A Fallen Lady

by Elizabeth Kingston

  The sound of her footsteps on the stairs came to him, and he became forcefully aware that it was not his place to forgive, or to judge. It was hers, as much as he might resent the fact. He did not dare move closer to Alex for fear that the urge to strike him was still too strong to resist. But he spoke from where he stood, softly enough so that she would not hear but loud enough that Whitemarsh would not misunderstand.

  "I will kill you if you hurt her again."

  And then she was there in the doorway, standing erect with her chin level. Like a soldier going to battle. But when she finally looked up and her eyes went straight to Alex, she lost the combative pose.

  She stared at him, and he stared back at her, both of them looking not a little lost as she walked slowly toward her brother. She stopped a pace away from him, her eyes drifting over his face.

  "You've got gray hair," she observed in a whisper, her eyes resting on the patches of silver at his temples.

  Alex's lips twitched, a smile that died before it was born. "And you've taken to wearing shoes."

  She lifted a hand and lightly touched the hair that fell on his forehead. It suddenly seemed quite natural, like the most obvious thing in the world, that these two should still love each other. That their bond had not been completely broken. Stephen felt like an intruder once again, witnessing things that he should not, his anger ebbing away at what he saw.

  Alex made a choked sound, hanging his head. Helen watched her brother as his knees buckled and he sank to the floor. His weeping was only the sound of wasted years and broken promises to Stephen, but he saw it stir compassion in her. She knelt next to him on the carpet and took his hand, and he knew without a doubt that they should be alone.

  Stephen took Lady Whitemarsh by the elbow and steered her away from the scene. He could not bear to watch as his wife – unbelievably, incredibly – comforted her sobbing brother over his guilt. He closed the door behind them and left her to fight her own battles in whatever way she chose.

  "It was true, then, all of it," said Alex. She could see from the horror in his face that he was imagining the details. "God forgive me, it is all true."

  "It's no use to dwell on it. It is impossible to live at all if you think of nothing else. I have learned that."

  She had an arm around him as they knelt together on the floor. It felt strange, that she would not be angry with him or feel any vindication. Perhaps she would, later. For now she could only think of the pain Henley had caused to so many people, and that included her brother. It gave her no joy to think that the guilt and helplessness might dog him all his days. She quelled the urge to apologize for carrying this thing with her wherever she went, this memory that would not go away. It contaminated everything. She contaminated everything.

  But she was determined she would not lose another thing she loved. Not even her brother and all his faithless suspicions.

  "Can you ever forgive me?" he asked, pulling away from her. "I'll go. You cannot possibly ever forgive me. What have I been thinking?"

  She looked down at her hands, still after days of trembling. "I don't even know what forgiveness is anymore, Alex. I cannot forget it, and I cannot love you again with a carefree heart." She gave a sad shrug, tired of years wasted in thinking of what forgiveness meant. She felt the tears swell in her throat and threaten to spill. "But you are my brother. I have tried and failed, to stop loving you."

  "I am unworthy of it." He wiped his hand roughly across his face. "I'll find him and kill him. That's what I'll do."

  "You'll do no such thing!" she snapped in alarm, tears forgotten. It terrified her even to think of anyone she cared about putting themselves in Henley's path. And Alex now wore the look of a man ready to do murder, or worse. "I will not lose another thing to him, do you hear me?" She shook him. "Do you? That is something I would never forgive you."

  She watched him acknowledge this, that she truly meant it. He gave her a resigned look. "Then I'm sure your new husband will be pleased to flay me alive."

  "Well, you won't oblige him, please."

  "But you – when..." He closed his eyes tightly as though to hide from his own words. "It hurt. Henley. He hurt you badly. What he did to you, I mean."

  "It is the past, Alex." He would think of it, picture it, and she couldn't stand the thought of her brother imagining her violation over and over again for the rest of his life. Just as Stephen would picture it, if he knew. She gave him a more severe look than ever she had given him. "You will leave it in the past, as I have. I will not suffer talk of it." She took a deep breath and blew it out. "It happened, it's done, and I am well. Now tell me about your wife."

  He stared at her, and she thought he must be trying to reconcile his memories of her younger frivolous self with the resolve he saw before him.

  "She was here, but…" he said, distracted. "But I want to know about you and Summerdale. I do not intend it as insult, but really – how did he come to wed you?"

  She couldn't resist smiling at his eager curiosity. My brother, she thought as a warm glow spread to her fingertips. I have my brother again. And in the same moment, she reminded herself that she must not invest too much hope in him. He had failed her, and she forgot that at her own peril. Still, it was wonderful, to have a brother to talk with and tease once more.

  "He asked me. He was really rather insistent, you know." She laughed at the astonishment on his face. "I actually tried to talk him out of it, if you can imagine. It fairly boggles the mind."

  "Well, he's an excellent man," Alex murmured, obviously trying to overcome his confusion. He looked keenly at her, catching her lighthearted air with a tentative smile. "Of course he would come to care for you. He is no fool, and only a fool would fail to love you instantly."

