Perhaps, thought Celestial, he needed a little help.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“Monica and Cedric?” Harriet shook her head in disbelief.
Eustace, who had just returned from Worthington after ascertaining for himself the state of his mother’s welfare, shrugged. “I was leery myself. But Mr. Gibbs seems a changed man. And Mother is happy.”
Harriet thought Eustace must be a changed man as well. Gone were the stiff, impossibly high collars he favored earlier. Now his jacket molded to his lanky form with none of the sharp angles and exaggerated padding typical of the dandy set. His straight-legged trousers were far removed from the voluminous Cossacks that Monica had found so unattractive. Eustace now dressed very much like Elias, with understated but impeccable taste.
Harriet did not want to think about her husband. It was enough that he sat across from her night after night, that they ate their meals together as if everything were perfectly normal. They spoke little to one another; indeed, were it not for the presence of Eustace, they might very well sit in utter silence.
She took another spoonful of turtle soup. She could not place the seasonings and made a mental note to ask Celestial about it. The taste was not off-putting, but it did not fit with turtle.
“I hope Cedric understands that he must follow my rules as to the fair use of the mill and distribution of the flour,” she told Eustace.
“He does,” Eustace assured her. “Mother made certain of that before she agreed to return to Worthington with him. He is very excited about some new grinding stone from the Continent. Says it will produce a better quality flour. That is why they are planning a wedding trip to the Rhine.”
Harriet wished her friend all happiness, but she could not help but feel a little abandoned. With Eustace doing so well on his own, Monica would turn her attention to the children who needed her, which was right and necessary. But she likely would not have time to share Harriet’s confidences.
Harriet took another sip of soup. “I do believe Celestial has erred in the seasoning.” She waited for Elias to comment, for his palate was remarkable, but he had eaten his soup as if nothing were amiss. So intently did Harriet watch him that she almost jumped when his gaze met hers.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
Yes. I do not wish to be living in this house with you, seeing your face every day, knowing that your chamber is next to mine. I do not wish to think about your kisses and wonder why you do not so much as venture into my room at night. Because even though you betrayed me, I cannot stop thinking about your touch.
But Harriet did not say those things. She merely shook her head.
His eyes searched hers. “Nevertheless, I sense that something is amiss.”
Her gaze shot to Eustace, the only other occupant of the dining room. Thank goodness he provided a buffer against the need to answer such probing questions. But even as she formed the thought, Eustace placed his napkin on the table.
“Please excuse me,” he said, rising. “I have an engagement.”
Harriet eyed Eustace suspiciously, but Elias merely wished him a pleasant evening, then returned his attention to her. “I wish to know what is causing you distress.”
Hadn’t she forsworn silence? Hadn’t her reluctance to speak up during her marriage with Freddy left her all but a ghost in their union? She would not repeat the mistakes of the past. She would not cease to exist. She would not play the silent, obedient wife.
Harriet took a deep breath. “Perhaps it is not a proper topic for dinner conversation, but since we are private…” She faltered as she saw him studying her intently.
“Yes?” he prodded softly.
“I am forced to point out, my lord, that — that our marriage is as much of a sham as our betrothal,” Harriet finished.
She thought he flinched at that, but in the next moment, that intent expression returned to his eyes. “Pray, continue.”
“In the week that we have lived in this house together,” she said — the words coming all at once now that she had braved them — “we do not converse in any meaningful fashion, nor can we sit in the same room together without there being a strained air between us. Indeed, I find your presence stifling, my lord.”
He took a sip of wine. “I would never wish to stifle you, Harriet.”
Harriet placed her napkin on the table. “I simply cannot tolerate this atmosphere of...of unnaturalness.”
He regarded her thoughtfully. “What would make it more natural?”
Absently, she fanned herself with the edge of the napkin. The dining room was uncommonly warm. “Perhaps it is simply that we are too aware of each other,” she said.
“Perhaps. I am very aware of you, certainly.”
“Yes, well, perhaps if we try to ignore it —”
“It?”
“The, er, unnaturalness,” she said. “Freddy and I had a tolerable arrangement. Indeed, we scarcely noticed if the other was in the house.”
“Is that what you wish?”
Harriet shook her head. “I do not want a marriage like I had with Freddy.”
“And yet, his shadow is in every room,” he said quietly. “It follows us around like an unwelcome guest. When you look at me you see him. Our marriage is freighted with the weight of Freddy’s perfidy and your expectation that our union will replicate the dismal experience of marriage to him.”
Harriet shook her head. “No.”
He took another sip of wine, then set his glass on the table. “Let me be clear, Harriet: I do not want a ‘tolerable’ arrangement. I want more.” He paused. “Much more.”
Harriet was not surprised that his patience was near an end. Perhaps now he would seek out other women who could provide him what she could not. But, no — that is what Freddy would have done. Was there truth, then, in what he’d said? That she was hobbling them with the legacy of her first marriage?
