Unsteadily, Imogen said, “I did not know that I would keep it.” Her hand rested instinctively on the curve of her waist, where the maid had helped her let out the seams of her dress just this morning. “I never have before. When I was younger. There were two … disappointments.”
Disappointments. That was what Arthur had called them, blotting out the messy medical reality of it, the tears, the pain, the bloody towels. This time, she knew that a miscarriage would, in all practicality, be a blessing, making the past a nullity, wiping out the evidence of her sin. It made sense, she knew.
But the thought of it filled her with horror.
Against all reason, she wanted this child, wanted it with a fierce yearning, wanted to hold its tiny body in her arms and kiss its downy head.
Gavin stared down at the swell of her skirts. “A child,” he said, and his voice was thick with wonder. “Our child.”
“Our child,” Imogen echoed softly.
The words were bittersweet.
She put a hand tentatively on his sleeve. Even that slight touch was a small torture, the familiar feel of his arm stabbing her with longing. “Don’t you see? Arthur will know it couldn’t be his. If there is—if there is retribution, it should not fall on you.”
She had thought it through, again and again, hour after tortured hour. Once her condition became impossible to hide, it would be all too clear to Arthur that the child couldn’t possibly be his. Current fashions helped; the widely belling skirts would hide her growing stomach for a time, but she had perhaps a month, or two at most, before it developed to a point where reefing up her top hoop would no longer serve.
Jane, Imogen was quite sure, already suspected. Suspected, but hadn’t yet had the nerve to ask right out.
Of course, Jane would have no reason to know that the child wasn’t Arthur’s. She had been even nastier than usual the last time Imogen had been with child; it was more likely jealousy than delicacy that had stilled her tongue. She hated the idea that Imogen might present Arthur with a child.
It took Gavin a moment to make sense of what she was saying. “No, not on me,” he said, his voice heavy. “Just on you and our child.”
Imogen lowered her head. “I have thought about this a great deal,” she said quietly. “Arthur will not want a scandal. There is every chance he will acknowledge the child as his.” What other choice did they have? “What private censure he heaps upon me I can bear.”
It was separation from Gavin that was the hardest part; if she could bear that, anything Arthur might say would have little power to hurt her.
“No,” said Gavin. “No.”
“You must see—” Imogen began, but Gavin silenced her by grasping her hand, holding it tight in his.
“Come away with me,” he said.
Imogen stared up at him, her eyes searching his face. “You can’t mean that.”
“Can’t I?” His face cleared, the lines at the corners of his mouth lifting, his pale eyes alive with sudden light. “Come away with me. Far away. We’ll start fresh, together.”
The words were like an incantation, like a conjurer’s charm. Imogen couldn’t look away. In the golden light of Gavin’s eyes she could see them, frolicking together through a landscape of impossible verdure, forever enchanted, forever young.
In a Shakespeare play, perhaps, with a deus ex machina to make everything right at the end. In the real world, she was married to Arthur and he had every right to pursue her to the full extent of the law.
Ruefully, she shook her head. “It can’t be done.”
“Never say can’t.” Gavin’s fingers tightened on hers. His face hardened. “What’s impossible is your thinking I would leave you to stay here, after—”
“What other choice is there?” Imogen looked hopelessly up at him, feeling the weight of the world upon her. She felt suddenly absurdly tired. With an attempt at humor, she said, “Even in the old tales, it seldom ends well for the escaped lovers. Didn’t they try to burn Guinevere at the stake?”
Gavin’s face was set. “And didn’t Lancelot rescue her? Give me the credit you would he, and more for the not being in a tale. It will take some planning, but we can do it.…”
She could see his mind working, sorting through possibilities and permutations. “But what of your painting?”
“Painting be damned!” he said, recklessly casting aside the one thing he had worked for all these years.
“I’ll not leave you and the child to him.” His voice softened. “Do you think I could just walk away from my own child? I couldn’t do that any more than I could walk away from you.”
