Web of Love

Chapter 20

ALL THE ADULTS OF THE HOUSE, EXCEPT THE dowager countess and Allan Penworth, joined the ride the following morning. Anna and Walter and Lord Agerton rode over to join them, as did Susan and two of her brothers. They were to ride inland up the valley in which Amberley Court was set.

It was a very good thing that they were to ride in a place where it would be impossible for the horses to move faster than a walk, Susan said timidly to anyone who was willing to listen. She was so very afraid to gallop, and she knew that she spoiled the enjoyment of her companions when she held them to a walk.

Lord Agerton declared that he would stay at the back of the group with her, and she could move at whatever pace she found comfortable.

“You are very obliging, my lord, I am sure,” she said, favoring him with a look of melting gratitude from wide hazel eyes.

They rode out, two abreast, past the formal gardens, across the stone bridge that spanned the stream, and turned up the valley, the sounds of the horses’ hooves muted by the masses of fallen and rotting leaves underfoot.

“There is always a very special smell about autumn,” the earl said to Ellen, with whom he rode. “I suppose it should be unpleasant, since it is largely the smell of decay, but it is not.”

“It is a very English smell,” she said. “I had forgotten it. It is strange how smells can bring back vivid memories. My father used to take me walking in the parks when I was a child. We would always walk on the grass during the autumn so that we could crunch leaves underfoot. They were happy times.”

“Are you glad to be back in England?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “I do not regret my ten years as a wanderer, because I learned a great deal about life that I might not otherwise know. And I had my husband for five years. I was happy. He was all the home I needed during those years. Besides, it is foolish to regret anything from one’s past. Everything that happens helps to shape us into the people we are. But I am glad to be home again. I would not wish to settle permanently in any other country.”

“But you are quite right,” he said. “People are really home, are they not? I have always been greatly attached to Amberley Court. If anyone were to take it away from me, I think I would die a little inside. But if ever I had to make the choice between this place and my wife and babies-well, there would be no choice at all.”

Lord Eden had Anna prattling at his side, telling him all about the triumphs of her Season during the spring, reminding him of her disappointment that he had not been there to see her or escort her at all, confiding her hope that her father would take her again the following spring.

“Then you can come too, Dominic,” she said, “and lead me into the first set of the first ball of my second Season.”

“I probably would not be able to fight my way past all the young bucks clustered about you, Anna,” he said.

“Oh, but I would send them all away,” she said, “so that you could sign my card first. For two sets. I wonder who it was who made the foolish rule that one can dance only twice with the same gentleman in the same evening. Don’t you think it silly, Dominic?”

“It depends on how badly I want to dance with one particular lady,” he said.

He was watching Ellen riding ahead of them with his brother. They were doing a great deal of talking and smiling. There was a certain satisfaction in knowing that she and Edmund and Alexandra got along well together. She looked happy this morning, and very lovely in her black velvet riding habit. It brought back vivid memories to see her on horseback.

They rode along a valley that was beautiful despite the bareness of the trees. The stream flowed past them on its way to the sea. The tree-covered slopes grew steeper as they proceeded, and the valley floor narrower.

Lord Amberley stopped when they had ridden for more than a mile. “There is a magnificent view back along the valley to Amberley and the sea from the top of this slope,” he said to Ellen and the riders behind them. “It is rather a steep climb, I’m afraid, and has to be done on foot, but it is well worth the effort. Is anyone feeling energetic?”

It seemed that everyone was. They all dismounted, the gentlemen tethering the horses to the trees. Lord Eden turned to find Ellen. He wanted to be with her when she saw the view.

“Oh, dear,” Susan said at his elbow, while Lord Agerton was still busy with her horse, “I think I had better stay here, my lord. Climbing up might be possible, but I know I would be terrified to come down again. I have no head for heights. I shall be quite all right down here. I shall take a turn along the bank of the stream and back.”

“What, Susan?” Lord Eden said with a grin. “You can never be so chickenhearted. You, who used to climb trees in pursuit of trapped kittens?”