Much of the blame for this strained air between them was hers, Harriet knew. She’d been angry that her father forced her into marriage, as if she were a green miss trying to save herself from scandal. She’d been angry at Elias for allowing them to be rushed into a ceremony neither could have wanted. She was angry that those shares had been so important to him that he had married her for them. Her anger had festered and caused a wedge between them. But lately, it had become increasingly harder to maintain her anger, to remind herself of the reasons for it.
In the week since they had wed, Elias had made no demands of her. He had not pressed her for marital intimacies, not engaged her in any meaningful examination of what their marriage was to be. It was as if he held himself back, waiting for something.
And the more he held himself aloof, the more she wanted him, the more thoughts of their intimate moments intruded. Indeed, she could think of little else. Harriet scarcely recognized the wanton woman she had become. This was a strange magic that he had wrought. It hovered in the air between them, lurked around the corners of this house she had shared with Freddy. It tormented her, made her acutely aware of the empty place in her bed at night.
She yearned for him to touch her. Even here in the dining room, on this very table. Could he read her thoughts? Did she wish him to?
Slowly, Harriet raised her gaze to his.
Abruptly, his chair scraped the floor. “Please excuse me,” he said politely. “I have something to attend to.” With that, her husband of one week rose and left the dining room.
Harriet stared numbly at his empty chair. Without thinking, she speared a piece of turtle meat and put it into her mouth. Again, that strange taste.
Dear Lord. What was happening to her?
***
His wife intended to kill him with kindness. Elias regarded the latest tray of pastries she had set before him, exquisite treasures all. She had been engaged in feverish culinary experimentation, channeling a vast amount of energy into the production of dozens of cakes, pies, and other confections. He had no doubt that tonight’s dessert would be another extravagant
product — a drunken trifle, perhaps, or the cheesecake she recently adorned with a baroque sculpture of blueberries, kumquats, and marzipan.
If he did not expire from overconsumption, he might die of unrequited lust. No matter what she served him, his appetite would not be satisfied by the most exquisite of Harriet’s pastries, only by the woman herself.
That he had even consented to that extemporized wedding ceremony in the ancient little church near the inn was a measure of his need. After the spectacle at St. Paul’s, Elias had thought never to set foot in such a structure again. But marrying Harriet in a tiny stone chapel that had served Norman invaders and druids alike seemed fitting, somehow. Certainly, it was nothing like the grand spectacle at St. Paul’s.
It surprised him that he’d entered a state which he had so long disparaged. He knew little about marriage or how their life together would be. Yet he would have married her in a barn or even in St. Paul’s had she wished it. He would have taken her on any terms, so long as they bound her to him.
But as he had predicted, the path since then had been difficult. Elias thought perhaps her anger had faded, but there were still barriers between them. He sensed she was trying to avoid him, to the point of exhausting herself in the kitchen night after night. Sometimes she stopped long enough in the afternoon to take tea with him. The tea seemed to restore her. After one cup, she usually lost her look of embattled fatigue. After another, she would fan herself and complain about the heat.
Elias yearned to bed his wife, but he was determined not to press her. She would come to him willingly, or not at all. It must be her decision — at least that is what he told himself. Still, it was becoming increasingly more difficult to keep his distance.
Night after night Elias had stared at the door between their rooms, knowing that if he went to her she would allow him to make love to her. But instinct told him that he would never possess her fully unless she came to him. Only then would he know that she was ready to trust him, that her heart was ready to love.
Love was new to him. He had never felt this way, certainly not with Zephyr. He suspected it might take a lifetime to understand it. If only Harriet would grant him that. If only she would not always flee to the kitchen.
“I am almost satisfied with the new sourdough,” Harriet said, sinking into a chair. She was followed by Celestial, carrying the tea tray.
Harriet accepted the cup Celestial poured from one of the teapots. “I will not rest until I have it just right. The Egyptians made a wondrous loaf with that flour Lady Hester sent. It is called —”
“Kamut,” Elias replied wearily, taking the teacup Celestial gave him.
“Oh.” She eyed him uncertainly. “I have mentioned it, then?”
“Several times.”
Harriet frowned at her teacup. “What have you done to the tea, Celestial? I had just gotten used to that new brew, and now you have gone back to the old way.”
“The old way?” Celestial’s gaze shot from Harriet’s cup to Elias’s. Quickly, she removed Harriet’s cup, poured out another from one of the pots, and offered it to her.
“Much better,” Harriet said after a sip.
Elias stared at his own cup, and then put it carefully on the tray. Celestial, meanwhile, slipped from the room. He cleared his throat. “I wish to tell you about a new arrangement I have made for the shares of Westwood Imports.”
“They are no longer my concern. You saw to that.” She fanned herself. “It is uncommonly warm in here, is it not?”
“I have made them your concern,” Elias said. “I have had my solicitor draw up papers dividing the shares equally between us, effective immediately. There are no conditions. You are free to do with them what you will.” He hesitated. “Should you wish to buy more cows for your neighbors, however, it would be more sensible to pay for them outright than to sell more shares. It was rather expensive to buy back those you sold.”
She stared at him. “I do not understand.”
“I have made you an equal owner in Westwood Imports,” he said.
“Did my father —?”
“He had nothing to do with it. It was my decision.”
