Her Convenient Husband's Return

by Eleanor Webster

  She couldn’t see a damned thing and yet she had the ability to make the world beautiful.

  ‘Come,’ he said. ‘Ten steps.’

  ‘Are they staring?’

  He glanced at the other theatre goers, clustered in groups. They largely ignored him except for furtive sideways glances. His life in London was one which defied convention. Indeed, he cared little for the Dowagers in their fancy clothes, the gentlemen with their discreet mistresses or the mamas who clutched at their offspring as though his very presence would contaminate.

  But Beth would care.

  ‘Not at all. We are fast becoming yesterday’s news,’ he said.

  ‘Describe it to me,’ she said. ‘It will help.’

  He looked about the crowded foyer. ‘We are in a huge, beautiful entrance hall. The ceiling is high, as high as a tall tree, and there are chandeliers which hang down, heavy with candles which glow like dozens of tiny, flickering suns. The people here are beautiful. They look more like exotic birds or flowers with brilliant petals. Indeed, the reds and oranges are so bright they seem to burn like fire and the blues and greens are cool like streams. And they glide or float like the dandelion puffs we used to blow as children.’

  Her breathing had slowed from that hurried pant. With a tiny, imperceptible nod, she stepped forward with him. He counted the steps as he had done during childhood whenever they navigated the unfamiliar. Her hand rested on his arm, her grip still firm, but her fingers no longer clenched tight into his arm.

  ‘In three more steps, we will turn left and be at my box,’ he continued. ‘Then we will be able to hear the orchestra tuning. I remember my mother once had a quartet of string instruments. We listened from the second floor and you said that the violin was talking to the cello.’

  She smiled. ‘And that the former rather sounded like a nagging spouse.’

  ‘Here is my box.’ He led her in and they sat down. He heard her exhale.

  ‘It will be quiet here,’ he said. ‘Well, except for the orchestra tuning.’

  ‘The quartet is quadrupled like many nagging spouses,’ she said, angling her head.

  He smiled, listening also to instruments. Many people milled in the pit, but most of the boxes opposite were still empty. She released his arm, her hand dropping to her lap, her fingers long, pale and delicate against the black silk.

  A frown flickered, as though more puzzled than distressed. ‘I was glad that nobody greeted us, but is that usual in town?’

  ‘It is usual for me.’

  ‘It was not because I looked odd or mad or because I am blind?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘It is because my behaviour is such that the ton choose not to recognise me.’

  ‘Good,’ she said.

  He felt his lips twitch. ‘It does save one from dreadful conversations about arthritis and gout.’

  ‘Gout?’

  ‘Yes, gentlemen and ladies past a certain age tend to have one or the other or both and too frequently feel the need to itemise the symptoms.’

  ‘What a fate.’

  ‘To experience the ailment or the conversation?’

  ‘Both,’ she said.

  He chuckled, appreciating her quick wit and that unusual lightness of spirit that she engendered within him.

  ‘And thank you for keeping me calm and remembering what to do,’ she added, after a moment. ‘That has not happened for a long time. I thought I was rid of it.’

  ‘Coming to London was an undertaking...’ He paused, glancing across the colourful assemblage within the pit and at the boxes opposite now starting to fill. ‘I cannot promise it will change my mind, but I do appreciate the effort it took.’

  She smiled. ‘But I won’t concede quite yet. I still hope to persuade you.’

  He looked at her. As though strengthened by the inner battle she had just fought and won, her natural optimism shone through. She looked so damned eager and bloody hopeful with her face suddenly flushed, her hair shimmering in the candlelight and her lips curved as if anticipating pleasure in a world which he’d found afforded little but pain.

  He felt his body tighten. He wanted both to extinguish that ludicrous assurance and, conversely, protect and preserve it.

  He shifted. ‘You will have to,’ he said more curtly. ‘It cannot be honourable to keep something which by blood should go to him. I may not like it. I don’t like it, but I still cannot see another choice.’

  ‘There are always choices.’

  ‘Not ones which I deem honourable.’

  ‘Then expand your view. If you feel you have no right to it, don’t keep it, but don’t give it to him. Find someone else.’

  Find someone else? Good Lord, she made it sound as though he should give the land to the nearest beggar.

  ‘The Duke of Ayrebourne is the closest blood relative,’ he said.

  ‘Forget about blood. Surely there are other reasons that one can merit land!’ She angled her body towards him and he found his gaze inexorably drawn to the soft swell of her breasts and the gleam of pale white skin above the black silk of her dress. Need stirred. He wanted her, this country girl morphed into a London lady.

  He liked it.

  And hated it.

  ‘A gift from the Crown. Perhaps you have the ear of the Prince?’

  ‘No.’ She straightened, a sudden jolting, jerking motion. He recognised also the sudden intensity of her expression. He’d seen it before whenever she was possessed of a new idea. ‘I have it! Give the land to the tenants.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It is the perfect solution. They have lived at Graham Hill for generations. They have toiled and sweated. Give it to them. Or give them the money to buy it.’

  She spoke with apparent sincerity, pressing her lips into a familiar straight line of determination.

  ‘My God, you are serious?’

