Nowhere But North

by Nicole Clarkston

  “I blamed myself. So did George—and we blamed each other. I believe he bore that guilt to his grave.”

  “As does John—blame himself, I mean. I am sure of it. I wonder why everyone is so determined to find fault in something or someone? So often there was nothing to be done!”

  “Do you not know? Where there can be fault and responsibility, there may be control. Where we can blame—even ourselves—we can assert our will that it cannot, it will not, happen again. And yet, it always does, somewhere. It is the way of the world.”

  Margaret drew a shaky breath. Hannah’s words, her unwonted revelations, her vulnerable manner, had drawn back a thick tapestry, that sacred veil shrouding the close sanctuary of her innermost feeling. It seemed a permission of sorts, for the cascades of sorrow to blind her once more with their salty baptism, and for the ache deep in her breast to take shape and form in a single, strangling cry.

  Other women must know such grief. They must! Hannah Thornton must… and yet in this moment, the distinction was entirely hers, the right to passion selfishly claimed as her own. She felt herself crumble, there in the centre of the drawing-room—knew herself to be beyond sense or reason even in the presence of one whose claim was no less than her own.

  Yes, it was also for that other lost child she wept—and it was for her own brokenness and weak spirits, for the unheard-of tremble in a strong woman’s voice, for the fracture between herself and for the only person she longed to hold for comfort, and for all the wrongs she had ever witnessed and had no power over. Yet more than that; it was for all the months and all the years she had remained steady and true, faithful to something greater—believing, in her simple naivety, that the pure ought to be spared such suffering. What now to do with the evidence of her own delusions?

  She turned her face into the heel of her hand, her shoulders heaving and her breath gasping in a throat long gone raw and swollen. And then, a gentle touch.... Hannah Thornton was at her side then, an arm about her and her jaw set in grim solidarity.

  Margaret lifted her head, only enough to lay it across the other’s shoulder, and sobbed.

  Sixteen

  “Mother? Why are you up so late?”

  His mother lifted her lantern in the darkened hallway, and John looked anxiously behind her to be certain that there was not some emergency.

  “I have not spoken more than two words with you since Sunday,” she reasoned calmly.

  He turned to drop his gloves on a side table. “Is there something important you wished to discuss?”

  “There is, but must that be my only reason for wishing to speak with my son?”

  He remained turned away, still staring down at the gloves for a moment. “I did not realise I was so difficult to engage.”

  “A natural result of never entering your own house, save when others are asleep.”

  He winced, then dared to look back at her. “Perhaps we ought to speak in the study, so we disturb no one.”

  She led the way with her lantern, and he closed the door and drew two chairs together. “Mother,” he began apologetically, “I understand that my time and sentiments have been more divided than in the past—”

  “I am planning to marry.”

  “You… to-to marry? Dr Donaldson, I presume?”

  “He has been waiting to speak with you for several days, but you have been returning late all week. I intend to accept him. Have you any objections?”

  “I… well, no. He is an honourable man, and I know no harm of him. But marriage! Why now? Is it because I have married? Have you been made to feel unwelcome in your own home? I never intended for you to—”

  “On the contrary—” she folded her hands slowly—“I have developed something of an attachment to Margaret.”

  “Then why? Can you hold deeper feelings for Donaldson?”

  “I am fond of him, and I believe he esteems me equally. I see no impediments to my happiness in his household.”

  “Hardly the language of one desperately in love,” he retorted. “Mother, I beg you, do not do this thing. There can be no cause for you to leave your home and begin anew at your stage of life.”

  “Do you object to the notion of me marrying another man after your father, or the idea of me leaving your house at last?”

  “I have no cause to object to you marrying again. If I thought you loved the man, I would carry you on my shoulders to the altar, but I fear that you find this a less uncomfortable option than remaining in a home with another mistress. Is that it?”

  She drew a long breath, studying him. “Perhaps, but not in the way you suppose.”

  “I do not understand. Do you feel that your support has become a burden for me? Mother! Remember the old days when it was you who sustained me in my struggles? I need you!”

  “No, you do not. Perhaps that realisation has been the most mortifying of my life. What you need, John, is to not need me.”

  “Has Margaret ever indicated that she is resentful of your place? Have I passed you over unfairly?”

  “Stop it, John,” she scolded.

  He subsided, still regarding her with baffled hurt. She pressed her lips, her fingers toying with her skirt, then spoke again.

  “Have you told her?”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Margaret? Told her what?”

  “That the mill is failing. I see it in your eyes, and along with it, another fear.”

  He sighed, rubbed his brow, and bit his upper lip. “Not in so many words. She knows matters have not improved, and she is no fool. However, I think it is unfair to accuse me of fear.”

  “Is it not fear which keeps you at the mill until your wife has retired for the night?”

  “I have work. It is not intentional.”

  “Indeed.”

  “Mother, I am tired. Have you some point you are attempting to prove?”

  She smiled, a little sadly. “Do you remember how dear we became to each other when we had no one else?”