  "Oh, thank you very much," she laughed at this extravagance. "I vow, I do enjoy a repentant brother."

  "But what about you? Did you marry him for love, then? Are you happy as you deserve to be?"

  She avoided answering all of it, knowing better than to admit anything as dangerous as love. She gave her brother a smile and responded with the one answer she was sure of.

  "I'm happy."

  The next few days passed in a kind of daydream for Helen. Her brother was there, and her new sister-in-law, and the manor became like home at last. They promised to come again and stay for a longer visit. "Next time at your invitation, of course," said Lady Whitemarsh, who did not apologize for dragging Alex and Helen into each other's presence. Lady Whitemarsh was keen to hear about Alex as a child, and Helen was most pleased to oblige her with tales that made Alex blush and bluster.

  The second day, when Alex and Stephen had closeted themselves in the office to discuss business affairs, she took Lady Whitemarsh out onto the grounds for a quick stroll. It was under the pretense of asking her opinion on the gardens, but Helen really wanted the opportunity to speak to her out of the servants' hearing.

  "I hope this business our husbands are so intent to discuss is not too dire," Helen said. "Lord Summerdale seemed rather tense about it. There is ill-feeling between them," she observed. Stephen had been coldly polite to her brother all through the evening meal.

  Lady Whitemarsh pursed her lips. "Well, I dare say there would be ill feelings. I'll tell you honestly, Lady Helen, that I care deeply for your brother. But the one thing I have always found despicable is that he refused to believe you. I very nearly refused to marry him because of it. I only agreed on the condition that he would speak to you again."

  Helen resisted the smile that came to her lips. Oh, she liked this new sister. It was most pleasant to have a woman to speak to. She was beginning to miss Marie-Anne desperately, and though of course she was irreplaceable, she thought her friend would approve of her brother's wife.

  "Yes," she granted with a nod. "That must be the cause of the animosity, but I should hate to come between them. It is the past." And she was determined to think only of the future. She would not be afraid and she would forget and be happy. "At least business a
ffairs seem to force them together. I can hope that whatever they're discussing will heal the breach."

  "I hope you are correct in that," said Lady Whitemarsh with a frown.

  Helen wanted no frowns, or any talk about the past. "I believe this fountain is visible from the office window," she tried. "Perhaps I'll ask Lord Summerdale if he objects to pulling out these shrubs."

  And they were launched into a discussion of gardening until the cold drove them inside. Their husbands did not appear until dinner was served, both of them looking in much better humor. Whatever they had discussed had eased the tension between them, though Helen couldn't hope to understand how simple business affairs had managed it.

  Her brother and Lady Whitemarsh left the next day. They had avoided asking if they would all meet up again in London soon, but Stephen alluded to it briefly. "In the spring," he said, and it was clear he meant they would go then.

  London in the spring. The season. Helen dreaded it, not only for herself, but because Stephen seemed very grim whenever London was mentioned. She wished they could stay hidden here, or perhaps somewhere else where his family would not come. That would be a perfect world.

  Even this was wonderful, with his mother gone. It was easy enough to avoid Lady Caroline and her thinly veiled threats to invite "friends" to visit. Helen had no doubt about which friends she alluded to. If ever it bothered her, if ever she found herself growing uneasy, Stephen set her fears aside by his mere presence.

  She sat composing a letter to Joyce, wondering whether or not she should tell her that they would be in London soon, the anxiety building at the thought. And Stephen would suddenly be there, grinning in the way that made her forget everything else. She had dresses made, feeling the apprehension swell inside her until her husband looked at the finished gowns and made her laugh by saying that Marie-Anne would insist on more flounces, that she was too modest in her tastes to appease the French sensibility. Life with him was like slipping into a dream, and she gave herself to it willingly.

  It would be a rude awakening when they went to London and saw his friends, his associates. But she found that she did not have to wait so long as that for the harsh reality to shatter her happiness.

  She went to his office one day while he was out riding, meeting with some tenants to discuss the planting. She had only wanted to find some wax to seal a letter to Emily. Not wishing to call Foster, she went to the office – a room she normally avoided in preference of the library – and searched the side drawer of Stephen's desk. There she found a stack of letters.

  She would not have taken notice of them had they not been bundled together with a blue silk ribbon. It was a sense of foreboding, a horrible feeling that she should have known about this, that made her pick up the letters and examine them more closely. It was vile, really, to pry into his private correspondence. No, she wouldn't do that. But she couldn't resist taking note of how thick the stack was. Hundreds of letters, a woman's writing on each. The same woman. A woman who evidently sprinkled her parchment with perfume, and who had written most recently by the stink of it.

  She told herself not to look almost as many times as she told herself to look further. It felt like being possessed of two entirely different minds: one wanting to act as if she had never seen it, and one wanting to rip them open and read whatever lay in wait. She had felt it before, this rejection of what was before her eyes and the dawning realization that she couldn't deny it. Just as she couldn't deny that she had seen Stephen hide his correspondence from her more than once. Oh, the terrible things he might hide, whispered that voice which had been born in her six years before.

