by Matilda Hart
“You are carrying my child, Anna?” he asked, his voice tender and full of wonder.
“I am carrying our child, yes,” she said.
He took her hands in his own and kissed each one in turn. “I do not know whether to apologize to you for the harm I have caused you with this pregnancy, or to thank you for the gift that you have given me,” he confessed. “All I know is that I need to hold you and kiss you and keep you with me always.”
Anna held herself still. His words were just what she would want to hear, but she held back, because he had not said the magic ones.
“I will never be your mistress, Daniel,” she said. “So if you want me in that role, then when I leave today, that is the last time you will see me. All I came here to do was to let you know that we will be parents, and I will need your support to care for our child.”
He stood up and paced away from her, before turning to face her once more. “You will never want for a thing, as long as you live,” he promised her, “and our child will be raised as the son of a Marquess.”
“You would take my child from me?” she asked, panic pitching her voice higher.
He hastened to reassure her. “No, Anna, no! But I will acknowledge him as mine.”
Anna considered that a moment before shaking her head. “I would prefer that your connection to our child be kept private,” she said. “I have no wish for my son to be sneered at as the byblow of the nobility. That is not a stigma that any child should have to bear.”
He flinched. “Anna, you know that if I could I would give you the world!”
“The only thing I want from you, Your Lordship, is the only thing you will not give me.” She stood up. There was no more to say. She had told him, and now all that remained was to tell her parents and to prepare for the birth of her child.
“I will make all legal arrangements,” he said, and will have my solicitor bring the documents for you to sign. As the mother of my firstborn, you will be well taken care of, I promise you.”
Anna nodded and turned away. He was at the door before she could open it, and she said, “Thank you! And I wish you every happiness in your marriage, whenever it occurs.”
Then she passed through the door he held open for her and made her way to the front, where the butler showed her out.
Chapter 6
The party was in full swing, the engaged couple having yet another dance as their indulgent parents watched and beamed with delight. The assembled guests were few in number, but Daniel felt as though a noose had been tied around his neck and he was being choked to death. Only that morning, his father had again demanded to know when he would propose to Isabel. It was time to act, and yet he found himself unable to get past the fact that the woman he loved was having a child he could not acknowledge publicly, and that she had cut him out of her life once again. And he freely admitted that the fault was entirely his own. He didn’t want to think about anything, and yet he was being forced to consider everything. Isabel had been trying for the last two days to speak privately with him, and he had managed to dodge her, but he knew it was the coward’s way, and he faced the fact that he had to act as the man of honor he wanted to be. Which meant he had to face the woman he did not love who expected him to marry her, because he had put his life on the line for her honor.
He turned through the doors to the balcony, and recalled another night, the night when he had first begun to realize that Annabelle Tracy was the woman he was interested in pursuing, the one that he wanted to adore, the one that he loved. Tonight there was no moon, and the stars were all hidden behind a heavy blanket of clouds. The scent of rain was in the air, mingling with the scent of Casablanca lilies and four o’clocks. Daniel wanted to weep, but knew tears were useless in a situation that demanded action. He must act, for his happiness as well as for the women who needed him. There was no easy answer to his dilemma, but he had brought it upon himself, and he would bear the guilt of the fallout from his decision.
He turned and walked purposefully back into the crowded living room, only to find his way blocked by Isabel.
“Daniel, a word, I pray you,” she said, and he nodded and led her to the side, within eyesight but not hearing distance of anyone who wished to ensure that they obeyed the rules.
“I have come to a decision,” she said, “and I wish to let you know before I announce it to everyone else. It is only right that you know first.”
“Isabel,” he said, “you must know that I would do anything to protect you.”
She stopped him with a smile. “And that is how this all began. You have proven yourself to be a true and loyal friend to me for all the years that we have known each other, and I have repaid you by putting you in an untenable position. I know that something had changed with you, and I saw the young woman who came to see you yesterday. I know what you will never tell me, Daniel, and I will not allow you to sacrifice your happiness for mine a moment more.”
Daniel was stunned into silence. He let her continue, because he did not know what to say..
“I came into a small inheritance when my parents died, and my aunt who resides in Florence, with whom I have been sharing my dilemma, insists that I come there to be her companion. I have been thinking about it for more than a month, and she has asked me to give her an answer soon. I have made up my mind. This is for the best, for both of us.”
“Isabel, I don’t know what to say except thank you,” he said at last, wishing he could convey the depth of his gratitude in more than words.
“You can say that you will come and visit me when you are wed, and bring your beautiful wife with you,” she said. “That will be thanks enough. I am at peace, Daniel, for the first time in a long while. I needed the respite you and your family provided, but the time has come to move on. I am grateful to you more than you can ever know, and I will always be your friend.”
