The Secret Pearl (42 page)

And yet she was not relaxed, either. The Duke of Ridgeway sat beside her, both of them silent, just a small space separating their shoulders.

Why had he come? Why was he taking such an interest in
her affairs? And why had she let him come? She might have said no. She might have argued the point more vigorously.

“Why?” she asked, as she had more than an hour before outside the stables. “Why are you here in Wiltshire? Why are you taking me to Wroxford?”

He did not look at her, but out of the window. She thought for a while that he would not answer.

“You know that you did not murder your cousin’s valet,” he said, “that in large measure you are not responsible for his death. And yet you have to see your involvement with him to its conclusion. You have to make this journey, a thing that very few people except you would understand. I feel something similar with you.”

She said nothing more for a while. She understood his answer. It made sense to her.

“I don’t understand,” she said at last. “I have never understood it, though in your case I find it particularly difficult to understand. The duchess is very beautiful. You have a daughter who thrives on your love and a home that must be one of the loveliest in all England. Why do men like you need women for casual and sordid relations? I don’t understand.”

He continued to look out of the window. “I can’t answer for other men,” he said, “only for myself. I will not say much about my marriage, Fleur, because I owe my wife privacy, if not myself. I will only say that it is a difficult and an unhappy marriage and has been from the start. Sometimes it is difficult not to feel certain cravings. But I was faithful to my marriage until that one occasion with you.”

Fleur looked at his profile, at the scarred side of his face. Cravings? Did he not have a normal marriage?

“I don’t know why it happened on that occasion,” he said. “I had not planned it and you did nothing to entice me. You stood still and quiet in the shadows. I could not even see you clearly. Perhaps …” He stopped talking, and Fleur thought
that he would not continue. But he did after a while. “Perhaps something in me recognized you. I don’t know.”

“Recognized?” The word came out as a whisper.

“My pearl beyond price,” he said quietly.

Fleur watched him swallow.

“And then I was angry,” he said, “because having made the decision to be unfaithful, I wanted a night of forgetfulness. I wanted to be able to blame you afterward. But you did nothing, only allowed me to use you. It was a dreadful experience for you, Fleur, and it was quite unpleasant for me. I got what I deserved, I suppose.”

“Why did you send Mr. Houghton to find me?” she asked. “Was it just guilt?”

He turned and looked at her for the first time. “For a long time I told myself that that was the reason,” he said. “I suppose that with my head I am still telling myself that. Don’t probe any further, Fleur.”

They stared at each other for a long while before she looked down at her hand, which was lying palm-down on the seat between them. No, she would probe no further. She did not want to know the truth. It was too strange, the fate that had brought them together, and too cruel.

She could feel his eyes on her hand too. And he set his own beside it, that beautiful long-fingered hand that had once terrified her and that still disturbed her and made her feel breathless. Their little fingers almost touched.

They sat like that, still and silent, for a long while before he moved his little finger to stroke lightly over hers. And she spread hers and bent it so that their two fingers twined together.

Their eyes watched their hands. They touched at only the one point. They said nothing.

T
HEY STOPPED FOR A MEAL THAT WAS NEITHER luncheon nor dinner, and continued on their way. There was a strange ease between them, the Duke of Ridgeway thought. Strange because they had traveled for several hours in near-silence and had eaten their meal without a great deal of conversation. Strange because they were alone together after all that had passed between them. There should have been an awkwardness, an embarrassment, but there was not.

When they resumed their seats in the carriage and it drew out of the innyard onto the open road again, he took her hand in his and rested their clasped hands on the seat between them. She made no resistance. She curled her fingers around his hand.

He wished that they had three hundred miles to travel, not thirty. Or three thousand.

He could feel her eyes on him, but he did not turn his head. He wished, as he had wished at the start of their journey, that he had thought of sitting on the other side of her, his good profile facing her.

“How did it happen?” she asked him quietly.

“This?” he said, indicating his scar with his free hand. “I have very little memory of just what occurred. It was at the
Battle of Waterloo, of course. I was with the infantry. We were in square, holding a cavalry charge at bay. But it was very frightening for some of the younger boys—and for all of us, I suppose—to see cavalry charging at us and to have only bayonets and the other men forming the square as a defense. It is a good defense, almost impregnable, in fact, but it does not feel safe. A few of our men panicked and turned away together. I leapt forward to try to hearten them and make sure that the square was not broken, and got caught on the face by a bayonet.”

Fleur grimaced.

“Not even an enemy’s,” he said, smiling. “Ironic, is it not? I believe I can recall the sharp pain and my hand coming away all red from my face. That is the last I remember. A shell must have hit at that moment and caused the other wounds.”

“You were almost a year recovering,” she said. “You must have suffered a great deal.”

“I believe so,” he said. “Mercifully, I seem to have been somewhat out of my head during the worst of it. It was hard, though, to adjust my mind to the knowledge that I would carry around the visible effects of what happened for the rest of my life.”

“The wounds still hurt sometimes?” she said.

“Not often.” He smiled at her again.

“I have seen you limping,” she said.

“When I am tired or under some stress,” he said. “That is when Sidney, my man, plays tyrant and orders me to submit myself to a massage. He has a most impertinent tongue and magic hands.”

She smiled at him. “Why did you go?” she asked. “If you were a duke, it would have been most unusual for you to be a part of the army, especially as an infantry officer. Did you not have a happy childhood?”

“Quite the contrary,” he said. “I was privileged and happy and sheltered. No human being is entitled to enjoy such a life
without paying back a little. There were thousands of men fighting for our country who really owed it almost nothing except their birth. And yet to them it was worth fighting for. The least I could do was fight alongside them.”

