No speech, no letter, no note.
Not a word.
Cora stumbled back to Chiltern Manor in a daze. Her body barely felt like hers; she had left part of herself, an integral part, back in the old kitchen of Ashcroft House. Twilight was barely darkening into true night, the first stars yet to appear—but she felt as if years had passed since her morning conversation with Lady Chiltern.
Marry me. Be with me. He had said those words; it hadn’t been a dream. He had promised her everything, begged her to accept… but still, still, no apology. Absolutely no acknowledgement of what he’d done.
Was she going mad? Was he? How could she be expected to accept him—and how on earth had she already given so much of herself to him, lost in a moment of passion?
When she finally knocked on the door of Chiltern Manor, exhaustion dogged her bones as fully as her confusion did. She walked silently past an astonished Carstairs as he let her in, barely noticing her surroundings—only stopping as Lady Chiltern’s astonished voice broke through her misery.
‘Miss Seabrooke? Cora? My goodness, girl, look at you! What on earth has happened?’
‘I… His Grace has offered to marry me. Offered his love—he is offering me the world, my lady.’ Cora stared at Lady Chiltern, too full of pain to lie. ‘Everything I want—and I cannot take it. I cannot accept, and I cannot forgive. Not if I hope to live in this world as a being of integrity—of plain good sense!’ Cora looked piteously at Lady Chiltern, quite forgetting herself. ‘I can never see him again—my good sense knows this, but the words are a dagger in my breast!’
‘Well… this is quite an escalation from simply inspecting some French books. Miss Seabrooke, you are making very little sense. As a mother, I feel I should force a little chamomile tea down your throat and command to sleep… but you are older than Daisy and Iris, and so I must speak to you as a woman.’ Lady Chiltern took Cora’s hands in hers. ‘I highly recommend, Cora, that you cry.’
‘That—I beg your pardon?’ Cora stared at Lady Chiltern, already feeling the first treacherous tears begin to rise. ‘I should not. I cannot.’
‘Nonsense.’ Lady Chiltern gently tucked Cora’s hand into the crook of her arm. ‘Come into the morning room, dear, and sob.’
It felt good to break. A strange thing to feel, but true; it felt both wonderful and terrible to cry in Lady Chiltern’s lap. Cry about everything she had refused to cry about before; her mother, her father, her family ruin. Abandon herself completely to grief, and shame, telling Lady Chiltern everything, if only for a minute of freedom.
‘Goodness me, Miss Seabrooke. The infamous Duke of Innsee.’ Cora heard the sympathy in Lady Chiltern’s voice as the woman stroked her hair. ‘I had simply no idea. I assumed your coldness towards his Grace came from a long-ago, childish argument—not something so personal, and so clearly painful. And as rakish as he was in his younger days, I cannot believe James Ashcroft to be false.’ The concern in Lady Chiltern’s eyes touched Cora’s heart. ‘Come now. What did he do?’
‘It… it was clear there was an understanding between us. An attachment. Nothing had been said clearly, no promises had been made, but—but I knew. And he knew too, my lady. We had—we had already begun to look at one another, to think of another, differently. He knew, and then—and then he announced to half the ton in the middle of Don Giovanni that every woman in the world was a sheep, a sheep, compared to Sabine LaCourt.’ Cora bent her head, fresh tears falling. ‘That he would die if he did not marry her. And after that, did he ever speak to me again? Did he say or write a single word of apology, of promise? Nothing!’
‘... The night of Don Giovanni.’ Lady Chiltern slowly repeated the words, staring at Cora. ‘… Are you sure, absolutely sure, that it was that night?’
‘Of course, my lady. I will remember it until I die.’ Cora paused, wondering why Lady Chiltern looked so very dumbstruck. ‘Is… is something wrong?’
‘My dear girl, I—I fear I am at a complete loss as to what to say.’ Lady Chiltern’s face showed more than worry; a grave apprehension, almost fear, shone in her eyes. ‘I… goodness, I must have—well it must be wrong, what I heard. Salacious gossip, you know—the kind that never reaches the ballroom, for fear of being sued for slander. Mrs Benson must have been confused. Or perhaps it is simply too long ago, and I am remembering incorrectly…’
‘What do you mean?’ Cora clung to Lady Chiltern’s sleeves, overcome. ‘What—what did you hear?’
