The Reckless Love of an Heir

by Jane Lark

  “I do not mind. I am happy to be descended upon by my family. It is not so good, though, when what has brought us together is such a sad event. We all miss William.”

  William’s name on Rob’s lips whispered through Henry’s soul. He longed to thank Rob for speaking it. Rob smiled at him.

  Henry looked at Drew as he began speaking. “We came straight here when we heard.” He smiled with a look of sympathy.

  Henry looked away searching his thoughts for another question to ask someone so he did not have to face more consolation.

  Harry provided the distraction. “Can you believe a brother and sister of mine have developed such boring streaks, Henry? They both rarely come to town and so it is so easy for them to change plans in the drop of hat.”

  Drew laughed with a bark of humour before answering, “Your sister is not boring, just carrying another child. And some of us prefer a sedate life Uncle Baba…”

  Uncle Baba was the name Drew had bestowed on the black sheep among Henry’s cousins and he loved teasing Harry with it.

  “Baaaa.” Harry made the sound in a way that said the name was as good as a sash of honour. “You were a black sheep once and now you might act as white as snow but I have heard of your past. You lived far more wildly than I may ever achieve.”

  “Those times are precisely that, in the past. Now I am as white as snow,” Drew answered with a smirk

  “And as boring and dull as Rob,” Harry retorted.

  The teasing and debating continued as Rob took exception to the charges against him.

  Henry looked at his uncle. He drank the last of the tea then set his cup down on its saucer. “May we talk, Uncle?” he said over the others’ conversation.

  Edward smiled and set his cup down too, even though it was half full. He stood up. “Let us go outside.”

  Henry had always liked his uncle. Henry’s father was full of mocking humour and sharp wit—much like Harry, or himself. Edward was more serious and measured.

  When they left the table he lifted a hand, directing Henry towards the door into the hall.

  As they reached the hall he told the footman who had followed that they did not need him, then looked at Henry. “If we go out the front door the others will assume we have gone to look at horses or something else more business-like. Shall we do that?”

  This was how his uncle was, always insightful.

  Once they were outside, he did not turn towards the stables, though, but away from them, crossing the gravel frontage. Henry walked beside him.

  When they entered the yew lined avenue that led around to the garden at the rear of the house, Uncle Edward’s arm wrapped about Henry’s shoulders. The comfort gripped at Henry’s heart. It was what he had needed his father to do—but then perhaps his father needed to be held too… Yet, he would never accept the gesture from Henry. Would he?

  Henry sighed.

  Uncle Edward’s arm slipped away. “Tell me how I may help?”

  “It is Papa.” Emotion swelled in Henry’s throat blocking it and it pressed at the back of his eyes too. He swallowed as he tried to speak. “I would be grateful if you spoke with him…” His voice had dried, strangled by the grief he battled with.

  “Why?”

  “He has become withdrawn. He barely speaks, and Stephen and Gerard are not coping, and Mama…” Henry had to swallow. “She cries all the time.”

  “And you?” his uncle asked.

  I need help. I wish to grieve and I cannot because I need to help them and I’m not succeeding. Desperation gripped Henry and shook him.

  “I will speak to him.” His uncle answered without waiting for Henry’s answer. “Robert has always run from grief.” He stopped walking and turned to look at Henry, then clasped his upper arm. “He will recover, Henry, time will pass and then things will go back to a normal life of some description. Never the same, but normal. The loss of someone never heals over completely, yet the rift in life knits back together with time.”

  Henry did not worry for his father suddenly, but for himself.

  Would he recover from William’s loss? He could not imagine the slashes of guilt and grief healing. Damn it was a selfish thought, and he had sworn to himself he would not be selfish again.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  The ebony coffin was far too narrow and light to contain William, no human could be within it. Henry, his father, his uncle Edward and Percy carried it among them, on one shoulder, walking in even, steady strides as they entered York Minster. But Henry had placed William within it, he knew William was inside, alone. But not alone, because they were here with him today—to say a final goodbye.

  The giant decoratively carved stone walls swallowed him, suffocating him, as he walked into the Minster. Like Jonah sucked into the belly of a fish. Yet, its height, breadth and grandness, and the beauty of the carvings on the towering columns and the ceiling above them made William’s life, that had ended in this narrow coffin, appear insignificant.

  It made them all insignificant. Henry wanted William’s life to have had some significance, some outstanding moment that would be forever remembered.

  William’s laughter ran through Henry’s head.

  He cursed himself again for not giving his brother more time. Perhaps he might remember something of significance if he had.

  It was too late now.

  He’d contemplated his own legacy months ago, when he’d fallen from his curricle, or rather the lack of it. William had had no time to create a legacy. Henry had never previously cared enough about anything to leave one. He cared now.

  There was no music to distract them as they walked along the broad aisle, only the sound of the people in the full pews either side of them. It was not only the higher and middle class who’d come, those faces he recognised from the assembly he’d attended, but there were those here who were in service with his father and others from the city who supplied his father’s estate.

  Henry’s footsteps rang out on the ancient painted tiles as he continued to process. The people in the pews whispered. A man coughed. People ahead of them looked back, straining to see the coffin and its bearers.

