Laura Matthews

by A Very Proper Widow

  How good it would be to have them all gone! But it looked more and more as though the Curtisses, at least, were bound to remain. Vanessa determined to try to get Hortense to take them with her when (and if) she left. She was prepared to continue their quarterly allowance, so long as they weren’t hanging about her house. Louisa was the sole exception. Vanessa had grown more fond of her over the last few weeks, but it was highly unlikely Louisa would remain if the others left. And, of course, it was highly unlikely that they would leave . . .

  When Vanessa and John approached the stream, Edward appeared as if from nowhere. Vanessa bit back her annoyance. There was nothing unusual about running into another member of the household when they were out riding. Cutsdean had several pleasant rides, but this was surely the most appealing. Vanessa had noted at the stables that Harley’s horse was not in its customary stall and had been relieved that Edward was out: his habit of trying to insinuate himself on their rides was irritating. What happened next was a little difficult for Vanessa to sort out in her mind afterward. Edward greeted them, riding up to place his horse on the opposite side of John’s pony from her. His spirits were high, she could tell by the way his eyes glowed.

  “Perfect day!” he proclaimed, beaming on the two of them. “And you’ll never guess what I’ve just seen down along the stream. There, in the largest oak. Can you make it out? A leather jerkin hanging from the branch. However do you suppose it got there?”

  Intrigued, Vanessa could indeed see some item of apparel swinging in the breeze. She was interested enough to consider riding in that direction when her son’s pony suddenly bucked and bolted, lunging into the water. John’s grip on the reins had slackened as he, too, looked toward the large oak and he was barely able to maintain his seat on the animal. Rollo plunged downstream, frantically trying to rid himself of his rider.

  For a moment, Vanessa sat frozen on her horse. Then instinct took over and she followed the maddened horse through the water. She was not aware of Edward. Her concentration was purely on reaching her son before some harm befell him. Even as she gave chase, her astonishment at Rollo’s behavior fuddled her mind. The pony had never shown the least sign of unruly conduct. And there he was, wildly swinging his head, shaking his body, stomping in the shallow stream so that sprays of water went in every direction.

  Frightened, little John was calling for her while desperately attempting to keep his position on the pony. Vanessa could see his small body jerked one way and then another, his arms flailing for balance. As she finally came abreast of him, she reached across to grab the bridle, but Rollo was lunging too wildly for her to catch hold. Instead, she was forced to try for her son. His feet had long since lost the stirrups and only one hand held tightly to the reins. Half the time his body seemed to float above the horse, only to crash back down and drive Rollo to renewed excesses of body contortion.

  Vanessa steadied her own mount, which was made nervous by his distraught neighbor. Holding the reins in one hand as firmly as she could, she strained to grasp her son about his waist. When she felt her hold was secure enough, she swung him bodily to her, badly wrenching her shoulder but maintaining her grip. John clung to her as she directed her horse onto the grassy bank. His face was white and terrified, his hands like claws digging into her flesh.

  “There, it’s all right,” she murmured into his hair where his head was buried against her shoulder. “You’re all right now, John.” She tried to lift her hand to soothe him but a sharp pain ran through it and she allowed it to fall again at her side. “You’ll have to climb down by yourself, love. I can’t use my arm.”

  Shaken out of his own anxiety by his concern for her, he did as he was told, sliding to the bank to stand on visibly shaking legs. Vanessa awkwardly lowered herself from the sidesaddle, wincing when she had to put any pressure on her right arm. Rollo was still thrashing in the stream, further away now, but as they watched he rolled in the water, dislodging the saddle when the girth broke. Abruptly, his struggles ceased and he stood shuddering in the shallow water, his head hanging down in exhaustion. John called to him and he raised his head and whinnied before trotting over to the bank and thrusting his muzzle against John’s chest.

  Still bewildered, John looked up at his mother. “Why did he do it?” he whispered. “He scared me, Mama. I didn’t want to fall off.”