‘Please, child. Do not take my word as the absolute truth.’ Lady Chiltern gently removed Cora’s clenched fists from her sleeves, holding her hands. ‘Because if I am correct, then—then something terrible has happened. Someone has done you a very grave disservice.’
‘Lady Chiltern, please.’ Another tear fell down Cora’s cheek; she furiously blinked it away. ‘Please, tell me what you heard.’
‘According to Miss Benson, who was most particular friends with Lady Ashcroft before he died… it wasn’t James Ashcroft, dear. He didn’t propose marriage to Sabine LaCourt, that night in the box.’ Lady Chiltern spoke slowly, as if living the memory. ‘It was his brother, Edward. Under such strain, you know, with his father dead and his mother sick… and so James, disreputable as he was at the time, pretended that he had proposed. To save the family from ruin. He was the black sheep, after all… it made sense to heap all sins onto a single brother. A certain kind of sense.’
Cora lay motionless on Lady Chiltern’s lap. Perhaps a minute passed, perhaps a hour; time was suddenly irrelevant.
It wasn’t him. It had never been him. It was so enormous a concept that she almost didn’t dare to think it. Ashcroft had never loudly declared his love for another woman in front of the Season’s best… he had never insulted the connection they had shared.
‘But he never told me.’ She finally murmured it. ‘Why would he have never told me? I would have believed him… I would have believed anything he said. Anything—a word, a note…’
‘Perhaps he could not. Perhaps his family compelled him to tell no-one. Perhaps a letter was misplaced, or misdirected—but we are entering into the realms of unfounded gossip, and we cannot.’ Lady Chiltern gently coaxed Cora upright. ‘The fact remains, Miss Seabrooke, that you did not ask him. Why did you not demand an explanation?’
‘My… my pride would not let me. I believed he had abandoned me without a word, and had no desire to have my belief confirmed.’ Cora looked down at her hands, realising she was twisting her gown into knots.
‘Cora Seabrooke, you have all the good sense of a sheep. I am incensed.’ Lady Chiltern’s tone was loving, even if her words were hard. ‘You have never had a clear, frank conversation with the man who owns your affections? You never demanded an explanation from his own lips as to his conduct, given that fate has thrown you both together again? My dear, one can always speak. Always. And one must demand to hear difficult things, precisely because they are difficult.’
‘I must go to him.’ Cora stood up, trying to wrench her hands from Lady Chiltern’s gentle but firm grip. ‘Now. I will take the mare.’
‘My dear, it is long past the correct hour for reconciliation. On this point, I am most severe.’ Lady Chiltern stroked Cora’s cheek, the hint of a mother’s touch in the careful gesture. ‘All demands, all requests, all understanding, shall take place in the morning. For now, you need to sleep.’
‘I do not need to sleep. I need to see him.’ Cora said it, even as she felt exhaustion rising in her chest. ‘I must.’
‘My dear, I was correct in ordering you to cry.’ Lady Chiltern’s eyes brooked no argument. ‘I am equally correct in ordering you to sleep.’
Ashcroft, sitting blearily in his study at Ashcroft House, could no more sleep than he could grow an extra head. He sat silently as the night began to turn to grey, waiting for the tell-tale sound of carriage wheels on the drive, digging his fingers into his palm to keep alert.
When the sound of Edward’s footsteps finally sounded in the hall, Ashc
roft clenched his hands into fists so tight his knuckles paled. All he needed to do was wait another moment; another long, dark moment of doubt…
‘Brother?’ Edward pushed open the study door, a look of confusion on his face. ‘Already up?’
‘You never gave Cora Seabrooke the letter I wrote.’
There was a moment of utter silence. Ashcroft let it grow; let it dwarf the both of them, spreading through the room. Edward seemed to have been struck dumb; all he did, still as stone, was look back at Ashcroft.
‘You never gave her the letter. You—you let the woman I love think that I cared nothing for her, for five years. You let me think that Cora was cruel and unforgiving, for five years.’ Ashcroft struggled to speak, his anger tight in his throat. ‘For God’s sake, Edward. Why? Why would you do such a thing?’
For another long moment, his brother stood silently by the door. Ashcroft waited with gritted teeth, his heart pounding in his chest, for Edward to speak.
Finally, his brother spoke. ‘I know you won’t believe me, brother, but—but I didn’t mean to.’ Edward spoke slowly, as if he were searching for each word. ‘To keep it going for this long. I can assure you, I had every intention of sending it.’
