“You exaggerate,” Aunt Adela said.
Coming to Sylvan’s side, he picked up her hand and brought it to his mouth in elaborate homage. “Not at all.”
“Newlyweds are given to open displays of affection, aren’t they?” The clergyman averted his eyes. “Charming. Lady Emmie, I hope you’ll forgive my lack of ceremony, but my shoes are covered with mud. I didn’t want to track on the carpet, nor could I leave without greeting the duke and duchess, and I had my wife to collect.”
“Nonsense, Reverend, no apologies are necessary,” Lady Emmie said. “Come, sit and warm your feet by the fire. Tea will be here directly and you can give us the news of the estate. Are all the crops quite gone?”
The Reverend Donald sank onto the settle beside his wife.
“I haven’t been too forward,” Clover quavered.
She looked so guilty, Sylvan could have groaned, but the vicar patted her hand. “Good, good.” Stretching his hands to the fire, he said, “God’s scythe has cut a swathe through the heart of Malkinhampsted and its people. I hate to see so many disheartened men and women.”
“I suppose more of them will migrate to the city.” Aunt Adela poured herself a glass of sherry. “I long for the good old days when they starved without feeling they had to leave.”
“That’s nonsense, Adela, and you know it,” Lady Emmie said.
Aunt Adela drank her sherry with one gulp. “I know it.”
A moment of profound silence greeted this moment of historic importance—Aunt Adela agreeing with Lady Emmie. Lady Emmie looked as if she’d swallowed a marble, and Rand exchanged a conspiratorial grin with Sylvan.
“The poor have always been with us,” the clergyman said. “They simply must resign themselves to their fate.”
“Why should they resign themselves to their fate when, with a little ambition, they can raise themselves in the world?” Rand asked.
The vicar listened to the blasphemy with an expression of sorrow. “Your Grace, I know there are those who have such a view, but it’s not attractive, nor is it the traditional judgment of the church.”
“The world is changing, Reverend,” Rand said.
“God’s truth is eternal, Your Grace.”
Sylvan hated it when men of God twisted God’s word to suit their own beliefs, then used their respected position to give themselves authority. Hotly, she said, “If we are to depend solely on tradition, then my father could never have raised himself above his lowly beginnings to the position of a man of wealth.”
Rand nodded. “Then you never would have been a part of the ton, gone to Waterloo, gained experience in nursing, come to Clairmont Court, and married me.”
His smug grin brought her hackles up, and she said, “There’s something to be said for the vicar’s theory.”
Her sarcasm didn’t dim Rand’s grin, and Lady Emmie said, “Dear, you and Rand sound just like my dear husband and me.”
18
“Dear, you know I don’t like to be an interfering mother.”
Turning away from the sunny window in his former bedchamber on the main floor, Rand stared absently at Lady Emmie. She stood framed in the doorway, watching him with the anxious expression she had worn so often since he and Sylvan had returned less than a month ago. He hated seeing her fret, but how could he alleviate it? He worried, too.
“Dear?”
He started, then answered, “You never interfere.”
She took a few hesitant steps forward. “But I am your mother, and I can’t help but worry. Is there trouble between you and Sylvan?”
He blinked in surprise, then leaned against the sill and gestured to the single chair that remained in the remodeled room. “Why do you think that?”
Fidgeting with her fichu, Lady Emmie perched on the edge of the seat. “Sylvan’s so subdued.”
She wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t know, but he tried to pretend ignorance just as he’d been trying to pretend everything was fine between him and Sylvan. “What do you mean?”
“She spends much of her time with Adela and me, doing a good imitation of a lady with no interest except in needlework. The only time she’s not sitting with us doing needlework is when she consults with Betty about meals, or sneaks off to be with Gail.”
Rubbing his hands across his eyes, he said, “Subdued. Yes, that’s the word for her, isn’t it?”
“She looks tired.”
“She has nightmares.” Nightmares that she denied having when he questioned her.
“If I didn’t occasionally hear her and Gail giggling, I’d think we somehow destroyed that madcap, loving personality who visited us first.”
He clenched his teeth and stared at the blank wall in front of him. We didn’t destroy Sylvan’s madcap, loving personality, but sometimes he wondered if he had.
“The women from the mill have called on her. Pert, Loretta, and Charity have all been here. Even Nanna has ridden over on a pony cart to show how proficient she’s become with her crutches. Sylvan has refused to see them.”
“Refused?”
“Well, perhaps not refused, but she’s not been available. The women are hurt. They want to thank her for healing them, and she wants no part of their gratitude. She doesn’t understand, or doesn’t want to understand, that it is a gesture of disrespect to so scorn their appreciation.”
Rand didn’t know what to say, and his gaze wandered over the bare room. The bed had been removed. Every sign of his previous occupancy had been purged, leaving only a single chair. His belongings had been placed in the master chamber on the floor above, as had Sylvan’s possessions. None of the furniture that had formerly made this room a study had been returned, yet Rand found himself spending time alone within the confines of his former chamber. “Why didn’t you explain that to Sylvan? I’m sure she’d listen to you.”
