by Carla Kelly
Her eyes filled with tears. “He had his heart so set on Winchester,” she managed and then hurried to keep up with Jim as he lengthened his stride.
“So he did. It won't do Ralph any harm to be incarcerated in a counting house for this spring and summer.” He gave her a little nudge with his shoulder. “Your father—Ellen, he does improve upon further acquaintance—your father and I both agree that he should have ample time to think about his future while totting up Uncle B's columns.”
He paused before the entrance to the Physic Garden and pointed to the gate. “Magnificent example of Inigo Jones's art. Memorize it for Miss Medford, and follow me, my dear.”
“But I don't understand,” she said, out of breath, as she hurried after him.
“Oh, beg pardon,” he said, slowing down and taking her by the hand this time. “Neither did Ralph. He cut up a bit ugly, in fact. Your father and I agree, especially after that display of temper, that a counting house right now is just the thing for Ralph. If he is still of the opinion that it must be Shakespeare and nothing else, he will be granted admission to Winchester this fall.”
“Oh, my,” was all Ellen could say.
“The two papers he wrote were excellent,” the marquess continued. “With that, and the fact that I am a trustee of that fine old institution, I foresee no difficulties for your brother.”
She squeezed his hand, and he smiled but said nothing more as they strolled about the garden, which contained nothing of interest in early March beyond a few bare stalks of one mysterious plant or another and the ragged remnants of apothecary herbs.
She waited for him to protest his love again and declare himself as he had done on a regular basis any number of times these past few weeks. When he did not, the flutter of anticipation in Ellen's stomach turned into a gnawing pain.
He led her finally to a bench and sat her down. He did not sit but paced the ground in front of her. “We discussed you too, my dear. Squire Grimsley enumerated your numerous virtues and undeniably beautiful parts.” He chuckled and sat down beside her. “I had to remind him that you are stubborn and willful and tenacious, when it comes to scholarship.”
She turned her face away from the quizzical look in his eyes.
“Then you don't love me after all,” she said slowly, wishing that the bench were closer to the gate and she could leap up and disappear in a crowd of shoppers on the street.
“I didn't say that, Ellen,” he exclaimed, his hand on her arm. “And don't bolt, please. I'm not done by half.”
She winced at his words but sat where she was.
“I merely state that I am well-acquainted with your faults, as well as your virtues.” He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, looking straight ahead. “And it happens that I share some of them.” He glanced at her. “Don't look so stricken! What do you think love is?”
“I have been asking myself that for some time now,” she replied finally, when the silence threatened to overwhelm her. She turned to face him. “Horry is Edwin's lapdog, and Mama is so afraid of Papa's bad humor that she does not give him sound advice when he needs it. They are my only examples, and it is not too satisfactory.”
The tears spilled onto her cheeks, and the marquess made no comment about them as he handed her his handkerchief. “No, it is not too satisfactory, if this is your glimpse of married love.”
She blushed. “I suppose we should not be having this discussion, Jim,” she said quietly.
“On the contrary, I contend that more couples should have this conversation before they do something rash and irrevocable.”
His words chilled her to the bone. She could not look at him.
He has changed his mind, she thought, and the idea filled her head almost to bursting. She forced herself to listen to him.
“Do you know what my example has been, Ellen? A father who married for convenience and thought nothing of keeping his light skirts on the family premises.” He stood up then, and walked to the edge of the garden path. “By all the saints, how humiliating it was for my mother!”
“I … I had no idea,” Ellen said.
He shrugged. “She is a silly, vain woman, with no ideas beyond the latest fashions and the arrangements of furniture. But I contend that no one, no matter how frivolous, deserves to be hurt like that. I vowed I would never do it, and I shall not.”
He sat down again. “So here we are, with your silly notions, and mine.” He took her hand. “How cold your fingers are! Where are your gloves?”
She shook her head, unable to speak. He kissed her fingers. “And we must add another ingredient to this witch's brew, Ellen. I can't tell you how I have been hounded and chased by delicate females of impeccable background who would love to partake of the Gatewood monetary benevolence. And all their family members.”
Ellen closed her eyes. “Go ahead, Jim, add Ralph and Gordon to your list. Gordon has probably petitioned you, has he not?” she said, her voice scarcely a whisper.
Gatewood smiled. “Oh, my, yes. But since that first time a couple of weeks ago, we have enjoyed several illuminating conversations. Do you know, my dear, he wears well with repeated conversations.”
“Gordon?” she asked, her eyes wide with amazement. “My brother Gordon?”
“Yes, Gordon,” he said. “Possibly you have not given him his due. Ah, well. I even heard from Horatia this week, who expects me to make Edwin a peer of the realm or something. Oh. Ellen, come back!”
She had bolted from the bench, her whole goal in life to reach Inigo Jones's gateway. Propriety would keep them from continuing this conversation, once they were in the street. And I thought to petition him for myself, she said to herself as she hurried along the path. Love has made me a fool.
He had her by the arm then, pulling her around to face him.
“I'm not finished, Ellen,” he said, his voice low, pleading, nothing in it of disgust. “Ellen! People are always going to be asking me for things! It is my lot in life.” He gave her a little shake. “When this term is over, I am finished at All Souls.”
