by Georgie Lee
The more the image of Lord Stanhope bowing over Clara’s hand and her basking in his attention tortured him, the more the patience he’d vowed to employ with her last night began to desert him. He’d lost her quickly once before when, after leaving Stonedown, she’d met Lord Kingston and then married him in a matter of months. If Hugh left her at the end of the party without a clear understanding of his future intentions, he might lose her again. When she’d stepped close to him in the closet, as eager for his touch as she’d been last night, he’d realised there was still hope for them to be together. Like all his opportunities to save Everburgh he must seize it. He might have lost his way for a while, but he wasn’t a man to give up and he would not give up on a chance with Clara. It would mean risking his heart, but if it meant capturing hers and having her stand beside him in the struggles facing him, to remember what it was like to enjoy life the way he had last night and during the hunt yesterday, then it was worth the risk.
Chapter Eight
Dark clouds moved in to cover the blue sky in the hours after lunch, casting Stonedown deep into early winter darkness. Footmen lit the candles and chandeliers in the hallways and common rooms to drive back the encroaching gloom. Everyone was gathered in the sitting room to enjoy the children’s theatrical performance. At the far end, a small stage had been erected and thick curtains hung on ropes draped either side of the boards.
Clara entered the impromptu theatre late, having spent the time after lunch in her bedroom enjoying the solitude and the chance to think uninterrupted about what had happened between her and Hugh in the closet. His past with Lady Frances was what she should focus on and how it was another in a long line of reasons why she should have nothing more to do with Hugh, except the incident didn’t trouble her as much as she thought it would. While she hadn’t liked finding out about his relationship with Lady Frances, he’d been honest with her instead of trying to hide behind lies or excuses. He didn’t pretend, like everyone had when Lady Pariston had called attention to it, that such things didn’t happen between men and women.
It was what had nearly happened before Lord Stanhope had stumbled in on them that troubled Clara far more than Hugh’s previous dalliance. For the second time in as many days she’d almost kissed him. The man she’d vowed to be nothing more than friends with had almost become...what? She didn’t know. She refused to be like Lady Frances and yet she’d almost fallen into Hugh’s arms the moment he’d barely reached out to her. It shocked and scared her how willing she’d been to do so. She shouldn’t want him or have him mean anything more to her than a regrettable part of her past and perhaps as a future acquaintance, yet every time they were alone together they kept inching towards a line she’d never wanted drawn in the first place.
She longed to call it foolish weakness, but it was a great deal more. When he spoke of his troubles it was as if she was hearing herself speak. When he admitted his failings and weaknesses she could see her own and how the grief that had changed her had done the same to him. Outwardly, they seemed so different in how they had dealt with hardship, but inside they were very much alike and she could speak with him about it all because he understood. Even in the moments when she doubted his integrity, he offered her every reason why she shouldn’t, undercutting all of her arguments against him and every advice about judging a man by his actions that her mother had ever given her. There was more to what he told her about his past than false words, but truth, reason, honour and grief. Then when he looked at her, as he had in the closet, it was as if she was the most precious thing in the world.
Her feelings about Hugh continued to baffle her, especially the closer she drew to the sitting room. She had no idea how she would greet Hugh or how to behave. It was wrong, but the more time she spent with him the harder it was to ignore logic and not listen to her heart. In his way, he was trying to help her put the pieces of it back together and she couldn’t help but yearn for him.
Thankfully, Hugh wasn’t in the sitting room and Clara let out a small sigh of relief. She took one of the empty chairs near the door, unnoticed by all the other guests who were enthralled with talk of their children and the upcoming joy of watching their little ones perform. The one good thing about worrying over Hugh was that it had distracted her from thinking about the play and her lack of a little player to watch. In the semi-shadows of the back of the room, the old pain rushed back to her, especially with the parents sitting in delight at the front where they deserved to be. As a marchioness, Clara might take precedence over all these people, but she would gladly trade that privilege to be sitting at the front row and waiting for a child of her own to step on to the boards. She turned her wedding band around on her finger, tired of waiting and mourning. At times this week when she’d been with Hugh, her losses hadn’t hurt so much because he understood what it was like to lose one’s future and dreams. With Hugh beside her she’d had someone to talk to whose care and concern gave her hope. Without him here, it was difficult to keep the sadness at bay.
Her private moment was short-lived as Lord Stanhope entered the room. He stopped on the threshold, taking in the guests and the available seats before spying the empty one beside her. Flashing a wide smile, he made directly for her. She should be flattered that he wished to sit with her, but something in the way he regarded her that didn’t quite liven his eyes, so unlike Hugh with his natural admiration, made her wish he would chose a different seat. He appeared to be a pleasant enough man, but there was an exaggerated aspect to his pleasantness that was difficult for Clara to put into words or to dismiss.
‘Good afternoon, Lady Kingston. May I?’ He pointed to the chair.
Clara was about to tell him to sit when Hugh came up behind Lord Stanhope, stepped around him and took the empty seat. ‘Excuse me, Lord Stanhope, but this is my place.’