“I thought you might talk to Sylvan about it. Because, dear, I hesitate to say it”—Lady Emmie touched the hair at the base of her neck, then rubbed the muscles there as if they were tense—“but you seem quiet and, oh, thoughtful.”
“Surely you don’t object to thoughtfulness.”
“Well.” She smiled with a bit of sly humor. “I find myself missing the days when you knocked out the windows.”
Startled, he studied her. She held out her arms and he went into them, kneeling beside her and laying his head on her shoulder. “Mama, she doesn’t trust me.”
Her muscles tensed beneath his cheek. “Do you blame her? After you sent her away?”
He leaned back and looked into her face. He knew his mother hadn’t approved, but she’d said little except to urge him to bring Sylvan back. Apparently, she’d been waiting for this chance, for her brown eyes snapped with irritation. He tried to explain, to excuse his actions. “She wouldn’t go by herself. I tried to convince her, to explain she had to go or she’d be in danger here, but she wouldn’t leave.”
“No. Of course, she wouldn’t leave. You were in danger, too. What kind of woman would leave the man she loves to face evil alone?”
“A smart one.”
“A cowardly one.”
“I did it for her own good.”
She slapped her hands on his shoulders and shoved him backward. He landed on his rear with a thump, and he stared at his usually gentle mother in astonishment.
“For her own good?” Her voice rose. “Is that what you think a wife is? A thing to be protected whether she wishes it or not?”
“I didn’t think you—”
“You didn’t think. Exactly. Just like every other man in the world.” She shook her finger under his nose. “Haven’t you wondered why Sylvan and Gail spend so much time together?”
He scooted away from that peremptory finger, but found he hadn’t quite the nerve to stand and tower above his mother. “They do seem to have found a great deal in common.”
“Of course. Gail couldn’t have lost her father at a worse time.”
Confused, he asked, “Why is this time worse than any ot
her?”
“I had forgotten how obtuse men can be.” Lady Emmie sighed in exasperation. “Because Gail is growing up. She’s perched in that precarious place between child and woman. Haven’t you noticed?”
He thought of the painfully thin, awkward girl who had grown so quickly in the last year. “She’s only eight.”
“She is ten,” Lady Emmie corrected.
His protest was automatic and heartfelt. “She can’t become a woman yet.”
“With or without your permission, she is ripening.”
“Is not.”
But he had muttered under his breath, and she ignored him. “Maturation is a delicate process for girls—they want to develop confidence, but the least setback can be fatal. That’s probably why she and Sylvan have discovered a kindred spirit.”
“Why…oh.” Lady Emmie watched him closely as he digested that. “Are you saying that, at a critical moment in Sylvan’s development, I crushed her with cruelty?”
“Maybe you’re not quite as imbecilic as I thought.”
“But Sylvan’s no adolescent who’s lost her father in a dreadful accident,” he objected.
“No, it’s worse for Sylvan. Do you remember when I received a letter from Sir Miles?”
He shook his head.
“That was during your chair-throwing period.” Picking her words with care, Lady Emmie said, “He seems to be a cold gentleman with little paternal pride in his daughter or her accomplishments.”
“I think you can safely say that.” Then it struck him with a frigid sensation in his gut, and he drew out his words as he thought about them. “She lacks confidence because she never had her father’s support?”
“I think you can safely say that.” She mocked him with his own words. “Her mother doesn’t care for her, either, does she?”
“Not enough to protect her.” He was still working this novel concept in his mind. “But you can’t say Sylvan lacks confidence. Look at what she did before she came here. She kicked aside all reins on her respectability, acted the wanton, danced and laughed and was”—he took a breath when he remembered—“totally irresistible.”
“Could she ever have won her father’s approval?”
He ignored her question with single-minded intensity. “Then when they needed nurses and most Englishwomen refused to help more than their own sons or brothers, she boldly stepped into the breech.” He faltered as she slowly shook her head. “You think we gave her confidence with our approval of her, don’t you?”
“Yes, we gave her confidence, but it was mostly you, with your admiration, your confidence in her abilities, your delight in her very eccentricities.”
The cold spread from inside him to the tips of his fingers, and he crossed his arms and tucked his hand tight against his body, battling to warm himself. “Then I stripped it from her in the cruelest manner possible.”
“I don’t think anyone who mattered to her has ever applauded her virtues, or even noticed them.”
“Do you think I matter to her?”
“I don’t know.” She wouldn’t give him anything, not even a smile to ease the sting of her denunciation. “I only know she’s trying to make herself over in the image of the perfect lady, and I suspect she’s doing it because she thinks it’s your desire.”
“She’s becoming her mother, but I never wanted her to be anything but what she is.”
His feeble protest made her lean toward him with more aggression than he’d ever seen from his gentle mother. “You insinuated she wasn’t good enough for you.”
“I didn’t mean it.”
“Did you tell her that?”
“I did better than that.”
She snorted. “You mean you made love to her.”
“Nicely!”
Using her hands for emphasis, she said, “Women need the words. How can she know what you’re thinking if you don’t tell her?”
“I thought she’d—” He shrugged, then shrugged again. “I thought she’d just know by the way I…”
“Son.” Lady Emmie leaned back and crossed her arms. “No woman with any kind of intelligence believes a man is devoted because he likes to tumble her.”
