by Mary Balogh
They talk, I talk – we do not have to make any effort to find topics. They just happen." "And are you ever silent with your family?" he asked.
She thought. "Yes, often," she said. "Silence can be companionable. It can be that even with close friends." "I am neither family nor a close friend, then?" he asked her.
She stared back at him. "You /are/ the one and must be both," she said. "But can friendship be forced, Duncan? Or the /ease/ of friendship?" He was feeling a little shaken, if the truth were known. He had not been finding the silence uncomfortable. If he had been, he would have filled it with some form of conversation. He had spoken a great deal about his home and family and childhood, for example, since their arrival. But he had not asked her anything about her own life. Those details would have filled the rest of the evening.
Of course, he realized suddenly, /he/ was at home. She was not – not in a place that had had a chance to /feel/ like home yet, anyway. Woodbine Park was a strange place to her. It was understandable that she was a little uncomfortable. "We are not enemies," he said. "No." "Are we not therefore friends?" he asked.
She smiled. "We are /lovers/," he said. "Yes." "But not friends?" "I think," she said, setting down her cup and saucer, "I am just tired." "And a little depressed?" he asked softly. "No," she said. And she laughed suddenly. "That would be disconcerting after I told you earlier that I am always an optimist. I am just tired and forgot for a moment that marriage is a journey, just as life is. I must not expect it to be perfect from the start. If it were, we would have nowhere to go with it, would we?" "Our marriage is not perfect?" he asked her. "No, of course it is not," she said, still smiling. "We married for imperfect reasons, and we have been married for only a few days. I want contentment, happiness with husband, home, and family. You want … well, you want simply not to regret your marriage as deeply as you fear you might. They are not impossible dreams, are they? For either of us?" He had been struck by her honesty from the start of their acquaintance.
She was being honest now. Her expectations were not impossibly high.
Neither were her demands of him. "I do not regret it," he said.
It struck him that if he were here alone now, he might also be feeling lonely – even though Toby was coming tomorrow. He was not feeling lonely now. A trifle irritated, perhaps, but not lonely. And not unhappy. "Thank you," she said. "One day you will say it with more conviction, I promise." "And you will tell me one day," he said, getting to his feet, "that you are not only contented with our marriage, but happy. I promise." He reached out a hand for hers and drew her to her feet. "And one day," he said, "we will be able to sit a whole hour together in silence without you feeling awkward." She laughed again.
And then she drew her hand from his, wrapped both arms about his neck, and leaned in to him, pressing one cheek against his. His arms closed about her. "Oh, how I have /longed/," she said, and paused for such a long time that he thought she would not continue. But she did. "How I have longed all my life for just this – a home of my own, a husband I can like and respect, intimacy, togetherness, the promise of happiness within grasping distance. Duncan, I /really/ am not depressed. I am … " She drew back her head to look into his face. She did not complete the thought. "Lusty?" he suggested. "Oh, you horrid man!" she cried. "You know words like that are not in a lady's vocabulary." He gazed back at her and said nothing. "Yes," she said softly. "/Lusty/. What a deliciously wicked word." Women were complex creatures, he thought as he kissed her – and /that/ was surely the original thought of the century. Lust for them was not the simple need for a thorough good bedding. It was all mixed up in their minds with marriage and home and liking and respect and romance and love.
And for men? For /him/?
He deepened the kiss, opening both their mouths and thrusting his tongue deep, spreading his hands over her buttocks and snuggling her in against his growing hardness.
He too had longed … For a woman in his arms and in his bed and in his –
Life?
Heart?
He did not know and would not puzzle now over the answer. But he /had/ longed.
Yearned. "Maggie," he murmured into her ear. "Come to bed." "Mmm," she said on a long sigh. "Yes. That is a /good/ part of our marriage, is it not?" "Shall we not analyze it?" he suggested, settling her hand on his arm. "Shall we just /do/ it? And /enjoy/ it?" Her lips curved into a smile and her eyes brightened with merriment. "Yes," she said. "To both. I think you are making a wanton of me." "Good," he said.
20
THE morning after her arrival at Woodbine Park, Margaret was ashamed of the way she had allowed herself to be overwhelmed the evening before by the newness and unfamiliarity of everything in her life.
She had found herself during that lengthy silence in the drawing room missing her family, Merton House, Warren Hall, the familiar round of her daily life. And knowing that everything was changed forever with no chance – ever – of going back.
Which had all been quite absurd. Why should she wish to go back? And it was not as if she had lost her family forever. She had merely got what she had longed for all of last winter.
In the morning everything looked brighter – even literally. The sun shone from a clear blue sky beyond the windows of the bedchamber she shared with Duncan, and she could see the view out over the park at the front of the house. And a lovely view it was too with the house situated as it was on the crest of the hill. Beyond the inner lawns she could see the trees that circled the park, the river to one side, the roofs of some of the houses in the village, the church spire, and farmland stretching like a giant patchwork quilt to a distant horizon.
She was filled with energy despite last night's love-making. Or perhaps partly because of it. That aspect of her new life was wonderful indeed and far surpassed any of her expectations. She had expected, and hoped, that it might be pleasant. It was … Well, it was much better than that.