Clara gaped at Hugh while Lord Stanhope’s charming smile went stiff about the sides. If Clara was not mistaken, distaste for Hugh flashed through his eyes before he covered it with a bow of defeat. ‘Of course, Lord Delamare.’
Lord Stanhope made for the opposite side of the room and the empty chair beside Lord Worth.
‘Rather forward of you, don’t you think?’ Clara asked, more charmed than annoyed by the little tiff over who had the right to sit beside her. It was the first time in her life that two men had vied for her attention and, far from being annoyed with Hugh’s heavy-handed deciding of the matter, she was flattered.
‘Not at all. I outrank him.’ Hugh tilted up his head in mock arrogance. ‘Can’t have these lower men thinking too much of themselves, now, can we?’
‘No, not at all.’ Clara stifled a giggle. ‘To think that a mere...um... What is he?’
‘The Second Baron Stanhope.’
‘That a baron, and only a second one at that, can sit next to a marchioness is outrageous.’
‘If I’d allowed his impertinence to stand, who knows what might have happened. Viscounts could challenge earls and then there would be no end to the chaos in line before dinner.’
This time Clara didn’t hold back her laughter, glad to enjoy herself and their jokes instead of enduring the tension of her accusations and his defence and her loss. She slid a sideways glance at Hugh, taking in the tight cut of his breeches against his firm thighs, the close fit of his waistcoat about his trim middle and the strength of him that called to her more than she cared to admit. It could happen between her and Hugh if she wanted it to, as Anne and Lady Pariston had suggested. All she need do was slip down the dark hall tonight to his room, but she wouldn’t. It was an entanglement some women could indulge in without risk to their hearts, but not her. She wanted a man’s whole life, not simply the sordid pieces hidden by the dark and not spoken of in polite society. If he could give her this, then she would be his, but he had to offer it, to make it clear to her and everyone that this time his affection for her was real and his promises to her would be kept.
‘What
play do you think we will be treated to today?’ Hugh asked, his breath brushing the side of her cheek and making the desire swirling inside her to go to his room tonight even stronger.
‘I don’t know, but I’m sure it will be a riveting production,’ Clara whispered, fighting to control this silly temptation. Thankfully, the performance began and Clara clapped with the rest of the audience as the youngest of the children took to the stage amidst a great deal of oohs and ahhs from the parents.
The sons and daughters of the guests, the littlest being about four years old and the oldest not quite out of the nursery performed a Christmas play about the Lord of Misrule and some of the antics he got up to during a Christmas house party.
Clara watched the performers, but it was difficult to concentrate on even the scenes with her niece and nephew with Hugh sitting so close. More than once, his thigh brushed the skirt of her dress when he moved, making the soft fabric caress her bare skin beneath.
‘They’re fun to watch, aren’t they?’ Hugh asked when James and another boy, both of them dressed as knights, began a mock battle on stage.
‘Yes, they are,’ Clara answered in a weak voice, trying to retain her smile as the all-too-familiar pain began to well inside her. Despite the joy of watching little James, the presence of Hugh and the jokes they’d shared before the start of the performance, she couldn’t hold back the sadness. If things had been different, Clara would be in the front of the room beside Adam and Anne, clapping enthusiastically for a well-delivered line and beaming with the same pride that decorated the few faces she could see from where she sat.
The longer the performance went, the more thoughts of Hugh beside her faded, replaced by an emptiness that made her chest ache until she could no longer sit still. Without making her excuses to Hugh, she rose and fled the room, doing all she could to not draw attention to herself. She didn’t wish to dull anyone else’s enthusiasm for they had the right to enjoy their children’s performance without her pain ruining it.
In the shadows of the hallway where the voices of the little mites were muted by the distance, Clara stopped. Wrapping her hands about her waist, she took a few deep breaths, doing her best to calm herself and regain control. It was one thing to cry in her room alone and quite another to do it where anyone might happen upon her. It also angered her. She thought she’d got over these fits of melancholy ages ago, but she hadn’t. They weren’t as frequent as they used to be, but they still hurt and she was helpless to do anything but endure them until they passed. They were something she did not speak about, not even to Anne, not wanting to be pitied. There was no one else to talk to because everyone else expected her to have moved past it, to forget. She wished it was so easy to forget, but it wasn’t.
‘Are you all right, Clara?’ Hugh asked, his voice soothing and comforting in the dim light of the hall.
Clara turned to face him, glad it was he and not someone else who’d stumbled on her. The closer he came, the more she wanted to throw herself in his arms and wet the wool of his coat with her tears. She wanted him to hold her and tell her that she wasn’t alone in her grief and that all was well and that, in time, everything would be all right, but she didn’t move. She longed to be brave as she always was in front of everyone, but she couldn’t lie to him either. She was tired of enduring the isolating grief that swathed her in moments like this, helpless to do more than let it wash over her until it passed. Perhaps if she gave it words it might release its hold on her and she could once again enjoy such simple delights as children performing at Christmas without the threat of tears.
‘Sometimes it’s difficult to see what others have and be reminded that it’s not a joy I share. I don’t wish them ill or that they go without like I do, but it hurts to not have a little one of my own.’
