“But, Bill—”
“Lori, I’m whacked. I’m sunburnt and mosquito-bitten and I put a fishhook through my thumb and I have to get some sleep or I’ll be good for nothing tomorrow.”
I paused. “All the way through your thumb?” I asked, aghast.
“Just through the fleshy pad, but it hurt like hell, and the shot the doctor gave me put me out like a light.” Bill interrupted himself with another yawn before continuing, “Please let me sink into oblivion again. I’ve had an incredibly trying day.”
“But—but, Bill ...” I stared blindly at the spotless tile floor, then raised my eyes to the morning light pouring through the bathroom window. Bill hadn’t bothered to ask about the kind of day I’d had, or why I was calling him at such an ungodly hour, or what my phone number was so he could call me back. His father might have had another heart attack, I might have crashed the Mini, Nell might have plunged headlong from Saint Bartholomew’s bell tower—but all Bill could think about was his sunburn, his mosquito bites, and his thumb.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “I understand.”
“Thanks, love,” Bill murmured. “G‘night.”
I hung up the phone, feeling as though I’d been cut adrift. Was I being unreasonable? Was it asking too much to expect my husband to recognize panic in my voice when he heard it?
I raised a hand to touch the gold band that still hung from the chain around my neck. It wasn’t the first time Bill had tuned me out, or the first time I’d struggled, in vain, to win his attention. That struggle had begun the moment our honeymoon had ended. I thought back to my conversation with Emma the previous morning and, with a sickening sense of clarity, began to listen to that small voice in the back of my head.
Bill didn’t want to start a family. A child, after all, would only compound the mistake he’d made by marrying me. That was why he kept me at arm’s length, why he buried himself at the office and evaded all discussion of our future. I’d thought success with the Biddifords would restore my husband to me, but I’d been grotesquely naive. The Biddifords were simply another in a long line of excuses Bill had found to stay as far away from me as he could get. My Handsome Prince had known all along how this fairy tale would end. He’d just been waiting for me to figure it out.
I sat huddled on the tub, clutching the phone, feeling sick and dizzy, as though the foundations of my life had been snatched out from under me. What would I do? Where would I go? How could I bear to start over again? Trembling, I placed the telephone on the floor and tottered to the sink to splash cold water on my face. I couldn’t allow myself to cry, because once I started I didn’t think I’d ever stop, so I leaned there, taking deep breaths, until the dizziness had passed. Then I looked at my reflection in the mirror.
“Willis, Sr., still cares about you,” I whispered. Of that I was certain. But I could no longer say the same about my husband.
Nell was awake and packing when I emerged from the bathroom, and she looked me over carefully before asking, “What happened last night?”
“I’ll tell you about it on the train,” I replied shortly.
“The train?”
“The train.”
I wasn’t up to engaging in a blushing match with Miss Coombs—my illicit tête-à-tête with Gerald was still burning holes in my conscience—so we slipped out of the Georgian via the garden, unencumbered by any luggage but the briefcase. I’d settle the bill by credit card, I told myself, and ask Miss Kingsley to arrange for our suitcases to be sent on.
I’d ask her to have someone pick up the car, too. Conscious of my promise to Derek to avoid driving in London, we left the Mini in the car park at the Haslemere station and caught the nine twenty-five for Waterloo. The carriages were packed with commuters, but Nell had spoken with Mr. Digby’s daughter in the ticket office and secured us a private compartment as well as two Styrofoam cups of milky, sugary tea.
Nell had discarded her Nicolette blacks in favor of a sleeveless sky-blue dress, a white linen jacket, white pumps, and a soft-sided white leather shoulder bag. She’d dressed Bertie in a blue-and-white sailor suit and selected a similarly summery outfit for me, but I’d opted for the hideous tweeds again. They were the closest thing to mourning she had packed.
In her pretty blue dress, with Bertie cradled in one arm and Reginald’s pink flannel ears poking out of her shoulder bag, Nell presented a picture of golden-haired innocence as we made our way to our private compartment, but as soon as I closed the door, she scowled like a Tatar.
“Eat,” she commanded, reaching into her shoulder bag to produce the round tin Gerald had given me.
I eyed the tin’s contents and felt my gorge rise.
“You had no dinner last night, no breakfast this morning, you haven’t spoken a word since we left the Georgian, and you’re as pale as rice pudding,” Nell lectured sternly. She took Reginald from her bag and placed him beside Bertie on the compartment’s small table, so they could both look out of the window. “If you don’t eat something this minute, Lori, I’ll telephone Papa when we reach London and tell him you’re not fit to continue the journey. Reginald insists. He’s very worried about you.”
I couldn’t see Reginald’s face, but I could tell by the upright angle of his ears that he was indeed perturbed by my behavior. Grudgingly, I pulled a tiny piece from one of the brownies, popped it in my mouth, and washed it down with tea. Nell folded her arms and waited until I’d finished the entire brownie, and two more besides, then ordered me to drink her tea as well as mine. When I’d downed it, she unfolded her arms, reached for Bertie, and promptly changed from a tough-talking blackmailer into a timid, twelve-year-old child.
“Feel better?” she asked.
With a sense of shock I realized that I’d thrown Nell for a loop. It had never occurred to me that a tsunami-sized mood swing or two might unnerve someone as serenely self-possessed as Lady Eleanor Harris. Her cornflower eyes were twice their normal size, and she clung so tightly to Bertie that his stuffing bulged beneath his sailor shirt. Shamefaced, I reached across the table to pat her hand.
“I didn’t sleep well last night,” I lied. In fact, I’d slept better than I had for months, despite a series of vivid dreams that should have made a married woman blush. “I always get cranky when I don’t get enough sleep. And I guess I’m feeling a bit fed up with all of this running around.”
“Are you sorry you brought Bertie and me with you?” Nell asked soberly.
“Good heavens, no, Nell, not one bit,” I exclaimed. “You’ve both been great. It’s just that ...” I sighed. “This isn’t how I’d hoped to spend my second honeymoon.”
Nell relaxed her grip on Bertie, but her expression remained grave. “Being married isn’t easy,” she said knowingly. “I’m the only one at school whose parents still live together in the same house. Except for Petra de Bernouilles, but she’s a Catholic and they’re not allowed to divorce. Are you going to divorce Bill?”
“Nell! What an idea!” I dismissed the question with a breezy chuckle while telling myself that perhaps it would be better if my own hypothetical twelve-year-old weren’t quite as perceptive as Nell. “I’ll admit that I’m disappointed that Bill couldn’t come with me on this trip, but what’s one trip?”
“When’s the last time he came with you?” she inquired.
“The last time? That would be ... This is August, right?” I tilted my head nonchalantly and squinted into the middle distance. “A year ago,” I answered finally. “Bill was here last August. We spent a few days in London and a week at the cottage. It was wonderful.”