‘My father only knew us as children. Adolescents at most. He couldn’t know how different we would become.’
‘We are different. Similar in many respects as well, of course, and that makes us great friends–’
‘And both of us are united in not wishing friendship alone to be the basis of their marriage. Most uncommon.’
‘Yes. Incredibly rare, when one looks around a ballroom. So many people seem to think that friendship is the same thing as love.’ Charles shook his head. ‘But… but it isn’t what you deserve. And it isn’t what I deserve either.’
‘Yes.’ Thank God he could put into words what she felt deep within her. Anne looked at him with all the gratefulness she could muster, feeling light as air. ‘We both deserve more.’
‘We both deserve love.’ Charles frowned. ‘But how to go about finding it?’
‘I—I think it may be a matter of luck.’
‘Yes.’ Charles looked at her carefully. ‘I suppose it could be. Although forgive me for saying so, but—but your eyes lit up a little when you said that.’
‘I don’t think they could have.’
‘I’ve known you for a long time. I’ve known you too long not to know when you’re happy.’ Charles’s tone held nothing more than patient, forgiving curiosity. ‘You’ve already found someone.’
‘Charles, I—’
‘You owe me nothing. No explanations, and certainly no apologies. If we both believe in love, then we must both support it when it happens.’ Charles smiled. ‘Believe me.’
‘I do believe you.’
‘Who is it?’
‘I don’t think you know him.’ Anne swallowed. It felt so unutterably strange to be having this conversation, but it was freeing—like removing the bandage from a long-ago injury and moving the stiff limb. ‘But you may work with his brothers on occasion. John Duke.’
‘John Duke.’ Charles reflected, nodding. ‘I’ve heard the name, even if I don’t know the man.’
Another silence, but a softer one this time. Like the first clear day after weeks of rain, revealing a sunny sky after so many days of cloud.
‘You could have told me a little earlier. We could have saved ourselves the most abominable pain.’ Charles looked at Anne with slight reproach, but the smile he gave was our relief. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘For the same reason you didn’t tell me that a loveless marriage would make you sad. You were meant to be happy with said marriage, and I was meant to be happy with the husband I was supposed to have chosen. Love isn’t meant to–to enter into negotiations.’ Anne sighed. ‘Oh, Charles. I’m sorry. I’ve been cruel.’
‘No. If anything, we’ve both been cruel. Fortunately, we’ve decided to be kind to one another at the end of it.’ Charles took Anne’s hand, gently squeezing it. ‘Is that not better than giving the cruelty precedence?’
‘Yes. But how strange it is, to be this honest.’
‘If we are to continue to be the friends that we always should have been, Anne, then we must be honest with one another from this day forward. We must hide nothing.’ Charles bowed his head. ‘And if you still have fears over lack of funding for your workshop, you must know that–’
‘I don’t. Not anymore. I don’t even know why I was frightened.’
‘And I don’t know why I let you be frightened. Why I didn’t see it.’ Charles sighed heavily. ‘Oh, what fools we are. Let us be what we were meant to be—good friends, with all the help and encouragement such friendship entails.’
‘You are quite the noblest man I know.’
‘I’m not. If I wished to have you as my wife, I’d do my best to keep you.’ Charles smiled. ‘But I don’t.’
‘And what are we to do now?’
‘Well. If I’m in any fit state to plan, which is debatable, we must inform the few friends of ours that consider our marriage a foregone conclusion. Miss Barton, certainly–and I have at least one aunt who’ll be dreadfully disappointed.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Not at all. She loves having something to be disappointed about. Her life would be quite empty with only joy and contentment to think of.’ Charles smiled softly. ‘And you, of course, must go to Mr. Duke. Or Mr. Duke must come to you.’
‘I don’t think he will. He was most determined to give us an unobstructed union.’
‘A considerate man. I like him already.’
‘Oh, Charles.’
‘Now now, Anne.’ Charles gently pushed the teapot towards her. ‘Have another cup of tea, and calm down. We both have nothing left to prove to anyone.’
Anne poured a cup of tea. With shaking hands, she held the cup to her lips. She drank deeply, the taste of the tea washing away the sick, sour nervousness of the morning.
