“Good gracious!”
“That's why you're leaving, isn't it? Because you are not really related to us, not by blood, so you don't feel entitled to live here? But if we were betrothed, even if it must be secret from everyone else for the present, then you need not be uneasy. Marry me, Cousin Laura,” he urged. “Do say you will.”
“Truly, my dear, it will not serve. I have other reasons for going away, reasons I cannot discuss—”
At that moment, Priscilla puffed out her cheeks and, with every evidence of delight, blew her mouthful of pap into Perry's face. “Abadakaboo,” she cooed, and giggled.
“Little monkey,” he said tolerantly.
What a marvellous father he would make, if he did not change as he grew up, Laura thought, taking the laughing baby from him. His wife would be a lucky woman, but he was not for her. As he went off to wash, she hoped the subject was closed. Surely he would not ask her reasons, when she had plainly said she did not wish to give them.
She could not possibly tell Perry she loved Gareth, that only as Gareth's wife could she remain here.
Of the conspirators, only Gareth was left. If he had changed his mind about taking a wife, why had he let all his brothers try first? Hurt, she had to assume he hoped she would accept one of the others. If he forced himself to propose, it would be for Priscilla's sake anyway, she reminded herself. Could she bear to wed him for the baby's sake? Had she the fortitude to refuse if he asked?
But the days passed, and her fortitude was not put to the test.
* * * *
The day before Perry returned to school, Gareth sent for him to the library to pick up his pocket-money, since he did not yet receive a regular quarterly allowance as did the others.
“Don't spend it all on cakes,” he advised, handing over a pair of bank notes and a handful of guineas.
“As though I should!”
Gareth grinned. “I recall my own schooldays very clearly.”
“There is one thing at least... I saw it in a shop just before Christmas and wanted to buy it, but my pockets were to let. I hope it is still there.”
“What's that?”
“A jointed wooden doll, painted in bright colours, and it had a string you pulled to make it dance. Don't you think Pris would like it hanging over her bed?”
“I'm sure she'd love it, but pray do not run away again to bring it to her! Perry, you're not still afraid of her dying, are you?”
“Well of course, but only a little bit, not much more than of you or Lance or the others dying, or Cousin Laura, or the children.” The boy leaned forward in his chair, his hands linked in supplication. “But Cousin Laura means to go away. Can't you stop them going? Her and Priscilla?”
“As Cousin Laura made very plain to me when I went to fetch her to Llys,” Gareth said wryly, “I have no authority over her whatsoever. Nor any desire to rule her, I may say. She is free to choose where she wishes to live.”
“Oh, I know that. Only, if you were to marry her, then she'd stay. She might accept you, even though she won't have any of the rest of us.”
“She what?”
Perry flushed guiltily. “I'm not supposed to tell. We knew you wouldn't like it.”
“Like what? Perry, cut line this instant!”
“Swear you won't tell them I told you?” He reverted to schoolboy language: “Cross your heart and hope to die if you do.”
“Upon my honour,” Gareth said impatiently. “Now, what mischief have the four of you been up to?”
“Not mischief. It's just that none of us want them to leave, and we think Laura ought to have someone to look after her and the baby, so each of us in turn offered her his hand. Cornie went first, because he's eldest.”
Stunned, for a moment Gareth could only stare. “And you, I collect, went last because you are youngest.”
“Yes, but she wouldn't—”
“Perry, you are fifteen years old!”
“Nearly sixteen. I explained she would have to wait, maybe even till I come of age.”
“Good gad!” Gareth was furious. “Cornelius at least should know better than to plot such a crackbrained scheme behind my back. And when she is still in mourning! Did it occur to none of you that Laura might be distressed and offended?”
“It wasn't as if it was some sort of jape,” Perry cried. “We all meant every word. And she wasn't offended, truly. But if it was wrong, punish me and don't tell the others. You promised.”
“I cannot punish you for being misled by your elders. Don't worry, I shan't tell. Although, for all your secrecy, Laura might well have told me.”
“She wouldn't. She is the kindest person in the world, and besides, Cornie said she has by far too much delicacy of mind to speak to a third party of proposals of marriage. Of course you'd have had to know if she accepted one of us, but she refused us all. You want them to stay, don't you? You must try your luck, Gareth, you must!”
“There is no 'must' about it,” Gareth said sternly, but his anger had died. Though he could not approve their collusion, in a way he was rather proud of his brothers. What had they done but what he would like to do himself?
What he would do, dammit! In any other sphere, to let fear hinder him would be to admit himself a coward. He could not let fear keep him from the woman he loved.
The thought that Laura might even now be betrothed to Cornelius or Rupert made him shudder. Thank heaven she had rejected his brothers' offers. He would speed at once to her side to lay his heart before her if it were not that he'd not for the world have her imagine he was a party to their plot. No, he owed it to her and to himself to observe the propriety they had ignored, to wait until her mourning year was over.
She had said she would stay until then. Only three months, but what a long three months they were going to be!
* * * *
Yet the time passed quickly. Priscilla's hair darkened to match her mother's and her eyes turned grey. She outgrew the cradle and moved into a crib.
Dismissing Gareth's doubts, Laura took her outdoors in the push-cradle whenever the winter weather was not utterly foul. As strong-minded as her mother, Pris refused to sit still in the push-cradle. After a tumble—luckily onto soft, if muddy, grass—Uncle Julius hastily created a chair on wheels with a strap round her tummy to hold her in.