Imogen struggled for self-control. “I know you think that now, but in time…” She forced herself to put her deepest fears into words. “What if … this thing between us … doesn’t last? I have mistaken myself before.”
“I haven’t.” Gavin grasped her hands in his. She could feel the heat of his grip through her gloves. “Trust me,” he said. “Whatever difficulties may come, we’ll face them together, us two.”
The picture he painted was so alluring, so seductive, the two of them, hand in hand together against the world. “But.…”
Gavin glanced quickly over his shoulder, biting off a curse. “This is no place for this. Meet me tomorrow. In our old place.”
Now was the time to nip this madness in the bud before it could go further. Imogen opened her mouth to say no, but something in his expression stayed her. His expression, and the sound of steps approaching their alcove, forcing her hand.
In a breathless voice she said, “All right. Tomorrow.” Stepping hastily away from him, she said loudly, “The expression on the Madonna’s face, it captivates you, doesn’t it? Oh, Arthur! I was just showing Mr. Thorne Mr. Ruskin’s Madonna and Child.”
“Quite right!” Arthur nodded genially to Gavin.
Imogen kept her eyes on her husband, trying to keep her breathing in order, hoping the high color in her cheeks could be attributed to the warmth of the room.
Arthur contemplated the painting thoughtfully. “It is very much in your line, Thorne. I ought to have thought of it myself.” He gave a small, self-deprecating cough. “What would we do without the ladies, eh, Thorne?”
Gavin inclined his head ever so slightly. “Sir.”
“Mr. Thorne is, as you can see, transported beyond reach of words,” Imogen said lightly. She twined her arm through her husband’s, tilting her head up at him in a simulacrum of wifely devotion, hoping, desperately, that Gavin would follow her lead. “I suggest we leave him to it. I believe you promised me an ice.”
“And so I did.” Arthur patted her hand.
Imogen could feel Gavin watching them, watching Arthur claim her.
Turning to Gavin, Arthur said pleasantly, “I hope we can persuade you to visit us again soon. My wife and I should both be pleased to see you, shouldn’t we, my love?”
“Certainly,” Imogen murmured. Arthur’s hand felt like a lead weight on her arm.
“Thank you, sir,” said Gavin, and his accent was very strong. “I do believe I shall.”
Tomorrow. In our old place.
Imogen smiled brightly up at Arthur. “My ice?” she prompted.
“Yes, yes,” said her husband, and with a final, apologetic nod to Gavin led her away, chattering inconsequentially of this and that.
Imogen made the right sorts of noises, but she didn’t hear any of it.
All she could hear was Gavin’s voice, rough with emotion:
Come away with me.
London, 2009
“I can’t tell you how much longer he’ll be,” the librarian said apologetically. “You might want to come back tomorrow.”
“That’s all right,” said Julia vaguely. “I know him.”
She set off towards Nick’s corner of the room, with only the faintest idea of what she meant to say.
Are you trying to embezzle my hypothetical family treasure? was hardly a conversation starter.
She couldn’t really acc
use him of going behind her back when she was the one who hadn’t returned his calls, but it still felt a little creepy to find him there with the very books she had intended to use.
Logically, none of her suspicions made much sense. What was the benefit of it? Sure, establishing a provenance for the Tristan and Iseult painting would probably raise the price, but even with that she doubted it would command the kind of sum that might tempt a man toward fraud.
Unless, of course, it was a man for whom fraud was a way of life, a man looking for one easy out after another. Nick certainly had charm enough. Why work when you could smile and steal?
“Julia!” Nick looked deceptively scholarly in his wire-rimmed glasses, books scattered around him. He lowered his voice as the woman next to him glared. She had the harried look of a very senior grad student or a very junior lecturer. “Did they tell you at the shop that I’d be here?”
Did he really think she’d come running after him like Natalie?
“I just came to do some research,” said Julia coolly. “I gather that you had the same idea.”
Nick took in her little black dress. His brows went up. “That’s quite a dress for the library. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.”