“But I always used to get stuck,” she said. “And someone had to come to my rescue.”

“I have a sturdy arm,” he said. “Will you trust it to keep you from falling? I will not let you slip, I promise.”

“Oh, thank you,” she said. “You are very kind.”

Anna and Jennifer, Walter and Miles Courtney were having a race to the top of the slope, with a great deal of crashing through the trees and shouting and shrieking. The others ascended somewhat more sedately. Susan hung heavily on Lord Eden’s arm and forced him to frequent stops, with the result that they were soon far behind the rest.

“I am spoiling your enjoyment,” she said.

“Not at all.” He smiled down at her. “You were always such a timid little thing, Susan. How is it that you could survive a life of following the drum for three whole years?”

“It was not easy,” she said. “I found it very difficult, my lord. But I felt that I must stay close to my husband, you see.”

He covered her hand with his. “Of course,” he said. “Do you miss him, Susan?”

“Life must go on,” she said, accepting the large linen handkerchief that he held out to her. “I would not burden you with my grief, my lord. It is good to be home with my family and friends. That is, if I may take the liberty of calling you my friend, my lord.”

“Well,” he said in some amusement, “if I am not your friend, Susan, I don’t know who is.”

By the time they reached the clearing almost at the top of the slope, it seemed that everyone else had already looked his fill. Except for Ellen, who was still gazing downward, back along the valley the way they had ridden to the house and its gardens and outbuildings, and to the distant line of the sea.

“Well, here comes Susan at last,” one of her brothers announced.

“You are not to think naughty thoughts,” she scolded loudly. “Lord Eden was merely helping me ascend the slope. I am so foolish that I had to rest several times. Nothing else was happening at all.”

Howard Courtney flushed, and Lord Amberley exchanged a look with his wife. Madeline paused in her conversation with Lord Agerton and looked closely at Susan. Lord Eden, too, looked down at her, startled, and across to Ellen, who still had her back to him. Susan released his arm and strolled across to join her.

“It is a lovely view, is it not?” she said. “It was very bad of Howard to suggest what he did just now. I am all of a blush, Mrs. Simpson. All because Lord Eden was my beau before I chose my husband instead of him. I am afraid that I hurt him badly at the time, but that was a long time ago. And you and I know that being a widow ousts all thoughts of beaux and romance quite out of one’s head. The very idea!”

Ellen smiled. “I don’t believe anyone thought any such thing,” she said.

“Oh, I am not so sure of that,” Susan said. “Just consider what Anna said about you last evening. She was merely being silly, of course, you being in mourning for your husband and in a delicate situation besides. But I felt for you even so. It is painful to be accused of flirting, is it not?”

The younger people were beginning the descent with as much noise and enthusiasm as they had shown on the way up.

“Come, Susan,” Lord Eden said from behind the two ladies. “I have enlisted Agerton’s support for the descent. With one of us on each side of you, I don’t think you could fall even if you tried.”

“Oh,” she said, “how kind you are. I am such a silly goose, Mrs. Simpson.”

Ellen, looking at Lord Eden for the first time that morning, found herself smiling back when he grinned and even winked at her.

When they were all at the bottom of the hill and mounted again, Lord Amberley gave them the choice of continuing on up the valley or returning to the house.

“Oh, do let us continue,” Jennifer said eagerly, and immediately clapped a hand to her mouth. “That is, if everyone else wishes to do so, of course, my lord.”

But it seemed that everyone did-the most vocal elements of the group, anyway.

“It seems we are not to see anything of our children this morning after all,” Lord Amberley said apologetically to his wife.

“Doubtless they will survive,” she said. “Mama had promised to paint with Christopher, apparently. What sort of disaster that may lead to, I shudder to think.”

They both laughed.

“We will take them for a ride down onto the beach this afternoon, shall we?” he suggested.

“That sounds like heaven, Edmund,” she said with a smile.

A mile or so farther upstream, they came to faster-flowing water and a trail of old stepping-stones spanning its width.