  Henry did not look at anyone particular but ahead at the altar, and to the wooden trestles where they were to rest his brother’s coffin.

  The weight of the snake of grief was tightening about Henry’s neck, strangling him, and yet he had to keep going, because his father had crumbled; this morning he’d barely said three words.

  Henry swallowed.

  A heavy scent of incense hung in the air when they reached the trestles. Once they’d set William down, Henry bowed to the altar before turning to find his seat in the front pew.

  Edward nodded at him.

  Henry smiled at him and then Percy as he let Percy enter the pew before him. He took the seat beside his brother and let his uncle sit next to his father.

  Gerard and Stephen sat on the far side of Percy, they had come into the church with Harry. In the pew behind them were Drew, Rob and John, and behind them were the men who were his father’s friends including Uncle Casper and Lord Wiltshire and some of their sons, his own friends with them. The inns and hotels in York had been populated by the privileged for the last couple of days.

  Henry leant forward to look at his younger brothers. Gerard was biting his top lip and his eyes glowed with the sheen of tears in the flickering light of a candle which burned on a pedestal near the pulpit.

  The muscle in Stephen’s jaw flickered as he stared at the coffin, as though he, too, could not believe it contained William.

  Henry looked up as the Archbishop began the service.

  He knelt with his family when it was time to pray, and his voice rose as he participated in the hymns the fist thumping against his ribs with the pulse of his heartbeat.

  At the end of the service Henry allowed himself a selfish prayer; for strength to continue to support his family. He could feel himself weakening, his strength and sanity were slipping through his fingers lik
e rope, and leaving burns. He was not succeeding.

  They stood then, with his father and uncle and Percy, to pick up William once more and carry him back outside, to be driven home, for the last time. He was to be entombed in the Marlows’, the Earls’ of Barringtons’, mausoleum.

  With the ebony coffin balanced on his shoulder again, Henry walked back along the aisle. Behind him he heard the men who had come to show their respect for his brother leave their seats and follow. The sound of their footsteps as pallbearers were no longer solitary.

  When they walked out of the Minster, the hearse which had brought William to York, stood awaiting him.

  They were helped to slide the coffin back on to the glass sided carriage by the funeral’s director.

  Henry’s body had never felt so heavy as he turned away from the coffin, from his brother, to follow his father back to their carriage. It was the Earls’ of Barrington’s state carriage so it was highly polished and gilded, and their brightly painted coat of arms was on either side.

  There was one less son in the Barringtons’ dynasty now… One less in the Marlow family.

  The knowledge screamed at Henry as he gripped the hand rail on the carriage’s side and climbed the step then dropped into the seat next to his father, to face his brothers.

  His uncle took the seat beside him.

  None of them spoke, even when the carriage pulled away.

  Henry did not look out through the window. He could not face the stares of the interested ordinary folk of York. They saw this as nothing more than a moment of ceremony. It was the loss of his youngest brother, William. His brother who was undeserving of that fate.

  Henry would say William’s name every day, at least once, for the rest of his life to ensure William had a legacy.

  The hearse travelled ahead of them leading them back to his father’s property in a slow procession. After an hour of travelling it turned through the gates into Farnborough. The giant lion statues that guarded Henry’s home greeted them.

  William must have seen the statues as a welcome home just as Henry had. But the carriage did not take them home to the house, the hearse turned left on to the grass and led them away from the house—towards the mausoleum.

  Nausea twisted through Henry’s stomach and rose to his throat, to think of his brother lying in the dark amongst the entombed bodies of their ancestors, on cold stone. But he would be with their grandfather and grandmother, whom they’d never met. Henry must remember that; William was not alone.

  He breathed out, disguising the shiver that gripped his body.

  When the carriage stopped, the weight of responsibility, of being the one who stayed in control made him rise and open the carriage door, before the footman had reached it.

  Henry jumped out and then knocked down the step with the heel of his shoe. He held the door for Percy, his father and uncle, then Gerard and Stephen.

  Edward smiled at him slightly. Henry turned away, pain tightening about his throat; the lump of emotion there pressed with a need to explode. He longed to shout, or growl, or hit or throw something.

  Oh, to be young enough to be allowed a rage. He longed to rant at God, and life and fate. William should not have been taken.

  The funeral director organised his men to lift William’s coffin from the hearse. When they walked forward Henry’s father followed. Henry followed him walking between Stephen and Gerard.

  He lay his arms on their shoulders. Gerard leaned into him a little. Stephen glanced at him and acknowledged the gesture, but his stiffness said he would rather be left alone to deal with his emotion. Henry’s arm fell away from Stephen, but his other remained around Gerard.

  The doors to the mausoleum’s crypt stood open. His father stopped walking as the coffin was carried in. Henry stopped too. He took a breath then said quietly. “Goodbye, William.”

  “Goodbye,” Stephen repeated.

  “Goodbye,” Gerard and Percy said together.

  “My son…” Henry heard on his father’s breath.

  Percy coughed, as though his throat was blocked. Henry glanced at him. He stood beside Edward. Edward braced Percy’s shoulder as Percy’s eyes glittered in the sunlight, but he did not allow the tears to fall.