Julia resisted the urge to tug on the hem. It was just a plain black sheath, nothing fancy, but in the V&A library, among all the researchers wearing jeans and T-shirts, the combination of black dress, pearls, and patent-leather sling-backs looked as exotic as a grass skirt and coconut bra.
Julia twitched the edges of her hot pink pashmina closer around her shoulders. “I’m meeting my father for dinner at seven.”
Nick tipped back in his chair. “Ah, right. The man who has consigned me to a lonely evening of snooker.”
Julia tipped her head towards the books. “You seem to have found other occupation.”
It wasn’t quite the same as Natalie letting herself in by the kitchen door, but it made Julia wary, nonetheless.
“I wish I’d thought of it sooner.” If he’d realized anything was wrong, he was doing a very good job of pretending otherwise. “These papers are a gold mine.”
The choice of phrase made Julia’s hackles rise. “How so?”
Nick gestured dismissively at the cardboard box. “Thorne’s papers aren’t much use. You get the feeling he wasn’t very comfortable with a pen. He only wrote when he had to. But Rossetti … That man wasn’t at a loss for words. There are several references to Thorne—and,” he added, with the air of a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, “at least three mentions of our Tristan and Iseult.”
Curiosity warred with caution. Curiosity won. “What does he say about it?”
Next to them, the grad student pointedly shifted two seats to the left. Julia leaned against the back of her vacated seat.
“Not much. Just the subject and that Thorne refuses to show it. That,” commented Nick, with a glimmer of humor, “appears to have been a sore point for Rossetti. He liked to see what his friends were painting.”
“But it means we do have a link between Thorne and the painting.” The we came out before Julia realized what she was saying.
Fortunately, Nick didn’t seem to notice. “It’s not proof, but it’s a damn good argument. How many Tristan and Iseults could there be from that year, in that style? But that’s not the best part.” His eyes were aquamarine with excitement.
“No?” The curved back of the chair was biting into Julia’s arms. She shifted her weight.
Nick flipped back a few pages in the book, which had been liberally dotted with white markers. “In January of 1850, Rossetti writes to William Holman Hunt that he stopped by Thorne’s studio and found that Thorne had cleared out.” Just in case Julia didn’t get the significance of that, he added, “Paintings, drawings, clothes, all gone.”
“We knew that Thorne left England in 1850. That’s not a surprise.”
“But this is. Thorne’s landlord told him that a lady had come by to pick up the last of Thorne’s things a week before. Not a woman. A lady.”
Julia thought she saw where he was going with this. “You think Imogen stole the painting?” It wasn’t an altogether bad idea. “If they were having an affair, she’d want the evidence hidden.… And that would explain how it wound up in the wardrobe.”
Nick shook his head impatiently. “I don’t think Imogen ran off with the painting. I think Thorne ran off with Imogen. Wait,” he said as Julia opened her mouth to protest. “Rossetti’s brother, William—who was also a member of the PRB, if a rather woodwork one—told his brother that he’d seen Thorne, or a man he believed to be Thorne, purchasing passage to New York. Not one passage, two passages. For a husband and wife.”
“It doesn’t work,” Julia argued. “How did the painting get in the wardrobe? You can’t have it both ways.”
Nick rolled his eyes heavenwards. “Can we abandon the wardrobe for the moment? Maybe Imogen stuck the painting in there for safekeeping before they fled.”
Julia looked at him closely. “You’re pretty invested in this, aren’t you?”
“I like a puzzle.” Jokingly he added, “You do realize what a story this would make. It has BBC special written all over it. Pre-Raphaelite painter, repressed Victorian wife…”
Like a devil on her shoulder, she could hear Natalie’s voice saying, Ask Nicholas. Ask Nicholas why he’s been so keen to help. “Is that why you’re taking such an interest?”
Nick closed the book. He looked at her quizzically. “I thought you wanted my help.”
Julia’s hands tightened on the back of the chair. “It depends on the price.”