‘Some day you will applaud as enthusiastically for your child delivering their stilted lines as much as Adam and Anne,’ Hugh assured her in a gentle voice, coming to stand in front of her.
‘I want to believe that, but it’s so difficult.’ During her marriage, Clara had consulted the midwife who, finding nothing wrong with her, had said it must be Alfred. He’d suffered from an awful bout of scarlet fever as a child and the midwife had heard stories of men fathering no more children after such illnesses. Given that he and his first wife had not been blessed, this had seemed right, but Clara had always held out hope that time might have proven the old woman wrong, but there hadn’t been enough of it. ‘I wish with all my heart that I had something more than a title and a widow’s portion to remind me of my former life.’ The one that had ended too soon, the memories of which were fading more and more every day.
‘You will find love again and have a child some day.’
In the background, the high voices of the children delivering their lines rang out in the room along with the occasional chuckles and ahhs of their parents.
‘That’s what everyone says.’ She turned away from him and stared up at the portrait of some past Lady Tillman in her heavy velvet dress and wide, ruffled-lace collar. She stood with her hand on the shoulder of her son, both of them looking out from the canvas in confidence. ‘But it’s difficult to believe sometimes. What if I never meet anyone else?’
‘You will, I promise you.’ He came up behind her and laid his hands comfortingly on her shoulders, their weight stronger than the melancholy draping her. ‘Don’t give up, Clara.’
His low voice in her ear was as soothing as it was warm against her skin. Six years ago, when she’d been hurting, Alfred had come to her and helped her. Now she was hurting in a different way and here was Hugh doing the same. She leaned into him, his comfort meaning more to her than anyone else’s because he’d experienced this, too. His spouse and every dream he’d had of a child with her had been stolen from him, leaving him, like Clara, to find his way to whatever the future held for him.
‘Sometimes I find it hard not to give up.’
‘We’ve both tried giving up before, you with Winsome, me in London and it didn’t help either of us.’ He tightened his arms round her, his chin close to her temple as he held her and spoke. ‘If we give up, then we will lose and we’ll really have nothing. I don’t want to have nothing. That’s a pain I can’t live with, more than mourning or anything. It’s why I’m here, to try to make things better.’
She closed her eyes, the resolution in his words giving her strength. With his firm arms around her she could believe that some day it would be her in a portrait with her children or her clapping for her child’s performance. Behind her his chest rose and fell with each of his long breaths, his arms tight against her chest. She raised her hands to rest them on the soft wool of his coat, revelling in the safety and contentment of his embrace. He pressed a kiss to her temple, his tenderness making her sigh. In his embrace there was more than comfort or need, but the answer to the questions she’d asked in the cupboard and the truth she’d sought all last night and most of today. She opened her eyes and looked up at the copper flecks in his brown eyes as he watched her. He hadn’t sought her out because of money or boredom, but because he truly did care for her as much as she did him and it would all be different this time.
She could have stood within the security of his arms for hours, but applause thundered out of the sitting room accompanied by shouts of ‘Bravo’.
‘I think the performance is over.’ Clara reluctantly straightened and Hugh let go of her. Despite what had happened between them, they stood where anyone leaving the sitting room could see them. ‘James and Lillie will expect me to be there to congratulate them.’
‘Then let’s not disappoint them.’
Clara walked beside Hugh back into the sitting room, the quiet between them more comfortable than words. The awkwardness of the cupboard, of their first dinner and all the near misses vanished like the smoke from the candles, as did Clara’s doubts about him. She’d come downstairs this morning eager for clarity about Hugh and
in his arms in the hallway she’d found it. He wasn’t the schemer who would break her heart, but a man she could reveal her fears and weaknesses to without worrying that he would laugh or make her regret being so open.
They entered the sitting room and were met by the sight of proud parents hugging their little players, fathers holding up their sons and mothers cuddling their daughters. While they watched the parents congratulate their children, no one, not even Lord Westbook or Lady Fulton, noticed them in back so far from the candle footlights. In the semi-darkness, Hugh stretched out his hand to touch hers. Clara didn’t pull away but turned her hand to accept his caresses. In his touch was the promise that their turn to be this happy and content with children and families and estates would come, too. Some day, she would return to Stonedown filled with the love of a husband and the joy of children. She had no idea when it might happen, but under the influence of Hugh’s encouragement and the pressure of his touch she believed that she was a little closer to claiming it. She would not give up or allow grief and isolation to keep her from gaining the things she craved. She would strive on, as Hugh urged, and succeed.
Chapter Nine
Clara entered the Holyfield ballroom beside Anne, pausing a moment on the threshold to search for Hugh. Among the dresses that had arrived from Winsome had been a light pink one with a flowing silk skirt and a bodice of rich velvet embroidered with silver thread that sparkled when she walked like the sapphires around her neck. The jewels had been her mother’s and in the family for three generations, but she wore them tonight as if they were hers and no one else’s. A number of people on both the dance floor and the crowd around it turned to take her in, eyes wide with amazement or with smiles of approval. However, it wasn’t for them that she’d chosen this dress and necklace, but for Hugh.