“Still raining, mistress. I believe it’s been raining all through the night.”
Yes, I thought, the patter of rain against the windows … lying there with him … just not wanting to move away … forgetting everything but the need to be there.
“Tis to be hoped milord and milady and the others will get the coach set to rights.”
“I daresay they will, Em.”
She went out and I opened the note.
It was brief. “I have had to go out on Court business. I shall return during the day. C.”
No indication that anything unusual had happened. I felt a rush of disappointment. How could he go like that after what had happened? Was he implying that there was nothing extraordinary? It was all very natural that he and I should become lovers? It was what he had always suggested. Was he laughing in triumph now?
I felt angry with him and with myself. How could I have been so weak, so foolish!
It was the impulse of a moment, I told myself. I had had a shock and he was there. He had dulled my resistance with his strong wines. What was that he had given me? It had acted like some witch’s love potion. Perhaps it was. I could hardly imagine his trafficking with witches. But he was capable of anything.
I washed and dressed. I was thankful that I did not have to face him yet.
I was very pale. I found a little rouge and rubbed it into my cheeks. That was better. I thought how I had loved Harriet. She had been as a sister to me. I had been really upset when she had gone away. If I had known …
But what a stupid innocent I had been!
How long and dreary was that day. Nothing happened. I stood at the window watching the raindrops. The grass was sodden. The last of the leaves were rapidly being tossed to the ground and there was a wet bronze carpet on the grass.
Why didn’t he come in? How like him to go off on business. I didn’t believe it. Where was he? I wondered if he were with a woman. A feeling of intense rage possessed me. I should hate her … and him. I could never trust anyone again. Oh, Edwin … Harriet … how could you? How could I ever bear to look at Leigh again?
In the early afternoon a messenger came to the house. I ran down to greet him, sure that he came from Carleton.
He did not. He was from my mother-in-law. They had had greater difficulties with the coach than had seemed likely yesterday. A spoke in one of the wheels had been damaged and was being repaired. This meant that they would be away for one more night. If the rain would stop it would be easier. They would be with me tomorrow without fail.
The evening came and Carleton had not returned.
I was angry with him. He had succeeded as he always said he would. Was that what he wanted? One single victory.
I ate alone—or made a pretence of eating. How different from last night. I found myself longing to see his dark, clever, wicked face opposite me. I wanted to hear his voice mocking me. I wanted to respond.
I retired early. I went to bed. I tried to sleep but I could not. I could not read because I kept going over the events of last night.
It must have been nearly midnight when my door opened and he was there. He wore a loose night robe.
I felt faint with baffling emotions as he looked at me.
“I did not know you had returned,” I stammered.
“Did you think I could stay away? There was much business, but I was determined to be with you.” He blew out the candle he was carrying. “We shall not need it,” he said.
I struggled up, but he was beside me, pinning me down.
“There is so much to say.”
“We shall have the rest of our lives in which to say it, Arabella. I have been thinking of you all through the day. At last. At last … My heart’s desire …”
I heard myself laugh. “To hear you talk so … it is unlike you. Sentimental …”
“I can be sentimental, romantic … foolish … with one woman in the world. You are that woman, Arabella. At last you know it.”
“You should not be here,” I said.
“There is no other place where I should be.”
I suppose everyone wonders at himself or herself at some time. I wondered then.
Afterwards I could tell myself that I was so unhappy, so wretched that I had to stop myself thinking. I had to be shocked into forgetfulness.
In any case that night, without the aid of spirits or love potions, I was submissive … no, not that … responsive … and I knew that in the morning I should despise myself for giving way so blatantly to the sensuous demands of my nature.
When I awoke I was alone in my bed, and as before with the coming of daylight, I was surprised at my behaviour on the previous night. It seemed that I had two natures—one daytime and one my nighttime other self. Carleton filled my thoughts so that I even forgot to brood on Edwin’s deceit. What was the outcome to be? There seemed an inevitable solution. Marriage.
Marriage with Carleton, who clearly wanted it so that as Edwin’s stepfather he could have a stronger control over the Eversleigh estates. I had been married once for convenience. Should I do so again? Oh, but with Edwin … I thought of those delightful interludes which had seemed to me the expression of pure romantic love. I shivered. I would never again allow myself to be so used.
When I went to breakfast Carleton was already there.
He smiled at me. “Good morning, dear Arabella.” One of the servants was hovering and he went on with a lift of his eyebrows: “I trust you slept well?”
“Thank you, yes,” I replied.
“The rain has stopped at last,” he added. “Let us take a turn in the garden after breakfast, shall we?”
“I should like that,” I replied.
When we were a little way from the house he said: “The question now, Arabella, is not will you but when will you marry me?”
“I … am not sure about marrying.”
“What! You do not want to remain my mistress, surely?”
I was angry with him just as I used to be. He had the power to make me so. In place of the passionate lover who could be sentimental and romantic just for me, here was the cynic, the Court wit, the man I always wanted to do battle with.
“Let us forget what has happened.”
“Forget the most wonderful nights of my life! Oh, come, Arabella, that is asking too much.”
“You are mocking me as you ever do.”
“No, I am serious. When my uncle returns I shall tell him the good news. He will be delighted. I know he has long decided that a marriage between us would be an ideal solution for Eversleigh.”
“I am tired of being a pawn in this Eversleigh game.”
“Not a pawn, my darling. I told you once before, you are a queen.”
“A piece then … to be moved about this way and that. I am not at all sure that I want to marry you.”
“Arabella, you shock me. Remembering what I shall never, never forget …”
“You tricked me. You shocked me … and then you gave me something to drink. What was it?”
He laughed at me and lifted his eyebrows again.
“My secret,” he said.
I turned away. “I am undecided,” I retorted.
“At least there is some hope.”
“After what happened …”
“And it will happen again.”
“I don’t want it to.”
“Oh, Arabella, still deceiving yourself! There was no magic in a glass last night and yet, and yet …”
“Oh, you … you …!”
He took my hand and kissed it. “Tonight when they return we shall tell them?”
“No,” I said.
“You are surely not thinking of my rival Geoffrey now, are you?”
I was not, but I could not resist the impulse to let him think I might be.
“Because,” he said, “there would be trouble. Don’t think that what has happened between us is an isolated incident. When we are alone together it will happen again. We’re drawn together like the moon and the sun …”