How Do I Love Thee? (27 page)

And then there was silence. Silence on the outside, but within . . . such a cacophony of noise arose within me, as if every thought, every emotion, every aspiration ever pondered had been awakened and were all talking at once, giving their opinions and offering advice. I pressed my hands against my head, trying to contain—

Wilson rushed into the room, out of breath. I had not even heard herreturn up the stairs. “How did it—?” Upon seeing me she stopped short. “Miss? Are you all right?”

I lowered my hands, but the inner noise did not dissipate. “I am . . . I am fine.”

Wilson gave me one of her appraising looks and put her hands upon her hips. “You don’t look fine, not one little bit. In fact, I am thinking you need to get in your bed right this minute. I could make you a draught to help you sleep and—”

Sleep was the last thing I wanted. “Coffee,” I said. “I want strong coffee.”

“But it will only keep you awake and—”

“Yes.”

She eyed me a moment, then smiled. “Mr. Browning riled you up, didn’t he?”

“He did no such thing.”

Her smiled broadened. “Begging your pardon, but by that blush upon your face, I’d say you were lying to me.”

“Just get me the coffee, Wilson. And be quick about it.” I added, “Please.”

“Yes’m,” she said. But she was smiling as she left.

Which caused me to do the same. Although I was not unfamiliar with the facial expression, today, at this moment, it sprang from a deeper place than had heretofore been tapped.

What did it mean? I did not know.

But I liked it. Immensely.

Wilson brought the coffee and I drank two cups, wishing to prolong the swell of my happiness. But my elation was short-lived. In its place came the flood of pent-up feelings that had assailed me upon Robert’s departure. The initial delight gave way to second-guessing. What did he truly think of me? Had I made a good impression? Had he enjoyed our encounter as much as I?

I relived every memory, testing each word, each gesture, each expression through the filter of the rationality that came with the passage of time. I expected to find differences between what I had felt within the moment and what I could study from a distance. Yet I was pleasantly surprised to find there was no alteration. The heady euphoria of our conversation held fast—each witty comment, each compliment, each smile, each laugh, each . . . touch.

I singled out touch as the one element, the one singular sensation that was completely new to me. I could not remember ever touching or being touched by a man who was not a relative or a doctor delivering his healing.

And yet, Robert had taken my hand as easily as if such contact were the norm. Which made me . . . Had Robert been close to many women? Surely he had. He was a dynamic, charismatic, handsome man who traveled through society with more ease than I traveled from one side of my room to the other.

The tug in my midsection shocked me. What was this odd sensation? Could it . . . no, certainly it could not be . . . yet it must be . . .

Jealousy?

I gasped at the knowledge.

I had not been immune to this vice—Mrs. Norton, in particular, elicited its fire in me—but I had never experienced its bite in regard to a man. A young man, at least. I held dim memories of feeling jealous of Mr. Boyd’s attentions towards others, and yet that was not the same. Mr. Boyd was decades my senior. He had been introduced into our family as a tutor, and had remained a mentor, with me his adoring pupil. There had been no touch of a man, as a
man
. . . .

I had been ill since I was a young teen. My entire womanly years had been spent set apart from the normal places where girls met boys and let nature and romance take their course. I had told myself I did not care, that I—among all females—did not need or desire
amour
.

And this is not that.

“No, it is not,” I said aloud. “Stop being the silly schoolgirl. It is utterly inappropriate and unbecom—”

I stopped chastising myself when I heard footsteps upon the stairs. Papa’s footsteps! I looked to the clock. It was time for our evening prayers. Normally I looked forward to this time shared, but tonight . . . I had no talent for hiding agitation. Papa had often claimed that my face was as transparent as my heart. I had always taken his assessment as a compliment, but tonight, some guile would have served me well.

As usual, he paused at the door and knocked on the jamb. “Ba?”

Fueled by a new breath, I answered him, “Come in, Papa.”

He entered, with his Bible beneath his arm. Then he stopped. “What is wrong? What happened?”

With his question came an answer, spilling from my lips with an abandon that was unfamiliar. “I am all right, Papa. Do not worry about me, but . . . but it is most extraordinary how the meeting of Mr. Browning does beset me—I suppose it is not being used to seeing strangers in some degree—but it haunts me. It is a . . . a persecution.”

His eyebrows met at the middle. “He is . . . Mr. Browning is your poet?”

His wording was far too apt. “He is not my poet, Papa, but a fellow poet, a comrade.”

“So he did come to call today?”

“Yes.”

“And he upset you. And so . . .” He waved a hand between us, as if swatting the very thought of Robert away. “You must not see him again.”

“No, no, Papa,” I said. “It is not a bad reaction, but simply one unexpected. I am out of practice at such things and—”

“Such things being . . . ?”

“Meeting face-to-face with any visitor outside the family. Other than Miss Mitford, Mrs. Jameson, and a few others, I only converse—in person—with family.”

“I should never have given my permission.”

