The Christmas Foundling: A Christmas Regency Romance (Belles of Christmas: Frost Fair Book 5)

by Martha Keyes

  He strode back into his room, straining his ears to see if he could hear what he expected: soft cries from Lydia’s room.

  But he heard nothing. He sat on the edge of his bed, feeling as though he might go mad without any sign of what his wife was feeling or thinking, when finally, he heard footsteps in the corridor and what he imagined was Sarah’s arrival to help Lydia dress for dinner.

  He waited.

  It was nearly twenty agonizing minutes later when the muffled shutting of the door followed by Sarah’s withdrawing footsteps told him it was safe to go.

  He knocked softly on Lydia’s door. His heart was racing, but he couldn’t help himself. It would be torture to go down to dinner with Lydia and her sisters, forced to make conversation about who knew what when all he wanted was to speak with Lydia alone.

  When the door opened, he hungrily searched Lydia’s face for signs of what she had been feeling. Her eyes were more red than usual, but she smiled at him when she saw him. It wasn’t a normal smile. It was strange. Almost haunting.

  “Lydia,” he said. “I…your sisters said….” He found he couldn’t get the words out. They stuck in his throat. Thomas was gone.

  Her eyes flickered almost imperceptibly. “Come in,” she said, opening the door wider.

  He swallowed and stepped in, noticing the absence of the cradle beside the bed. The floor looked bare, the room too quiet. Just a few hours ago, it had been filled with Thomas’s cradle and coos—and Miles’s hurtful words.

  “Lydia,” he said, turning to her. “I am so unbelievably sorry. For all those things I said to you. I never meant for you to…I didn’t mean any of it. I was just so terrified I had lost you.”

  She shook her head. “I should have told you, should never have kept anything from you.”

  “You kept it from me because you were afraid you couldn’t talk to me. That is my fault.”

  “It is just as much mine. More, I think.”

  “But…but Thomas?”

  She swallowed. “It is for the best. For him and for us.”

  He searched her face. “I don’t understand.”

  “I need you to know, Miles,” she said, and the first hint of emotion made her voice tremble. But she kept her chin up and her gaze on him. “I need you to know that I am here. With you. No matter what. I want a future with you, and I want to do whatever it takes to make it a happy one, even if it doesn’t include children. I don’t know if you still want me, but…” Her voice softened, and she averted her eyes. “I needed you to know that.”

  Heart in his throat and a burning in his eyes, he folded his wife in his arms, holding her tightly to him. “I have always wanted you,” he said in a thick voice, muffled by her hair. “And I always shall.”

  They held each other—his face buried in her hair, hers in his shoulder—for Miles knew not how long. And with each passing minute, he felt some of the pain of the last few years falling away, until finally a knock sounded on the door.

  “Lydia?” Diana’s voice called. “Do you still wish to come down for dinner? Or shall I have it brought up to you?”

  Miles and Lydia pulled apart, and Lydia brushed at her eyes, blinking quickly. “I am coming,” she called out. “I shall meet you down there.” She looked up at Miles, and he wiped at some of the remaining moisture on her cheeks then offered her his arm.

  They shared a bed that night, and though Lydia slept in his arms, sleep eluded Miles. His heart was uneasy. Lydia had smiled and talked throughout dinner and in the time they’d spent in the drawing room afterward, but she couldn’t hide the hurt that lurked behind her smiles nor her glances at the door, as though Jane might bring Thomas to her anytime.

  He felt it, too. Thomas’s absence was deafening in the house. It seemed to change the entire atmosphere, and he couldn’t be sure if it was just he and Lydia who felt it, or if Diana and Mary did too.

  Twice that night, Lydia mumbled something in her sleep, arms cradling an imaginary baby. It was clear she had been keeping Thomas in her bed with her recently, and the sight of her hand searching for him drew Miles’s brows together in a pained frown.

  He pulled Lydia closer to him, which seemed to pacify her, for she settled into him, and her breathing calmed.