“Mother!”
“There are all kinds of marriages. There are marriages based on passion alone, marriages made for money, and marriages where each spouse is happier apart. Those marriages are the most common.” She touched the gold ring she still wore. “Then there are a few blessed unions where husband and wife talk and laugh and love as one, and nothing—not even death—ends that.”
“Like you and Papa.”
“He’s still here with me.” She pressed her hand over her heart. “You have to decide what you want from Sylvan. What do you want to have between the two of you?” Rising, she patted him on the head as if he were a dog. “You think about it.”
What did he want from Sylvan? Just everything, and he’d proved he couldn’t get it with sexual prowess alone. Perhaps his mother knew something he didn’t. Perhaps she understood that Sylvan’s hesitation to trust him stemmed from more than one incredibly stupid outburst on his part. Perhaps she’d told him how to regain his wife’s trust.
Rand failed to notice that his mother watched him as he hurried down the hall and up the stairs. He was unaware of his aunt Adela when she stepped out from one of the other rooms, and he never saw their conspiratorial grin.
The door of the duke’s bedchamber was closed, and he slowed as he approached. He’d been so sure he’d done everything right, yet he hadn’t. How could he repair the damage, when he now questioned his every gesture? He placed his hand on the doorknob and took a sustaining breath, then opened it and walked in.
Sylvan sat staring out one of the newly repaired windows—or she would have been staring out, if the curtains had not been pulled tight against the morning sun.
Whatever he did, Rand realized, could scarcely make things worse.
“Greetings, Wife.” In the dimness, he saw her turn her head, and he walked to the window and pulled the curtains. Sunlight flooded the room, and she lifted her hand against it. With false jollity, he said, “I’m going for a walk. Come with me.”
“Not today.” She lowered her hand, but didn’t look at him. “Thank you.”
“Are you ill?”
“That’s it. I don’t feel well.”
“Are you bleeding?”
Her gaze flew to his, shocked and embarrassed. “No!”
“Hm.” He lifted her chin with his hand and turned her face to the light. She stared at him defiantly for one moment, then she looked down, and he wondered if she denied the truth. Yet breeding or not, this melancholy could not be healthy. “Come out with me,” he coaxed. “You’ve scarcely been out of the house since we arrived.”
“That storm we encountered outside of Malkinhampsted frightened me.”
She sounded almost childlike, offering the excuse with no hope of being believed, and his faith in his mother and her theory increased. “Frightened you? Frightened the woman who faced me down when I was in a rage and ignored a ghost with a club?”
“You and the ghost were mere men, but if another storm blows up, I’ll be at its mercy. That’s not the same at all.”
Rand stared at his wife’s silhouette and wondered whether she realized how much the sunshine revealed of her expression. She was afraid, all right, but not of a storm. The woman who had taken such pleasure in wandering the estate now cowered inside Clairmont Court, and Rand didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all. “It hasn’t even rained since the storm, and by October you’ll be regretting these days you’ve spent inside. Come, I’m going to go to our favorite place today, and perhaps we could make memories there.”
Her lips parted, and she turned her head to look up at him with such naked longing that it tore at his heart. With all the conceit in the world, he couldn’t think it was the prospect of lovemaking with him that excited her so. It was the idea of going to Beechwood Hollow.
He answered her as if s
he had spoken. “All right then. I’ll have Betty pack us a basket.”
“I really…I don’t want…”
He backed toward the door. “Put on your walking clothes and I’ll meet you in the entry in half an hour.”
“I don’t think—”
“Be there, or I’ll come and get you.” He shut the door on her protests and headed for the kitchen, a frown etched on his face. He had somehow broken more than her fragile trust in him with his cruelty, and it was up to him to heal her—or to show her how to heal herself. He could do it, couldn’t he? Hadn’t she already shown him the way?
As he descended the stairs, the front door opened with a bang and a brisk wind swept through the entryway. “Make way for the prodigal son,” a laughing voice cried.
“James!” Rand leaped from the fifth step and landed on the hard floor.
“Rand!” James leaped through the door and slid on the slick wood.
Rand ignored the irritating tingle in his hip joints as he and James laughed together. Rand said, “You don’t look like a weary traveler.”
“But I am.” James laid the back of his hand against his forehead in excessive dramatics. “All the way from London in five days.”
“I made it in three,” Rand observed.
“Ah, but I hazard you didn’t have to stop and spend time with a lonely dowager countess in need of personal attention.” James had a wicked twinkle in his eye.
“No, I had Sylvan with me.”
James’s relief was not the product of dramatics. “You prevailed and brought her home, then?”
“How could she resist me?”
“How indeed.” James glanced out the door, then yelled, “Hey! Don’t drop those portmanteaus off the top of the coach. Hey!” He tromped out the door and hollered at the hired men, then spotted Jasper in the stable yard. James hollered, “Hey! Jasper, come and supervise these cabbage heads, will you?” He tromped back inside. “Damn fools. Don’t have a care for anything.”
Tongue in cheek, Rand said, “Maybe they fear their vails will be insufficient.”
“Are you saying my pockets are to let?” James demanded.