  "Silly girl," she admonished herself.

  She let neither impulse win out. She only set the bundle on the desk very gently, as if it would explode at any minute, and prepared to wake up from the dream.

  Stephen stayed outdoors far longer than he should have, discussing crops and cattle with tenants who seemed more eager to talk about the new countess and how she had kindly solved the problem of a midwife in addition to making a favorable impression on everyone in the village when she had visited a few days ago. He could not stop the smile that crept across his face every time she was mentioned. There seemed to be no detail too small for her to involve herself in, and no reason to fear that she was not happy to make her home here, with him.

  And so he told himself as he strolled into the house, smiling broadly because he knew he would see her soon. But there was no sign of her in the library, or in the salon when he looked there.

  "Collins," he said to the butler as he spotted the servant on the stair. "I'm late for dinner, am I?"

  "Lady Summerdale has requested the meal wait for your arrival, my lord. I have alerted the kitchen to your return."

  There was something like reproach in the butler's look. He must be imagining it.

  "Very well, then. We may wish to take dinner en suite this evening," he said, heading toward the stairs, expecting to find her in their rooms.

  "As you wish, my lord." The look on the butler's face as he said it stopped him. If Stephen did not know him better, he would say the expression was sly. But the butler gave a slight bow and said, "I believe your secretary has sent some rather important documents. You will find them in your office."

  Stephen was not expecting any important documents. That, coupled with the cunning look on Collins' face, was enough to alarm him. If Alex had written, if Helen had seen their correspondence and her eye had been drawn to Henley's name on the page... He wanted to shield her from anything having to do with Henley. And if she knew that they worked now against him, he was sure she would try to stop them. He did not wish to be stopped. He did not wish to debate it with her, when it would require them to speak of her past. With a growing sense of dread, he made his way to the office to dispose of any telltale scraps having to do with Henley. The he would seek out Helen to find if any damage had been done.

  It was too late. She was there, sitting on the small divan before the fire, no other light in the room. She made no acknowledgement of his entrance. He had the feeling she'd been there all day, and a cold weight settled in the pit of his stomach when she did not turn to him. Even when he came to stand behind her and kiss her head in greeting, she stared down at the table in front of her, stiff and silent.

  "I'm late," he said softly. "You've been waiting. I'm sorry."

  Silence was the only response. She was as remote to him as she had been on their first meeting, the distance so great and difficult to traverse that it felt like they were strangers. Finally she spoke, with such polite detachment that he thought he had dreamed everything since he'd first seen her.

  "You need not apologize," she said with a pleasantness that chilled him to the bone. "I have no wish to take your time or attention away from your business affairs. Or your personal affairs, either."

  He concentrated on drawing air into his lungs. "What do you mean by that?" he asked with what he hoped was indifferent curiosity. "And why are you here in my office? I've become used to finding you in the library."

  And then his eye fell on the table before her, the ribbon that held Clara's letters gleaming in the firelight. He felt it like a silent explosion in his chest, a weakness that spread throughout him and made him want to shout a denial. He stood there for an eternity listening to his world crumble.

  "I didn't know what to do," she said steadily. "I was looking for sealing wax." She gave a little flip of her hand, as though to dismiss the unimportance of it. "I thought I could either pretend not to see it, or I could read every one of them. But in the end I couldn't decide, so I stayed here. I didn't want to...touch them again, but it seemed impolite to leave them sitting here."

  "Helen," he began. Then he stopped, not having any other words to say in the midst of the emotion that seized him. Fear and embarrassment, but also a childish resentment. He had no right to be angry, but he was. Angry at her for finding them, for being there at all where she didn't belong. His affairs, his office, his corres
pondence – what business did she have looking through his desk? And he, idiot that he was, had left them there, so easy to find and so obvious in what they were, condemnation bundled in a cool blue ribbon.

  The sudden realization that he had to choose between them angered him in a way he had never expected. So many secrets he had learned and kept in his life, but Clara was the only one of them he had cherished. The only thing that was his own, the pain and joy of her neatly contained in this damning stack of paper. He had given Helen everything it was in his power to give: thrown his principles to the wind, made her his wife, had chosen her and her protection over the life he knew, would gladly endure the mockery of all his acquaintance for her sake. And still it was not enough.

  It was this that would make him lose her, and the pain of it kept him frozen where he stood. She had not moved at all, a sculpture in ice as he stood dying slowly behind her. It was her indifference, her apparent resignation and acceptance that made him shut his eyes and take a deep breath. He didn't allow himself to think as he walked around to the table in carefully measured steps.

  He looked down at them, at the ribbon that he remembered tied around Clara's hair on that night when they had last met. He had woken the next morning to read that she was engaged to her duke, as if the kisses and avowals of love between them had never happened. There near the top of the stack was her letter of condolence that had come to him upon Edward's death. Above it was a year's worth of love letters; below it was everything since, filled with more love and friendship and promise, his only buffer against solitude.

  He picked them up, Helen's silence at his back threatening to rip him into pieces, and set them in the fire.