“Tell me about your childhood,” she said.

He smiled. “That is a large question,” he said. “Do you want to hear about what a good little boy I was or about what a rogue I could be? Unfortunately, I sometimes drove my father to distraction. And the footmen. One poor fellow who lived in terror of ghosts and devils found two in the grand hall. Two named Adam and Thomas, who inhabited the gallery and made strange noises when he was on duty during the evenings. They haunted him for three whole weeks before they were finally caught. I can still feel the walloping I had for that. I believe I had to lie facedown on my bed for at least a couple of hours afterward.”

She laughed.

“It was a wonderful childhood,” he said. “We were Greek gods among the temples and Vikings on the lake and bear hunters by the cascades. Our father used to spend a great deal of time with us, teaching us to fish and to shoot and ride. My stepmother taught me how to play the pianoforte, though I do not have your talent. And she taught us to dance. There was always a great deal of laughter during those lessons. She used to accuse us both of having two left feet.”

“And yet you dance so well now,” Fleur said.

“I wish Pamela’s childhood could be as happy,” he said. “I wish there could have been other children. I always wanted a large family.”

He realized what he had said when she looked inquiringly at him.

“I will devote myself to her happiness when I go home,” he said. “I’ll stay with her. I’ll not leave her again.”

He closed his eyes and braced one booted foot against the seat opposite. It was late afternoon. The drowsy hour.

He had never voiced that dream before—the dream of sons of his own, and daughters too, running free at Willoughby, their shouts and laughter bringing the place alive again. It was not fair to Pamela that she be so alone.

His children and Fleur’s. They would take them riding and picnicking and boating. And fishing too. He would teach Fleur to fish. And she would teach the children to play the pianoforte, and herself play for their entertainment some evenings. And together they would teach their children to dance. They would teach them to waltz.

And he would love her by night. He would sleep with her all night and every night in the large canopied bed that had been his father’s before him and that had never held a woman since his father’s death. And he would fill her with his seed. He would watch her grow with his children. And he would watch those children being born and watch her giving birth to them.

He had paid his dues for a life of incredible privilege and for a childhood of wonderful security. He would be happy again and happy forever. He would open the oyster shell and find the pearl within.

He opened his eyes and became aware of his surroundings when her head touched his shoulder. She was breathing deeply and evenly. He turned his head very slowly so as not to wake her and rested his cheek against her soft curls. And he breathed in the scent of her. Their hands were still clasped together.

He closed his eyes again.

W
ROXFORD WAS NOT QUITE
a town. It was a large village. Darkness had begun to fall when they arrived there, and the churchyard was quite large. It was altogether possible that they had just missed finding the correct tombstone in the half-light, the Duke of Ridgeway reassured her after they had
searched without success. Or perhaps there was no tombstone yet. They should ask at the vicarage.

But the vicar was from home, at the bedside of a sick parishioner, his wife explained. She had no knowledge of such a grave. There were Hobsons in the churchyard, yes, but the last to be buried there must be old Bessie Hobson, all of seven or eight years before. Certainly there had been none buried there in the past six months. There had been only one funeral in that time, and that had certainly not been a Hobson.

“This man was valet to Lord Brocklehurst of Heron House,” the duke explained. “His father was a butcher here at one time, I understand.”

The vicar’s wife nodded. “That would be Mr. Maurice Hobson, sir,” she said. “He lives on the hill now.” She pointed to the east. “A redbrick house, sir, with roses in the front garden.”

“How strange,” Fleur said as they turned away, the vicar’s wife standing politely on the doorstep to see them on their way. “Mollie was quite sure it was Wroxford, and it seems to be the right place. His father does live here. But he was not buried here? I must speak with Mr. Hobson. It is not too late, is it?”

“I’m afraid so,” he said. “We will put up at the inn for tonight and I will call on Mr. Hobson in the morning. Alone, Fleur. I don’t think it advisable for you to meet him.”

“But I cannot expect you to do that for me,” she said.

“I will do it nevertheless,” he said, handing her back into his carriage. “And for tonight you are Miss Kent, my sister.”

“Yes,” she said. “Thank you. But what can it mean? Matthew did not have Daniel bury Hobson because he wanted to bring him home. But this is home, and the burial was not here.”

“I am sure there is a perfectly good explanation,” he said, taking her hand in his again. “I shall discover what it is tomorrow. Are you hungry? And don’t say no. I am, and I hate eating alone.”

“A little,” she said. She smiled quickly at him. “Oh, not very.
But what can be the meaning of it? Have we come all this way for nothing? Is this business never to have an ending?”

“Tomorrow,” he said. “For the rest of this evening you are going to sit and watch me eat, and eat a little yourself, and tell me all about your early childhood. I entertained you this afternoon before we both fell asleep. Now it is your turn.”

“There is not much to tell,” she said. “My parents died when I was eight. I cannot remember a great deal.”

“More than you think, I will wager,” he said. “Here we are. I hope this inn offers somewhat better accommodation than the one in your village. And better food too.”

They were given small rooms next to each other. There was nothing fancy about either one, but the inn did boast a private parlor, which the duke engaged for the evening. There were about a dozen men in the public taproom.

She should feel embarrassed, Fleur thought. She was alone during the darkness of the evening with the Duke of Ridgeway. They were to sleep in adjoining rooms in a village inn. They had been alone together all day, their hands clasped for most of the time. And she had woken up at some time late in the afternoon with her head on his shoulder.