by Mary Balogh
Unfortunately, she had to approach the fireplace in order to take her leave of Mrs. Howell and Morfydd, who was standing behind her mother's chair.
"It has been lovely," Marged said, bending over the elderly lady to kiss her cheek again. She straightened up. "Thank you, Morfydd. I will leave my harp here, if you don't mind, and ask Mr. Williams to bring it home tomorrow or when it is convenient to him."
Both Morfydd and her mother were effusive in their thanks for the music and in their assurances that the harp could stay as long as Marged wished. The children would be kept away from it and no harm would come to it.
"I will carry it up to Ty-Gwyn now," a voice said from behind Marged. She closed her eyes briefly. "And see you home at the same time, Marged. Women should not be out alone in the hills at night."
She could not refuse any more than she had been able to refuse outside chapel on Sunday. But twice within a week! She had been teased after Sunday by the group who had joined her in planning the pranks at Tegfan and carrying them out. This could lead to more than teasing. It could lead to gossip.
But it was not the gossip she cared about. It was being alone with him in the hills at night. Though even that was not her primary concern. Did he not understand that he was the last man on earth… Ah, it sounded like a cliche.
She tried. "It is quite unnecessary for you to go out of your way, my lord."
"It will be my pleasure, ma'am," he said, sounding for all the world as if he were preparing to escort an English lady home from an English ball.
He was ready to leave by the time she had drawn on her cloak and raised the hood over her head. He lifted her harp and followed her out into the night.
Chapter 10
It was a walk of over a mile, first across the crest of a hill and then upward. It was a dark night, with not much moonlight to light the way, and they had not brought a lantern. She found herself hoping that he would not be as surefooted as she, though the thought seemed absurd when she remembered him as a child. And she hoped that he would find himself unequal to the task of carrying her harp the whole distance. It was a heavy instrument and awkward to carry. She hoped that soft living would have him puffing and taking frequent rests. But he carried it with apparent ease.
They did not talk. They walked side by side in the darkness and in silence and she wondered if the air between them really did pulse with tension, or if only she felt it. She had never been more thankful to be the owner of a harp. Would he have insisted on escorting her home if there had not been the harp? She imagined what it would be like now, walking together across the lonely hills, if there was nothing to burden his arms. And she became more breathless than the walk and the climb could justify.
She tried to think of Eurwyn and succeeded better than she had hoped. There had always been work to occupy both of them for most of their waking hours. And the longhouse had always been occupied by his mother and grandmother as well as the two of them. She had loved those few occasions when they went out together and could walk home alone together, relaxed and comfortable. It had happened so rarely. She had liked to walk with her arm linked through his. He had not been a fat man, but he had been large and solid. She had always felt softly feminine, protected, almost fragile with Eurwyn. They were not images of herself that she cultivated, but sometimes it had felt good to believe that her man would protect her from all of life's harms.
Sometimes she had wished that he would stop in the darkness and kiss tier. She had even suggested it once, not long after their marriage. He had been almost embarrassed. Eurwyn had not been a romantic man. What happened between a man and his wife to give them both ease should happen only at a certain time of day and only in their bed. He had never stated that in words—Eurwyn had never been able to talk about intimate matters — but it had been his belief.
She had loved him for his firm beliefs and principles, for his solidity, for the gentle affection he had shown her even though he had never put it into words, even during his courtship of her.
And then they were home and she was opening the gate into the farmyard so that the Earl of Wyvern would not have to set her harp down in the dust. And she was aware of him again, alive and there with her while Eurwyn was long dead, nothing to her but a memory. She hurried across the yard to open the door into the passageway and then the one into the kitchen. It was in darkness. Her mother-in-law and Gran would have been in bed for an hour or more.
She had felt very alone with him out on the hills. She felt even more alone with him when he had followed her into the kitchen and set her harp down in its usual place—even though the other two women were so close in the next room that they might hear a whisper.
He straightened up and turned to look at her, the planes of his face looking even more chiseled and even harsher than usual in the dying embers of the fire. They were alone, and he was no longer burdened with the harp. And they were standing no more than three feet apart.
She was very aware of the cupboard bed just behind her.
She turned sharply and led the way back out into the passageway. She could hear a few of the cows moving restlessly in the straw.
He turned in the doorway to look at her. It was quite dark there, but they had been walking in the dark for longer than half an hour. Their eyes were accustomed to it.
Eurwyn had used to kiss her when they were in bed together. Never at any other time except a few times when he was courting her. His lips had always used to be soft and warm against hers. And then he would turn her onto her back and draw up her nightgown. She would settle him in the cradle of her thighs and feel his weight pressing down on her. And then he would come inside and they would be man and wife together for a few silent minutes. There was never any great excitement, but just that—the being together, the being one as a man was supposed to be one with his wife. And then afterward his kiss again and his arm beneath her head and his apology. Always his apology for bothering her when she must be tired.