‘But you didn’t.’ Ashcroft reeled; it had been Edward. It wasn’t his own mind seeding doubt, making him rash. ‘So I repeat. Why?’
‘I… do you really want to know why I didn’t send it?’ Edward looked up at Ashcroft, a small, chilling smile appearing briefly on his face. ‘Are you sure?’
’Just say it, Edward.’ Ashcroft stared at his brother, trying not to blink. ‘Break the habit of a lifetime, and speak plainly.’
Edward came to the desk, sitting opposite Ashcroft. Looking down at his nails, his face far too composed, he eventually began to speak again.
‘My first motivation was panic. I had no idea if Miss Seabrooke was the talkative type—if she would talk to her friends in the heat of the moment, and bring ruin down upon our heads. I was embarrassed, and half-mad with grief from father, and all too aware of the fact that I brought the family to within a whisker of social death. Over an opera singer, of all things.’ Edward’s lip briefly curled. ‘So that rather explains the first week of silence. The years that followed… well. I came to the conclusion that you rather deserved it.’
‘... What?’ Ashcroft looked at Edward, aghast. ‘Deserved what? Unhappiness?’
‘Yes. Vast unhappiness. Because I never got to be vastly unhappy, did I, James?’ The cold smile on Edward’s face was back. ‘Apart from that night, when I hid in the opera box like a fugitive swigging champagne until I lost my head. You got to be unhappy after father’s death, and during mother’s illness. You got to be as miserable as you wanted—and oh, how extravagantly miserable you were! Sorrowful enough to shame both your title and father’s memory, while I was left to be dutiful. Noble. Your servant, picking up the pieces of the Ashcroft reputation.’
He stopped, taking a deep breath. Ashcroft waited, wordless, pain alive in every nerve.
‘Someone had to keep the estate afloat, James. Someone had to get up early every day, and do all of the work that you either didn’t want to do or were incapable of doing.’ Edward spat the words, his face twisted with an anger Ashcroft couldn’t ever remember seeing. ‘Someone had to take care of the duke’s responsibilities, even if he never got a taste the duke’s perks. Just work, and work, and more bloody work, and the papers full of the antics of his brother every bloody day.’ He slammed his hand down on the desk, sending papers flying. ‘I could never make a single mistake, James. Never put a foot wrong. You denied me that, as you denied me every other pleasure—every moment of ecstasy, or of grief. So when I saw an opportunity to make you suffer, brother, I took it. I took it with both hands. And no, I wouldn’t do it again—but I know why I did it. I know myself, down the bone, and I know I thought you deserved it.’ He folded his arms, his face dark with what looked like exultant anger. ‘There. You have it.’
For a long stretch of time, all Ashcroft could do was sit. Sit and stare mutely at his brother, trying to stem the avalanche of rage that threatened to engulf him entirely. Then, with a strength that came from some savage place he’d barely accessed before, his hands shot out to grip his Edward’s shirt.
‘Get out. Now.’ He held his brother tight, even as he struggled. ‘Far away from here.’
‘James.’ His brother spluttered, his face flushed as he moved in vain. ‘As your brother, I must—’
‘And as the Duke of Innsee, I decree that if you darken this door again, it will be pistols at dawn.’ Ashcroft gripped Edward’s neck tighter, letting him know that his threat was more than serious. ‘Take your money, and your deeds, and your intrigues, and go far away from me, brother. As far as you can.’
‘James. I am sorry.’ Edward looked truly desperate; the knowledge of what he’d done seemingly dawning on him in the grip of his brother’s fist. ‘I was young, and stupid, and crazed with grief—’
‘—and if you stay, the few people who still care for you will grieve you when I bury you.’ Ashcroft pushed Edward away, hoping against hope his brother had the good sense to move backward. ‘Go. Now.’
For a moment Edward simply looked at him, shocked. Then, with a twist to his mouth that looked remarkably like a bitter smile, he left.
Ashcroft watched him go, breathing hard. He slowly settled back into his chair, not knowing what to do—not knowing if his body would even work, however hard he compelled it to.
Cora. The only person who could make sense of this—the betrayal, the confusion, the sorrow—was Cora.
He couldn’t go to her now. She would never let him inside, not to mention Lady Chiltern. All he could do, his heart breaking and renewing with each beat, was wait for dawn.
At dawn, his life could begin again.