  “You are still so to me. Nothing has changed.”

  “In that, you are wrong. I can no longer claim first place in your heart.”

  “You cannot assume that there is room for only one woman in my life. Am I a well that I should run dry? No! I depend upon your strength and affection, just as surely as I live for Margaret’s.”

  “You do not need me any longer. I daresay my presence prevents you from finding something which has so far eluded you.”

  “And what is that?”

  “Your own wife.”

  He pressed his fingers into his eyes, then pinched the bridge of his nose. “Mother, what are you speaking of? Margaret is not jealous of you—in fact she holds you in high regard. What is more, she has not been strong enough of late to manage the household. I would imagine she looks to you with gratitude.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Then why do you wish to leave?”

  She sighed, then rose to pace the room. “I wish to be needed.”

  “But I have told you, you are needed here!”

  “As an accessory? No, John. If anything, I have stifled what could be. It is wiser that I go.”

  “Stifled… what can you possibly mean by that?”

  “I mean that as we clung to each other before, now you must turn to your wife, and I will seek the same with another. I am no longer young, John. There is a certain charm in spending my energies with one like myself in tastes and pursuits.”

  “But why Donaldson? Is he merely a convenient choice, the first man who dared approach you?”

  “And what is wrong with that? I could not count worthy the man who would not dare.”

  “Mother, I need none of your salt. It makes no sense—why now? Why him? I would not see you settle and find yourself dissatisfied.”

  “John….” She frowned, glanced down, then raised her eyes to his. “It is not the same as choosing the husband of my youth. I do not know how to make you understand that. I am not the fool I was then. What I thought I had with your father… what
you and Margaret could have—”

  “Could have? Are you implying that my own marriage is a disappointment?”

  “Not yet. Stop interrupting and hear me out.”

  He clamped his jaw.

  “That sort of… affection—” she rolled her eyes, seemingly embarrassed to voice the word—“it is the province of the young. Few there are who find what they thought they had, and great the number who are disappointed in their choice. I have no patience for that at this stage of life. I am content to seek companionship, for I would greatly prefer a steady and sensible partner to an ardent romance.”

  “But why marry at all? What is so uncomfortable for you here that you think it better to go?”

  “Do not be so pig-headed, John! I have told you, my place is no longer here.”

  He stilled, leaning forward on his weary elbows and gazing into the fire grate for long minutes. “Is it decided, then? Have you accepted?”

  “I intend to.”

  He met her eyes again, a strange new feeling dawning upon him. “We have never been apart, you and I.”

  She reached to take his hand. “No, son John, not since you were in school. As it was then, it will be more bitter for me than for you!”

  A film had crept over his vision, and he blinked it away. “I cannot change your mind, can I?”

  She shook her head resolutely. “You have your own life to pursue. If I am not mistaken, it awaits you upstairs.”

  A long breath left him, and he felt his shoulders sag. “I fear I am only proving myself unworthy of that life.”

  “And why would you think this? You believe these temporal griefs too much?” She snorted softly. “I had not thought you capable of surrender.”

  “Surrender! Sometimes there is no alternative. The mill cannot sustain itself much longer, and Margaret has never seen failure of that kind. She has already too much to bear. I cannot know how to tell her.”

  “The truth is one place to begin.”

  “The truth… it is an ugly thing. I have discovered a dark side to my own character—a failure, of all that I should have been as her husband. How now to ask her to trust me with the turbulent times that lie ahead?”

  “You have not been unfaithful, John!”

  He jerked. “Mother, I would die before touching another woman! I have never even wanted any other… only her. Therein lies my weakness. She would be justified in desiring some distance from me. My failings—”

  “Nay, do not tell me more than I ought to know. What is spoken between a husband and his wife must remain there, but I think you do the lass a disservice in thinking she does not wish for your confidences.”

  He fisted his hands over one another and pressed them to his lips, staring back to the fire with hazy eyes. What he would give—his soul, his strength, his very life!—if he thought his mother’s words were true. But how could they be? Fear, such as he had never known, had begun its dreaded spiral about his heart, and it seized his every waking thought until there was no escape even in sleep, for that rest was denied him.

  He felt his mother’s hand patting his arm and turned to watch her rise. It had been several minutes since another word had passed, while he stumbled in his nightmarish musings. Apparently, his mother sensed her continued presence an intrusion upon his private thoughts and had determined to go without speaking more. She bent once to caress his cheek, with a soft, “Goodnight, John,” and left him alone.

  He could not tell how long he remained there—too weak to stir, too doubtful to go up to his own room. His mind could see the door to hers already, and it was surely closed to him. Somehow, it seemed less painful to imagine the worst than to face it in truth and risk being correct.

  At length, the shame of being discovered by one of the maids, sleeping in the study in his clothing, drove him to that place. He undressed, in the exhausted way of one who is too tired to prepare for bed and looked to every other matter before he could force himself to acknowledge her door. He drew near, his heart sinking when he found that indeed, it was not open, but as his longing fingertips brushed the latch, it gave way.

