Addie by Leenie Brown

Author:Leenie Brown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-989410-35-6
Publisher: Leenie B Books

Chapter 9

For a week after that first day on which Addie had presented her idea to save Damon, she, James, and Mr. Eldridge met to race their mounts against one another. For the same week, Mr. Eldridge rode either Damon or Pythias while Addie rode Hugo and James rode whichever of Silverthorne’s horses Mr. Eldridge was not riding. For that same week, the three of them would afterwards return to Silverthorne Hall and have tea. And, for that same week, Addie slept more in the chair in her father’s room than in her bed.

However, one week and a day after that first day on which Addie had presented her idea to save Damon, she did not venture from her house. The horses remained in the stable. The chair beside her father’s bed was taken away, and she no longer had to wonder whether she would have to give up her father or Damon first, for she knew the answer.

Within three days of her father’s passing, all that needed to be done in seeing him quietly laid to rest in the churchyard next to his wife and parents had been done, and while the churchyard grew just that much more crowded, Silverthorne Hall was left with a gaping hole.

However, it was not just the house which seemed incomplete, so did Addie’s heart.

“Are you going to come with me?” James asked five days after their family had shrunken by one. “I cannot ride two horses at once.”

“Take Stuart. He is an excellent rider.” She barely glanced up from the toast she was breaking into pieces on her plate rather than eating. It was better if all the heartbreak was done with at once. She simply could not bear to ride Damon knowing that tomorrow, he would leave with Mr. Eldridge and likely never return.

Addie was uncertain which was most painful, to know that Damon would be gone forever, or that Mr. Eldridge would be. It was likely both. She had come to view Mr. Eldridge as a very good friend, much as she did Damon. They both seemed to understand her and wish for her to be as she was and not as society demanded her to be. Neither cared how much she loved horses or the interest she took in understanding the workings of an estate and stable.

Such acceptance reminded her of her father and was what was missing and had made her brother such a ninny after he had left for school. When he had come home at that first holiday, he no longer viewed her as he always had. He saw her through the eyes of his friends, and they viewed her as no different than any other female of their acquaintance.

“Adela, please.” James sat down next to her and stopped her hands. “You cannot waste away in the house. Think of how distressed Father would be to see it.”

She clenched her teeth together and swallowed the immediate sorrow which rose at the mention of her father. Shaking her head, she whispered, “I cannot.

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