“Aha, they are still here,” Lord Eden said. “Walter, Howard, are those stones in the center not the very ones we placed there three years or so ago? The old ones had disappeared, I recall.”

“Yes, they are,” Madeline said, riding up alongside her brother. “I recognize the very flat one in the middle. The very solid and safe one. It does not look near as much fun as the one that used to wobble there when we were children.”

“Do you remember the dunking I got once when I fell in?” Lord Eden said with a grin. “What were we doing at that particular time? Crossing backward, or on one leg, or blindfold?”

“We did them all at one time or another,” Howard said. “I think it was blindfold and backward when I got wet-and had a thrashing for it when I got home.”

“Do let us go across,” Anna said. “There are the ruins of an old abbey at the top of the slope opposite, Jennifer. I want to show it to you.”

Lord Eden groaned. “Oh, the energy of the young!” he said, dismounting and lifting first his cousin and then Jennifer to the ground. “Away you go, then, children. We older folk will follow at a more sedate pace.”

Anna pulled a face and turned toward the stream.

He lifted Madeline to the ground. She stood staring ahead along the bank of the stream.

“It was just along there,” she said, “that he kissed me for the first time. The last time I was here, Dom. It seems like forever ago.”

“Purnell?” he said. “So it was. I believe I was walking Susan along the opposite bank-because she was afraid to cross over-and nobly resisting the urge to kiss her. Oh, Lord! Another lifetime, Mad.”

Susan, who had been lifted to the ground by the earl, was protesting quite clearly and timidly that she could not possibly set foot on one of the stepping-stones, not if her life depended on it. She looked appealingly at Lord Eden.

“And I have no intention of going across either, Susan,” Lord Amberley said. “I have had quite enough violent exercise for one day, I thank you. You and I will stroll along the bank together and tell each other how foolishly all these children are behaving. Shall we?”

“Oh,” Susan said, glancing at Lord Agerton, who was helping the countess across the stones, and at Lord Eden, who was tethering Ellen’s horse to a tree. “You are very kind, my lord.”

“Not at all, Susan,” he said. “I will be glad of the company.”

“I am sure you do not need my hand,” Lord Eden said with a smile at Ellen. “I have watched you cross much worse without assistance. But I must play the gentleman, you see, in case anyone is looking.” He stretched out a hand to her.

She placed hers in it and followed his lead across the stones, which were indeed sturdy and safe.

“Do you want to go up?” he asked when they reached the other side. “Or shall we stroll along the bank here? Is it wise for you to have so much exercise?”

“Perhaps not overmuch,” she said. “The stroll sounds good. But perhaps you want to stay with the others?”

“I think I will be safe with you,” he said with a grin.

She took his arm and they strolled slowly along the bank and among the trees, which grew right to the water’s edge on that side of the stream. It was good to have the bitterness behind them, she thought, to be able to think of him, however cautiously, as a friend again. His arm felt strong and reassuring beneath hers. She did feel rather tired from the ride.

“You grew up in a very beautiful place,” she said.

“Yes.” He looked down at her. It was only just beginning to register on his mind that this was Ellen Simpson and that she was at his childhood home with him and that they were walking together, their arms linked, in quiet harmony with each other. “We had something of an idyllic childhood. Madeline and I were as wild as could be, and always into the most hair-raising scrapes. And Edmund was no better, from what I have heard. Perry Lampman used to be his particular partner in crime. Until Edmund was forced to grow up very fast at the age of nineteen, when our father died.”

“That must have been a hard time for you,” she said.

“Yes,” he agreed, “but our father had always lavished a great deal of affection on us, and that held us together after he was gone.” He grinned. “Unfortunately, affection did not lighten his hand when I was into some trouble. My only hope was that Madeline was in it with me. He would never beat her, you see, and could not in all conscience beat me for a shared offense.”

She smiled up at him. “I find now,” she said, “that I am able to picture the places where several of those stories you told me took place.” She remembered suddenly where she had heard those stories and waited for the pain of embarrassment. But he had been right in what he had said the night before. There had been more between them during those days in her rooms than just the physical. She had sat on a chair and he had lain on the bed, hand in hand, getting to know each other.