  ‘Of course, I am. Never more so.’

  ‘You do realise how outrageous such a suggestion is?’

  ‘Outrageous is not the same as impossible,’ she said, looking damned smug with the retort.

  ‘It would set London on its ear.’

  ‘Again, not necessarily a negative. And I thought you already behaved in a way which caused tongues to wag. Indeed, I rather thought you relished such behaviour,’ she retorted, her chin angled in that firm, determined way he also recognised.

  ‘But this is different.’

  ‘You mean it is all right to cause comment by the acquisition of mistresses, but not by giving land to the people who have worked it for generations?’

  ‘For goodness sake, stop talking about mistresses.’ Anger flared. The woman seemed to delight in the mention of mistresses, taking every opportunity to bring them into the conversation. Surely any proper wife would be saddened or shocked or angered.

  But then, of course, she was not a ‘proper’ wife and had no desire for the position.

  ‘I merely meant that you do not seem to rule your life based on what is acceptable to others. Therefore, you should not dismiss this suggestion due to that reason alone.’

  ‘And now you start to sound like an Oxford tutor,’ he muttered.

  But her words were both true and untrue. Certainly, he no longer received invitations to any respectable establishment, but was he really as unacceptable as he supposed? Indeed, his behaviour was even lauded within a certain quarter.

  His skill at cards and pistols was known in every gentlemen’s club. He was entirely cognisant that his very presence caused tension to rise whenever he entered the card room. He knew well the nervous movement and hurried removal of those less comfortable with high stakes. And that his wild recklessness was aped and admired.

  ‘Anyhow, if you are going to shock society you might as well do so for a worthy cause. Indeed, the more I consider the idea, the more I think it has merit,’ she
said in irritatingly firm tones as though she had given the last word on the subject.

  ‘And I think it’s crazy.’

  * * *

  For the first act, Ren studied the orchestra with a single-minded purpose. He refused to look at this woman who was his wife and yet not his wife, this woman who wanted an annulment, mentioned his mistresses every second sentence, but also seemed under the erroneous impression that she should have input into the fate of his estate. Moreover, just because she lived her life in a way which was not typical of the disabled, she imagined it gave her leave to spout ludicrous ideas smacking too much of revolution.

  Still, at some point, he found his tension ease as he relaxed into the seat. The music was pleasant and the ballet well staged. But, despite the perfect, precise movements of the dancers, he found his gaze drawn to Beth. It was her absolute involvement: the way she leaned forward, as though mesmerised, swaying to the music, her movements unselfconscious, rhythmic, instinctive, her eagerness palpable.

  She would be that way about making love, he thought.

  There might be restraint at first, but not for long.

  He pushed the thought away.

  He was illegitimate. He lived in London. His life was one of dissolution. Even now, she was the subject of gossip because of him. She might not see the glances, the sneers, the fancy ladies ducking behind their fans, but he did. And eventually she would become aware of them and hurt by them.

  It angered him that she should be the subject of gossip, even more so that he should have put her in that position. Indeed, it angered him that he had come up with this ludicrous idea to go to the theatre. He should in actuality have insisted that she leave London with all possible dispatch. He was a fool.

  He was a selfish fool.

  He must stop such nonsense forthwith. Beth would be returned to Allington. He would give Graham Hill to the Duke and continue his path to hell.

  I think if you are going to shock society you might as well do so for a worthy cause.

  The words came so clearly that he glanced towards her to see if she had spoken, but Beth remained mesmerised and silent even as her words rotated in his mind like a child’s chanting of a nursery rhyme:

  You might as well do so for a worthy cause,

  You might as well do so for a worthy cause,

  You might as well do so for a worthy cause.

  He remembered how he’d hated the Duke as a boy. He remembered the rumours about village girls and the way his gaze slid over Beth, lingering too long on her slim, girlish figure and the hint of breasts pushing against the bodice her dress.

  ‘I do like to acquire beautiful things,’ he’d said.

  Everything had been simpler then. Black and white. Good and bad.

  At school Ren had learned how to be a gentleman, to pay one’s gambling debts before one’s tailor, to know how to wear one’s tie and value one’s honour above all things.

  But what was honour, when all was said and done?

  * * *

  The ballet was magic. From the moment the orchestra started, Beth was entranced. She forgot about the crowded foyer and her momentary panic. This, she realised, was what Ren had meant all those years ago by the ache of beauty. Could sighted people see music? It seemed they should, as though music was a physical entity.

  For the first time, she could understand London’s appeal. To hear something like this was remarkable. To have such a multitude of instruments—cellos, violins, flutes—singing together. Never before had she felt so enveloped by sound and sensation, so transported. Indeed, it seemed to her that her blindness did not matter. It was inconsequential compared to the sounds vibrating through and around her.

  Once, she’d thought that she could never leave Allington, even for a short time. Now she realised it would be worth any discomfort to hear music like this or the opera. She had never heard the opera. Perhaps the opera was even more entrancing in its interplay of voice and instrument. This warm theatre had a magic so far removed from mud-splattered bogs and the long winter months when Allington’s silence was uninterrupted.

  The music ended, the last note fading into the thunder of applause. Beth remained still for long moments. She could not move. She could not shatter that moment.

