“Mrs. Sutton decided that it was too near their teatime to go visiting,” Deirdre replied. “So I came by myself.”

Beatrix was secretly glad that they would not have to keep an eye on the children playing in the barnyard, where they were bound to annoy the three old hens. Mrs. Boots, Mrs. Shawl, and Mrs. Bonnet did not like their tail feathers pulled. “Well, then,” she said cheerily, taking Deirdre’s coat and hat, “you and I will have longer to talk. I’ve been thinking about you since I saw you in the lane. Do sit down, dear, and tell me your news. The kettle’s boiling—tea won’t be a minute.”

Deirdre sat, looking extraordinarily happy. Her eyes were sparkling and her unruly red curls seemed to dance with sheer delight. Of course, you and I know her secret—the Jeremy part, at least. But Beatrix doesn’t, and as she set out bread and butter (she believed in simple teas), she was genuinely puzzled.

“Well,” she said finally, “I hope you are going to tell me, and not just sit there looking as pleased as a kitten who’s caught her first mouse.”

“Oh, Miss Potter, I am pleased!” Deirdre exclaimed. “But it’s not like catchin’ a mouse—oh, no, not at all! Jeremy Crosfield has asked me to marry him, an’ I have said yes!”

“Jeremy!” Beatrix exclaimed, astonished and a little dismayed. “Married!” And then she thought that perhaps it was like catching a mouse, after all, except that she wasn’t sure whether the mouse was Jeremy and the cat was Deirdre, or the other way around.

But Deirdre did not seem to hear the dismay. “Aye—isn’t it wonderful?” she crowed happily. “We’re to be wed in t’ garden at Courier Cottage in June, when Jeremy’s school is out. Mrs. Sutton has promised to help me make my dress, an’ there’ll be lots of flowers, an’ all our friends are invited, especially you!” She clasped her hands under her chin. “Dear Miss Potter, do say it’s wonderful! Oh, do!”

“Well, my goodness,” said Beatrix, by now feeling not just dismayed but envious. First it had been Grace and the vicar, and now Deirdre and Jeremy—free to pledge themselves, to follow their hearts, whilst she herself could not. Still, she managed a smile as she poured their tea. “Why, of course it’s wonderful, my dear. How did this all come about? And when?”

And with that encouragement, Deirdre’s story spilled out, embellished with girlish giggles and happy asides and enough starry-eyed happiness to soften even the hardest heart. She and Jeremy had realized their attraction to each other long ago, years ago, in fact. But they’d had precious little opportunity to spend any time together until he came back to the village to teach. He boarded at High Green Gate with the Llewellyns, just up the hill from Courier Cottage. This had made it convenient for him to accompany Deirdre and the little Suttons as they walked to Moss Eccles Tarn and along the shore of Esthwaite Water, supplying the children with paper and pencil stubs and showing them how to look at a plant and draw it.

“Drawin’ is his passion,” Deirdre said. Beatrix already knew this, for the first time she had met Jeremy, he had been drawing a cat, and quite a good one, at that. She had been working on her frog book at the time, and he had shown her where to go to find frogs to draw, so she had named her book The Tale of Jeremy Fisher.

It hadn’t been long before the hours Deirdre and Jeremy spent together had become the highlight of their days. But it had been a much longer time before they could agree to be married, because, as she said rather shyly, “There was so much to be worked out.”

The “so much” was mostly money, Beatrix suspected. Two could not live as cheaply as one—that was a fallacy. Did they think they could manage to live on Jeremy’s salary as a teacher, assuming that he would stay on at the village school? But that was an impolite question. Instead, she asked another. “Have you spoken to Mr. and Mrs. Sutton?”

Deirdre, as you may remember, was an orphan, claimed five years before by Rose Sutton (such was the practice at the time) to help with the children, in return for room and board and the privilege of going to school. Sometimes, these arrangements did not work out well, and the orphan was sent back. But not this time. The Sutton children thought of Deirdre as their sister, and the Suttons considered her their daughter. And since she had no real parents, the Suttons would have to speak for her.

“They were a little surprised,” Deirdre admitted. “An’ they didn’t think it was a good thing—in the beginning. They feared I was too young, an’ we wouldn’t have enough money. But we kept talkin’ to ’em and lettin’ ’em know we were serious, and they finally agreed, especially after Jeremy was asked to stay on and teach at the school.” She grinned engagingly. “The Suttons like Jeremy, o’ course. An’ they married when they were young, even though Mrs. Sutton’s parents didn’t approve. And now just look at their fine family.”

Indeed, Beatrix thought to herself. It was a fine large family. And then she asked the question that was at the top of her mind.

“But what about Jeremy’s art? And his university education. I thought . . . that is, I hoped ...” She stopped. She had understood that Jeremy was simply taking a year to work on his drawing and painting skills before going off to university. After all, Major Kittredge had promised to help support him while he finished his studies. If he were to marry, that avenue would be closed to him. But it was his decision, wasn’t it? What rights did she have in the matter? None at all, of course.

Deirdre sobered. “To tell t’ truth,” she said quietly, “that’s why I said no at first, Miss Potter. And kept on sayin’ no all t’ way through Christmas and t’ winter. I thought he ought to go to university, since Major Kittredge is so keen to help, an’ I promised to wait an’ work an’ save as much as I could until he was finished. But he says he would rather draw an’ paint than spend his time studyin’ in books, and would rather teach an’ live in t’ village than go off to Cambridge.” She colored prettily. “An’ marry me, o’ course. I told him I thought he was wrong to miss his chance, but he says he knows what he wants.”

