Have I found love instead? A love that makes the other one pale in comparison?" "I cannot answer that," he said, feathering his lips across hers and discovering that her face was wet with tears. "/Have/ you?" "I tell myself," she said, "that I love you because I admire the courage with which you have lived your life. And I tell myself I love you because you love a poor helpless child totally and unconditionally. And I /do/ love you for those things. But Duncan, I love you most because you live /here/." She patted one hand over her heart. "Because I know I was meant all my life to meet you and discover the joy for which I was created." "Ah," he said. "Just /ah/?" She attempted a soft laugh and hiccupped instead.
He kissed her, and when she pressed her lips back against his, he wrapped her in his arms and deepened the kiss as he turned her to lay her down on the grass beside the tree.
They made love at half past midnight on ground that was none too soft surrounded by air that was none too warm – and when they were both almost light-headed with exhaustion.
Life was not perfect.
Except when it was. "Duncan," she said when they were finished and she lay cradled in his arms while moonlight danced in patterns of light and shade over them as the branches of the tree swayed in the breeze. "I must tell you something, though I did not mean to do so until I could be more sure. It is not a day for secrets, though, is it? Or am I talking about yesterday? Today is not for secrets either. There is a chance – the merest chance – that I am with child." He pressed his face to her hair and inhaled slowly. Already? He had been a father for four and a half years, but was he now to be – a /father/? "I am only a few days late," she said softly. "Perhaps it is nothing." "I promised my grandfather when I was twenty," he said, "that I would be married by the time I was thirty and would have a child in the nursery by the time I was thirty-one. A son and heir. Is it to happen after all?
Or could this be a daughter? Oh, good Lord, Maggie, a daughter! Could life offer a greater miracle?" "I cannot even be sure yet," she said, "that there will be a child at all, Duncan. But perhaps there will. A son or a daughter. Oh, perhaps it is true. I am never late." He drew her more snugly into his arms. He breathed in the warm woman's scent of her and closed his eyes. "No matter," he said. "We will have an excuse to try even harder if this is a false hope. I love you and you love me and we are married and living at Woodbine, and we have our families and Toby. All that is quite happiness enough for now, Maggie. We will hope there is a child but not be too disappointed if there is not. Agreed?" "Life is not perfect," she said, and laughed softly. "It feels pretty close at the moment," he said. "Except," she said, "that I have a tree root or something digging into my hip and my feet are like blocks of ice." They walked homeward with their arms about each other's waists. "Are you as tired as I am?" he asked. "At least twice as tired," she said. "Shall we persuade your grandfather to stay with us for a good long while? Perhaps even to make his home with us if he wishes? And shall we invite some of our neighbors to dine before Nessie and Elliott leave? Shall we – " He bent his head to kiss her as they stepped onto the terrace before the house. "We certainly shall, my love," he said. "But tomorrow. Or later today.
Much later. Shall we go to bed now? And sleep?" "Sleep?" she said. "Oh, that does sound wonderful, Duncan. I could sleep for a week – but only if your arms are about me." "Where else would they be?" he asked her, his one arm closing more tightly about her waist as he led her up the steps to the house. "Nowhere, I suppose," she said. "Precisely." She yawned and tipped her head sideways to rest on his shoulder.
Being in love, he thought, was the most wonderful thing.
The best thing in the world, in fact.