  Neither closed nor open… could she have meant something by that? Or had a passing draught merely blown it farther closed than she had intended? Or… he swallowed… had she meant to close it, and the latch simply did not click?

  Unable to abide not knowing, he peered inside. She was asleep, of course. He could hear her steady breathing, and there was neither break nor pause when the door creaked wider and he hesitated in the shadows. He dared a few more steps, hovering near the back wall where he could see her, and she might recognise him in the light from his own room if she should startle awake. She did not.

  He sighed in bitter disappointment. He would not dream of waking her and could not know what to say to her even if she roused herself. His hand fell to the chair at the nearby escritoire, but something on the surface drew his attention. He narrowed his eyes in the dusky light and found a note lying on the desk.

  Warmth returned to his fingertips, and he reached eagerly for it. She cared enough, at least, to leave him something of her thoughts as she slept! Even as he caught up the folded paper, an ache of foreboding shot through his hands, but he could not ignore it. He must know, even if the words were a scathing admonishment for all his failings. He clasped it to his heart, backing out of the room as he gazed lovingly at her sleeping form.

  Once returned to his own desk and lantern, he could not unfold it quickly enough. Perhaps she had left him permission to wake her, hoping to speak to him! Hope died almost immediately in his chest when the light bathed her elegant script, and he discovered that he was not the intended recipient.

  Dear Edith,

  I am glad to hear of your safe return to London. How I long to see everyone! Please give my aunt my love and tell her I will write to her within the next day or two. I am pleased that Maxwell found his assignment satisfactory, and that little Sholto is growing well. I wish I could see him and discover whether I still have any artistic talent, for I could attempt a modest portrait.

  You asked of the winters; I will not embellish the truth. Winter here in Milton is darker than you can imagine, for you are correct that the smoke makes everything dreary. We are farther north, you understand, so it is remarkably colder here than in London, and certainly more so than my dear old Helstone. I have seen little of this winter, as I have been much confined these last months, but I believe this to be the hardest I have known here.

  I am surprised at what you tell me of Henry. I have always wished him happiness, and I feel badly that he has yet to find it. Please convey my sentiments on the matter, for I have missed his friendship.

  Edith, I must now set my pen to a grim task. I beg you would not ask me again to speak of the joy I had anticipated. It is too bitter for me to think on now, but my disappointment cannot be measured in words. There has been precious little comfort

  John blinked, dashing away the flood of disbelief from his eyes, and stared at the page again. The writing had simply stopped, left to be continued at another time. He might have expected a melodramatic blotting of tears, blurring the lines and staining the paper, but it was clean, crisp, and cold.

  He turned the page over, half expecting to find the recipient’s original letter folded behind it, but there was nothing. He read it again, dwelling painfully upon each despondent word written in his wife’s hand. Guilt there was, in reading that which was not meant for his eyes, but so starved was he for any indication of her sentiments he gladly claimed that disgrace, bared his flesh to the lash of her words, simply to hear her express herself.

  The truth was too plain, even for one such as he, to miss. She hated Milton. She missed her family, longed to return to the gentle ways of the South… regretted not waiting for Henry Lennox.

  The fatal stab to his heart, however, was her unfinished last line—precious little comfort. That was what he had offered her! Her words could only refer to himself, could they not? Somehow, he had not understood, n
ot been sufficient, and all his woeful efforts had fallen short of expectations and need. Surely, he could not be found wanting in motive, for securing her happiness was the sublime purpose of his life. He was simply not good enough.

  His hands trembled, his fingers scarcely daring to touch the edges of the paper as he read the list of indictments again. He would force himself to know all, to stare into the depth of the disappointment that was his own doing. He wished to burn it into his forehead, so that all who saw him might know the shame that was his, but it was not his own possession.

  Her door looked more forbidding than ever, hanging half-opened as he had left it in his haste. With breathless care, he eased into her room and replaced the letter on the desk. This time, he would not permit himself to look at her. He bowed his head low as he withdrew, a whispered apology on his lips as he hid his eyes, and then silently closed the door.

  ~

  Margaret rose early the next morning in hopes of seeing John, but it was not early enough. She pushed the door to his room, but found that it had been latched somehow, and puzzled over it. Slowly, she made her preparations, and some while later she was below stairs.

  The morning passed unremarkably enough. Margaret busied herself with the kitchen accounts, making revisions here and there to minimise the family’s expenditures. John had mentioned nothing of finances to her, but she could only assume that matters with the mill were not improving. She offered the ledgers to Hannah for her approval but was politely refused.

  Not long before the dinner hour, she was engaged with one of her father’s old books while her mother-in-law sewed industriously. Jane came to the door, announcing that Mrs Watson had arrived with a guest.

  Margaret tensed like a frightened hare. She had not seen Fanny for more than a few moments since that day she had called on her in her room, and still could not rid herself of the sting. It wanted every muscle and sinew at attention and required the last drop of willpower she possessed to remain in the room to receive her sister-in-law, whose figure now openly declared everything Margaret did not wish to think on.