  Before Vanessa could answer, Edward had come pounding up to them, on foot, swearing every inch of the way. “The damned horse wouldn’t go in the water! The — son of a — wouldn’t set one of his — feet in a little—stream.”

  It was obvious that Edward had been bested in his struggles with the dilapidated nag. His clothes were once again tattered from a rough fall and his boots were scuffed. There were grass stains on his buckskins, and though he had chosen them purposely for the expedition he had in mind, he frowned at the stains with unmitigated disgust. He showed no concern for Vanessa or her son, groping about his waistcoat pocket for one of his fobs which was missing. “I’ll kill the beast,” he roared. “I’ll slice his — throat.”

  “That’s enough, Edward,” Vanessa commanded. “John is shaken and I can’t move my arm. Would you please retrieve Rollo’s saddle from the stream?”

  Edward regarded her with complete astonishment. As if he hadn’t been through enough without wading into the icy water and permanently ruining his boots. “It’s beyond reclaiming by now,” he snapped. “And how would you get it back to the stables? I don’t intend to ride with it dripping in my lap.”

  The situation, to his mind, was irretrievable and his mood was by now so foul he didn’t care what she thought of him. All his work, all his plans, ruined. How clever he had been to hang the leather jerkin in the tree to capture their attention while he shoved the burr under Rollo’s blanket! John had even unknowingly aided him by standing up in his stirrups to look. But there was no one to appreciate his cleverness. Edward gave her one glance of uncompromising dislike and stalked off to find his horse. His language, when he found that the beast had taken off, was only slightly worse than previously, but Vanessa and John were too far away to catch all its intricacy.

  “Pantywaist!” John snickered, his courage somewhat restored.

  “Worse,” Vanessa said bitterly. “Come along, John. You’ll have to ride Rollo bareback. We’ll send someone back for the saddle later.” She found that she was unable to remount her horse and smiled up at his worried frown. “I think I’ll be more comfortable walking anyway, love.”

  “His back is all bloody!” John exclaimed as Rollo moved restlessly under him. “I’ll walk, too.”

  Since Edward had disappeared somewhere (possibly to avenge himself on Harley’s hapless nag), mother and son trudged back to the stables alone, leading their mounts and discussing what might have caused Rollo’s injury. Vanessa didn’t mention the shooting pains in her arm which even walking caused, and John was surprised, later, to see her arm resting in a sling.

  “It’s not broken,” she assured him as Catherine stared wide-eyed. “Dr. Brinkworth says the shoulder is wrenched and I must keep my arm immobile. It’s only for a few days.”

  “Does it hurt?” Catherine asked, her eyes filling with tears of empathy.

  “Not if I don’t jar it,” Vanessa assured her. “And I’m being very careful about that.” They didn’t need to know that almost anything one did jarred it.

  Vanessa felt sure her mother-in-law looked upon it as a righteous judgment on her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The long-awaited letter finally came the next day, and it was a stunning disappointment. Not in the news he had about his brother. Alvescot wrote to say that Charles had regained consciousness soon after he returned home, and that the boy was slowly mending. There had been some concern about the extent of the head injury for about a week, but their fears had finally been allayed. Charles was beginning to speak normally again and his appetite was returning, but he would need careful nursing for some time yet. Alvescot thanked her again for her hospitality a
nd said he had every confidence in her ability to manage Cutsdean with Paul Burford. It was a polite note, friendly, but it told her nothing she wanted to hear.

  Vanessa read the letter three times, though it was awkward holding it in her left hand. One is given to reading between the lines when desperate for some morsel of affection. He did call her “My dear Vanessa,” but that might well have been his usual form of salutation. Certainly signing himself her “devoted servant” was no more than standard practice. He excused his long silence by his anxiety for his brother’s welfare and some pressing business at St. Aldwyns. “I shall be tied here for some weeks,” he said, in regard to the continuing care Charles needed, but as this was not followed by any suggestion of what he might do after that, Vanessa could not find it encouraging. He hoped to hear from her soon about the status of her household.

