by Mary Balogh
Peregrine was enjoying the whole experience of meeting his in-laws and the other people who had been a part of Grace’s past. He liked the rather dull and plodding but solid and respectable Martin, and the serious, dutiful, and shrewd Ethel. And he was intrigued by his father-in-law, who spent most of his days shut up in his own rooms, rather like a volcano that one was never quite sure was dormant. There was a great deal of resentment and guilt and love and other muddled emotions locked up inside the old man, Peregrine was sure. He only hoped that Grace’s father would not die before he had come to some sort of peace with himself.
And Grace. Peregrine, standing beside a panting Miss Horlick, sipping lemonade with her, looked fondly at his wife, who was not dancing at that moment, though she had accepted a few partners. This was a hard time for her. She was looking rather as she had looked at the rectory for five years: withdrawn, rather tight about the lips, only her eyes calm. It was only now that he realized that in the last year since their marriage her expression had relaxed, softened, and that she had bloomed into a mature beauty.
She was looking severe again. Perhaps a little less than beautiful, though it was hard for him to tell. He knew her so well, was so familiar with her every mood and expression, that he could not possibly say any longer if she was beautiful or not. He could only say that, to him, she always was. She was Grace, his wife. She was the only woman, perhaps, on whom he looked not with his customary indulgent amusement, but with something of an ache. He could make other women happy without any conscious effort. He wanted so very badly to make Grace happy, and he was not at all sure that he did so.
This time was hard for her. But it was also good for her. He was sure of that. Her life would never be complete if she could not be reconciled with her family. And that reconciliation was coming slowly, inch by cautious inch. And she could never be at peace until she was reconciled with herself, until she could forgive herself. She must have this time, agonizing as it might be for her now, to learn that there had been no connection whatsoever between the death of her child and her sin in conceiving him out of wedlock. She must learn to see that death as the tragic accident it had been.
She was looking particularly drawn tonight, Peregrine thought. It must be more than usually hard on her to be in a gathering such as this, surrounded by all the people who had known her when she lived through her five-year ordeal. His eyes twinkled down at Miss Horlick as he took the empty glass from her hand and assured her that she would doubtless survive even if Mr. Piper, her next partner, did choose to swirl her down the set as he liked to do. And his heart ached for his wife.
There was only so much he could do to help her. She must live alone through the torment of her memories. She must find her own peace. He could only be there to smile at her, to hold her hand during the worst moments, to leave her alone to find room for her memories, to hold her and love her with slow tenderness at night.
He caught her eye across the room and smiled warmly as he came toward her.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” he asked, knowing very well that she was not. “Will you dance this next one with me, Grace?”
“I have promised it to his lordship,” she said, looking up at him with her large, calm eyes and setting her hand in his without seeming to realize that she did so.
“Grace?” Peregrine frowned and lowered his voice so as not to attract the attention of anyone else. “You are not going to faint, are you?”
“No, of course not.” Her eyes appeared to grow larger. “Only it is hot in here, Perry. And I have been dancing. Of course I am not going to faint.”
And of course being overheated did not turn one as pale as any ghost, Peregrine thought, squeezing her hand and turning his attention and his smile on the lady seated beside her.
GRACE HAD TOLD only one conscious lie in her relationship with her husband. She had told him on the day he had offered her marriage—or, rather, she had agreed with his assumption—that Gareth was dead. And yet at the time it had not seemed like a lie. Gareth was dead to her, had been since his final letter to her when she had already been increasing for six months, explaining that circumstances had forced him to marry a girl she had never heard of.
That was all. He had not explained what the circumstances were or what made them more important than returning home to marry the woman he had claimed to love for the past four years, the woman who was bearing his child. There were the usual protestations of undying love and a few enthusiastic details about life as an officer in the Guards.
He was dead. As far as Grace was concerned, he was dead. Except that she had not grieved or worn mourning for him. She had merely died a little inside and grown up a great deal and turned all her thoughts and her passion inward to the child she had so selfishly and so carelessly conceived.
The lie to Perry should be easy to correct. It had been a fairly innocent lie, and Perry was not a hard man to deal with. She should have been able to turn to him when he came from his dressing room later that night, put down her hairbrush, and simply tell him. Tell him that Gareth was still alive, that Gareth was the Lord Sandersford who had been their host that evening. It should have been easy. And it was certainly essential.
“Let me do that,” Peregrine said, reaching for the brush. “You have such lovely hair, Grace. Did you send Effie to bed?”
“She was yawning rather loudly,” Grace said. “Effie is quite an expert at dropping not so subtle hints.”
“She is very young,” he said.
“I know.” Grace smiled at him in the mirror. “And very smitten with that blond-haired footman of Martin’s. Have you noticed?”
He grinned back at her. “It was a pleasant evening, wasn’t it?” he said. “We haven’t danced since Christmas.”
“Yes,” Grace said, “it was pleasant.” She closed her eyes. He was drawing the brush gently through her hair. Her heart was thumping uncomfortably.
“Was Sandersford ever a soldier?” he asked. “He certainly bears himself like a military man.”