Smiling widely at him, she turned away and went to sit with his mother, who cast him an inquiring look. He merely smiled, knowing that she would think he had good news for her. Well, in a manner of speaking, he did, but not of the sort she was expecting. And he knew it would not be the most welcome news for her or for his father, but as he had told her all those weeks ago, he was tired of living for the will of others. It was time to be his own man.
To that end, he made a visit to his beloved’s home on a Saturday morning when he knew Anna would be at the river doing laundry for her mother. The lady of the house was there, and happily, so was the man of the house, who remembered him from the affair with the butcher’s son. They invited him, clearly puzzled as to why he would be visiting them. He set about telling them.
“I must tell you, Mr. and Mrs. Tracy, that you will be the first to hear what I have to say. And I must beg your forgiveness, for some of what you will hear will anger you. I take full responsibility for everything that has occurred, and I have come to make full restitution.”
Lavinia offered him some cider, but he refused, knowing that by the end, she might prefer to throw it in his face than to offer it as a drink.
“I have fallen in love with your daughter,” he began. “I first met her on a Saturday morning when she went to the river to wash the fabrics her mother had dyed. I had had a tumble off my horse, and was battered and bruised. She kindly led me back into the village. Her beauty captured me at once, and I wanted to meet her again. So I went back to the river the following Saturday. She was there, and we talked, and I found her to be witty, cheerful, amusing, dutiful to her parents, and courageous.”
He paused, gathering his thoughts. “When Clancy attacked her, I was glad to be there to protect her honor, but I’m afraid I forgot to protect her from myself.”
“I seduced Anna two months ago by the river,” he said. Looking her father square in the eye. “I did her wrong in so doing, one because she was a virgin, and two because I was in a situation from which I did not think I could escape, and I could not therefore choose to marry her.”
Henry Tracy had been surprisingly silent. Finally, he
asked a question. “Are you betrothed to another?” he asked, his voice dangerously low.
Daniel was happy not to have to equivocate. “No sir, I am not. However, at the time, I was tied to an expectation that meant I might as well have been.” At the puzzled look on their faces, he went on to explain about Isabel.
“So you are no longer expected to marry this woman?” her mother asked.
“My parents probably still think I will marry her, but I have been released by Isabel herself. Which brings me to why I am here.”
“A moment, Your Lordship,” Henry said. “Why have you chosen to tell us before your parents?”
“It is simple, sir. You are the ones I have wronged. Reparations must first be made to you.”
Apparently satisfied, Henry sat back and Daniel continued. “It is my wish to marry your daughter as soon as I am able. I have come to ask you both for your forgiveness, and for her hand in marriage.”
He inhaled deeply. He had done it. He had made a clean breast of his actions, both good and bad, and now it was up to these two people to decide his fate. He waited anxiously, not really knowing what to expect, and then Henry spoke.
“I have been alive a long time, Your Lordship,” he said, “and I have met a lot of men, some of whom are the salt of the Earth, and some the scum.”
Daniel felt his heart trip up...was this man about to call him scum? It would be no better than he deserved, but still it hurt. He stiffened his spine, prepared to hear the worst.
“I can in all honesty say that you, sir, are salt. You did some bad things, indeed, and for that no doubt you will be punished. Our actions, both good and ill, always come back to haunt us. But you have done some good, as well. And it is because you are a man of honor that I will allow you to address my daughter. She has always been a dreamer, our Annabelle, and it seems that her dreams will finally come true.”
Daniel’s shoulders relaxed, and he smiled. “Thank you, sir,” he said, shaking his future father-in-law’s hand.
“No doubt you will wish to see her when she returns,” Henry went on, but Daniel stopped him.
“No sir, not quite yet. I have a plan for that, and I will let you know as soon as it comes to fruition. In the meantime, I would like this visit to be kept a secret from her.”
“It will be hard to do so, sir, as you have been observed coming in to visit,” her mother said.
“Well, then the exact nature of the visit can be the secret that you keep,” he said. “I know that I can depend on you to make the surprise grand for her.”
The woman preened, as though her ability to keep a secret had just been challenged, and she was going to prove him wrong. He smiled at her, and she beamed.
He stood and made his way to the front door. “I cannot thank you both enough for trusting me. I promise to look after Anna until the day I die.”
When he left, he felt as though the weight of the whole world had lifted off his shoulders. He spied her coming along the road and slipped into a copse of trees, waiting till she had shut her front door before emerging to ride back to the manor house. Now it was time to inform his parents. Isabel and he would do it together. They had discussed it after breakfast, and because she wanted to be on her way as early as possible, she needed to return to London to make final arrangements. He had sent word to his solicitors to book a passage for her on the next ship to Italy, and to facilitate her journey to Florence once she arrived. She would meet with his solicitors to settle her itinerary and the she would be off.