Nick looked up at her through those gold-rimmed glasses, looking disarmingly boyish. “If you want to buy me a drink, I won’t object.” When she didn’t smile, his own smile faded. “What are you trying to say?”
With the memory of Natalie’s words buzzing in her ear, Julia blurted out, “Did Natalie ever tell you her theories about treasure in the house?”
“Well, yes, but it’s all—” Puzzlement gave way to dawning comprehension as the penny dropped. His lips tightened into a hard line. “You think I’m after Natalie’s imaginary treasure?”
Put that way, it sounded idiotic.
“You never told me the real reason you had to leave Dietrich Bank,” she said belligerently.
Nick pushed the book away from him. “It’s not exactly something I enjoy talking about,” he said shortly. He looked up at Julia. Whatever he saw in her face made his eyes narrow. “That’s what this is about? You think I’m—” Words failed him. “Christ. I would have thought you had more sense than that.”
Stung, Julia struck back, “You don’t exactly have a reputation for probity.”
Nick pushed back his chair with a scrape of wood against wood that made the grad student glare at them.
“If,” he said in a tight voice, “you had bothered to investigate before lobbing accusations, you would have seen that I was cleared. It was one of the junior members of the team who was moving the stock, not I. Not that it matters.”
His voice was utterly flat and without inflection. It made Julia feel worse than any display of temper might have done. It was like listening to the knell of a funeral bell.
Behind her, she could almost hear Natalie snickering.
“Nick—” she began.
He cut her off. “Since you’ve already tried and condemned me, there’s not much more for me to say, is there? Here.” He pushed the volume of Rossetti’s letters across to her with a quick, impatient gesture. “You can have this.”
“You don’t have to—”
Nick stopped her with one withering glance. With unerring aim he struck the final blow. “That will teach me to engage in charity work.”
Before Julia could gather her wits together, he was already well away, striding towards the exit.
TWENTY-TWO
Herne Hill, 1849
Gavin arrived at the orchard gate the next day armed with an arsenal of arguments in favor of flight
. He had stayed up half the night, planning and replanning, parsing out his reasons with the precision of a barrister at the bar.
When he saw Imogen, all his well-reasoned arguments fled.
She was waiting for him by the gnarled apple tree at the base of the hill, the bare branches providing a rustic frame. Gavin held out his arms to her, and she came into them, resting against his chest with a little sigh of content.
They stood like that for what seemed an eternity, content just to be together, his cheek resting against her brow, her skirts rustling around his legs. The wind might howl around them, the branches might bow and shake, but they were warm and safe together, whole and entire to themselves.
Her voice rusty, she said, without moving her head, “Arthur is gone away to town and Evie is at the Sturgises’.” At the moment, Gavin couldn’t have given a farthing for any of them; all he cared for was the feel of Imogen in her arms, the warmth of her body, the smell of her hair. “Jane is doing something with the flowers at the church and the maids will be staying close by the fire.”
“So we are safe,” he said.
“For the moment.” In a voice so low he could hardly hear her she said, “I have missed this so.” Imogen lifted her head and looked him full in the face, her expression rueful. “I have missed you so.”
Gavin lifted her ungloved hand to his lips. He could feel triumph singing in his blood, although native caution urged him to go slowly.
“You needn’t sound so sad about it,” he said with rough humor. “This is a gift, what we have.”
Her eyes met his. “With a very high price.”
“It’s a price I’m willing to pay.” Gavin squeezed her cold fingers. “I want us to be together. I can’t say you truer than that.”
Imogen’s petticoats crinkled as she drew her hand away, making an anxious gesture. “But what about all the prospects you would be giving up? You’ve only just begun to make a name for yourself.”
He had thought all that through, the night before. “The skill is still there, name or no name. If I can make a name for myself here, I can make a name for myself elsewhere—it will just be a slightly different one.” He cupped her face in his hands, resting his forehead against hers. “I’m not afraid of hard work. I’ve worked with my hands before and I will again, if that’s what needs be. And now,” he added, “I’ll be working for we three. That’s a powerful incentive.”