Grace kept her eyes closed. He had provided her with the perfect lead-in to what she must say. “Yes,” she said. “The Guards. He sold out, I believe, when his father died six years ago. He … we … they have always been neighbors of ours.”
“A pleasant man,” he said. He laughed suddenly. “Who do you think is going to get the curate, Grace? Would you care to place a wager?”
“I think that to a young girl he must appear remarkably handsome,” Grace said.
“With the added attraction of being far too thin and underfed,” he added with a grin. “All those girls are just bursting with maternal concern. The only problem, as I see it, is that the poor man may never get up his courage to ask any of them. I think he can outdo any one of the girls in the matter of blushes.”
“You ought not to laugh, Perry,” she said, turning and taking the brush from his hand, “just because you find it so easy to converse with the ladies.”
“Laugh?” he said. “When the man is in the enviable position of having at least five young female hearts beating for him? I am not guilty, Grace, I swear. He has nothing but my admiration. You did not enjoy yourself a great deal, dear.” He set his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. The smile had disappeared from his face.
“Yes, I did,” she said. “Of course I did, Perry.”
“Is it difficult for you to be with all these people again?” he asked. “Did they treat you badly before you left here?”
“No,” she said. “They treated me with amazing courtesy. I was never made to feel like a pariah.”
He framed her face with his hands. “The viscount too?” he asked. “And his father? They received you?”
Grace had never been suffocated by her husband’s nearness before. She swallowed awkwardly and could not look away from his eyes. “I was never received there,” she said, “after Jeremy.”
“Ah,” he said. “But this viscount wants to make amends. He seated you beside him at dinner, Grace. Was he
a friend of your Gareth? A relative, perhaps?”
It should have been so easy. It was easy. He was making it as easy for her as it could possibly be. “A friend,” she said jerkily, removing her eyes from his at last and lifting her hands to the lapels of his dressing gown.
“Ah,” he said again, “I guessed as much. But the pain can be allowed to recede now, Grace. He wants to make a friend of you again. That was very clear. Forgive him, dear. Let it all go, the bitterness. People do behave badly, you know. We all do on occasion. We owe it to one another to give a second chance, and sometimes even a third and fourth.”
“Yes,” she said, running her palms along the smooth silk of his lapels. She looked up into his eyes, gathering resolution, gathering courage from the kindliness she saw there. “Perry …”
“Hush now,” he said, lowering his head and kissing her lips. “Let’s forget it all for tonight and go to bed. It is late.”
“But, Perry …”
“Shh,” he murmured against her lips. “Come and let me make love to you. Does it relax you to make love? Or is it a trouble to you?” He raised his head enough to smile into her eyes.
“You know it is not a trouble,” she said. “You know that, Perry.”
“Sometimes I need reassuring,” he said with his old boyish grin. “You get into bed, Grace. I’ll see to the candles.”
She would tell him afterward, Grace decided as she got into bed. She would tell him later when they were lying quiet and relaxed, her head on his arm. Or tomorrow morning, perhaps …
BUT SHE DID not tell him. The moment had passed. She had told the lie, and she had clung to it when the only thing to have done was to tell the truth simply and directly. And immediately. She would just have to see to it, she decided the next day, that they did not cross paths with Gareth again during the two weeks that remained of their stay before they went to London.
“You did not tell me that Lord Sandersford died,” she said to Ethel when the two of them were alone, gazing down at a daffodil bud that was about to brave the brisk air of early spring. “Or that Gareth was home.”
Ethel looked stricken. Her hand flew to her mouth. “You did not know?” she said. “But he has been back home for years. Oh, Grace, I am so sorry. But of course you would not have known. You have been gone for ten years. I am sorry.”
Grace touched the bud gently.
“I wondered that you were willing to go last night,” Ethel said. “I wondered that you did not beg me to refuse the invitation. It must have been a dreadful shock for you. Does Peregrine know?”
“No,” Grace said abruptly, and moved on.
But her hope of staying clear of Gareth for the remainder of their stay was not to be realized, as she might have known.
“We ran into Sandersford,” Peregrine said late one afternoon after he and Martin had ridden into the village on some business. “He took us back with him to look at his stables. He has enough horses to mount a whole hunt, Grace, and still have enough left for the ladies’ carriages. Some impressive horseflesh too. He made himself very agreeable.”
“Did he?” Grace looked at him in some unease, but he did not elaborate on what topics the viscount had made himself agreeable about.
“And I bought you a length of blue ribbon,” he said, removing it from his pocket and presenting it to her with a bow and a grin, “to replace the black one on your straw bonnet. I wish I might have brought you a more valuable gift, but village shops do not offer much beyond the purely practical.”
“Thank you, Perry,” she said. “It is a lovely shade. And quite as valuable as diamonds, you know.”
And she could not avoid Gareth on her own account either, Grace was to discover. She was walking with Ethel one afternoon along the bank of the stream that flowed into the lake, looking for wild spring flowers, when he came riding along the road that ran parallel to the water. The road led directly from his house to the village. He stopped to hail them, and Grace reluctantly followed Ethel to the fence to exchange civilities.
“Well met,” he called. “Are you ladies just out for a stroll?”
“Yes,” Ethel said. “The weather is so lovely suddenly and the wild flowers blooming.”