I had made a huge blunder telling him about the meeting. So used was I to telling him everything. . . . And yet I had to calm down or all would be lost. With a determination that I rarely tapped, I dug deep within, past the excitement and questions, and found the pool of normalcy that had served me all these years. “I assure you that is not necessary, Papa,” I said, trying to sound offhand. “We are both working on projects that need the additional help of a peer’s edit, so you see, it would serve us both if our meetings continued. Our work would be served well.”

He looked at me askance and I knew he was not convinced.

I stood and extended my hand, inviting him towards me. “Our prayers, Papa?”

We knelt together and prayed as we did every evening.

But not exactly as we did . . . for on this evening my prayers were transformed and expanded to include one other person who deserved God’s blessings.

“Miss. Miss?”

I awakened to Wilson nudging my shoulder. She did not usually awaken me.

I opened one eye, then closed it. “Leave me be. It was late before I slept and I wish to—”

“Then I suppose you are not interested in reading a certain letter from a certain gentleman?”

I sprang upwards, letting the bedclothes fall from my shoulders and gather on my lap. “A let—?”

She handed it to me with a dramatic sweep of her arm. “He musta wrote it soon as he got home for you to get it this very morning.”

So it would seem. I broke the seal, then thought better of the company. What if he wrote so soon after to tell me that, though he esteemed me as a correspondent, he would not be able to visit me again?

I held the letter to my chest and told Wilson, “Thank you for bringing it so quickly. That will be all.”

She gave me a pout but left me to my privacy.

I closed my eyes and uttered a quick prayer. Then I read the letter:

Tuesday Evening

I trust to you for a true account of how you are—if tired, if not tired, if I did wrong in any thing—or, if you please, right in any thing (only, not one more word about my “kindness,” which, to get done with, I will grant is exceptive). But let us so arrange matters if possible, and why should it not be that my great happiness, such as it will be if I see you as this morning from time to time, may be obtained at the cost of as little inconvenience to you as we can contrive. For an instance, they all say I speak very loud (a trick caught from having to talk with a deaf relative of mine). And did I stay too long?

I will tell you unhesitatingly of any errors I find in the printing of your books—nay, I will again say, do not humiliate me by calling me “kind” in that way.

I am proud and happy in your friendship—now and ever. May God bless you!

R.B.

A laugh escaped my lips and I halted its expansion with a hand. Robert was worried about talking too loudly? Staying too long? Such trifles compared to the dire alternatives that had wracked my mind! All was well. There would be more meetings!

I had to respond to him at once, and so scrambled out of bed to fetch a lap desk and stationery. I returned to the covers and puffed the pillows just so behind me. I poised the pen above paper, giving myself but a moment to let my thoughts congeal.

And then, I began. . . .

Indeed there was nothing wrong—how could there be? And there was everything right—as how should there not be? And as for the “loud speaking,” I did not hear any, and, instead of being worse, I ought to be better for what was certainly (to speak it, or be silent of it) happiness and honour to me yesterday.

Which reminds me to observe that you are so restricting our vocabulary as to be ominous of silence. First, one word is not to be spoken—and then, another is not. And why? Why deny me the use of such words as have natural feelings belonging to them? And how can the use of such be “humiliating” to you? If my heart were open to you, you could see nothing offensive to you in any thought or trace of thought that has been there.

I teased him, even as I stated my true feelings. I simply had to be allowed the use of such words as
kindness
and
grateful
. Yet I forced myself to be put in his shoes. Was Robert so used to expressing himself freely that perhaps he had accrued an offhandedness in regard to people being deigned kind and grateful? As to myself, who had been an invalid for most of my life, I saw such traits as truly God-sent and did not offer mention of them lightly.

I went back to my response.

It is hard for you to understand what my mental position is after the peculiar experience I have suffered, and what a sort of feeling is irrepressible from me to you, when, from the height of your brilliant happy sphere, you ask for personal intercourse with me. What words but “kindness,” but “gratitude”? But I will not in any case be unkind and ungrateful, and do what is displeasing to you. And let us both leave the subject with the words because we perceive it from different points of view; we stand in the black and white sides of the shield; and there is no coming to a conclusion.

Enough of that. I hoped the issue of
kind
and
grateful
was put to rest. Now, I proceeded towards the future, towards our next meeting.

But you will come on Tuesday—and again, when you like—it will not be more “inconvenient” to me to be pleased. It will be delightful to receive you here whenever you like. Believe it of

Your friend,
E.B.B.

And there it was, the complete fruition of our first meeting. The thing was accomplished, acknowledged, and set forward to occur again, and I could not have been happier.

I noticed a flash of movement outside my room. “Wilson?” I asked.

She came fully in, her curiosity unconcealed.
Well?
her expression asked.

I folded the letter in half and placed it in an envelope. “It was a good letter received,” I said. “And I have made a good response. Would you see that this gets out, please?”

“Immediately, miss.” And she meant it, for I heard her verily gallop down the stairs.

It was none too fast for me.