Cora had never waited for morning so expectantly. When the sun finally filled her bedroom with morning light, rosy as a blush, she dressed as hurriedly as she could before running to the front door—only to find Carstairs waiting there, holding a tray.
‘Miss Seabrooke. Lady Chiltern had an inkling that you would wake early—she asked me to prepare you a little coffee, should you want it. The cup is here.’ He gestured to the tray. ‘She also advises you to take Marigold, but knows that you will refuse.’
Cora nodded, drinking gratefully from the cup. The coffee was at perfect drinking temperature—another butler trick, and one she welcomed wholeheartedly. ‘Lady Chiltern is a marvel.’
‘Yes.’ Carstairs looked down at the tray, his expression stiffening a little. ‘She is. And—and if you’ll permit me to say so, Miss Seabrooke, James Ashcroft has changed greatly. He is no longer the blackguard I remember. Time has changed him, and perhaps sorrow.’
‘I will permit you to say such a thing, if you’ll permit me to say something in return.’ Cora gently placed the cup back onto the tray, looking hard at Carstairs. ‘Sentiment is often kept secret. We believe it cannot be mirrored, or should not be given back in kind… but we can never know, if it is not expressed.’
Carstairs briefly nodded, his expression kept very carefully blank. ‘A prettily-phrased piece of very general advice, Miss Seabrooke.’
‘Yes.’ Cora knew that it was best not to press such a sensitive subject. A man, after all, had his pride. ‘If only any of us followed advice.’
The road that led to the Ashcroft estate glimmered gently in the morning light, each fallen leaf and blade of grass glistening with dew. Cora walked as quickly as she could, chiding herself for not taking Lady Chiltern’s mare, deciding with each hasty footstep that she had made terrible mistakes with her dress, shoes, bonnet and hair. Time seemed to fly alongside her, urging her pace onward, whispering in her ear that so many years had already been wasted…
The imposing façade of Ashcroft House filled her vision sooner than expected. Cora faltered on the path; should she have come here so early, so impetuously? Perhaps Lady Chiltern had been incorrect—maybe
this was all pure foolishness, based on little more than old gossip. But then, it had been gossip which had sent her down the cold, lonely path of silence—
Him. Him.
He was standing by the door of the house. He was striding down the path towards her, dark hair shining like a crow’s wing in the sunlight, his eyes full of every hope that Cora felt clamouring in her own breast.
‘James.’ Even though she only whispered his name, Cora was sure Ashcroft had heard it. She broke into a run, her heart impossibly full—and gasped as finally, in a breathless clash of bodies, Ashcroft pulled her into his arms.
‘It wasn’t you.’ She murmured it against his neck, not caring that they were in public. Let any passing person see them; let the whole of the Ashcroft estate gossip. ‘Lady Chiltern—she told me that it wasn’t you.’
‘I wrote you a letter. God help me, I promise I did.’ Ashcroft’s voice was thick and ragged; his arms held her so tightly she could barely breathe. ‘My bastard brother never sent it. Believe me, Cora—my God, you have to believe me.’
‘No. I believe you. Of course I believe you.’ Cora blinked as a tear fell, her breath catching as the rough pad of Ashcroft’s thumb gently wiped away the drop. ‘You… you have always believed in me. Unquestioningly. Do you really think I could ever deny you the same grace?’
‘My brother denied you everything.’ Ashcroft’s face darkened, his eyes blazing. ‘He denied me my apology, and he denied you the truth. If he ever sees me face-to-face again, I—’
‘Do not say something rash. The years are long, and hardened hearts keep no-one warm in winter.’ Cora swallowed, realising she couldn’t keep more tears from falling. ‘After the horrors I have endured thanks to my own anger, my own pride, I cannot imagine encouraging someone to pursue such a difficult course.’ She leaned closer, resting her head against Ashcroft’s. ‘Keep your heart open, James. Just… just love me, as I love you. As I always have.’
‘But Cora, I wrote my heart. My bleeding heart, laid out in lines for you—every ounce of pain, every sorrow, every regret. How desperately I wanted you, and how desperate I was to escape my fate—how enraged I was at my own poor conduct, which made the pretence the only thing I could do to protect the family. Believe me, Cora, it was all there and more.’ Ashcroft held her tighter, cupping her face, a cracking to his voice that Cora had never previously heard. ‘But if you need to hear the words, the exact words, I know damned well I can recite at least the first three pages by heart.’
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