The Arrangement (35 page)

She looked down at her hands and hoped she was not blushing too noticeably. And she felt suddenly
miserable
. For though Vincent would surely be pleased at the possibility of having an heir, he did not really want to be saddled with either wife or child. He had never wanted it. Not yet, anyway. And there was one thing they had not considered. If they should decide when the time came that they would live apart,
who would have the child
?

She suspected they would remain together after all, but not with any degree of happiness. Not that happiness had been part of their bargain. Contentment, then. They would not live in perfect contentment.

Tab had come to curl up on the love seat beside Sophia, and Percival came to sit on her lap so that he could smooth one small hand over the cat’s coat.

Sophia smiled at him and felt the soreness of unshed tears at the back of her throat.

V
incent’s sisters and their families were soon to return to their own homes, and his grandmother was going to move back to Bath in the autumn. She was missing her friends and her life there. For a similar reason, his mother was seriously considering returning to Barton Coombs and Covington House. Mrs. Plunkett could be persuaded to join her there, she was sure.

Vincent would be sad to see them all go. He was genuinely fond of his family, and even more so now when they no longer hovered over his every move and insisted upon doing everything for him that was within their power.

They had accepted Sophia and even grown fond of her, he believed. His mother spoke approvingly of what she had done for him during two short months, even though she had had her doubts about the dog.

He would be sad to see them all go, but he would be happy too. They would be able to relax into their own lives without having to worry every moment about his, and he would be alone with Sophia. He had told her even before they married that he thought they could be comfortable together, and they were. At least he was, and he thought she was enjoying her life with him too.

He hoped they could be comfortable together for a lifetime. He very much hoped it. Although he was becoming more and more independent—thanks in many ways to his wife’s efforts—he could not quite imagine his life without Sophia. Indeed, the thought was too terrible to contemplate.

They were seated side by side on the love seat in their private sitting room on the evening of the day Croft had declared Shep’s training complete. The cat was lying at his wife’s feet, its tail curled over Vincent’s foot. Shep was beside the love seat, close to him. He could trail his arm over the side and touch the dog’s head. He could hear the dog heave a great sigh and settle to sleep. He could still not fully comprehend the wonder of it. It was almost like having his eyes back. Well, not quite, perhaps, but it was certainly going to restore a great deal of his freedom of movement.

He was not really thinking about either the dog or his independence, though, at the moment. He was listening to Sophia reading aloud from Henry Fielding’s
Joseph Andrews,
a book they had both been enjoying for the last couple of weeks. She set it aside after she had finished a chapter.

“Living in a house with a large library,” she said, “is a little like living in heaven.”

“I might feel that
I
was in heaven,” he said, “if I were not being tormented by an undisclosed secret.”

“Oh, that.” She hesitated. “You may think it very foolish or intrusive of me. I thought we might have half a race track built inside the east and north walls of the park and inside the walls on part of the south side too where there are no trees. It would be properly surfaced and railed on both sides and curved gradually at the corners so that a horse would round them without any particular guidance. It would be almost five miles long, and you would be able to ride along it and even gallop. And you would be able to use it as a running track too if you wished, your hand on the rail. Or even with Shep.
He
would undoubtedly enjoy the run. You could have a great deal of freedom there.”

His first instinct was to laugh. It was a preposterously grandiose idea. Only Sophie…

He did not laugh. Instead, he visualized such a track in his mind’s eye. Almost five miles long. Without obstacles. Shaped in such a way that a horse could walk it or run it with no real guidance. Shaped in such a way that
he
could run it. Uninhibited forward movement for miles. Fresh air rushing against his face.

Freedom.

“It would be too big a task for the gardeners,” she said. “Workers would have to be hired. And a designer. It would probably take a long time to design and construct and would be costly.”

He swallowed and licked his lips.

He could almost feel himself riding—alone. Taking his horse to a canter. To a gallop. For five miles. He could almost feel himself running, stretching his muscles, falling into a rhythm of movement, exhausting himself over five miles. Perhaps ten if he ran back again. Or just walking, striding briskly along with no fear of where his next step would take him.

He had been blind for six years. Why was it that only now…

It was because he had not met Sophia before now. That vivid imagination of hers was not just for fantasy.

“Mr. Fisk thinks it is a good idea,” she said. Her voice was curiously flat, and he realized he had not spoken any of his thoughts aloud. “Perhaps you do not. Perhaps you think I am managing your life just a little too much.”

He turned his head to smile at her.

“Will you ride there with me, Sophie?” he asked her. “We could take a picnic luncheon with us, for we would need to stop halfway to sustain ourselves.”

“Oh,” she said. “How horrid of you. I am not
that
slow on horseback.”

“I will teach you to ride like the wind,” he promised her.

“Do you think it is a ridiculous idea?” she asked. “Or one too many ideas? Should I mind my own business more?”

She was sounding strangely uncertain of herself. He thought she had got past that.

“I am in awe,” he said. “Where do all these ideas come from?”

“I think from a lifetime of only being able to observe and never being able to
do,
” she said. “I have twenty years of inaction to make up for.”

“Heaven help me, then,” he said. “You will be building me a flying machine next that will guide itself through the skies and find its way home again.”

“Oh,” she said. “Oh, Vincent, that
would
be one idea too many. But we could create some marvelous stories around the idea. We could—”

But he was laughing, and she stopped talking to join him.

“I think your idea is brilliant,” he told her. “I think
you
are brilliant. Have you read your letter?”

