Read More Than You Know for Free Online

would lift her hair—and the rest of her—right into the water. He quickly revised the image. She would never survive the cold Atlantic crossing to meet up with those breezes again. Certainly she would never encounter them on the Cerberus. “How long ago was that?"
    "A year and a half."
    Rand made the connection to the onset of her blindness. “Was it the sun?” he asked.
    "Most of the doctors say that. Stickle has taken me to more than a dozen. Almost to a man they say the same thing: the sun's glare off the water, the steady exposure to the bright light, burned the retinas. These same physicians hold out no hope. The condition cannot be reversed."
    He almost said he was sorry. Those words, coming from a person of no account in her life, such as himself, would give little comfort and might even be construed as pity. Besides, he had heard something else, something that made him believe Claire Bancroft might hold out some hope. “You said almost all,” he told her. “What do the others say about your condition?"
    "Not others,” she said. “Only one. A physician in Paris, Dr. Anton Messier, believes there may be another explanation. He says the one offered by others is too facile. The condition of my eyes is not consistent with what I report to have suffered. He thinks my blindness is here, in my head.” She tapped her temple lightly. “In my thinking,” she went on. “Not in my eyes."
    Now Rand realized he could feel pity for her. She was quite literally groping in the dark, accepting one irresponsible physician's opinion against the prevailing wisdom of all the others.
    Claire knew how to interpret this silence. “Your skepticism is understandable. His grace thinks no differently, but he is my godfather and he believes it's his duty to indulge me."
    "Forgive me, Miss Bancroft, but I can't help but point out—"
    She held up her hand. “When you begin a sentence with forgive me, it's a sure sign that the rest should be left unsaid. Do I seem spoiled to you, Captain? Have I given you the impression that I must have my own way? I have yet to throw a tantrum because you've turned me down. If you were the sightless one in this room, can you honestly say you would not reach for the carrot Dr. Messier has offered?"
    As Claire warmed to her subject and as her agitation increased, she moved closer to the edge of the sofa. “I know what I am risking by holding out this hope, but I am accepting a life of darkness if I risk nothing."
    Rand watched her come to her feet. A year or more ago, he thought, she would have paced the floor, perhaps gone to the window and turned her back on him while she spoke. Her short, impassioned speech had given rise to a certain restlessness that she could not properly express in an unfamiliar room. She stood in front of the sofa, her hands at her side, the fingers alone betraying something of what she was feeling by curling and uncurling against the dark fabric of her gown.
    "I am at six o'clock,” he said quietly. “There is a window bench twelve paces behind you at twelve o'clock. You must only skirt the sofa and side table."
    Surprise stilled her fingers. Her head lowered and her eyes narrowed in Rand's direction, as if she could peer through the black curtain of her vision and see him clearly. She smiled faintly as she realized what she was trying to do. “Thank you,” Claire said. “I never oriented myself to this room. I was afraid I would break something."
    He considered how difficult it must have been for her to sit in one corner of the sofa while she waited for him, when what she wanted to do was explore. “There's nothing in it that can't be replaced,” he said. “Of course, since I'm renting the house, none of it's mine.” He watched her feel her way carefully around the side table. The cup and saucer she had placed there rattled momentarily as her fingers brushed them.
    "Twelve paces?” she asked, rounding the table.
    "I think so. Unless you have a mannish stride, Miss