‘It’s true.’ She closed her eyes for a moment, her head slightly bowed. ‘We can be happy.’
He had managed to eat a pie, in the end. Henry had sent a footman out to order eight of them–pigeon, his favourite, from the little chophouse two streets away where all the cooks knew his name. John had devoured four of them, ashamed of his hunger but unable to fight it anymore, and had even started on a fifth before Robert gently pulled him away. The rest had been eaten by his brothers while he had bathed, bathed again, and sat being clipped and pruned into physical respectability while a fleet of maids restored his room to pleasant, sweet-smelling order.
With food, bathing and company, his courage had returned. it had even grown, with the help of Thomas and Robert explaining patiently that nothing had been lost yet. With Edward sprawled on the chaise longue recounting his latest visit to the pleasure house, and Henry idly designing a revolutionary sewer system in-between bites of pie, it almost felt as if normality had arrived again.
There was still everything to play for if he acted quickly. If he managed to push away the shame of asking Anne to live a less splendid life with him, as opposed to a life of endless riches with Charles Weldon, he could make a declaration of his love that offended no-one’s sensibilities beyond repair. He could say his piece, wait for Anne’s response, and live as an honest man.
There were suggestions raised concerning a letter of proposal. Despite eager approval from Thomas and Henry, who for some reason was taking a very active part when it came to the mechanics of marriage, John didn’t like the idea of writing a letter. As fast as the post came and went now, a letter could still arrive far too late.
A physical body, however, could move faster than a letter if one ran. John lay in bed that night, Edward and Henry snoring in rooms nearby, and knew what he was going to do the next morning. When sunrise came, he forced down a boiled egg and some toast under Edward’s watchful eye and left before new discussions could begin.
He couldn’t arrive too late, but neither could he go to the workshop before it was open. It would do him no good. When he arrived in the garment district, the strong scents of fabric dye and leather burning his nostrils, the closed shutters of the shop sent a shock through him that almost made him gasp.
Where could she be? She had no family left, and if she was with Charlotte or Dorothea then Thomas or Robert would have told him. She wasn’t a social butterfly–she enjoyed the fierce fire of creative work and the rest that came afterwards, just as he did…
‘Oh, no.’ He whispered the words to himself. There was only one other place where she could reasonably be.
The location of Charles Weldon’s house was a matter of common knowledge. A prosperous industrialist couldn’t live in privacy, after all. The journey from the workshop to the front door of the towering, gloomy façade of the Weldon townhouse, so simple and straightforward in a carriage, was a slushy, dirty mess of a walk that John attempted to do as quickly as humanly possible.
Finally, panting, he stared up at the large windows and balconies. Ignoring the people having to walk around him, flinching as the loud clop of a horse’s hooves came too close for comfort, John considered his options.
Dramatic declarations felt deep
ly alien to him, no matter how necessary one was at this point. He took a deep breath, jumping out of the way of a cart bearing carnations, and attempted to shout up at the open window. ‘I–Oi!’
His voice was far too quiet, ending on a sort of breathless wheeze. Ignoring a curious look to a nearby man selling roasted chestnuts, John tried again.
‘Oi!’ This time it was loud enough. Too loud, if the startled reactions of passers-by were anything to go by. John stood in agonised stubbornness, his heart beating in his throat as he waited for any reaction from within the Weldon townhouse.
When Charles Weldon appeared on the balcony, he bit his lip so tightly that he was half-sure he tasted blood. He hadn’t been expecting Anne–that would have been too much to hope for–but he had dreamed of her running to him all the same, wearing one of her gowns, her eyes shining with rapturous enthusiasm as she kissed him in the middle of the street. Exactly as Charlotte Pembroke had kissed Robert, shortly before she became Charlotte Duke.
He didn’t want Charles Weldon to run and kiss him in the middle of the street. Neither did he want to fight a duel in the middle of the street, but that seemed the more likely scenario. John squinted up at Charles, trying to see if his fists were clenched or his brow was furrowed, as a spindly butler opened the front door.
‘I don’t want to talk to you. Sorry.’ John spoke as firmly as he could to the butler, his need for Anne tempered by his desire to remain polite in every situation. ‘I need to speak to your master.’
