For the Love of Emma

by Lucy Gordon

  “Where I’m going to sleep.”

  “But we agreed that you’d have the room next to Emma.”

  “I know, but she’s got it fixed in her head that your room has to be redecorated to make it suitable for me to share it. She told me on the way home today that she wants to help choose the new decor. It’s all part of her mental picture of family life. She’s stayed overnight with her friends, so she knows married people share a room. She told me so.”

  He looked alarmed. “What did you say?”

  “I referred her to you,” Briony said firmly.

  “Well, I suppose—if she’s set her heart—”

  “No,” Briony said quickly. “I will not share a room with you. That wasn’t in our agreement. You’ll just have to tell her—I don’t know—say I want to be close to her in case she’s ill in the night.”

  “That will sound too suspicious. She thinks she’s getting better. I don’t want any risk that she might guess the truth.”

  Briony was silent and thoughtful for a long moment before asking, “Hasn’t it ever crossed your mind that she might have guessed already?”

  “Of course not,” he said a little too quickly.

  “Carlyle,” she said gently, “you can’t tell how much Emma knows.”

  “She doesn’t know anything,” he said brusquely. “I’ve made sure of it.”

  “You can’t ‘make sure of it.’ You don’t know what’s going on in her mind. She’s very bright and perceptive.”

  He looked at her coldly, and his tone was suddenly arctic. “I tell you it’s impossible!” he said in a deliberate voice. “She thinks she’s recovering, and I intend her to go on thinking that way.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Briony said patiently. “But you might be wrong. I’ve seen the way she consciously brightens up when you come into the room. You’re putting on a show to reassure her, but I think she’s doing the same for you.”

  His face was hard, closed against her. “Rubbish! Good God, what can you know about her in such a short time?”

  The injustice of this made her temper flare. “You evidently felt I was good at getting close to her or we wouldn’t be having this discussion.”

  “I asked you in to help Emma, not spout a lot of fanciful theories—”

  “And I think I help her best by understanding her. What about when you were considering an operation? Didn’t she know about that?”

  “Yes, but I dealt with it. I told her she didn’t need an operation, that everything would be all right as long as she was careful.”

  “But don’t you realize that Emma knows what she knows, not just what she’s told?”

  “I tell you she has no idea of the truth,” Carlyle shouted. “She believes what I tell her. I want Emma’s last few months to be perfect for her, and I asked you to help me make them perfect, not to interfere.”

  Briony stared at him, shocked by the explosion she’d touched off. She knew it was pain that made Carlyle so unreasonable, pain that his dream of giving Emma the perfect happiness he’d never given her before might be unattainable. She could feel compassion for that pain, but she wasn’t going to let him walk over her like this.

  “Is it interfering to disagree with you?” she demanded crossly.

  “Do you know what you’re saying?” he demanded, his face livid. “You’re saying it’s too late to make her happy—”

  “I’m not—”

  “Don’t you realize that her happiness is the only thing that counts with me? Nothing and nobody else matters. I’ll do anything to make her last few months perfect—”

  “But you’ll do that best by understanding what she wants,” Briony said. “Can’t you see how wrong you’ve been about everything? Emma doesn’t just want a mother, she wants a complete family because she’s never known that kind of total security.”

  “She’s always known that I love her—”

  “But how much of your attention has she had? You thought you had years to be the perfect father, but now there aren’t any years, you’re trying to give her a whole childhood in a few months. But who are you doing it for, Carlyle? Her or yourself?”

  She hadn’t meant to say so much, but the words had poured out. She hated herself for hurting a man already wounded, yet for his child’s sake there were things he needed to face.

  But it was too late. She knew that when she saw the look he turned on her. “That’s enough!” he snapped. “I won’t have you ruining her last months with your idiot theories.” He took a deep breath. “Cancel everything. From now on you stay right away from her.”

  She stared. “You’re calling it off?”

  “Exactly. She’s better off without you.”