“Yes,” he said. “This in particular was a favorite playground.”

“I have reconciled with my father. Did you know?” she asked.

“You did go to visit him, then?” he said. “I am glad, Ellen. I remember stories you told me of your childhood, and I understood that you had been fond of him.”

“He still drinks,” she said. “Worse than ever, I believe.”

“Does that upset you?”

She considered. “Only for his sake,” she said. “He is not a happy man. He believes he really is my father, Dominic.”

“Does he?” He smiled at her. “Perhaps I should be calling you ‘Lady Ellen,’ then.”

“He wants me to go and live with him when I leave here,” she said.

“And are you going to?” he asked. “You are not going to move into your father-in-law’s house?”

“No,” she said. She stared straight ahead of her along the path. “I told him the truth before I left town. And Dorothy too. I will not be going back to them.”

He resisted the urge to draw her more closely against his side. He concentrated every effort of will on being a comfortable, friendly presence for her.

“Well,” he said, “I am happy you have found your father again, Ellen. Everyone should have someone he can call his own.”

“I always felt safe with him,” she said, looking up at him and smiling. “When he held my hand, nothing in the world could harm me.”

“That is what fathers are for,” he said.

“I always felt that way with Charlie too,” she said, looking deliberately into his eyes to dispel instantly any awkwardness that that name would arouse between them. “All the dirt and the discomfort, the tedium, the danger, mattered not one bit when Charlie was there. The whole of the French army could not have harmed me if his arms were about me. It was only when he was in battle that I was afraid. And then I was always mortally afraid.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “War is cruel on wives and mothers.”

They strolled in silence for a couple of minutes. He could feel the tension in her and could only walk quietly at her side and hope to bring her reassurance.

“Tell me,” she said finally, her voice trembling. “I want to know. I must know. You said you were with him when he died. Tell me how it happened. Tell me about those few days. I have to know.”

“I don’t think he suffered,” he said, curling his fingers beneath hers as they rested on his arm and holding her hand tightly. She had quickened their pace. “He did not die in agony, as so many poor men did. He just…went away, Ellen. I saw he had been hit and went to him. He recognized me, and he said your name and Miss Simpson’s name. But I don’t think he heard anything I said in reply. He went too quickly. And then I was hit immediately after.”

He could see that she was biting hard on her lower lip. “There was a man,” she said. “I had him brought to my rooms from outside the cathedral. He was getting wet. He was going to die, but I did not want him to die wet and alone. He was not unconscious, but he was halfway there into death. He was past pain too, like Charlie. I sat with him and held his hand while he died. I wondered if someone else was doing as much for Charlie.”

“He knew I was there,” he said. “He was not alone.”

He could see that her eyes were bright with tears, but she would not give in to them. “Tell me the rest,” she said. “Tell me the whole of it. He lived for three days after I last saw him. I want to know about those days.”

He began with the tedious hours they had spent at Mont St. Jean waiting for the order to march that had apparently gone astray. And he told her about the march south to Quatre Bras and the battle there and the trudge north the next day through the rain and the mud and with the French coming up on them and peppering them with shot. He told her about the night spent sleeping on the muddy ground and about the part of the Battle of Waterloo that he had seen.

“It was just one battle too many,” she said when he had finished. “But I hope it was the last. I hope it is all over now. For Mrs. Byng’s sake, and Mrs. Cleary’s and Mrs. Slattery’s. I’m glad you have told me. I have wanted to know for a long time. And have dreaded knowing. I have had nightmares in which he has been screaming and writhing in agony.”

“No,” he said. “You need not have them any longer, Ellen. I have told you the truth. I have not covered it up for your comfort.”

“That had crossed my mind too,” she said, smiling fleetingly. “Thank you, Dominic. I am glad you were there with him. If I could not be with him myself, I am glad it was you. He loved you.”