“What?” she asked, hardly believing her ears.
“There won't be another year here, or two more years, or a lifetime of sweet scholarship. I am the head of a large, silly, demanding family. I am the Gatewood freak of nature because I do not enjoy their idle pastimes.”
He watched her closely to make sure she would not run and then pulled her down onto a bench near the gate. “You're going to hear all of this, my dear Ellen.”
She only nodded.
“Now, lean against me like a good girl,” he said. “That's much better. My relatives all laugh at me and wring their hands over me, and wonder when I will have the good sense to become like them. They are distraught because I do not gamble and race horses, and dip snuff to perfection, and moon about because my tailor doesn't put enough buckram wadding in my coats.”
“It's hard to believe,” she murmured.
“Believe it,” he said, his arm tight around her shoulders. “If you were to marry me, you would be marrying into a sillier family than the one you belong to. They would wear you out with their demands and petitions. You might even extend that disgust to me. That is what I greatly fear.”
She leaned away from him just to straighten her skirt, and he quickly took his arm from around her shoulders. “I thought I had hoped too much,” he said, his voice low. He got to his feet. “My dear, let me walk you back to St. Hilda's.” He kissed her hand and held it for a lingering moment. “And now the term is almost up. My property manager has done yeoman's duty this year, overseeing the estates, but he has assured me in numerous correspondences that he is retiring in June. I have to go back to Hertfordshire and learn how to manage land, crops, tenants, sheep, and cattle.”
“Country life is not so onerous,” Ellen said. She tried to take his arm again, but he had moved away.
He looked back at her and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “You see, there wouldn't be any trips to explore and map the world,
Ellen. There won't be much leisure to study, either.” He chuckled without any mirth. “I am destined to become a gentleman farmer who falls asleep over his soup at dinner because he is so tired. And when I am in London, I will be expected to spend my time in frivolity, or endure the constant remarks of my stupid relatives.”
“Sticks and stones, my lord …”
He nodded. “I know. I know. But, you know, El, the constant niggling and wrangling wears away at me, until it becomes easier to forget I ever had any dreams of my own.”
Ellen joined him then and walked along in silence beside him.
How stupid I have been about men, she thought. She hesitated and then linked her arm through his. He looked at her in surprise.
“Forgive me,” she said suddenly.
“For what?” Gatewood asked.
“For feeling sorry for myself because I am a woman. Forgive me for thinking you were so lucky and independent and could do whatever you wanted because you are a man.”
He was silent for the length of the block. “Forgiven,” he said finally, his voice unsure. “Forgiven time and time again, my dear.”
The streets were almost empty of shoppers now as people hurried home to dinner. She slowed her steps, willing him to propose to her again.
He walked with her in silence up the shallow steps of St. Hilda's, worn smooth by centuries of scholars. He took her hand at the top, and she held her breath.
“Ellen, thank you for hearing me out.” He kissed her hand and pressed it briefly against his chest. “And thank you for being such a welcome addition to my life this year at Oxford.”
He cleared his throat, and she slowly let out her breath. Oh, please, she thought.
“Well, let us part as friends, my very dear Ellen Grimsley, who has such plans to take the world apart and reassemble it. I wish I could help you, but my time will never be my own.”
He turned to go, stepping down until his face was hidden by the lengthening shadows of early evening. “April will be a busy month at All Souls. Let us do meet again in May before the term ends.”
“But …”
“Good-bye.”
F THERE WAS EVER A WORSE APRIL ON RECORD in the British Isles, Ellen Grimsley didn't know of it. Usually it was her favorite month. She did not even mind drinking the horrible black brew that Mama inflicted on all her children in April to flush the miseries of winter out of their systems. She tolerated the rain because it was not a freezing rain anymore, and it would inevitably lead to a flowering of the English countryside, an event of such heart-breaking sweetness that Ellen knew she could never live anywhere else, even if she did travel the world.
But this April was different, preoccupied as she was by the greatest misery she had ever known. The rain was only rain, colder and more pelting this year, filling the gutters, drizzling down the windows, contributing to a general dampness in the air that did nothing to relieve the ache in her heart.
He still sent her flowers every Wednesday, but there was never a note anymore. She could only wonder if James Gatewood harbored some affection still or had merely neglected to tell the florist to discontinue the standing order in his rush to put her out of his mind and heart.
Her studies were sawdust and dry toast. She stared at her books for hours, deriving no information from the pages. Once, during geometry, she looked up from the meaningless page to see Miss Medford regarding her, a worried frown on her face. Ellen wanted to throw herself on her knees in front of the headmistress and sob out her misery, but she merely turned the page and attempted to apply the wisdom of Pythagoras.
Walks were little help. The favorite route from St. Hilda's took them by a small house with a sign in the window, “To let.” Blowing trash from a long winter had accumulated on the front steps, in perfect harmony with a shutter that banged back and forth, and the windows bereft of curtains that stared back like hollow eyes.
She felt like that empty house, abandoned, neglected, dark. She would always turn away from it when they passed, and then would be drawn to look back, and suffer all over again. And then she would return to her room, only to stare at the flowers and ask herself over and over, “Why didn't I say yes when he asked me?”