  In the morning, he rose before her. His restless night had given him ample time to consider things, and he dressed in Lydia’s room without the help of Bailey then made his way to his mother’s.

  She was sitting down to breakfast when he arrived, and from the surprised look on her face, he surmised that she had not been expecting him. There was no sign of Thomas. No doubt he was with one of the servants. Miles would ask to see him once he had spoken with his mother. He wanted a chance to say goodbye, if that was what he felt should happen by the end of his time with his mother.

  “Miles,” she said with a welcoming smile and gesture. “Come, sit, my dear. Have you breakfasted yet?”

  He took a seat but made no move to reach for any of the food on the table. “No, but I am not hungry. Thank you.”

  She took her hand from the handle of the teapot with a sidelong glance at him.

  “I won’t be here long,” he said. “I merely came to speak with you about Lydia’s visit yesterday.”

  She took a sip from her teacup and raised her brows. “What about it?”

  “What happened?” he asked.

  She raised her shoulders up and blinked. “She came asking for me to take the child. But you knew that, of course.”

  “No, I didn’t know.”

  “Didn’t know? I assumed she had spoken to you about it.”

  He shook his head.

  She reared back slightly, staring at him.

  “We had an argument yesterday,” he said, “and the next time I saw her was after her return. I had no idea…” He scrubbed a hand over his chin. “How did she seem?”

  His mother tweaked her teacup slightly so that it sat at a more precise angle on the saucer. “She was very out of sorts. Which just goes to show that it was the right decision.”

  “I don’t follow,” he said.

  “I only mean that she had become far too attached to the poor little thing. It was as if she thought he was hers.” She sighed and gave a little shake of the head. “It will be much better this way.”

  Miles wasn’t sure he agreed. “Where is he?”

  “He is gone, of course. I took him myself yesterday just after the girls left. Just as I said I would.”

  Miles went still. “He is already gone?”

  “Yes, my dear. I just said that. I didn’t see the purpose to keeping him here any longer. The sooner he can habituate himself to his new situation, the better, surely.”

  Miles swallowed down his disappointment. “And what is that situation?”

  She looked away from him, shifting in her seat. “Lydia specifically asked me not to tell her. I think you would be wise to follow her lead there.”

  “Mother,” he said, feeling more uneasy than ever. “What is the situation?”

  She didn’t answer right away, and the result was that Miles’s fists clenched and his heart raced. What had she done?

  “I thought he would do best at the Foundling Hospital.”

  Miles was bereft of speech for nearly a minute. “The Foundling Hospital? But—but—they would not accept him.”

  She tipped her head to the side and pressed her lips together. “I do remember telling you that he surely would be if the right incentive was offered.”

  “Good heavens, Mother. Do you mean to say you bribed them to take him?”

  Her brows snapped together. “What a vulgar way to phrase it. He is a foundling, Miles. Certainly there is no better place for him than the Foundling Hospital. Besides, they are always in need of more funds, of course. I was more than happy to contribute to the cause.”

  Miles covered his face with two hands, his stomach churning. What would Lydia say to know that this was the situation his mother had found? She would be horrified. It would devast
ate her.

  “You are surely not angry with me,” said his mother.

  He stood, and the chair he was sitting in screeched dissonantly on the floor. “You made us believe you had found a family for him. You said nothing of the Foundling Hospital.”

  She rose from her seat. “The Foundling Hospital is a respectable institution. He will be well cared for, educated, trained to work. That is nothing for a child from heaven only knows where to sneer at.”

  Miles’s jaw clenched tightly together, and he fought to keep the sharp words on his tongue from passing his lips. “You have done a great deal of damage, Mother. I have no desire to speak to you just now.”

  He turned on his heel and strode from the room, ill at the thought of revealing what he had discovered to Lydia.