“And what do you want?” Beatrix asked softly. It was the same question she had asked Caroline, who had not told her all the truth.

“Me?” Deirdre met her eyes in an utterly straightforward way. “I want Jeremy to be happy,” she said simply. “If livin’ here an’ teaching at t’ school an’ bein’ married to me makes him happy, that’s what I want. I’ve asked him over an’ over, an’ that’s what he says.” She sighed and looked down at her hands, capable hands with blunt fingers and close-trimmed nails. “T’ won’t be easy, I know. I’ve promised to help by goin’ out to work—Mr. Sutton wants me to stay on at the surgery, at least for a while. An’ we’ve found a cottage in Far Sawrey that will be vacant come June. Slatestone Cottage. Just a little place, but it’s clean an’ not too far from Jeremy’s school an’ has a vegetable garden an’ even a little shed where he can paint.” She smiled a little. “I know you’ve wanted Jeremy to be an artist, Miss Potter. You’ve helped him an’ encouraged him. I promise not to do anything to stand in the way of his art.”

Well, there it is. And I must admit that I cannot help comparing Deirdre’s feelings about Jeremy to Caroline’s. Caroline was full of romantic dreams of white bridal gowns and babies in ribbons and pinafores (cared for by Deirdre and the nanny’s helper) and tea under the awning. In fact, now that I think about it, all her dreams had Caroline herself at the center of them, with husband and children and servants on the periphery, like a young girls’ dolls.

Deirdre’s dreams, on the other hand, are centered on Jeremy: what he wants, what will make him happy. Some of us might say that perhaps she is too focused on him, at least for our modern sensibility. Where are her own desires? Her own wishes? Isn’t there something she wants for herself, not for Jeremy?

But I hope we won’t be too judgmental. Deirdre, like Beatrix and Caroline and all the others in this story, are creatures of the time and place in which they live, and we cannot fault them for not seeing beyond the walls of their dwelling. Even Sarah Barwick, that Modern Woman who wears men’s trousers and smokes cigarettes, is a person of her time, for if she lived in our day and age, she would surely be aware that while trousers are a good thing, cigarettes are not. In any event, I am glad to see that Deirdre is so clear-eyed and realistic when she speaks about her marriage. When it comes to marriage, realism goes farther than romance, and Deirdre seems prepared to work. And although every marriage is held together by mutual love and respect, work—especially when two people find something they want to work for together—can be a remarkably strong glue.

And so the conversation turned to wedding dresses and curtains for the new cottage. When Beatrix asked Deirdre what she and Jeremy would like for a wedding present, she was quick to say, “Oh, pots an’ pans, for sure, or dishes for every day! Nothin’ fancy, please, Miss Potter.” Then she looked down at Beatrix’s blue rug and smiled. “Unless it’s a little blue rug, like this one. It’s so pretty.”

This remark made Beatrix smile, for it was so like Deirdre. She made a mental note to obtain an identical blue rug for the floor of Deirdre’s and Jeremy’s cottage, and perhaps a nice serving dish, as well. This made her think what sort of wedding presents she would like, if she and Will were to be married—a thought that she immediately pushed away. But not that far. It lingered, like a curious spectator, at the edge of her awareness, as she and Deirdre talked about village matters, about the little Suttons and their father’s veterinary practice, and about the aeroplane, which, Deirdre said, had fallen into the lake that morning.

“It did?” Beatrix asked, astonished. “Into the lake?”

“You haven’t heard? Mr. Alter, one of Mr. Sutton’s clients, was waitin’ at the landin’ to catch the eastbound ferry, when he heard the engine sputter-like and saw the thing go down in the water.”

“Was anybody hurt?”

“I don’t think so. But they say the wing is busted, and the tail, too. No tellin’ when it’ll be flyin’ again. Weeks, maybe.”

“Well, that will be some relief,” Beatrix said. “It’s a mercy it didn’t fall on someone’s house.”

After Deirdre had finished her tea and left, Beatrix sat at the table looking out of the window, watching the gray March twilight creep ghostlike across the garden. She was lost in thought, reflecting on the young and innocent love between Deirdre and Jeremy, the recent weddings of her friends, Dimity Woodcock and Margaret Nash, and the happiness that Grace and the vicar had found together later in their lives—if the mystery of the letters could be solved. The world seemed to be full of people who met and fell in love and married. But sadly, it was a world from which she was excluded, because, as Mrs. Thompson had put it so aptly that morning, she was a martyr to duty. “We must do what we must,” Mrs. Thompson had said, her voice heavy with resignation, “whether we like it or not.” But did that have to exclude any possibility that she and Will might find happiness together?

She sat awhile longer, thinking. Then, when the room darkened, she brought the paraffin lamp to the table and lit the wick, loving as she always did the circle of warm light that fell like a blessing across the red-checked cloth. She poured herself another cup of tea, sat down, and took Bertram’s letter out of the pocket of her skirt. She reread it for the dozenth time. Then she got up and went for pen, ink, and paper.

It was time to write a letter to her parents.