  Well, she couldn’t very well write with her aching arm, and she had no intention of asking someone to act her scribe. Even eating with her left hand was difficult; she would not make the hopeless attempt to write with it. There seemed little hurry in answering the kind but uninvolved letter. She would, when she was able, convey her happiness in his brother’s recovery and mention the fiasco of William Oldcastle. By then, too, she would know if Hortense intended to leave. It was impossible to tell at this point, for Hortense spoke to her only when spoken to.

  Nothing else was changed in the household, except that Louisa frequently sat with her, reading from any book which Vanessa chose. There were so few things she could comfortably do that this was a blessing, but Louisa remained low-spirited and seemed grateful for something useful to do.

  Paul Burford came to sit with her in the Library and go over the estate books. His presence always cheered her, and he took time from his work to substitute for her on rides with John. But the time passed slowly. It was a week and a half before she was able to use her arm with any degree of comfort. The pain was still there, but much diminished. With some effort she was able to make entries in the books and she knew it was time to write to Alvescot but she continued to delay the inevitable. What, after all, did she have to say to him?

  When a month had slid past since his departure, she did not feel she could delay any longer. Simple courtesy demanded a response to his letter. Vanessa left the breakfast table that morning with the firm resolve to go straight to the Morning Room and pen her reply. The day was overcast and chilly, so she allowed the draperies to remain closed and seated herself at her desk, pulling a shawl closer about her shoulders.

  Should she address him as “My dear James”? It would be in keeping with his own letter, though somehow coming from her pen it sounded a little too forward. She decided on “Dear Lord Alvescot.” After that the first few sentences were easy, expressing her relief that his brother was recovering. But from that point on she had to worry about every word, trying not to sound as though she expected him to be particularly interested in her small problems, making them, in fact, sound like no trouble at all.

  She had very nearly finished the painstaking letter when there was a tap at the door. Any interruption was a welcome relief and she called, “Come in.” It could only be a footman, of course, and she finished the word she was writing before glancing toward the door.

  Alvescot stood there, looking rather larger than she remembered him, and a great deal more forbidding. “May I?” he asked, his voice crisp.

  The moment of stunned surprise passed and she rose haltingly from her chair. “Of course. Is something wrong? Why have you come?”

  “What else was I to do when I didn’t hear from you?” he demanded. “I imagined all sorts of wretched things happening here at Cutsdean. Why else wouldn’t you have written?”

  “I was writing you just now,” she murmured, waving toward the single sheet lying on the desk. “I . . . I couldn’t write for a few weeks. There didn’t seem to be any hurry.” And then, belatedly, “Won’t you sit down?”

  “May I see the letter?”

  “Of course.” Suddenly she felt a little embarrassed about the letter. It didn’t seem to take into account his apparently real concern, somehow. But how was she to know his interest was genuine? The letter he had written could as well have come from any distant relation. Vanessa watched as he scanned the sheet, a puzzled frown drawing his brows together. When he had finished it, he folded it and stuck it in his pocket, but he said nothing, just standing there regarding her with unwavering eyes.

  “I . . . I injured my shoulder just before I received your letter . . . , James. My arm was in a sling for more than a week.”

  The sling was, of course, gone now, and he looked skeptical. “How did you injure yourself?”

  “It’s rather a long story.”

  “I expected long stories when I came all the way from St. Aldwyns to find out what was amiss here,” he told her in a remarkably level voice. “Tell me about it.”

  “If you would sit down . . .”

  He joined her on the sofa, his hands planted firmly over his crossed knees. Vanessa described John’s adventure on Rollo as best she was able under his intent gaze. When she had finished, he asked, “Did you come to any conclusion about what caused the pony to bolt?”

  “Well, yes, I did, but my suspicions are unconfirmed. I wouldn’t want to speak of them.”

  “Hogwash! You know as well as I do that Edward had to have been to blame. He put something irritating under the pony’s blanket when you and John were looking toward the tree.”

  “Yes, but why would he do it? It seems so pointless.”