  Chapter 24

  Lydia stayed in Miles’s bed long past her usual time of rising. She was reluctant to enter her own room, and when she did, it was with slow steps and a heaviness in her heart. She didn’t know where Miles had gone so early—she was only vaguely aware of him kissing her on the head, saying something in a reassuring voice, and rolling out of bed. The events of the day before had exhausted her, and she had quickly fallen back asleep.

  But now she stood on the threshold of her own bedchamber, keenly aware of how empty her room felt. Where the cradle belonged, there was bare floorboard. It was the first thing she’d done when she had returned from the dowager’s—had Jane take the cradle back downstairs.

  It was silly for the empty space to affect her so. There had not always been a cradle there, after all. But it was the fact that there never would be again which wrung her heart and kept her feet from passing fully into the room.

  She pulled her eyes from the vacant place and let them rove over the room. It felt different there. Not just because Thomas was gone. Something had shifted—perhaps not in the room itself. Perhaps it was within her. This place had felt like a refuge when she had first begun to occupy it. It was free of the conflict, the pain, and the failure she had begun to associate with the bed in Miles’s room. In this bed, she had found rest and reprieve for a time.

  Now, though, it was no refuge. It was full of loneliness. Even her time there with Thomas—so joyful while it had happened—was now awash in heartache and loss, as if someone had painted a glaze of sadness over the memories.

  She wanted to leave it behind. She would gladly return to Miles’s bed and share his room with him. It might not be entirely free of sorrow, but at least she wouldn’t have to face it alone. That was the only comfort in all of this: Miles. When he had held her yesterday after her return from the dowager’s, she had felt his love in a new way. It had given her hope that he would come to resign himself—or, heaven willing, may have already done so—to the likelihood that it would only ever be the two of them.

  She took a determined step into the room, making her way toward the chest full of her clothing. This was something Sarah could have done, but Lydia wanted to do it herself. She wanted to experience it and let the significance of it wash over her.

  A few at a time, she took her dresses and moved them to Miles’s room, setting them on the bed. Then she pulled and hefted the chest there as well, setting it beside Miles’s—where it used to be.

  It took her nearly an hour to move everything to its new home—or old home, rather. Last of all, she went to the desk and opened the drawer. The letter from the solicitor sat inside, and the vial of pennyroyal rocked slightly beside it. She pulled out the letter and opened it, her eyes running over the words. It felt like a lifetime ago that she had opened it and read its contents. She had felt such disappointment then. It had been a crushing blow, the knowledge that she couldn’t free Miles from his marriage to her.

  What would things be like now if the solicitor’s news had been different? If he had offered her hope rather than a door, locked and closed?

  She took the paper to the fire and touched its edge to one of the flames, watching it consume the words little by little, then tossing it all onto the burning logs. The trail of fire turned the letter to ash and smoke, and with it, any thought Lydia had harbored of a life outside her marriage to Miles. If Miles would let them, they would envision a new future together.

  The door to her room opened, and Miles appeared in the doorway. She smiled at him, but it flickered at the look on his face. He did not look happy.

  “You’re…in here,” he said.

  She nodded and rose, walking over to him. “Yes. But perhaps you noticed my trunk in your room. Our room,” she said with a hint of shyness.

  He glanced behind him, and the side of his mouth turned up at the corner. There was still sadness in it, though.

  “I don’t want to be in here anymore, Miles,” she said. “I want to be with you.”

  He took her hands in his and looked down at her with what she could only describe as melancholy love. “I am very happy to hear that,” he said.

  “You do not look it,” she said with a nervous lump in her throat.

  He shook his head and looked down at their hands, rubbing his thumb along hers. “I have something to tell you. I was just at my mother’s.”

  “Oh,” she said, her mind immediately jumping to Thomas. “Is that where you went? I wasn’t certain.”

  He nodded. “I wanted to see Thomas again and discover where she intended to take him.”

  Lydia swallowed, trying not to think of how much she wanted to see Thomas again too. “I am sorry, Miles. I should have allowed you to say goodbye before taking him. I was…I was afraid I would lose my nerve if I waited any longer. And I worried that you simply wanted him gone.”