It became the last question she asked herself each night before she blew out her candle, and the first thing she thought of each morning. And from the way her head ached and her stomach hurt, it must have bothered her in her sleep too.
Letters from home were no balm to her wounds. Ralph mailed back the student's gown and breeches she had sent him off in. “It's not safe for me to keep them here, especially since I will soon be with Uncle Breezly,” he had written. “And I think I know what they mean to you.”
Horry wrote too, all misspellings and enthusiasm for the married state. She dropped a hint about a blessed event far in the future and hoped that Ellen would stroll the aisle soon enough with Lord Chesney so that she could participate without embarrassment.
Ellen sent no reply to either letter. What could she say? She dreaded her return home, and the disappointment that her unwelcome news would cause. Mama would give her no peace, compelling her to go over and over again all that she had said and done to disgust Lord Chesney. Papa would storm and rage and call her ungrateful.
When the pain was too great to bear, Ellen tried the other tack, convincing herself that she never loved him anyway, and they never would have suited. “I would surely have been a disappointment to Lord Chesney,” she told herself each night as part of her consoling catechism. “Even if his family is silly, they are still peers. I would be so out of place. It is better this way. And besides, I'm still not so sure that I loved him.”
Then why don't you feel any better? she asked herself one afternoon when the sky was bluer than blue and the willows along the river had finally burst into bloom. She could see the Isis from her window. With a pang, she observed that students were already out punting.
I wonder if he even thinks of me, Ellen thought as she leaned her elbows on the open window and watched the little boats drift past. He is probably too busy.
When the maid knocked on the door, she jumped. “Someone to see you below, miss,” the maid said and giggled behind her hand.
Ellen leaped to her feet, patting at her hair and cramming her feet into her slippers. She straightened her dress on the way down the stairs, regretting that it was her least attractive kerseymere.
Gordon waited below. “Oh,” she said from the doorway. “It's you.”
He smiled. “Who did you expect, the chancellor of the exchequer?”
She shook her head.
“Speaking of which, dear El, are you sure you won't make me a small loan?”
“Gordon! The quarter has only begun!” she exclaimed, irritated out of her lethargy. “How can you possibly be under the hatches?”
“It's an easy matter when your chambermate is practically a faro dealer,” he grumbled. “I shall never turn a card with him again. Ellen, it is a matter of a gambling debt. Surely you will help.”
He named the sum, and she paled. “I have not half that amount, Gordon. Whatever were you thinking?” she said.
“I was thinking that I would eventually get lucky,” he said.
“Oh, Gordon.”
He regarded her low state. “Really, El, can't you do any better than that? I expected at least a resounding scold, and all you can do is look hangdog and tell me ‘Oh, Gordon.’ ”
When she said nothing, he took her by the arm. “Come on, El, let's escape from the halls of academe.” He overrode the excuse already forming on her lips. “I saw Miss Medford when I came in, and she suggested that I do this very thing. Said you were blue-deviled about something.”
The afternoon was warm, and she did not shiver, even though Gordon wouldn't give her a moment to grab up a pelisse, or even a bonnet. He held her hand, content to stroll along.
“What do you say we turn into the Physic Garden?” he asked. Tears came to her eyes and she pulled back on his hand. “I couldn't pos
sibly go there,” she said.
“Very well, then, Ellen,” he said, his voice less certain. “My word, you remind me of Lord Chesney. I've never seen anyone so down in the dumps.”
Her eyes flew to his face. “Have you seen him lately?”
“Only this morning.”
“I had no idea you visited him.”
He smiled at her confusion. “Oh, I've been doing that off and on for some weeks now.” He laughed. “And now you're going to ask me whose idea that was! Well, it was his at first, but now I go because I like his company. Do you know, El, he's quite an engaging sort, when one looks beyond all that blasted scholarship.”
“I know,” she whispered and then humiliated herself by bursting into tears.
If she had done that six months ago, Gordon would have turned and fled, or laughed in her face. Instead, he pulled her into the shelter of an alley and held her close, patting her back until her tears stopped.
“Poor dear,” he said. “I suppose you will tell me now that Lord Chesney has changed his mind.”
She nodded and blew her nose vigorously on the handkerchief he gave her. “He teased and teased all term,” she wailed, “proposing over and over, and then when I finally thought it would be a good idea, he didn't.”
“Scurvy rascal,” Gordon said mildly, kissing her cheek. “No wonder he hasn't been much fun lately. I go to his chamber for good conversation and better ale, and he stares into the fire and doesn't hear half of what I say.”
“I think I love him,” she said, sniffing back her tears, “but how will I ever know for sure now?”
“Well, you could propose to him,” Gordon suggested.
“I could never!” she gasped.
They stared back toward St. Hilda's. “I'm fresh out of ideas, El,” Gordon said finally. “You know ideas aren't my strong suit. Now, if you want me to call him out or something …”
Ellen put her hand on his arm. “No, don't do anything, Gordon,” she said hastily. “And I'm sorry I cannot help you with that gambling debt. I'll give you what I have.”