“I think the only thing that kept me going on that ghastly ride back to Brussels,” he said, “was my need to bring you the news myself. I didn’t want anyone else telling you. Or no one at all.”

She nodded and stopped walking suddenly. She was fighting an inner battle, he could see. He took her firmly by the shoulders and drew her against him. He did not kiss her. He laid his cheek against hers and rocked her in his arms.

“I shed all my tears for him long ago,” she said. “I am not going to cry all over you. But it is such a relief to know. Such a relief, Dominic. Perhaps I will be able to start letting him go now. A part of me still expects him to walk through every open door.”

“I know,” he said. “I know.” And he closed his eyes and rocked her and wondered at the enormous self-delusion that had ever made him imagine that he had mistaken his feelings for her in Brussels. He held her to him and allowed her to take from him the comfort she needed, and smelled that familiar fragrance from her hair and felt the slim grace of her body. Still slender-she was not yet swollen with their child.

She rested her cheek on his broad shoulder and closed her eyes. And gave herself up to the comfort of his warm and strong body, his circling arms. And was glad that she had asked him, glad that he had told her. And glad that he had come into Charlie’s life and into hers more than three years before. He had comforted Charlie as he lay dying, and now he was there for her too.

She raised her head finally and looked up into his eyes. She touched his cheek with her fingertips. “Dominic,” she said, “I have never stopped liking you, you know. You were a good friend to Charlie. I am glad we have been able to get back beyond that other again. Thank you for telling me.”

He smiled down at her.

“The others will think we are lost,” she said, stepping back from him and smiling more brightly. “Though I have not heard any stampede down the hill yet. Have you?”

“You cheated,” Lord Amberley called from the opposite bank as Lord Eden was handing Ellen back across the stepping-stones. “You did not climb after all. Susan and I were at least honest about our laziness, were we not, my dear?”

“Ah, but we put our lives in peril by venturing across these stones,” Lord Eden said cheerfully. “We did not cower on this side, did we, Ellen?”

“We also risked the danger of being run over by those exuberant children if they had chosen to come back down,” Ellen said. “Here they come now. Oh, dear, is that Jennifer shrieking? Or is it Anna? What hoydens! This is very good for Jennifer, my lord, though I fear it is sending her back into childhood. I am very grateful to you for inviting us here.”

The earl glanced from her to his brother and back again. “I dare to hope that it is good for both of you, ma’am,” he said, turning to lift Susan back into the saddle. “You are looking well. Is that my wife actually running down the slope? Perhaps it is a blessing that I do not have a quizzing glass about me. May I lift you up too?”

“If you will just give me a boost, my lord,” Ellen said, “I can mount myself.”

“No you won’t!” Lord Eden took the two strides that separated them. “I will lift you, Ellen.”

Lord Amberley looked in mingled amusement and curiosity at his brother and turned to grin at his wife, who was part of the group crossing noisily over the stepping-stones.

THE EARL AND COUNTESS invited anyone who was interested to join them in a walk on the beach during the afternoon, but they did warn that the outing was intended for the children and would be focused on them.

The dowager countess suggested a drive into the village of Abbotsford-after they had all rested from the exertions of the morning, that was. She had looked with particular significance at Ellen. The shops did not have a great deal to offer, she explained, but it was a pretty place. And they might call upon the Misses Stanhope, who would be delighted to make their acquaintance, or on the rector’s wife, if they could extricate her from her rapidly growing brood of hopeful children.

Ellen and Jennifer agreed to the drive.

Allan Penworth too was to rest after luncheon. Madeline walked upstairs with him, careful not to offer him any assistance at all.

“It is a beautiful day,” she said. “You will probably enjoy sitting in the churchyard or outside the inn while the rest of us look in the shops. You will like the village.”

“I intend to spend the afternoon outside painting,” he said. “I had a long talk with your mother this morning, and she has lent me all the necessary equipment.”

“Oh, good,” she said. “Where are we going to go? Onto the terrace?”

“We are not going anywhere,” he said. “You are going with the other ladies to enjoy an afternoon in the village. I am going to the other side of the bridge to paint the house.”