Duncan was a skilled, patient, thorough, and passionate lover. And she had discovered an answering passion in herself. Perhaps it was unladylike to enjoy the marriage bed quite so much. But if it was, then she was content to be no lady – at least during the nights and in the privacy of their own bedchamber.
She intended to spend at least a part of the morning in consultation with the housekeeper and perhaps the cook too. There was much to learn, much to organize, if she was to establish herself as mistress of Woodbine. She would find it easier this time. When she had moved to Warren Hall with Stephen and Kate, she had gone from managing a small village cottage to running a grand country mansion. The two tasks had had very few similarities. It had taken her a great deal of effort and determination.
Duncan arrived in her dressing room before Ellen had quite finished styling her hair. He had been gone from bed when she woke up earlier. He was wearing riding clothes and looked as if he had been out already. "I thought," he said, meeting her eyes in the mirror, "that perhaps you would get lost between here and the breakfast parlor and would wander aimlessly about the house all day before someone found you and rescued you." "And so you came to escort me?" She smiled at his image. He looked as full of energy as she. He looked younger somehow, more carefree, more handsome. It struck her that he was probably far more at home in the country than he was in the city. "I did." He sat down on a chair by the door to wait for her and crossed one booted ankle over the other knee. Oh, yes, and he looked very virile too. Very attractive. "I must spend the morning with the housekeeper," she said when they were on their way downstairs for breakfast. "Mrs. Dowling, that is. There will be a great deal to learn, and I am eager to begin." "But not today," he said. "You must need to spend time with your steward after such a long absence," she said. "But not today," he said again. "Today we will start with the gallery, though we will not spend a great deal of time there when the weather is so good. We will go outside, and I will show you the park." A day of pleasure instead of duty? How irresponsible! And how irresistible! "Is that an order?" she asked him, turning her head to
smile at him as they reached the bottom of the staircase and turned in the direction of the breakfast parlor.
He stopped walking rather abruptly, and he was not smiling when he looked back into her eyes. "It was /not/ an order," he said. "You will never hear one of those from me, Maggie." "It will be a holiday because we both wish for it, then," she said, tipping her head to one side, still smiling. "A sort of honeymoon." He raised his eyebrows. "Yes," he said. "Precisely. Though I am not sure I have heard that word more than once or twice in my life." "It is a holiday," she explained, "in celebration of a new marriage." "Oh, yes," he said, "I know what it /is/. It is a span of time in which a newly married couple can give, ah, vigorous attention to their new relationship." "Yes," she said. "Precisely." Oh, she felt very wicked, very carefree, very… /happy/?
So after breakfast they proceeded to the portrait gallery, which ran the whole width of the top floor of the house on the east side and was filled with light from windows on three sides.
The portraits were youthful and cheerful, as Duncan had indicated last evening. And he knew who every painted figure was and could recount numerous anecdotes about them.
It surprised Margaret to see how much he resembled his grandfather as a young man. "Oh," she said, "what a very handsome man he was. And you look just like him, Duncan." "Is that a compliment?" he asked. "I seem to remember your saying that I am not handsome or in any way good-looking." Had she really said that? But she seemed to remember that she had. "I was wrong," she said. "It was because you looked bleak, almost morose. People are always better-looking when they are happy." "I am happy, then?" he asked.
Oh, why did he keep asking questions like that?
She turned to him, stepped closer, and reached up to cup one side of his face with her hand. "I don't know," she said. "I can only guess at all you have suffered in the last five years, Duncan. I can only guess at how you must have longed for some solitude after your bereavement in order to deal with your grief and recover from your loss and enjoy the company of your son.
But you /are/ happier than you were when I first met you. I do not know if returning home here has done that for you or if I have had a hand in it." "And you," he said, setting a hand over hers. "Are /you/ happier, Maggie?" "Than I was when I met you?" she said, and smiled. "I was fleeing Crispin and the Marquess of Allingham at the time, and the realization that all the dreaming and planning I had done over the winter had come to naught. And then I met you. Yes, I am happier. Oh, and I did correct my first impression of your looks on our wedding day. I told you you were beautiful, if you remember." The smile began deep in his eyes and ended by curving his lips upward at the corners and lighting up his whole face. "I was naked," he said. "Perhaps my body is prettier than my face." "But your face is part of your body," she protested, and they both laughed.
Oh, it felt very good, she thought as she rested her free hand on his shoulder, to laugh together over something so absurd. The sun, slanting in through the south window, bathed them in light and warmth.
She moved away from him to look out through the window, and he followed her. The view was very similar to the one they had from their bedchamber. When they moved to one of the east windows they could look down upon the flower garden. It had been built over a series of low stone walls, which were almost like steps in the hillside. There were roses growing there and pansies, marigolds, hyacinths, sweet peas, daisies – oh, almost every flower Margaret could think of, all rioting together in a glorious mix of color and height and size and texture, and all apparently spilling downward to the river.
