Sky Pirates

Chapter 40

While they dined, the girls with their heads together talking, and the boys in the same position, a wind swept through Wickwillowshire bringing a sky of heavy dark clouds. When the girl offered Mildred her bowl of pudding, she whispered to her: "Please have the servants close the windows against the storm."

"Yes, Miss," said the girl. She finished her task of serving and left the room in a rush.

As the foursome finished lunch they could hear the windows, one after another, rhythmically closing throughout the house. Cole turned to his sister and offered a smirk. She knew what he was thinking, that if she hadn't ordered all the windows to be opened, they wouldn't have to be closed now. But, he didn't speak a word to her. He hadn't spoken more than the most minor of pleasantries to her since their breakfast argument a few days earlier, and it was getting on her nerves. She missed her brother and his kindnesses. And, didn't know how to change the situation.

After lunch, with rain pounding against Wickwillow Manor, the girls retired to the parlor and the boys disappeared somewhere else into the house.

Edith plopped down onto a sofa, her limbs akimbo on the richly upholstered cushions. "What shall we do now, Mildred?"

Mildred looked around the room. "We could play the piano together. Your father chastises me because I don't practice enough."

Edith shook her head. "No."

"I have some new yarn that we could ball together. That would be a great help to me, because I don't like to ask the servants to help me. I never know what to say to them, but it's terribly difficult for me to do it by myself." She missed Miss Canton. Of course, while the tutor had resided in their home, she'd resented having to help her with the menial tasks, like balling yarn, but now that there wasn't anyone to look after her, she sometimes felt lost and alone. Especially in the evenings after dinner, and now even more so since her brother wasn't speaking to her at all.

"Fine," said Edith.

Mildred gathered up the three skeins of yarn, their soft pastel colors a great contrast to the rooms darker décor. Together, with Mildred holding the first skein of yarn in her two hands after having found the free end, gently rolled her hands as Edith formed the ball. They quickly found a rhythm. While silent in the moment, Mildred liked the feel of working together with Edith. She watched her friend as she focused on forming the ball, turning it expertly in her small hands forming the most even ball of yarn Mildred had ever seen. She wanted to ask her how she managed to do that, keep the thing so even, yet she didn't want to break the spell that had formed in the short minutes that had passed.

"What will you make?" asked Edith, her eyes still firmly on her task.

"What?" Mildred felt confused in the moment and that embarrassed her.

"With the yarn. What do you plan to make?"

"I was thinking of crafting a light shawl. Something I can put over my shoulders at night while I sit at my desk and write to Uncle. Sometimes, even in the dead of summer, the house grows a bit chilly in the evening."

"May I see your room?" Edith asked as they started on the second skein of yarn, this one a contrasting and lighter blue than the first.

"I suppose so. I've never had anyone in there before, well other than Cole or Lorain." She thought for a moment, "or the servants, of course."

Edith didn't speak, but nodded her head as she listened. The girl didn't make eye contact with Mildred, keeping her focus on the perfectly forming ball in her hands.

Again, Mildred wanted to ask her how she did that, kept the form so regulated. Her own balls of yarns always were misshapen and lopsided. But, once again, embarrassed by the question, she refrained.