  ‘It was so beautiful that it hurt,’ she whispered at last when she could speak and the applause had died.

  ‘I remember—’ Ren said, but broke off the words.

  She turned towards him, wondering what he had been about to say. She wished she could see his expression or that she could explore the lines and contours of his face without attracting attention.

  ‘Do you come here often? I suppose you must if you have your own box?’ she said instead.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why do you have a box?’

  ‘It was Edmund’s.’

  ‘He used to like music. Mirabelle would play to us both,’ she said.

  ‘You spent a lot of time with them?’

  ‘Yes, I enjoyed visiting. Jamie is not the best of company.’

  Those had been happier times. Edmund would read to them while Mirabelle sewed and Beth sat listening to the rustle of thread through cloth. When Edmund was away, she and Mirabelle would keep each other company. They’d talked and planned. She had felt the tiny clothes that Mirabelle was making and Mirabelle had let her place her hands against the fabric of her dress over her abdomen so she could feel the baby’s movements.

  Except it had not survived. Mirabelle had not survived. In many ways, Edmund had not survived. He had changed, withdrawing into himself, a broken man.

  ‘I should have come for Mirabelle’s funeral,’ Ren said, the words blunt and stark.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I saw Edmund in London but I should have been there for him and you.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But at least I understand now why you didn’t come back.’

  ‘I do not make the best husband, even for one married only for expedience.’

  ‘You saved me from Ayrebourne which was the purpose of it.’

  He was silent. She wished again she could discern his expression and almost reached forward.

  With an abrupt movement, he stood. ‘Shall we depart? I do not think it will be crowded now.’

  * * *

  The Duke stood at the base of the staircase. Ren stiffened. He had not noticed his presence in the theatre earlier and felt a confused shock, as though his preoccupation with the man had caused him to manifest in the flesh.

  Looking at him, Ren felt that instant wave of dislike. There was a pale blandness to him. He smiled, greeting his acquaintances in a way which was both obsequious and yet calculating.

  ‘Ayrebourne is here,’ he said into Beth’s ear.

  He felt her stiffen, her fingers tightening perceptibly against his arm.

  Ayrebourne noted their approach. He stepped forward. ‘Cousin,’ he said, somehow giving the word a sarcastic twist.

  Ren made his bow.

  ‘And Lady Graham,’ Ayrebourne said to Beth, again making his bow. ‘I haven’t seen you in London before... Cousin Rendell, you should not hide her away. Her beauty has only grown greater.’

  Ren watched the Duke’s gaze flicker over Beth. His eyes were blue, but an odd light blue which somehow added to his overall pallor.

  ‘Indeed, dear Lady Graham, you should visit me at Ayrebourne,’ the Duke continued in silky tones. ‘I am still there on occasion for hunting weekends. Do you hunt, Lady Graham?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Of course, you can’t see. So sad. There is a beauty to the hunt. The noise of the hounds, their speed, their singularity of purpose.’

  ‘It seems a rather cruel sport,’ Beth said.

  ‘There can be beauty in cruelty.’

  ‘Not to me.’ Beth’s tone was sharp and she straightened her spine, t
hat familiar determined expression flickering across her features. ‘On the topic of cruelty, I went to your estate and found your people starving.’

  ‘Are they? How unfortunate. Perhaps I will visit and you can show me.’

  ‘I would imagine your manager could do that,’ Ren said curtly. ‘I do not think my wife needs to act as a guide to your own estate.’

  The Duke’s expression did not change. ‘Indeed, although it appears Lady Graham might have some particular expertise.’

  He enunciated the last word mockingly, playing with the syllables. Ren saw Beth’s brows draw together. ‘I can certainly make some practical suggestions. You should stop enclosing the farm land and asking them to pay rents they cannot afford.’

  The Duke yawned. ‘Good gracious, I must say, Rendell, you have acquired a spitfire.’

  ‘My wife is a person, not an acquisition,’ Ren said coldly.

  Before the Duke could make any reply, Ren realised that his mother had sidled up to them.

  ‘Ren, darling, how nice to see you and so unusual for you to be with your wife. Beth, I did not know you had come to London. Did you enjoy the evening?’

  ‘Yes. The music is quite wonderful, except I was discussing the tenants with Lord Ayre—’

  ‘Darling, not the time or place,’ his mother said, almost sharply. ‘Ren, you really will have to school Beth in social etiquette. You cannot have her rambling on about tenants every verse end. Now can I drop you anywhere? I have my carriage—’

  ‘No,’ Ren said. ‘And I find my wife’s discourse on tenants more fascinating than the simpering gossip of the ton.’

  ‘How quaint,’ the Duke said. ‘I wonder if Celeste is aware of this sudden fondness for your wife’s company. She will perhaps be inspired to develop new topics to better amuse you. Maybe she could adopt the plight of chimney sweeps.’

  Fury flashed hot, molten and empowering. Ren stepped closer to the Duke so that he was only inches from the man’s face. He could smell the sweet scent of the opium Ayrebourne too frequently consumed. He could see the pores in his pallid skin, the paleness broken only by the tiny red threads of broken blood vessels.