“My—oh, my
letter
. I had forgotten it.” She got to her feet. “It has been there on the mantelpiece staring me in the eye all the time we have been sitting here.”

He heard her cross the room.

“I do not recognize the hand,” she said. “I wonder—”

“There is a way of satisfying your curiosity, you know,” he pointed out.

He heard a seal breaking and the rustle of paper.

“Perhaps,” she said, “it is from one of your friends, Vincent, writing to you for me to read aloud.”

It had happened a few times. There had been letters from George and Ralph.

There was a rather lengthy silence.

“What?” he asked.

“My uncle,” she said. “It is from Sir Terrence Fry.”

He felt instantly angry.

“He is back in England,” she said, “and has heard of my marriage.”

There was another lengthy silence.

“Come,” he said at last, reaching out one hand.

She came to sit beside him again, though she did not take his hand.

“Is he congratulating you?” he asked. “Or commiserating?”

He could feel her hesitation.

“A bit of both, I suppose,” she said. “He is happy that socially and financially I am secure for life.”

And sorry that she had married a blind man. She did not say it aloud. She did not need to.

“He has no right.” Her voice was trembling. “He has no
right
.”

No, he most certainly did not. Vincent lifted a hand, found the back of her neck, and rubbed his fingers soothingly over it.

“He has spoken with Aunt Martha,” she said. “Or, rather, she has spoken with him. She explained how I snared you.”

“Did she, by Jove?” he said.

“But he is not sure he believes her,” she said. “He wants to hear the story from my own lips.”

“He expects you to go to London to wait on him?”

“No,” she said. “He wishes to come here.”

He opened his mouth to tell her exactly what he thought of that brazen idea. But he closed it again, the words unspoken. Sir Terrence Fry was her relative, one of the very few.

“Does he have a wife?” he asked.

“She died many years ago,” she told him.

“Any children?”

“None that survived infancy,” she said. “Only Sebastian.”

“Sebastian?”

“His stepson,” she explained. “His wife was a widow when he married her.”

“And he has never communicated with you before now?” he asked her. “He never came to visit your father? He did not attend his funeral? Or your aunt’s, his sister’s?”

“He was out of the country,” she told him. “He is a diplomat. And no, I have never met him or heard from him directly. Until now.”

“Directly,” he said, frowning. “And indirectly?”

“He wrote to Sebastian and asked him to call on me when I went to live with Aunt Mary,” she said. “He wanted to know that I was well cared for there and happy.”

“Did he?” He was still frowning. “And
did
his stepson call on you?” But he must have if she knew about the request.

“Yes,” she said. “A number of times.”

And for some reason he remembered asking if her Aunt Mary had any children, if she had any cousins in London. She had answered no, but there had been some hesitation, and he had noticed it then. Sometimes there was a world of meaning in hesitation.

“He is older than you?” he asked her.

“Oh, yes,” she said. “Eight years older.”

She had been fifteen when her father died. The step-cousin would have been twenty-three. Vincent’s age now.

He massaged the back of her neck and could tell that her head was lowered farther than a reading of the letter made necessary. He guessed that her chin was against her chest and that perhaps her eyes were closed.

“Tell me about him,” he said. “Tell me about those visits.”

“He was very handsome,” she said, “and amiable and full of vitality and confidence.”

He waited.

“He was very kind,” she said. “He befriended me and we talked and talked. He took me walking and driving in his curricle. He took me to galleries and old churches and once to Gunter’s for an ice. I was terribly broken up over my father’s death. He helped ease the pain.”

He waited again. The air about them was charged with some terrible pain. He hoped it was not what he suspected it might be.

“I was very silly,” she said. “I fell in love with him. It was hardly surprising, I suppose. Indeed, it would have been surprising if I had not. But I told him. In my foolishness I thought he had fallen in love with me too. I
told
him.”

“You were fifteen, Sophie,” he said, his hand pausing at her neck.

“He laughed at me.”

Ah, Sophie. So young and fragile. At that age she would have been vulnerable even if the rest of her life had been as solid as a rock.

“He laughed and told me I was a silly, ungrateful little chit. Which I was. I would have been heartbroken anyway. I would also have been wounded and humiliated by his laughter and would have squirmed at the memory of my own naïveté. But I would have recovered. I think I would. I suppose it is not uncommon for young girls to fall hopelessly in love with handsome men and then to have their hopes and dreams dashed.”

“Why did you not recover?” he asked when she did not continue.

“We were in the sitting room at Aunt Mary’s,” she said, “and there was a mirror. A long one. He took me to stand in front of it while he stood behind me explaining to me why it was absurd and even a little insulting of me to fall in love with him and expect him to return my regard. He made me look at my figure and my face and my hair, which was in a great bush about my head and down over my shoulders because I never could manage it. He told me I was a scrawny, ugly little thing. He told me he liked me well enough, but only as a little cousin he had promised his stepfather to keep an eye on. He laughed as he said it. It was an affectionate sort of laugh, I think, but it sounded grotesque to me. After he had left, I went to my room and found my scissors and hacked my hair off. He did not come ever again, and I would not have seen him if he had.”

He wrapped both arms about her and drew her against him until her head was resting on his shoulder.

“Pardon my language, Sophie,” he said, “but the
bastard
. I just wish I could have five minutes alone with him.”

“It was a long time ago.”

“He was
my age,
” he said. “Your father had just died. Your aunt was neglecting you. You were fifteen. You were not even fully grown. And even apart from all that, you were a
human being
. And he was a
gentleman
. Oh, Sophie. My sweet Sophie. Even then you must have been beautiful. I know you are now.”