  “But you’ll break her heart,” Briony cried. “You can’t do this to her. It’s cruel.”

  “Not half as cruel as the damage you could do her. You’d better let me have the ring before we forget it.”

  He held out his hand. Moving as in a trance Briony handed him the ring. She couldn’t believe what was happening. While she was still trying to take it in, Carlyle flung her one final look of hate, then walked out of her flat, and she heard his footsteps growing fainter.

  It took Briony a long time to get to sleep, and when she did doze off, Emma was there, looking at her sadly. She cried out, but Emma vanished and the world was suddenly full of a loud, persistent ringing. She woke to the realization that someone was pressing her doorbell.

  The clock said five in the morning. She stumbled out of bed and pulled on a light dressing gown over her cotton nightdress. The bell was still ringing as she went sleepily into the hall and switched on the light which, mercifully, had the effect of making whoever was out there take their finger off the bell. She opened the door to find Carlyle.

  He looked terrible. There were dark shadows under his eyes and he seemed like a man who’d been through hell. He was still wearing the clothes he’d worn when he’d stormed out, but in contrast to his immaculate appearance then, the throat of his shirt had been torn open and his tie hung awry.

  “May I come in?” he asked.

  She stood back for him to pass, and closed the front door. In her front room he turned to face her. “Is it too late to ask for your forgiveness?” he said quietly.

  She forgave him at once. Wretchedness was written all over his face, and she couldn’t bear it. “It’s all right,” she said.

  “No!” He shook his head as though trying to clear his mind. “It’s not all right. I had no business speaking to you like that just because you told me—things I didn’t want to hear.”

  “I’m probably wrong,” she said quickly.

  “No—yes—I don’t know. But I wouldn’t even listen to you because if you’re right—” It seemed as if he had to force the next words out. “You see, I wanted everything to be perfect for her. But it’s too late, isn’t it?” His face was haggard.

  A thousand words sprang to Briony’s lips, but she dismissed them all. Words were useless now. She put out her arms and he went blindly into them. “Help me,” he whispered.

  He held her tightly, desperately, as though she was the only refuge in a hideous world. Briony was filled with a sensation that was half anguish, half delight. It felt so right to hold him, offering the warmth and comfort that he needed so badly. She stroked his untidy hair and rested her cheek against his.

  “I’m sorry for what I said,” she murmured. “I didn’t mean it all to come out like that—”

  “But it’s true, isn’t it?” he said with self-condemning bitterness. “I’m doing it for myself, to ease my own conscience about not being a better father sooner. But I swear to you I’d give my own life for Emma. She’s the only person in the world I love—”

  “I know,” Briony said with a little sigh. “I know.”

  He drew back to look at her. “I don’t know what to do,” he confessed. “I’m floundering around, trying to do the right thing, and always getting it wrong, because in the end there is no right thing. In the
end she’s going to die, and I’m trying to pretend it’s not true.” His eyes were bleak and terrible. “But it is true, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” she said. “It’s true.”

  Then, because there was nothing else to do, she laid her mouth gently on his for a moment. He didn’t kiss her back, but he accepted her kiss, and she felt his big, strong body relax in her arms. When he took his lips from hers, he didn’t draw away, but let his head rest on her shoulder as though too weary to do anything but seek comfort.

  At last she forced herself to let him go. To be this close to him was dangerous. She wanted too much, but he wasn’t interested in her as a woman. “Let me make you some coffee,” she said with an attempt at lightness. She straightened his tie. “You need looking after.”

  He followed her into the kitchen. “I haven’t been home since I left here,” he said. “I drove for a while. Then I got out and walked for miles—God knows where—anywhere—”

  “You look exhausted.”

  “I wanted to be too tired to think. But it didn’t work. I couldn’t get away from what was really driving me, the knowledge that you may be right. That’s why I was so angry with you.”

  She nodded and set his coffee before him. He hesitated before saying, “Could you bear to take us on again, Emma and me? It won’t be easy.”