Dinner that evening was a quiet affair, almost as though his parents sensed a change in the weather and didn’t know which way the wind blew. He waited until the butler had withdrawn from the living room after dinner to broach the subject on everyone’s mind.
“Mother, Father, Isabel and I have something to say to you both.” He turned to Isabel, cutting off his mother who was about to make an excited statement of congratulations. “You go first,” he told her.
“Your Grace, Lady Violet, I will be traveling to Florence to be companion to my aunt. I expect to be gone within the week. I wanted to thank you, and Daniel, for being such dear and kind friends to me in my troubles. You have done more to help me than anyone can imagine, and I will always be grateful to you. But the time has come for me to move on. I’ll be leaving tomorrow morning, and wanted to say my thank you’s before then.”
She rose gracefully as she spoke and said, “I think what Daniel has to tell you is best kept in the family. I will say goodnight now.”
She closed the door quietly on her way out, and Daniel sat forward in his chair. He took a deep breath and plunged in.
“I have met someone,” he began, and his mother looked over at his father, who smiled a knowing smile.
“Your mother said as much to me,” he remarked. “Is this why Isabel is leaving? Did you tell her about the woman?”
“Isabel informed me of her decision last evening before I had a chance to tell her anything,” he said.
“Who is this woman?” his mother asked.
“Her name is Annabelle. Annabelle Tracy.”
He waited, knowing that his father would eventually recognize her surname. And when he did, he exploded, just as Daniel had expected.
“You wish to bring a chit from the village into our family? Her father is a hunter. Her mother is a seamstress. What can she have in common with us?”
“She is with child by me,” he said.
A long silence followed, in which Daniel heard the ticking of the clock like a death knell.
“And this is why you wish to marry the girl? Surely you jest! She would not be the first strumpet who opened her legs…”
“Father,” Daniel said, his voice raw with anger, “you will never refer to the woman I love in those terms again. She is not a strumpet. She did not seduce me. I seduced her. And she ended our affair when I told her I might have to marry another.”
His mother tried to placate him. “Daniel, you must understand that your father and I have your best interests at heart,” she said.
“If you care for me, and wish the best for me, you will not oppose my marriage to Anna,” he said adamantly. She is the woman I love, and now that she is carrying my child, I will never leave her side again.”
Another long, uncomfortable silence followed, and then his father spoke. “Have you spoken to her parents?”
“They know the whole sordid story. All except that she is with child. I thought it best to let her be the one to tell them that, especially as I didn’t know whether or not they already knew.”
“No doubt you were eagerly accepted,” his father said sarcastically.
Daniel ignored the jab. “I want your assurance that you will not interfere in this,” he said. “If you cannot give me your blessing, at least give me your word that you will do nothing to hinder this union.”
“When is the wedding to be?” his mother asked.
“When Anna says yes,” he said.
“You have not asked her yet?” his father said hopefully.
“She will not say no,” he said. “That was the reason she left me, because I did not ask her to be my wife.”
“We will hold our own counsel until you tell us what her reply is. Then you will know our decision. Are you prepared to be disinherited?”
His father’s question shook him, but he had known it could come to that. “If you feel that I cannot be your son unless I marry someone you choose for me, then you must do what you will,” he said.
HIs words clearly shocked his father, but he noted the small smile that played about his mother’s lips. She was scheming. As long as it didn’t involve his beauty, he didn’t care what they did.
Chapter 7
Anna sat with her niece in her lap, singing softly to her while her mother went to help the midwife with a difficult birth. George had been called to his father’s house on business, and her mother had surprisingly had nothing for her to do. It was a Saturday, but she was happy to be free to help her siste
r. She was three months along herself, and her belly had just begun to sprout a little bit, still not enough for anyone to notice, except her mother, which had forced her to tell her parents the news. They were curiously silent when she told them, neither one showing any sign of anger. It puzzled her, but she was grateful that they had not thrown her out on her ear for bringing disgrace to the family.
The house was quiet. John had gone with his father to the vicarage, and she was alone, except for the cat and her kittens, who were all ensconced for the moment in the basket by the door, snoozing away the afternoon. A knock sounded on the door, and she rose with the baby to answer it. Daniel stood before her, carrying a large bouquet and a basket.
“Good morrow, my beauty,” he said. “May I come in?”
“No one is here, Your Lordship,” she replied. “I am just watching my niece until my sister returns.”
