At Last Comes Love

20

THE morning after her arrival at Woodbine Park, Margaret was ashamed of the way she had allowed herself to be overwhelmed the evening before by the newness and unfamiliarity of everything in her life.

She had found herself during that lengthy silence in the drawing room missing her family, Merton House, Warren Hall, the familiar round of her daily life. And knowing that everything was changed forever with no chance – ever – of going back.

Which had all been quite absurd. Why should she wish to go back? And it was not as if she had lost her family forever. She had merely got what she had longed for all of last winter.

In the morning everything looked brighter – even literally. The sun shone from a clear blue sky beyond the windows of the bedchamber she shared with Duncan, and she could see the view out over the park at the front of the house. And a lovely view it was too with the house situated as it was on the crest of the hill. Beyond the inner lawns she could see the trees that circled the park, the river to one side, the roofs of some of the houses in the village, the church spire, and farmland stretching like a giant patchwork quilt to a distant horizon.

She was filled with energy despite last night's love-making. Or perhaps partly because of it. That aspect of her new life was wonderful indeed and far surpassed any of her expectations. She had expected, and hoped, that it might be pleasant. It was … Well, it was much better than that.

Duncan was a skilled, patient, thorough, and passionate lover. And she had discovered an answering passion in herself. Perhaps it was unladylike to enjoy the marriage bed quite so much. But if it was, then she was content to be no lady – at least during the nights and in the privacy of their own bedchamber.

She intended to spend at least a part of the morning in consultation with the housekeeper and perhaps the cook too. There was much to learn, much to organize, if she was to establish herself as mistress of Woodbine. She would find it easier this time. When she had moved to Warren Hall with Stephen and Kate, she had gone from managing a small village cottage to running a grand country mansion. The two tasks had had very few similarities. It had taken her a great deal of effort and determination.

Duncan arrived in her dressing room before Ellen had quite finished styling her hair. He had been gone from bed when she woke up earlier. He was wearing riding clothes and looked as if he had been out already. "I thought," he said, meeting her eyes in the mirror, "that perhaps you would get lost between here and the breakfast parlor and would wander aimlessly about the house all day before someone found you and rescued you." "And so you came to escort me?" She smiled at his image. He looked as full of energy as she. He looked younger somehow, more carefree, more handsome. It struck her that he was probably far more at home in the country than he was in the city. "I did." He sat down on a chair by the door to wait for her and crossed one booted ankle over the other knee. Oh, yes, and he looked very virile too. Very attractive. "I must spend the morning with the housekeeper," she said when they were on their way downstairs for breakfast. "Mrs. Dowling, that is. There will be a great deal to learn, and I am eager to begin." "But not today," he said. "You must need to spend time with your steward after such a long absence," she said. "But not today," he said again. "Today we will start with the gallery, though we will not spend a great deal of time there when the weather is so good. We will go outside, and I will show you the park." A day of pleasure instead of duty? How irresponsible! And how irresistible! "Is that an order?" she asked him, turning her head to smile at him as they reached the bottom of the staircase and turned in the direction of the breakfast parlor.

He stopped walking rather abruptly, and he was not smiling when he looked back into her eyes. "It was /not/ an order," he said. "You will never hear one of those from me, Maggie." "It will be a holiday because we both wish for it, then," she said, tipping her head to one side, still smiling. "A sort of honeymoon." He raised his eyebrows. "Yes," he said. "Precisely. Though I am not sure I have heard that word more than once or twice in my life." "It is a holiday," she explained, "in celebration of a new marriage." "Oh, yes," he said, "I know what it /is/. It is a span of time in which a newly married couple can give, ah, vigorous attention to their new relationship." "Yes," she said. "Precisely." Oh, she felt very wicked, very carefree, very… /happy/?

So after breakfast they proceeded to the portrait gallery, which ran the whole width of the top floor of the house on the east side and was filled with light from windows on three sides.

The portraits were youthful and cheerful, as Duncan had indicated last evening. And he knew who every painted figure was and could recount numerous anecdotes about them.