  “I’ll manage.” She smiled at him. “You need me. Both of you.”

  “Yes, we do.”

  “But, Carlyle, if I’m going to be Emma’s mother, then you must let me be her mother. A real mother, not someone who can be reduced to the hired help whenever it suits you.”

  He winced, but accepted it. “It won’t happen again,” he promised. “I trust you better than I trust myself.” He gave a half smile. “I think I instinctively knew that about you from the start—that you could be trusted.”

  “From the start?” she queried lightly. “You mean, those two months when you didn’t notice I was there?”

  “No, I mean the day I did notice you—was it only three weeks ago?—when you handled the worst I could throw at you without making any notes, and never got a thing wrong. I knew then you were efficient and reliable. I never guessed how important those qualities were to become to me.”

  Old reliable, she thought wryly. That’s how he sees me. But at least he needed her. She could take comfort in that.

  “What would I do if I hadn’t found you?” he mused aloud.

  “It doesn’t matter. You did find me, and I’m here for you.”

  “You’re a most forgiving woman—”

  “I said terrible things too,” she said quickly.

  “I don’t just mean that. I promised I wouldn’t make any demands on you, but I quarrel with you, and bully you—”

  “I can stand up for myself.”

  He managed the ghost of a smile. “Well, I guess I know that now.”

  He took the diamond ring from his pocket and put it on her finger. He didn’t speak, but for a moment his hand gripped hers tightly.

  “I’d better be off home,” he said huskily. “Good night. And thank you.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  IN THE end, Briony lost the battle to have her own room. Carlyle conceded, but Emma outmaneuvered them both.

  “It’s a wedding present to both of you, from me,” she explained, indicating a huge box from the same store where Briony had bought her wedding dress. It had been delivered earlier in the day, but Emma had refused to let Briony look inside until her father was there, too.

  Together they opened the box and discovered a huge, luxurious bedspread, created from silk patchwork, cunningly designed to suggest a jungle. It was a work of art and at any other time Briony would have rejoiced in its beauty. Now all she saw was that she’d been comprehensively defeated.

  “Let’s put it on, and see how it looks,” Emma begged. She tugged at Briony’s hand.

  “You go on ahead of us,” Carlyle said, turning away to hide the fact that his lips were twitching. When they were alone he gave her a pleading look. Briony met his eyes defiantly, until at last her lips, too, began to quiver. At the same moment they both began to laugh.

  “I swear I didn’t put her up to this,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t put anything past you.”

  “You do me an injustice. My mind isn’t nearly as subtle and convoluted as Emma’s.”

  “Well, what do we do now?” she demanded.

  “My instinct is simply to give in, but I know you’ll think that shockingly spineless.”

  She sighed. “Oh, well—”

  “You’ll never regret it, Briony, I promise.”

  “I’m regretting it already,” she said with a laugh.

  “Come on,” Emma yelled down through the banisters.

  “Coming, coming,” they said, hoisting the bedspread between them and making their way obediently upstairs.

  With a week to go, Carlyle’s mother moved into the house. Briony was apprehensive before they met, and even more so when she discovered that Joyce Brackman had sharp eyes that seemed to see everything.

  “How much have you told her?” she asked Carlyle.

  “She knows I’m marrying for Emma’s sake,” he admitted, “but I haven’t said anything about our bargain.”

  Joyce was inclined to regard Briony askance until she saw that Emma loved her. After that her reserve melted and Briony soon discovered that a warm heart underlay Joyce’s shrewdness. It was she who, after a visit to Briony’s little flat, suggested that she should be married from Carlyle’s house.

  “You need to make a grand entrance in that dress,” she said. “And you can’t make a grand entrance down seven floors of a tower block. Besides, if you’ve got no family you’ll need me there to help you. You did say you had no family, didn’t you?”