Her body had been so empty without his. Her heart had been empty without him. Now, coming home together after the rare treat of a party with their friends and neighbors, they would have gone to bed together and have had the closeness of each other for the rest of the night.
The man who was standing in the doorway reached out and took her hands in his, as he had done on a previous occasion. But instead of looking down at the calluses this time, he raised them one at a time to his mouth and set his lips against her palms. She felt the warmth of his breath. He set her hands together, palm to palm, and held them there as if to keep his kisses warm. He looked into her eyes, though she could not see for sure that he did so. What little light there was. was behind him.
"Good night, Marged," he said so softly that it was a mere whisper of sound.
And then he was gone while her palms were still pressed together and tears would have blurred her vision if there had been anything to see.
Good night, Marged.
They were the only words either of them had spoken since leaving Ianto Riehards's house, she realized. The house behind her felt empty and she knew that the bed would be cold. She yearned and yearned for a man's touch, for a man's loving. But they were all mixed up together, her longing for a long-dead husband and her yearning for the man who had betrayed her.
Good night, Geraint. The tears spilled over, hot onto her cheeks. Damn you. Oh, damn von.
He was cautiously hopeful. He could not pretend that he had been welcomed with open arms at Mrs. Howell's party the evening before, but neither had he been openly rejected. Everyone had been polite. A few had made the effort to talk with him. Perhaps with some persistence and some patience on his part, eventually he would make them see that he was not the eternal enemy. Once that happened, there could be dialogue. He could find out where the real problems lay and try to find solutions.
Even Marged had seemed less hostile. He had spent a largely sleepless night thinking of Marged, wondering what she would have done if he had lowered his head and kissed he
r lips, as he had wanted to do. And wondering where the one kiss would have led if she had been receptive to him. Part of him wished he had put it to the test. His body was on fire for her. Part of him was glad that he had not tempted fate, that he had an almost tender memory of the end of the evening.
Of course, he must not be overoptimistic. He had not failed to notice that Aled had disappeared during the singing and had not returned. Aled had avoided him. Perhaps because he had not wanted to be trapped into having either to show open friendship or to openly snub his friend.
Were they friends? Geraint was not sure. He doubted Aled was sure either. And he guessed that neither of them really wanted to find out at the moment.
But Geraint felt hopeful. For a few days there had been no "accidents." And tomorrow he had an appointment with the man who had leased the toll roads and gates from the trust of which he, Geraint, was part owner. He was going to see if something could be done about lessening the burden on the farmers. It seemed they had two particular grievances. They paid tolls on the vast quantities of lime they had to haul for fertilizing their fields, and they paid frequent tolls because there were several different trusts in Carmarthenshire and they all had their gates and their charges.
Surely something could be arranged. Surely landowners like himself would consent to paying tolls on the roads too—it seemed only fair. And perhaps too they could lower the cost of the lease so that the man leasing from them would not be out of pocket for easing the burden on the poor.
It was going to mean several meetings with several people, and some of them—like his aunt and uncle—would doubtless be resistant at first. But he could get them to see sense. He had never lacked for persuasive powers.
He went to bed that night quite early and slept soundly after his sleeplessness of the night before. He woke up later, feeling angry, wondering what sort of drunken brawl was going on in the street outside until he remembered that he was at Tegfan, in the country. But what the devil was going on outside? He could not have been sleeping for longer than a few hours. It must be the very dead of night. And yet he could hear yelling voices and the crunch of boots on the gravel of the terrace. He could hear at least one horse whinnying.
He looked down from his window a few moments later on a scene of chaos. There was plenty of moonlight tonight.
He could see the stable block over to his right. A couple of grooms were standing outside it, one hopping about as he tried to pull on a boot, the other seeming to have a hard time getting his arms inside the sleeves of a shirt. Other grooms were dashing after disappearing horses, in various states of undress.
It did not take a genius to understand what had happened. By some strange chance—doubtless an accident—the stable doors had been left open as well as all the doors into the horses' stalls, and the horses had bolted. No one could be blamed. Accidents happened, after all.
Geraint's jaw hardened and he felt fury ball inside him. And disappointment. And frustration. It would take his men perhaps the rest of the night to round up the frightened animals—they had clearly not wandered out of those unlatched doors. They had been driven out.
He turned and strode toward his dressing room.
They were fortunate that at least they were not hampered by the darkness. It took them less than an hour to round up all but two of the horses. One of those was Geraint's own. It and the other missing one were nowhere to be found.
"Leave it," Geraint said wearily to his head groom sometime later when the two of them were at the northern end of the park, uphill from the house, and could see down and across a whole expanse of land. Nothing was moving except for a few servants, halfheartedly searching for the missing animals. "Tell the men to go back to bed. We will find them in the morning, or more likely they will return on their own when they discover they are ready for their morning feed."
The head groom did not argue. He made his way back downhill, leaving Geraint where he was.