It surprised Margaret to see how much he resembled his grandfather as a young man. "Oh," she said, "what a very handsome man he was. And you look just like him, Duncan." "Is that a compliment?" he asked. "I seem to remember your saying that I am not handsome or in any way good-looking." Had she really said that? But she seemed to remember that she had. "I was wrong," she said. "It was because you looked bleak, almost morose. People are always better-looking when they are happy." "I am happy, then?" he asked.

Oh, why did he keep asking questions like that?

She turned to him, stepped closer, and reached up to cup one side of his face with her hand. "I don't know," she said. "I can only guess at all you have suffered in the last five years, Duncan. I can only guess at how you must have longed for some solitude after your bereavement in order to deal with your grief and recover from your loss and enjoy the company of your son.

But you /are/ happier than you were when I first met you. I do not know if returning home here has done that for you or if I have had a hand in it." "And you," he said, setting a hand over hers. "Are /you/ happier, Maggie?" "Than I was when I met you?" she said, and smiled. "I was fleeing Crispin and the Marquess of Allingham at the time, and the realization that all the dreaming and planning I had done over the winter had come to naught. And then I met you. Yes, I am happier. Oh, and I did correct my first impression of your looks on our wedding day. I told you you were beautiful, if you remember." The smile began deep in his eyes and ended by curving his lips upward at the corners and lighting up his whole face. "I was naked," he said. "Perhaps my body is prettier than my face." "But your face is part of your body," she protested, and they both laughed.

Oh, it felt very good, she thought as she rested her free hand on his shoulder, to laugh together over something so absurd. The sun, slanting in through the south window, bathed them in light and warmth.

She moved away from him to look out through the window, and he followed her. The view was very similar to the one they had from their bedchamber. When they moved to one of the east windows they could look down upon the flower garden. It had been built over a series of low stone walls, which were almost like steps in the hillside. There were roses growing there and pansies, marigolds, hyacinths, sweet peas, daisies – oh, almost every flower Margaret could think of, all rioting together in a glorious mix of color and height and size and texture, and all apparently spilling downward to the river.

Someone had wanted both wildness and cultivation in that garden and had succeeded wonderfully well. There were a few wrought iron seats set among the flowers, she could see. "Was that your mother's creation?" she asked. "My grandmother's when she lived here as a young wife," he said. "I have always thought it lovelier than any carefully regimented formal gardens I have seen." They strolled on to look out the north window. There was a cobbled terrace directly below the house and then a steep bank ending at the river. There were a few low trees on the slope and masses of wildflowers. There was a boathouse and a short jetty off to the left.

And beyond the river was a long avenue, whose grass surface had been shaved so close that it might almost have been used as a bowling green.

There was a stone structure in the distance, at the end of it. Trees lined it on either side, like soldiers. "This is all very, very beautiful," she said.

He took her hand in his and laced his fingers with hers. "Shall we go outside?" They did not go far from the house, though they remained outside for several hours. They did not even return for luncheon. There was so much to see, so much sunshine to be soaked up, so many flowers to be smelled and touched, so many different vistas to be admired. So much talking to do. So many short silences to enjoy, filled with birdsong and the croaking of unseen insects.

They ended up strolling along beside the river behind the house, watching fish dart beneath the surface, watching the slight breeze rippling over it.

The air was warm without being oppressively hot. "There used to be a private little nook down here," he said, "not far from the boathouse. I used to sit there dreaming when I wanted to be alone or inventing some darkly secret club with my cousins. Ah, yes, here it is." It was a small inlet in the bank, grassy and overhung by coarse grasses and shaded by a cluster of bushy trees. It was a place to sit unobserved from the house above.