“You will need someone to carry your easel and your brushes and things,” she said. “I will be quite delighted to help you, Allan. I can visit the village anytime.”

“There are such people as servants,” he said. “All I need to do is ask for help. It is a very simple matter.”

“But I want to stay,” she said. “I miss those days, Allan, when we were always alone together. Let’s do something together this afternoon.”

“A few minutes ago,” he said, “you were full of enthusiasm for showing off your village to Mrs. Simpson. You don’t need to give up that pleasure for me, Madeline. I will be quite happy painting alone. I prefer to be alone when I paint. I can concentrate better.”

They came to a stop outside his room.

“You really don’t want me with you, do you?” she said. “I am getting on your nerves, Allan?”

He looked exasperated. “No, you don’t get on my nerves,” he said. “Have I said the wrong thing again? I have, haven’t I? I have hurt you again. I don’t seem to be able to help doing so these days, though I never mean to do it. Stay with me, then, Madeline, if it is what you really wish to do. I would like that.”

“I think we should end our betrothal,” she said in a rush, her voice not quite steady. She looked about her hastily to make sure that the corridor was deserted.

“What?” he looked at her, incredulous. “Have I hurt you that badly? I must be a far worse brute than I thought. I merely wanted you to have a pleasant afternoon, free of the necessity of fetching and carrying for me. Come, Madeline, don’t overreact. Smile at me and say you forgive me.”

“It is not just today,” she said. “And it is not your fault. Perhaps this was inevitable, Allan. You are recovering and regaining your independence. You don’t need me any longer.”

“Yes, I do,” he said, reaching out for her hand, which she kept clasped in the other one in front of her. “I wouldn’t be alive now if it were not for you. Do you think I can ever forget that?”

“I’m not blaming you,” she said. “You did need me, yes. You leaned on me for a long time. And I made the mistake of thinking that you would always need me like that. It was very naive of me. You don’t need me now, and I have to be happy for you that you don’t.”

He tried to laugh to relieve the tension. “Can we not just love each other?” he asked. “Does there have to be any need? Any dependence? Can we not just have a normal, happy marriage?”

She shook her head slowly. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I don’t think we love each other, Allan. Not in that way.”

“I love you,” he said. “You are very, very special to me. I owe you my life and my sanity.”

“I love you dearly too, Allan,” she said. “But I don’t think we could make a marriage of it. We are too different from each other. We would bicker and bicker and come to thoroughly dislike each other before we had been married a year. I don’t want that to happen. I am too fond of you.”

He shifted his weight on his crutches and blew out air from puffed cheeks. “I can’t quite believe I am having this conversation,” he said. “You always seemed so unattainable, you know. Lady Madeline Raine, whom everyone admired. I did not think you had even noticed me. And now I feel as if I am the one who has let you down. I have made you unhappy.”

“No, not you,” she said. “You really are not to blame for anything, Allan. I am only unhappy with myself. My life seems to have been one string of self-delusions. Yet this time I was so sure. Oh, never mind. We must be thankful that we have come to our senses before it is too late.”

“I will make arrangements to leave tomorrow, then,” he said.

“Oh, no!” She reached out a hand to touch his arm. “No, Allan. That would cause unbearable pain and embarrassment. Please stay. You like Mama and Edmund and Dominic, don’t you? And you are painting and playing the pianoforte. You are gaining more independence here. Stay awhile.”

“I don’t want to cause you any unpleasantness,” he said, frowning. “If you want, I will stay for a few days longer, then. I’m sorry about this, Madeline. More sorry than I can say.”

“Well,” she said, smiling, “at least we have been able to put an end to a betrothal without hurling things at each other’s heads. We are still friends, are we not?”

“You will always be my friend,” he said. “I will always love you, Madeline.”

“Like a sister,” she said. “It will be better that way. You are in some pain, standing there, Allan. Go inside your room now and lie down for an hour. And do it. Don’t pace the floor brooding on what has just happened.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, raising one hand in a smart salute and smiling at her rather ruefully.