Someone had wanted both wildness and cultivation in that garden and had succeeded wonderfully well. There were a few wrought iron seats set among the flowers, she could see. "Was that your mother's creation?" she asked. "My grandmother's when she lived here as a young wife," he said. "I have always thought it lovelier than any carefully regimented formal gardens I have seen." They strolled on to look out the north window. There was a cobbled terrace directly below the house and then a steep bank ending at the river. There were a few low trees on the slope and masses of wildflowers. There was a boathouse and a short jetty off to the left.
And beyond the river was a long avenue, whose grass surface had been shaved so close that it might almost have been used as a bowling green.
There was a stone structure in the distance, at the end of it. Trees lined it on either side, like soldiers. "This is all very, very beautiful," she said.
He took her hand in his and laced his fingers with hers. "Shall we go outside?" They did not go far from the house, though they remained outside for several hours. They did not even return for luncheon. There was so much to see, so much sunshine to be soaked up, so many flowers to be smelled and touched, so many different vistas to be admired. So much talking to do. So many short silences to enjoy, filled with birdsong and the croaking of unseen insects.
They ended up strolling along beside the river behind the house, watching fish dart beneath the surface, watching the slight breeze rippling over it.
The air was warm without being oppressively hot. "There used to be a private little nook down here," he said, "not far from the boathouse. I used to sit there dreaming when I wanted to be alone or inventing some darkly secret club with my cousins. Ah, yes, here it is." It was a small inlet in the bank, grassy and overhung by coarse grasses and shaded by a cluster of bushy trees. It was a place to sit unobserved from the house above.
They settled there side by side. Margaret clasped her knees and gazed out at the light dancing off the river. "This homecoming has been all me, me, me, has it not?" he said after a few minutes of silence. "/My/ home, /my/ park, /my/ ancestors, /my/ memories." She smiled. "But it is my home now too," she said. "I want to learn all I can about it and about you." "But what about you?" he said. "Who are /you/, Maggie? What childhood experiences shaped you into the person you are now?" "It was a very ordinary childhood," she said. "We grew up at the rectory in Throckbridge. It was a smallish house in a small village. We were neither rich nor abjectly poor. At least, I believe we /were/ rather poor, but we were sheltered from the knowledge by a mother who was an excellent manager and a father who preached, and believed, that happiness was something that had little to do with money or possessions." "You were happy, then," he said. "And we had good neighbors," she told him, "including the Dews at Rundle Park. There were a number of children of all ages both there and in the village. We all played together." "And then," he said, "your parents died." "There was some time between the two events," she said. "Our mother died first. It was a terrible blow to all of us. But our lives did not change a great deal – though I suppose our father's did. He was a sadder, quieter man afterward." "How old were you when he died?" he asked her. "Seventeen." "And you promised him," he said, "that you would hold the family together until all of you were grown up and settled." "Yes," she said. "If your father had not died," he said after a while, "you would have married Dew." "Yes," she said. "It is strange, is it not? All these years I have believed that if only that could have happened I would have lived happily ever after. It was all I ever wanted, all I ever dreamed of." "But now you have changed your mind?" he asked. "I can never know how my life would have turned out," she said. "But I think perhaps I would not have been very happy. Even if he had remained devoted to me – and I suppose he might have done if I had been with him all the time – I would have been an officer's wife. I would have followed the drum, and I would have had no settled home all these years, or on into the future." "You would not have enjoyed that?" he asked. "It seemed glamorous at the time," she said. "It has always seemed glamorous since – until recently. But I am not an adventurous person, you know. When I remained home with my brother and sisters, I thought I did so out of necessity. And that was indeed part of the reason – maybe even most of it. But home is where I belong. I do not mean necessarily one particular house and neighborhood. I have never had that attachment as you have. But /home/. Somewhere – some fixed place – that is my own with peo
ple who are my own and neighbors I can like and trust and with whom I can socialize. Somewhere to make into a home not just for myself but for those who are close to me. I do not believe I could bear to be a nomad." The silence stretched for a long time. It was not at all uncomfortable.
Margaret was absorbing what she had just said. It was absolutely the truth. If she had married Crispin at the age of seventeen and gone off with him to the wars, perhaps she would have adapted to the life she would have been forced to live, but she did not think so.
She was a home maker.
She had always been happy making a home for her sisters and Stephen. The only thing missing had been someone to share the heart of the home with her.
She had always thought he was Crispin.
But Crispin, she knew now, could never have filled that role.
And she would not have been entirely happy. /… someone to share the heart of the home with her/.
She rested her forehead on her knees and tightened her arms about her legs.
Would she ever find that someone? Had she found him? If she had not, she never would, would she? She was married.
After a few moments his hand came to rest warmly against the back of her neck. "Maggie," he asked softly, "what is it?" "Nothing," she said, but her voice was thin and high pitched, and before she could clear her throat and say something in a more normal tone, he had unclasped her hands and drawn her down to lie on her side on the grass. He lay close to her, one arm beneath her head.
He dried her eyes with his handkerchief.
She had not realized that she was crying.
She felt very foolish. For so many years she had guarded her emotions.