They settled there side by side. Margaret clasped her knees and gazed out at the light dancing off the river. "This homecoming has been all me, me, me, has it not?" he said after a few minutes of silence. "/My/ home, /my/ park, /my/ ancestors, /my/ memories." She smiled. "But it is my home now too," she said. "I want to learn all I can about it and about you." "But what about you?" he said. "Who are /you/, Maggie? What childhood experiences shaped you into the person you are now?" "It was a very ordinary childhood," she said. "We grew up at the rectory in Throckbridge. It was a smallish house in a small village. We were neither rich nor abjectly poor. At least, I believe we /were/ rather poor, but we were sheltered from the knowledge by a mother who was an excellent manager and a father who preached, and believed, that happiness was something that had little to do with money or possessions." "You were happy, then," he said. "And we had good neighbors," she told him, "including the Dews at Rundle Park. There were a number of children of all ages both there and in the village. We all played together." "And then," he said, "your parents died." "There was some time between the two events," she said. "Our mother died first. It was a terrible blow to all of us. But our lives did not change a great deal – though I suppose our father's did. He was a sadder, quieter man afterward." "How old were you when he died?" he asked her. "Seventeen." "And you promised him," he said, "that you would hold the family together until all of you were grown up and settled." "Yes," she said. "If your father had not died," he said after a while, "you would have married Dew." "Yes," she said. "It is strange, is it not? All these years I have believed that if only that could have happened I would have lived happily ever after. It was all I ever wanted, all I ever dreamed of." "But now you have changed your mind?" he asked. "I can never know how my life would have turned out," she said. "But I think perhaps I would not have been very happy. Even if he had remained devoted to me – and I suppose he might have done if I had been with him all the time – I would have been an officer's wife. I would have followed the drum, and I would have had no settled home all these years, or on into the future." "You would not have enjoyed that?" he asked. "It seemed glamorous at the time," she said. "It has always seemed glamorous since – until recently. But I am not an adventurous person, you know. When I remained home with my brother and sisters, I thought I did so out of necessity. And that was indeed part of the reason – maybe even most of it. But home is where I belong. I do not mean necessarily one particular house and neighborhood. I have never had that attachment as you have. But /home/. Somewhere – some fixed place – that is my own with people who are my own and neighbors I can like and trust and with whom I can socialize. Somewhere to make into a home not just for myself but for those who are close to me. I do not believe I could bear to be a nomad." The silence stretched for a long time. It was not at all uncomfortable.

Margaret was absorbing what she had just said. It was absolutely the truth. If she had married Crispin at the age of seventeen and gone off with him to the wars, perhaps she would have adapted to the life she would have been forced to live, but she did not think so.

She was a home maker.

She had always been happy making a home for her sisters and Stephen. The only thing missing had been someone to share the heart of the home with her.

She had always thought he was Crispin.

But Crispin, she knew now, could never have filled that role.

And she would not have been entirely happy. /… someone to share the heart of the home with her/.

She rested her forehead on her knees and tightened her arms about her legs.

Would she ever find that someone? Had she found him? If she had not, she never would, would she? She was married.

After a few moments his hand came to rest warmly against the back of her neck. "Maggie," he asked softly, "what is it?" "Nothing," she said, but her voice was thin and high pitched, and before she could clear her throat and say something in a more normal tone, he had unclasped her hands and drawn her down to lie on her side on the grass. He lay close to her, one arm beneath her head.

He dried her eyes with his handkerchief.

She had not realized that she was crying.

She felt very foolish. For so many years she had guarded her emotions.

Now her control seemed to be slipping. "What is it?" he murmured again. /I have been so lonely/, she almost blurted aloud. /So very, very lonely. I am so lonely/.

It was all very well to be cheerful and practical, to make plans for a workable marriage and a home that would be comfortable and welcoming and not unhappy.

But it was impossible to fool the heart all the time. /I am so lonely/.

It was abject. It was selfish. It was despicable.

It was not like her. "Nothing," she said again. "Maggie," he said, "I wish there had been time to court you as you deserved to be courted. Time to win your love. Time to fall in love.

