes also chuckled.

So it went for the whole of the day’s journey. She engaged the entire party in lively conversation, sometimes singing to the baby, asking questions of each person that showed she was interested in hearing about their lives. Nothing seemed too dull a topic for her, from the best way to bake a honey cake to the proper care of geese to listening, riveted, to an aspiring novelist relate the plot of their work in progress.

It wasn’t merely chitchat to fill the time. She truly seemed to care about these people that she would never see again. Things continued in this vein when they paused at a public house for luncheon, losing a few passengers—including the mother and her baby—and gaining new ones, and then on into the evening.

But she didn’t chatter. She sensed when the party’s energy flagged, and she let the mail coach fall into a peaceful silence. A few passengers nodded off.

Across the interior of the vehicle, his gaze met hers, and heat sizzled along his spine. It was captivating to watch her all day, see how her hands moved through the air as she talked, watch the pink in her cheeks when something somebody said delighted her.

What must it feel like to dive headfirst into every new adventure? To eagerly experience and celebrate what it meant to be alive in this world? Unlike him, she didn’t cautiously, carefully assess situations and make meticulous—Rotherby and the others might say arduous—decisions.

It was mystifying, and yet .

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