The trouble with foolish pranks like this, Geraint thought, was that one dared not show how furious one was. For that was just what the pranksters hoped to provoke. They would like nothing better than to have him storm into the village tomorrow and about the farms, breathing fire and brimstone, demanding confessions. He would play right into their hands by doing that. But the impotent feeling of knowing that there was nothing he could do merely fed his fury.
He watched the grooms return to the stables. He watched one of them come from behind the house and dart quickly, doubled over, across a stretch of lawn and into the trees opposite. The same groom reappeared a few moments later higher up, just below where Geraint was standing. He stopped and looked back, gazing downward, shielded by the trees just below him. Geraint frowned.
As a boy he had learned to move quickly and silently. Often his safety and his very freedom had depended on his being able to do so. It was amazing how some skills never quite left one even if they had not been used a great deal for many years. It did not take Geraint even a minute to descend the slope and to come up behind the still-motionless figure of the lad.
Except that he was not a lad. He was dressed in breeches and a man's jacket, but he was hatless, and his long hair was twisted into a knot at the nape of his neck.
"The show is over," Geraint said softly. "Everyone is on the way back to bed."
The lad spun around and gaped at him in dismay.
"I believe I told you last night that it is dangerous for a woman to be out on the hills alone," he said coldly.
She did not try to run away. Doubtless she realized it would have been pointless. Neither did she speak. She lifted her chin and stared back at him.
"What do you know about all this, Marged?" he asked.
Still she said nothing. He saw scorn in her eyes, and perhaps hatred too.
"You were a part of it?" he asked. "You were one of them?"
He waited for her to reply but she did not answer him.
"'Tell me who your leader is." he said. "Tell me who has organized all this. There is a modicum of humor in it all, I suppose, but I have ceased to be amused. Who is he?"
She still did not speak, but the corners of her mouth turned up into a smile that was not really a smile.
"Why?" he asked.
The half smile faded and now the look of hatred was quite naked.
"Why do you hate me?" he asked her. He could feel his temper rising and fought to keep it under control. "Marged, I was a boy with a boy's cravings and a boy's gaucheness. I thought you were willing and did not stop to ask you or to consider that perhaps it was unwise even if you were. For this must you hate me for the rest of my life?"
Her nostrils flared and her eyes flashed and her hands curled into fists at her sides. At last she spoke.
"You did not even answer my letters," she hissed at him. "When I had groveled before you, you would not even say no."
"Your letters?" He frowned.
"I begged you to show mercy on Eurwyn," she said. "You would not even deign to answer me."
Oh, God!
"What happened to your husband?" He could scarcely get the words past his lips.
"You do not even know, do you?" she said, scorn and fury mingled in her eyes and her voice. "You washed your hands of him and did not even care to find out what happened to him afterward. He died in the hulks. He did not even get as far as Van Diemen's Land to begin serving his seven-year sentence of transportation. He died on the ship. He was a strong man, a healthy man. But he could not survive those inhuman conditions. He died. My Eurwyn died like a vicious, depraved criminal."
She was not crying or hysterical, but he could tell from the clenched fists and the tautness of her posture that she was reliving the agony of her loss.
"Marged—" He reached out a hand toward her.
She leaned back sharply. "Don't touch me!" she said to him. "What did you need with all the salmon? You were not even living here. There were hungry people. The harvest had been bad. Eurwyn cared. We were not hungry. But he cared about
those who were." She laughed suddenly. "He died because of some salmon. Your salmon. And because you would not intervene to save him."
"Marged—" he said.
"You killed my husband," she said. "You did not put a bullet through his heart, but you killed him. And you ask me why I hate you? There is no one in this world I hate as I hate you, Geraint Penderyn. Are you going to have me arrested now? Perhaps I will live to see Van Diemen's Land, as Eurwyn did not."
"I will see you home," he said.
"I will see you in hell first," she said.
"You need not walk at my side," he said. "You need not make conversation with me. You need not see me. But I will see you safely home."
She stared at him for a long while before turning sharply and striding away in the direction of home. He followed behind her, keeping his distance, keeping her in sight so that he might protect her from any danger that presented itself.
He watched her let herself in through the gate when she reached Ty-Gwyn and stayed where he was until she had entered the house without looking back at him.
He still did not know quite what had happened, though it was not difficult to piece together the main events. Eurwyn Evans must have been caught poaching for salmon on Tegfan land. He had been arrested and taken before the nearest magistrate for trial. He had been found guilty and sentenced to seven years transportation. And he had died in the hulks.
Marged had written to him, begging him to intervene on her husband's behalf. He could have done so. He was not a magistrate, but it was on his land Eurwyn had been caught. All he needed to have done was to have written to the appropriate authority explaining that Evans had been fishing with his permission.
But he had never read the letters. His steward at Tegfan had been instructed not to bother him with estate business, and his secretary in London had been instructed to intercept anything that came directly from Tegfan and deal with it himself. He did not know if Marged's letters had been presented at Tegfan or sent to London. He did not know which servant had withheld them from him. But it did not matter. Whoever it was had done so on his instructions.