She absorbed that information in silence. “Why?” she asked finally.
“Because I wish you to have equal right to all that is mine,” he said. “And because I wish there to be trust between us.”
“I…had not expected such a thing,” she said slowly. “I thought you married me for the shares.”
“Had you bothered to ask me whether that was true,” Elias said evenly, “I would have told you that it was not.” He could feel his temper rising. “You solicitor was a crook, you see.”
She looked shocked. “Mr. Stevens?”
“He sold your shares at a higher price than what he gave you as proceeds. He made a handsome profit by pocketing the difference. And, yes, I was determined to regain those shares, but it had nothing to do with marrying you. It was to right a grievous fraud that was done to you and to the business.”
She stared at him. “I did not realize —”
Elias rose abruptly. “Yes, it was easier to assume I betrayed you, wasn’t it? As I said, Freddy’s blasted ghost is everywhere.”
She reached for her teacup, but he snatched it from her and strode from the room. Within moments, he found Celestial in the kitchen, along with Horace. He set Harriet’s teacup on the worktable with such force that it nearly shattered.
They stared at him.
“You have been putting ginseng into her food,” he growled.
Horace gasped. Celestial merely regarded Elias curiously. “How did you know?”
“You gave me her tea by mistake. I recognized it instantly. When she complained of the taste, you poured her a new cup from the pot containing the ginseng. I’ll warrant it was also in her turtle soup and any number of other dishes besides.”
“It will stimulate —”
“I am well aware of ginseng’s reputed properties,” he snapped. “I imagine you thought to help her. But I will brook no more interference. Is that clear?”
Warily, Celestial nodded.
***
The next morning, Elias signed the documents implementing the transfer of half of the shares to Harriet. His solicitor had other documents for his attention, including one from an associate in Jamaica.
“Tell him to expect me there by the end of September,” Elias said.
Jeremy Wilson looked uncertain. “But you would have to sail next week. And, well...you have been married less than a fortnight.”
“Nevertheless, do as I say.”
“Yes, my lord.” The solicitor busied himself with his papers.
Elias suppressed a sigh. Jeremy was a good man. Doubtless he thought a newly married husband and wife would not wish to be parted so soon. But at this point, Jamaica seemed a godsend. He could not go on like this with Harriet.
The knowledge that he would soon put an ocean between them should have buoyed him, but by the time Elias reached his chamber, he was in a foul mood. “Brandy, Henry,” he barked, flopping into a chair.
His batman quickly set a glass at his elbow. Lately, Henry had been eager to please — suspiciously so, given that the man was probably thoroughly miserable in his new surroundings, what with Heavenly and Celestial ruling the roost above and below stairs.
A more meddling group of servants Elias had never seen. It was beyond tolerating that Celestial had tampered with Harriet’s food, even though she’d meant well. He would never resort to artifice to arouse his wife. If Harriet did not come to him of her own free will, nothing else mattered.
In frustration, Elias kicked the footstool, sending it toppling onto its side. Henry made a great fuss of righting the thing. Elias wanted nothing more than to be left alone with his thoughts, but here was Henry refilling his glass and standing expectantly until Elias could no longer ignore him.
“What is it, Henry?” he demanded.
Henry took a deep breath. “I wish to make amends.”
“Amends?” Elias frowned. “For what?”
“I, er, perhaps overstepped in one area.”
“You overstep in every area, Henry. What the devil are you babbling about?”
Henry faced him squarely. “In the matter of that Mr. Hunt.”
“Oliver Hunt?” Elias stared at him. “What have you done?”
“Some time ago I wrote a note to him pretending to be Lady Harriet. I may have said that I — she — admired him. The man was most receptive, I’ll say that. Even made me wait for a reply to take to her.”
Elias stared at him. “You arranged their assignation that night at her salon.”
“I thought perhaps he and your ladyship would form a tendre so you’d be able to slip the noose. As I said, overstepped.”
“God’s blood,” Elias swore. “Is there to be no end to the meddling?”
“It was just the one letter I wrote,” Henry said indignantly. “Was only thinking of you. It was because of that earlier business with Miss Payne. I saw how you suffered. Didn’t want you to go through that again. Anyway, I was wrong. Wish to apologize.”
Elias sighed heavily. “How long have you been in my employ, Henry?”
“Since before the war,” Henry said proudly. “And during. And after.”
“We risked our lives together, didn’t we?” Elias said. “Even so, Henry, one day you will go too far. Mayhap that time is now.”
“But now that the deed is done —”
“The ‘deed’?”
“The, er, marriage.” Henry reddened. “It’s done, so no harm came of things. And I would not like you to be miserable.”
Elias regarded him in mock surprise. “Do I understand that you actually wish me happy?”
“I have always wished for your happiness, my lord,” Henry replied stiffly. “I simply never trusted a female to provide it.”
Elias pondered that. Until recently, he had felt exactly the same. He sighed. “Sometimes a man has no choice but to hope that she will.”
Henry sniffed disdainfully. Elias eyed him curiously. “Have you never met a woman who left you no choice, Henry?”
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