“Did you bully anyone when you were at Harrow?” she asked pointedly.
“Of course not. But my situation was different. I was raised in a loving family. We lived in a house by the sea with our own private sand beach. We each had our own pony, for God’s sake. It was an embarrassingly perfect childhood, especially in contrast to the Ravenel brothers, who were the poor relations of their family. They were orphaned at a young age and sent to boarding school because no one wanted them.”
“Because they were mean little ruffians?” she suggested darkly.
“They had no parents, no family, no home, no money or possessions . . . what would you expect of boys in their situation?”
“I don’t care what caused Mr. Ravenel’s behavior. All that matters is that he hurt Henry.”
Gabriel frowned thoughtfully. “Unless there’s something I missed in those letters, Ravenel did nothing particularly vicious. Never bloodied Henry’s nose or thrashed him. It was more pranks and name-calling than anything else, wasn’t it?”
“Fear and humiliation can inflict far worse damage than fists.” Phoebe’s eyes stung, and a hard lump formed in her throat. “Why are you standing up for Mr. Ravenel and not my husband?”
“Redbird,” Gabriel said, his tone gentling. It was the pet name only he and their father used for her. “You know I loved Henry. Come here.”
She went to him, sniffling, and his arms closed around her in a comforting embrace.
In their youth, Henry, Gabriel, Raphael, and their friends had spent many a sunny afternoon at the Challon estate in Heron’s Point, sailing little skiffs in the private cove or rambling through the nearby woodland. No one had ever dared bully or tease Henry, knowing the Challon brothers would thrash them for it.
At the end of Henry’s life, when he’d been too weak to go anywhere on his own, Gabriel had taken him fishing one last time, carrying him to the bank of his favorite trout stream and setting him on a triangular camp stool. With endless patience, Gabriel had baited the pitches and helped Henry reel the line in, until they had returned with a creel full of trout. That had been Henry’s last day outside.
Gabriel patted her back and briefly laid his cheek against her hair. “This situation must be damned difficult for you. Why didn’t you mention it before? At least half the Ravenel family stayed with us at Heron’s Point for a week, and you didn’t say a word.”
“I didn’t want to cause trouble while you and Pandora were trying to decide if you liked each other well enough to marry. And also . . . well, most of the time I feel like a rain cloud, glooming up the atmosphere everywhere I go. I’m trying not to do that anymore.” Stepping back, Phoebe wiped the wet corners of her eyes with her fingertips. “It’s not right for me to dredge up past grievances that no one else remembers, especially at such a happy time. I’m sorry I mentioned it at all. But the prospect of being in Mr. Ravenel’s company fills me with dread.”
“Are you going to say something to him about it? Or would you like me to?”
“No, please don’t. It would serve no purpose. I don’t think he even remembers it. Promise you’ll say nothing.”
“I promise,” Gabriel said reluctantly. “Although it seems only fair to give him a chance to apologize.”
“It’s too late for apologies,” she muttered. “And I doubt he would anyway.”
“Don’t be too hard on him. He seems to have grown up into a decent fellow.”
Phoebe gave him a dour look. “Oh? Did you come to that conclusion before or after he lectured me as if I were some feudal overlord who’d just been trampling the peasants?”
Gabriel fought to suppress a grin. “You handled that well,” he said. “You took it with good grace, when you could have sliced him to ribbons with a few words.”
“I was tempted,” she admitted. “But I couldn’t help remembering something Mother once said.”
It had been on a long-ago morning in her childhood, when she and Gabriel had still needed books stacked on their chairs whenever they sat at the breakfast table. Their father had been reading a freshly ironed newspaper, while their mother, Evangeline, or Evie, as family and friends called her, fed spoonfuls of sweetened porridge to baby Raphael in his high chair.
After Phoebe had recounted some injustice done to her by a playmate, saying she wouldn’t accept the girl’s apology, her mother had persuaded her to reconsider for the sake of kindness.
“But she’s a bad, selfish girl,” Phoebe had said indignantly.
Evie’s reply was gentle but matter-of-fact. “Kindness counts the most when it’s given to people who don’t deserve it.”
“Does Gabriel have to be kind to everyone too?” Phoebe had demanded.
“Yes, darling.”
“Does Father?”
“No, Redbird,” her father had replied, his mouth twitching at the corners. “That’s why I married your mother—she’s kind enough for two people.”
“Mother,” Gabriel had asked hopefully, “could you be kind enough for three people?”
At that, their father had taken a sudden intense interest in his newspaper, lifting it in front of his face. A quiet wheeze emerged from behind it.
“I’m afraid not, dear,” Evie had said gently, her eyes sparkling. “But I’m sure you and your sister can find a great deal of kindness in your own hearts.”
Returning her thoughts to the present, Phoebe said, “Mother told us to be kind even to people who don’t deserve it. Which includes Mr. Ravenel, although I suspect he would have liked to deliver a dressing-down to me right there in the entrance hall.”
Gabriel’s tone was cinder dry. “I suspect his thoughts had less do with dressing-down than undressing.”
Phoebe’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Oh, come,” her brother chided, amused. “You had to notice the way his eyes were waving about on stalks like a lobster about to be boiled. Has it been so long that you can’t tell when a man is attracted to you?”