“I feel tempted to join you,” he said while Grace examined the small bunch of primroses she held in her hand.
“Please do.” Ethel’s words, to do her justice, Grace thought, came rather stiffly and after a slight pause.
“I wonder,” Lord Sandersford said, dismounting from his horse and looping the reins over the fence, “if I might beg the indulgence of a few minutes alone with Grace, ma’am?” He smiled at Ethel.
Ethel looked inquiringly at her sister-in-law while Grace said nothing, but smoothed a finger lightly over the petals of a primrose. “Grace?” she said.
Grace looked up tight-lipped into Gareth’s face. “Yes,” she said. “I shall follow you home later, Ethel.” She resumed the absorbing task of smoothing the flower petals until the other woman had walked beyond earshot.
“Well, Grace …” Gareth said.
He had changed. He had always been handsome, attractive, confident of his power to charm. He had been tall and slim when he had left her. He still had all those qualities. But now he was a man, powerfully built, exuding a seductive and assured sexuality. He was the sort of man no woman would be able to resist if he set his mind on attracting her. Not that that was anything very new either.
“You have changed,” he said, echoing her own thoughts.
“I am six-and-thirty years old,” she said, looking finally into his dark eyes. “No longer a girl, Gareth. Time is not always kind.”
“Oh,” he said, “I would not say it has been unkind to you. You had the grace of a girl when I knew you. Now you have the mature beauty of a woman. But you have lost your proud look, your defiance.”
“I grew up,” she said.
He swung his long legs one at a time over the fence that divided them and offered his arm so that they could stroll along in the direction of the lake.
Grace shook her head, but fell into step beside him.
“You wear mourning?” he said. “You did not a few evenings ago.”
“We wear it in the daytime here still out of respect for my father,” she said. “We will leave it off altogether when we go to London.”
“Ah, yes, Paul,” he said. “He died in predictably heroic manner, I heard. Saving a child?”
“Yes,” she said.
“And cut himself off from his family in equally heroic defense of your honor, I gather,” he said.
“Yes.”
“I would have thought the gesture unnecessary,” he said. “I did not think you would run away, Grace. You used not to be a coward.”
“Some things are too hurtful to be borne,” she said, “especially when they concern someone one has harmed irrevocably.”
“The child,” he said. “Did you care about him, Grace? My father once told me that he looked like me. Did he? Did you think of me when you looked at him?” He smiled.
“I loved him,” she said. “He was my son. And, no, I did not see you when I looked at him. Or myself. I saw Jeremy. He was a quite separate person. He was not either you or me, I thank God. He was an innocent child.”
“You are bitter,” he said, “and I suppose that is understandable. The child was a nasty mistake, and unfortunately you had to bear the consequences. Are you still bitter that I did not come home to marry you?”
Grace’s voice shook with fury when she finally answered. “Jeremy was not a nasty mistake,” she said. “He was not a mistake at all. He was the most precious thing that has happened in my life, except perhaps …”
“For me?” he completed. One eyebrow was raised. His mouth was drawn into the ironic half-smile that she had always found so attractive. “Did I let you down very badly, Grace?”
“It was a long time ago,” she said, looking away from him and walking on. “A lifetime ago.”
“She was just too wealth
y, you know,” he said. “Martha, I mean. And Papa was in debt and my pockets to let and an officer’s pay just too small a pittance for my needs. I could not have offered you much of a life, Grace. Or the child. But it was you I loved all the same. You never doubted that, did you?”
“Strangely, yes,” she said.
“And did you stop loving me?” he asked.
“Very soon,” she said. “Long before Jeremy was born.”
“Well,” he said, “my feelings are not so fickle, Grace. And I am not sure you tell the truth. There has always been something between you and me. We both knew it fifteen years ago and more. And you felt it when we met again a few evenings ago, did you not? And you feel it now, Grace, as I do. Fifteen years cannot erase a love like that we shared.”
“And yet,” she said, “you seem to have lived very well without me in all that time, Gareth.”
He shrugged. “And what is this marriage you have contracted, Grace? What is he like, the beautiful boy? I would guess he is not much of a man.”
Grace was smoothing the petals of her flowers again. “It depends upon your definition of manhood, Gareth,” she said. “I daresay he would not be long on his feet in a mill against you. But there is more to a man than fists and muscles.”
He laughed. “Well said,” he said. “And don’t tell me that that part is good with him, Grace. You need more of a man to give you that, my love. I know. I have had you, remember?”
Grace examined her flowers, her jaw set in a hard line.
“Why did you marry him?” he asked. “To spite me?”
She laughed. “You are not in my life, Gareth,” she said, “and have not been for fifteen years. It is a long time. You have no part in my life any longer.”
“Why, then?” he asked. “Tell me, Grace. I am curious to know.”
She looked up at him. They had stopped walking. “My reasons for marrying Perry and my whole relationship with him are private matters between me and him,” she said. “They are none of your concern, Gareth.”
“Ah, but I believe they are, Grace,” he said, “or soon will be. Will you not admit that your interest in me has been rekindled in the last few days? Come, Grace, I know you of old. You cannot lie to me.”