  “That’s right,” Briony said quietly. She was thinking of how this wedding might have been with Sally sharing bridesmaid duties with Emma. How lovely they would have looked, walking side-by-side down the aisle, identically dressed in pink satin—

  But there the vision collapsed. The tomboyish Sally might have worn pink satin for Briony’s sake, but no power on earth would have made her comfortable in it. She’d have fiddled and scratched until she could rid herself of the hated dress with a sigh of relief. For a moment the picture was so clear that Briony smiled in affectionate amusement. It was the first time she’d remembered Sally with more pleasure than pain.

  Then she came back to the present, to discover Carlyle and Joyce regarding her with puzzled looks.

  “What is it, dear?” Joyce asked. “You went off into a dream.”

  “Nothing,” Briony said hastily. “I think your idea of being married from here is lovely.”

  The day before the wedding the house began to fill up with cousins and aunts. Emma rapidly grew beside herself with excitement, and soon after tea Briony declared that it was time for her to go to bed.

  “Oh, not yet,” Emma cried in dismay.

  “You’ve got a big day tomorrow and you won’t be up to it if you don’t get a good night’s sleep,” Briony said firmly. She was really worried at the thought of Emma overdoing it.

  “But I’m better now,” Emma pleaded. “I am. Really I am.”

  “I know. But you won’t stay better if you get overtired,” Briony said patiently. “Off to bed.”

  With comical suddenness Emma’s face changed. The angelic fairy vanished, to be replaced by a mutinous child. “I won’t get overtired,” she said belligerently. “I’m not tired. I’m not.”

  “Emma, go to bed,” Briony said with quiet firmness.

  “But everybody’s here. Oh, please, Mummy.”

  It was the first time she’d used the word. Briony smiled with pleasure, and Briony dropped down on one knee in front of her. “Are you going to call me Mummy? I like that.”

  Emma glowered at her. “Well, I shan’t, because you’re hateful and horrid.”

  “Fine,” Briony said affably. “I’m hateful and horrid, and you�
��re still going to bed.”

  “Daddy—” Emma turned to her father as to a court of final appeal, but he threw up his hands.

  “She’s the boss now,” he said, indicating Briony.

  Briony said quickly, “Suppose Daddy carries you up? You always like that.”

  Emma scowled harder, but let him pick her up. Briony followed them upstairs, while Emma glared at her over her father’s shoulder. But when she was in bed she opened her arms to her and whispered, “I’m sorry, Mummy.”

  “That’s all right,” Briony said, laughing. “Now you’ve called me hateful and horrid I really feel like your mother.”

  “Can I truly call you Mummy? It’s not too soon?”

  “No, darling. It’s not too soon.” She looked at Carlyle. “I’ll come down when Emma’s asleep.”

  “Don’t you want to go back to the party?” Emma asked.

  “I’d much rather stay with you,” Briony assured her.

  Carlyle watched them a moment before leaving the room. Briony stayed until Emma had nodded off, then went downstairs to rejoin the family party.

  “Is she all right?” Carlyle asked her in a low voice.

  “Fine. We’re the best of friends again, and she’s sound asleep.”

  He smiled faintly and took both her hands in his. “I’m so glad I found you for Emma. I can’t tell you—”

  “You don’t need to,” she said quickly. “As long as Emma’s happy, that’s all that matters, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” he said fervently. “That’s all that matters.”

  *

  Next morning Emma was bright as a lark. Wearing her dressing gown she ran in just as Briony, assisted by Joyce, was putting on the bridal gown. Emma helped to do up the tiny buttons at the back, then watched in ecstasy as Joyce applied Briony’s makeup.

  “Now these,” she said, indicating the string of flawless pearls that had been Carlyle’s wedding gift. Briony had gasped when she saw them. Her own gift to him had been cuff links. They were platinum and had cleaned out her savings, but they paled beside the magnificence of the pearls.

  “You put them on for me,” Briony said. Frowning with concentration, Emma clasped them round her neck. “Did you help Daddy chose these?” Briony asked.