‘And you consider shouting in the middle of the street an appropriate way of attracting my master’s attention?’ The butler sniffed. ‘You will remove yourself from the road, sir, or I will summon the–’
‘Don’t worry, Wilkins. I’ll deal with it.’ Charles Weldon sounded different to how John had imagined him. A rather stiff, buttoned-up gentleman to the eye, his voice rang with joy. Please let that joy not relate to Anne in any way. ‘Well? Who are you?’
He couldn’t introduce himself. He hadn’t got the words in his head; he only had the sentence he’d prepared, and that was wavering. ‘I wish to speak to Miss Fletcher.’
‘I… oh.’ Weldon peered down from the balcony. ‘Is it you?’
John tried to keep his expression as neutral as possible. ‘Beg pardon?’
‘Is it you? You! Are you John Duke, or not?’
This wasn’t promising at all. Still–if he was going to be brave, this was the way to go about it. ‘Yes. I am. And I’ll have you know that–’
‘Wonderful! That’s wonderful!’ Weldon clapped his hands. ‘Excellent!’
Being greeted with such joy by the man was only mildly less surprising than being kissed in the middle of the street. John stiffened, trying not to display his complete confusion.
‘Anne’s here. She’ll want to speak to you.’ Charles leant back into the room that bordered the balcony; John heard his muffled voice. ‘He’s downstairs! Go and speak to him!’
‘Excuse me.’ If he didn’t ask what on earth was going on, he wasn’t going to get a chance to be brave at all. ‘Do you mind telling me what’s—’
‘We don’t love one another!’
‘Beg pardon?’
‘Not in the slightest! We’re friends, of course, friends as ever we were—probably better friends, if truth be told!’ Charles held out his hands, beaming, for all the world as if he were about to serenade the street. ‘Isn’t it the best news you’ve ever heard!’
The man had to have taken leave of his senses. Shouting such intimate details of one’s life in public certainly hinted at a loss of reason. John blinked, wondering what on earth to do, before a sudden rustle of skirts behind the half-open front door took all of his attention.
Anne. Anne bursting out from behind the front door, the butler throwing up his hands in professional despair. Anne, her dress wrinkled and her hair dishevelled, her face full of a glow that made her even more exquisite.
John looked up to the balcony, where Charles Weldon was beaming down at the two of them. Nodding, trying to communicate both gratitude and a clear need to be left alone, he sighed with quiet relief as Charles waved and went back inside.
‘You’re here.’ Anne’s voice was barely above a whisper. She sounded so tired—Lord, the pain they had given one another for no good reason! ‘You’re really here.’
‘I couldn’t stay away. I couldn’t.’
‘We were both so sure.’
‘I know. I decided to be noble, and damn near starved to death. So I decided to be brave instead.’ John blinked; she couldn’t be standing in front of him in the doorway of the Weldon townhouse. Charles Weldon couldn’t have shouted down the words that would alter his life with such cheerful lightness, as if he was saying nothing of importance. ‘Although I think I might have died. None of this can be real.’
‘It is. It absolutely is. Take my hand.’ There it was, her palm in his, warm and strong and living. John took it, squeezing it tight, not caring that he was in public. He would take both hands–he would kiss her too. ‘It’s real.’
‘And I must tell you that I would be being brave even in less fortunate circumstances. Even if Mr. Weldon had decided to make trouble. I would have been very brave indeed.’
‘I know.’ Anne nodded eagerly. ‘And I would have been too. I would have been forthright, and honest, and… and…’
‘I know.’ John shook his head, smiling. ‘We’re both such terrible cowards.’
‘Tremendously so.’ Anne’s laughter had a touch of hysteria. ‘We never would have said anything.’
‘We would have been terribly noble and dreadfully sad for the rest of our lives.’
‘But we would have loved one another until we were dust.’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘Because I love you, John Duke.’
‘And I love you.’
‘And being noble dust is infinitely worse than being a loving, imperfect human.’
‘I quite agree, Miss Fletcher.’ Ushering her into the comforting darkness of the entrance hall, taking advantage of the brief, sweet moment of unobserved silence, John kissed her until he saw stars. Endless, white-hot stars that burned in the firmament of his future. ‘I quite agree.’
THE END
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