  “Don’t be naive, Vanessa!” he retorted. “To win your regard, of course, by acting the brave knight who rescues your son. The idiot actually thinks you would consider marrying him.”

  “He cannot be that oblivious,” she contradicted. “Perhaps he wanted to work his way up in my estimation so I would allow him the use of the stables again. But to take such a course! To endanger John’s life!”

  “He probably thought it was safe enough in the stream bed. But he has to go, Vanessa.”

  It was so easy for him to say, she thought rebelliously. He had made no remark on the parts of her letter about Oldcastle and Hortense, and now he was insisting that she take on one more of her household, and the least able to fend for himself, regardless of his unscrupulous behavior. Exasperated, she asked, “How do you suggest I get rid of him? Slice his throat, like he planned to do with Harley’s horse?”

  A grin appeared briefly on his lips. “Not a bad idea, but I’m afraid you couldn’t get away with it, my dear. I think I have a better idea.”

  “Don’t just tell me to ask him to leave! I’m not even sure Hortense is going, though I’ve asked her. She likes keeping me in suspense. And Edward, fine fellow that he is, would simply laugh and say, ‘You don’t mean that, Vanessa. Where would I go?’ They are the most obstinate, selfish, inflexible bunch of people I’ve ever met!”

  Her cheeks were flushed with anger and he raised one hand to her face, brushing the glowing skin with a gentle fingertip. “You didn’t use to let them upset you so much. When I first came here you knew what they were and that they were imposing on you, but you took it all in stride, regarding them with amusement and an uncommon tolerance. What changed all that?”

  “You did,” she muttered, defiant. “Coming and telling me I was a fool to let them stay, insisting it wasn’t my duty, saying that Frederick wouldn’t have wanted it. I would have put up with them because my parents thought I should. I regarded it as an act of Christian charity, not an idiocy. Even after you came I might have succeeded in keeping to my resolve, if your very presence hadn’t made them all start behaving like a group from Bedlam: Mabel pushing Louisa on you and William sulking, Hortense aggrieved by your aristocracy and Edward forcing more attention on me. It would have been better if you’d never come!”

  Abruptly he withdrew his hand, a startled look in his eyes. Alvescot had come to believe that Vanessa was as attracted to him as he was to her. Since he’d left Cutsdean not a
day had gone by when he didn’t think of her and wish that he could be with her. The emergency at St. Aldwyns had required his spending a lot of time sitting by his brother’s bed, unoccupied, and he had gone over their interactions carefully, looking for signs of her interest. And he was sure he had found them. She had not rejected his tentative advances, though admittedly they were not so glaring as to call forth any decisive action.

  Was it possible he’d been deluding himself? Vanessa was his cousin’s widow and it was only two years since her husband had died. What he had taken for interest might have been mere loneliness, a desire to have someone to talk to who wasn’t as reprehensible as most of her household. Certainly she had needed a friend, and had every incentive to rub along with him as co-trustee.

  But she had let him kiss her, that last afternoon. Yes, and then he had purposely left her without any promise to return. Thinking back on his letter to her, he realized that he had assumed too much in it, after all those hours of considering their time together. By the time he wrote her, he had settled in his mind that he wanted to marry her—and he had not doubted that it was a mutual desire. How could he have been so conceited?

  Alvescot regarded her now with wary eyes. She had turned her face away from him, toward the window. Her hands lay clenched in her lap. Before he could speak, she said softly, “I don’t really mean that, James. You had every right to come and it was not your fault that everyone was disturbed by your visit. I’d gotten accustomed to running things here and I may at first have resented your interference, but I came to understand you were only trying to help. So many people here are determined to undermine what little authority I have that I cling to it rather tenaciously, I fear. Your . . . friendship was most welcome.”

  Still, she didn’t look at him and he sat unmoving, and unsure how to proceed. Slowly, he decided. It would be all too easy to break the tenuous thread that joined them. If she called it friendship, that was better than nothing. In fact, it was a great deal stronger bond than he had begun to fear. Perhaps the strongest that any enduring partnership could be based on.