  “Well, he is gone now. My mother took him yesterday.”

  Lydia nodded, taking in a large breath. It was just as the dowager had promised it would be. But the knowledge that Thomas was truly gone—completely out of reach—it still ached. She didn’t want Miles to see just how much, though. She didn’t want him to think she regretted it. She had done what was best for them.

  “Lydia,” Miles said, shutting his eyes with a brow furrowed in pain. “She took him to the Foundling Hospital.”

  Lydia’s head snapped up, her eyes searching Miles’s face.

  “I am so sorry,” he said. “If I’d had any idea it was what she intended, I would never have let her do such a thing. You must believe me.”

  She took a step back, blinking. “She couldn’t have. They wouldn’t accept him. They told us.”

  Miles lifted helpless shoulders. “She provided a donation they couldn’t refuse. Whoever she spoke to must have made an exception.”

  She shook her head rapidly as images of the little boy she’d spoken to flashed into her mind—the one who hadn’t said a word to her, who’d been wary of her. She shut her eyes to dispel the image, but it lingered there, and in the boy, she saw Thomas.

  “We must get him,” she said. “He can’t stay there. He can’t.” She stepped back toward Miles and took his hands pleadingly in hers. “We must bring him back here and find him a family, Miles.”

  He nodded quickly. “Of course. I can go there now.”

  “Should I come?” she asked. She didn’t know whether she wanted to or not. What if Thomas was already gone? What if they’d sent him to the countryside already and the errand was a futile one?

  He searched her eyes. “I think you should remain here,” he said.

  He was right. She didn’t know whether she would be able to keep her composure if she accompanied him. Miles had a more level head. He would be able to make them see reason. If it wasn’t too late.

  “I shall return as quickly as I can with news.” He paused a moment then kissed her and left.

  “How shall I ever face her?” Lydia wrung her hands, pacing the floor in Diana’s room as her sisters stood by.

  “It was badly done of her, certainly,” Diana said.

  Lydia checked in place—perhaps the first time she had stopped moving since Miles left—and stared at her sister. “But…?” She knew
the tone Diana was using.

  Diana and Mary shared a look then Diana let out a gush of air. “I imagine it was done with good intention, Lydia. Just think, in the dowager’s mind, the Foundling Hospital is precisely where Thomas belongs. She did not see what we saw when we went, and she has precious little attachment to the child. I imagine that Miles was foremost in her mind when she decided upon the course.”

  Lydia struggled to decide which part of this speech to respond to, but she settled on saying, “Miles?”

  Mary nodded and stepped forward, almost as though they had rehearsed this conversation and the time had come for her part in the speech. “I am not saying that I agree with the course she took, for I don’t, but I think it beneficial to at least try to see things from her perspective.” She hesitated, her gaze shifting to the bed. “Come, sit, will you?”

  Lydia complied, too curious how Mary or Diana might rationalize what her mother-in-law had done to resist.

  Mary turned her body toward Lydia, looking at her intently. “You came to love Thomas quite dearly, didn’t you?”

  Lydia looked away, afraid if she responded to it, her anger might begin to give way to tears.

  Mary nodded. “I know you did. It was apparent to all of us. He became like a son to you, I think. You want what is best for him, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” Lydia managed to say. She had been unable to keep the doubts at bay since taking Thomas to the dowager’s—doubts that, in acting in hers and Miles’s interests, she was not acting in Thomas’s, much as she might try to persuade herself. Would his new family truly be more loving than Lydia and Miles might have been? But there was no family. Her doubts had been merited.

  “You know, then,” Mary said, “what it is to be willing to do whatever it takes to ensure his happiness and success. That is precisely what Miles’s mother was doing for him, I think. She has clearly been concerned about how Thomas would affect things here. It seemed she saw him as a distraction at best.” She lifted her shoulders. “No doubt she believed she was doing what was best for Miles and you in taking Thomas to the Foundling Hospital.”