Time to do everything properly. I wish there had. But since there was not – " She set two fingers across his lips. "There never would have been time," she said. "If we had not both been desperate for different reasons when we collided, we would not have stopped for anything more than a hasty, embarrassed apology. The only time is /now/. Now is the only time there ever is." "Then I will court you now," he said, and his eyes were very deep, very dark. "I will make you fall in love with me. And I will fall in love with you." "Oh," she said, "you need not make such promises just because I have been shedding tears, Duncan. I do not even know why I have been doing so." "You are lonely," he said just as if she had spoken her thoughts out loud, "and have been for a long while. So am I – and have been for a long while. It is foolish to be lonely when we have each other." "I am not lonely," she protested. "Liar," he said, and kissed her.

She kissed him back with a sudden, desperate ardor. She had everything.

If she were to write a list, it would be a long one indeed, and it would include almost every imaginable dream any woman could possibly want or need to make her happy. Except something at the core of her being.

Something for which she searched blindly in the kiss and knew she would not find there.

Could one make a conscious decision to fall in love? Could two people? "I do love you, you know," she said, drawing back from him. "Yes," he said, "I /do/ know. But it is what you do in life, Maggie. It is what you have always done. You have always selflessly loved others and given of yourself for them. It is not enough." She looked at him, stricken. "But you have been a giver too," she said. "You gave up everything in order to shelter Mrs. Turner from harm – your family, your friends, your home, your good name. You are no stranger to love. That is what love does when it must." "It is not enough," he said again. "We have to fall in love, Maggie, and falling in love is different from simply loving. It calls for the willingness to receive as well as to give, and you and I are probably better at giving." She stared back at him. Was he right? "Opening ourselves to love is to make ourselves vulnerable," he said. "We might get hurt – again. We might lose the little of ourselves that we have left or that we have pieced back together. But unless we can open ourselves to receive as well as to give, we can never be truly happy.

Shall we take the risk? Or shall we decide to be content with contentment? I think we can learn to be content with each other." She still could not find words.

He tipped his head back and shut his eyes. The arm beneath her head was tense. She guessed that he had spoken from impulse, that he had not known what he was going to say until he said it.

He had already made himself vulnerable.

He was afraid to love. No, not that. He was afraid to /be loved/.

Was she? Oh, surely not. But she thought of how she had always hidden her emotions even from her own family – /especially/ from them – so that she would always appear strong and dependable. Of how she had cultivated a cheerful placidity during the years when the absence of Crispin had been a constant pain gnawing at her heart. Of how she had hidden from them her intense grief when she heard of his marriage, though they had guessed at it. Of how she had planned to make this marriage work in the same way as she had made her family life work – by being placidly cheerful, or cheerfully placid.

She did love him. She would not be able to live a lifetime with him if she did not. But could she let him love her? What if the love he had to offer turned out to be not strong enough or deep enough or devoted enough or passionate enough? What if he could never be heart of her heart?

It would be better to guard her heart instead. /Or not/. "How is it to be done?" she asked him. "How are we to do it?" But before he could answer they both became aware of the clopping of horses' hooves and the crunching of wheels over gravel in the distance on the other side of the house.

It was the reason they had not gone far from the house all day, Margaret realized, though neither of them had put it into words. They had wanted to be within earshot of any approaching carriage.

He tensed again, listening. So did she. But they had not mistaken. "A carriage," he said. "Yes." They scrambled to their feet and half ran up the steep bank to the terrace and around the west side of the house, Duncan slightly ahead of her.

A heavy traveling carriage had just drawn up before the portico, and the coachman was opening the door and reaching inside even before he set down the steps. Someone was shrieking in a high treble voice, and the coachman swung him out and set him down on the ground – a slight little boy with a mop of blond curls, Margaret saw as she stopped running and walked forward more slowly.

The child must have seen Duncan at the side of the house. He came running as soon as his feet touched firm earth, still shrieking, his arms stretched out to the sides. "Papa!" he cried as he came. "Papa!" He did not have far to run. Duncan had not slackened his pace. He bent down and swung the child into his arms, spun him in a circle, and held him tight. The boy's arms were wrapped about his neck.

Margaret stopped some distance away. "Papa," the child was saying over and over again into the side of his neck.