  Gerard sobbed.

  Stephen sniffed and then wiped his nose on his sleeve.

  Henry’s heart banged hard in his chest, as though it wished to be let out. He looked at his father. He wanted to go to him, to hold him, to give and receive comfort, but his father was staring at the open doors the coffin had been carried through and he did not look as though he would welcome Henry approaching him.

  When the funeral director’s pallbearers came back out, it was without William. They turned and closed the giant doors.

  He’d gone. They’d never see his face again, only in the portraits at the house.

  Stephen looked at Gerard, and then reached past Henry to grip a handful of Gerard’s coat sleeve. “Come on.” Gerard consented and turned with Stephen.

  Henry breathed out then turned away too, and walked back towards the carriage behind his young brothers. Percy sighed. Henry looked back. Percy walked a few paces behind him. Henry waited for him to catch up.

  Beyond Percy his uncle and father still stood looking at the mausoleum.

  His uncle said something to his father then turned and walked away. When he met Henry’s gaze he made a grim expression.

  His father did not move.

  Henry turned to head back.

  “Leave him!” Uncle Edward called.

  Henry looked at his father, he wanted to be able to do something.

  “He needs time alone,” his uncle said when he reached Henry. “Come along,” he caught hold of Henry’s arm and drew him back towards the carriage.

  Henry glanced over his shoulder before he climbed into the carriage. His father had not moved.

  When Henry sat down, he leant against the squabs and looked up at the roof of the carriage while his uncle spoke to the coach man outside. “Wait a moment please.”

  A sense of helplessness hovered around Henry. He wanted answers, actions… But there was nothing to be said and nothing to be done to heal this.

  Henry looked out of the window. His father stood staring at the closed doors of the mausoleum, saying who knew what to William.

  Henry remembered the women who awaited them at the house, along with his friends and the rest of the men who had been in the first few pews behind him in the Minster. He would not be able to speak with his friends, he needed to welcome everyone if his father was still so silent. But it did not matter, the life and conversations he’d shared in that friendship group now seemed like they’d occurred years ago. He was no longer the man they knew.

  Edward breathed out heavily.

  Henry’s gaze passed to him.

  “If you would rather…” he looked from Henry to Percy, to Stephen and Gerard, “avoid the wake, then show your faces for a short time only, I am happy to ensure people are cared for sufficiently. You have done well and endured enough today.”

  Gerard and Stephen said nothing, but they would be happy they’d been given permission to abscond. Percy nodded.

  “Thank you,” Henry breathed out heavily too, as relief washed through him. He’d hoped his uncle would take some of the burden, and he had.

  The carriage door opened. They all looked. His father climbed in.

  They did not speak again then.

  ~

  Susan rose. She had heard the carriages arriving in Farnborough’s central courtyard a few minutes before, and fresh tea had then been sent for, but the women had remained seated. Now the door opened and a footman stepped in to hold it wide, then the men walked into the room.

  Some of the other women stood.

  The room had the sense of a macabre painting. The mirror above the hearth had been covered in black as the family were in deepest mourning, and all the women of Henry’s family wore black, while Susan wore her dove grey and Alethea and her mother were i
n dull mauves and Aunt Jane’s friends were in similar drab colours.

  Aunt Jane walked across the room with purposeful strides to greet her guests. Susan’s father came in. When Aunt Jane greeted him he pressed a kiss on Aunt Jane’s cheek, then moved on as others walked in.

  Henry and Uncle Robert were not among the men behind him. Susan looked through the doorway but no one remained in the hall.

  Her hands clasped together as she stood near the hearth. She’d never taken part in mourning and so she had no idea what was the right thing to do or say. Since she’d arrived she’d been terrified of saying the wrong thing to Aunt Jane, or any of the women in Henry’s family.

  If she could have chosen to, without causing offence, she would have remained at home and pretended this had not happened. But that was a selfish, unkind and insensitive thought that was unlike her.

  Her teeth nipped nervously at the inside of her lower lip.

  She sat down once more, her hands trembling. She clasped them together in her lap. Her mother was in conversation with one of Aunt Jane’s guests, trying to ease some of the pressure on Aunt Jane.

  It was Aunt Jane’s duty to play hostess and yet she must feel as though she were walking in her sleep. She had lost her son. Susan’s only sense of comparison was the thought of losing Alethea, or her mother, or father and that would be unbearable. Losing a child must be a far worse loss.

  Alethea sat across the room speaking with Sarah, Christine and Uncle Edward’s and Aunt Ellen’s daughters. There had been no seat near them for Susan to sit amidst them.

  Quiet conversation developed around her. The fresh tea arrived. Susan sat silent and watching, awkwardness hovering over her like a hunting kestrel.

  The sound of another carriage on the cobble outside filtered through the windows.

  Susan wished to stand again, but no one else turned to the door or moved.

  Yet when the door opened her emotion drew her to her feet regardless. Henry walked in first. Longing lanced at her, a desire to hold him, to offer comfort, her heart beat only for him. Her feet moved of their own accord. But she stopped herself after two steps as his father, uncle and brothers followed him in, their expressions sullen.