Duncan turned his head and kissed him. "I thought we would /never/ get here," the boy said in his high, piping voice. "I was a trial to Mrs. Harris – she told me so. Mr. Harris slept most of the way. He was /snoring/. I thought you would not be here. Mrs.

Harris said you might not be. She said we might race you home. I thought maybe you would never come and I would never see you again and I would not have a papa. But you /are/ here. And now Mrs. Harris will tell you all the bad things I have been doing, and you will frown and tell me that I have been unkind, and I will be sad. Don't be cross, Papa. Please don't." And he lifted his head, spread his little hands over Duncan's cheeks, and kissed him on the lips. "I won't ever be bad again," he said, all wide, innocent eyes and wheedling tone, "now that I am home and now that I am with you again." "I daresay," Duncan said, "you have been driving poor Mrs. Harris to distraction with all your prattling, have you, imp?" "Yes, I have," the child admitted, and patted Duncan's cheeks before wriggling to be set down. His eyes alit upon Margaret. "Who are you?" "Not a very polite question, Tobe," Duncan said, taking his hand. "I would have told you if you had waited a moment. This is Lady Sheringford, my new wife. Your new mama." "No," the child said, shrinking against Duncan's side, trying to hide behind one of his legs. "/Not/ my mama. I don't /want/ a mama. We don't need her, Papa. Send her away. Now." Margaret made a slight hand gesture when Duncan would have spoken, his brows knitting together. "Of course I am not your mama, Toby," she said. "I am your papa's wife, that is all. You fell out of a tree a little while ago and bumped your forehead, did you not? Your papa told me. Do you still have the mark there?" He leaned against Duncan's leg and circled one finger about his forehead. "I think it's gone," he said. "But it was the size of an egg. /Two/ eggs." "I wish I could have seen it," she said. "My brother fell off a horse once when he was about your age or a little older, but the lump on his head was certainly no bigger than one egg. He used to get cuts and bruises all over too – and scabs." "I have a scab on /my/ knee," Toby said. "Do you want to see?" "I am sure – " Duncan began. "Oh, yes, please," Margaret said, stepping closer. "How did you get it?" "I was /trying/ to catch Mrs. Lennox's cat," he said, bending to pull up his breeches and roll down his stocking to expose one knee. "She /never/ lets him out, and when he does escape, he will not let anyone pet him because he is not used to people. I had my hands on him, and then she stuck out her broom and I tripped over it." "Nasty," Margaret said, and bent closer to look at the dried scab that covered his kneecap. "Did you bleed?" "All over my breeches," he said, "and they were not even /old/ ones.

Mrs. Harris had to scrub them for an hour to get it all out. And then she had to mend the hole. She said Papa would have paddled my bottom if he had been there." "It sounds to me," Margaret said, stepping back as the boy bent to roll up his stocking again, "as if perhaps it was Mrs. Lennox who deserved to have her bottom paddled." He shrieked with surprised laughter and reached for Duncan's hand again. "Is this /really/ home, Papa?" he asked. "Forever and ever? No more moving?" "This is really home, Tobe," Duncan assured him. "And you are not going away /ever/ again?" "Ever is a long time," Duncan told him. "But we are going to live together here, you and I and – " He glanced at Margaret but did not complete the thought. "Come and see your room. And I expect you are hungry. Cook, I hear, has been baking some special cakes just for you." Toby climbed the steps at his father's side, his hand clasped in his.

But he stopped before they reached the top and looked back at Margaret. "You can be my /friend/ if you want," he said. "Can I?" Margaret asked. "I'll think about it and give you my answer tomorrow or the day after." "All right," the child said, and disappeared through the door.

Blond delicacy beside dark strength.

A garrulous, active, mischievous child, who was quite innocent of all the ugliness that had surrounded his birth and early years.

Now he was home.

They all were.

She could be his /friend/, Margaret thought as she entered the house more slowly. He had already disappeared upstairs with Duncan.

She smiled. It was better than nothing.

And she and Duncan were going to fall in love.

Would they succeed?