This delayed his production of the baby-cage, renamed a baby-pen at Perry's insistence. Before it was ready, Priscilla started to creep, lifting her little bottom in the air and shooting forward at a remarkable rate. An active and inquisitive child, she had to be watched constantly. Mrs. Barley at last began to earn her keep, and Gareth dared hope Laura was starting to realize the difficulties of bringing up her daughter on her own.
He spent as much time as possible with Priscilla, partly to demonstrate to Laura that he would be a good father, partly for the sheer pleasure of it. Her arms around his neck, her nose nuzzling his cheek, were ample rewards for endless games of peek-a-boo and pat-a-cake.
The long winter evenings also allowed more time spent with Laura. They played backgammon or discussed the estate, the political news of the day, the books he read aloud to her and Aunt Antonia while they plied their needles. Though Laura was quite willing to admit her ignorance of the world and to learn from him, once she understood matters she had strong opinions and no reticence about expressing them.
She often shocked Aunt Antonia, but Gareth found himself more and more in love.
Alas, his growing love not only increased his yearning to make her his wife, it magnified his dread of eventually being the cause of her death. A platonic marriage was out of the question. If she was his, he would not be able to resist making love to her. He sometimes found it difficult even now, when she was close to him, when he touched her hand by chance or lent her his arm, when she stood before a window, her figure outlined by the wintry light.
He did his best to conceal his desire and his torment from her. Whether she guessed or not, he could not tell, but she said nothing. However, Aunt Antonia's sharp eyes eventually detected something amiss.
One morning towards the middle of March, she requested his presence in her sitting room. “Sit down, Gareth,” she said with unwonted gentleness. “You are troubled, I believe. Do you wish to tell me what is amiss? You know if there is the least thing I may do to help, nothing could give me more satisfaction.”
He subsided into one of her flowered-chintz chairs, running his hand through his hair. “Laura will leave soon. Is that not trouble enough? At least, I assume she will, since she has not told me she will not.”
“Yes, she speaks to me now and then of departure. She wishes to leave soon enough not to have to travel on Good Friday.”
“When is that?”
“Easter Sunday is on the 26th of March, I believe.”
“Two weeks! Shall you not be sorry to see her go, ma'am?” he cried, her composure irksome to his fretted nerves.
“Indeed I shall, more than you can guess. I also envy her, for being free to choose without the restraints of her family's expectations.”
“As you never were?” Dismayed, he reached for her hand, a white, slender, elegant hand still despite the swollen knuckles and prominent veins. “Are you not satisfied here at Llys, Aunt Antonia? You know you have only to voice your wishes, for we all owe you more than can ever be paid.”
“My dear, you owe me nothing.” She patted his hand. “I am resigned to the past, and content with the present, though I was not always so. However, we were speaking of Laura, not of me. She is too young for resignation and too independent of spirit to bow to what most females would regard as the dictates of Fate.”
“Still less the dicatates of any man!”
“Did she seek my advice, I should beg her to stay, for my sake, for all our sakes. Whether for her own sake, I cannot tell. Only she can decide what is best for her.”
“She cannot decide for the best,” Gareth said in a low voice, “unless she is fully aware of the alternatives.”
His aunt gave him a penetrating glance. “To live in a cottage in straitened but independent circumstances, or to reside at Llys Manor with every comfort and elegancy—as your dependent.”
“As my wife.”
She seemed unsurprised. “You have not asked her, I collect.”
He jumped up and took an agitated turn about the room. The urge to open his budget was near irresistible, but how could he approach such a subject with his prim and proper, ever-decorous spinster aunt?
“You love her, do you not?” she said, a hint of disturbance ruffling her usual calm. “I have suspected it any time these several months. But you are thinking of your mama.”
“Yes.” Gareth rushed to her side and sank to his knees, clasping both her hands. “Aunt Antonia, what shall I do? I love her to distraction. I should die if my passion were to blame for her death.”
Colour tinged her thin cheeks. “Emily never blamed Wyckham for his...his claiming the rights of a husband.”
“He blamed himself. I heard him.” In a whisper he repeated the dreadful words: “ ‘Oh God, why could I not leave her alone?' If I married Laura, if she accepted me, I should not be able to leave her alone.”
“Gareth, Laura is a healthy young woman. Your mama was always fragile, though a good deal tougher than she looked. She bore five surviving children, remember. It was not childbirth in itself which killed her, it was too frequently repeated childbirth.” The old lady's pinkness deepened. “She...she conceived easily, which I believe is not the case with all women. Should it prove so with Laura... I am far from qualified to speak on the subject, but surely a...a little self-restraint would answer the purpose.”
She did not understand. How could she? Of course self-restraint was the answer, but it was precisely what he feared he lacked. He envisaged years of sleeping alone and unsatisfied in his dressing room, aching for Laura while she lay lonely in the marital bed. Simple lust might be satisfied elsewhere, yet he could not imagine being unfaithful to Laura, though many men preserved their wives from constant demands and frequent pregnancies by taking a mistress.
“That's it!” He hugged his startled aunt, whose words had set him at last on the right track. “At least, I hope that's it. I shall have to go to Town.”
“To Town!”
“To request Lord Medway's permission to address his daughter,” Gareth invented airily, though now he came to consider it, it was not half a bad idea. “A mere formality, since he's unlikely to object to my suit and if he should I shall disregard it. Not a word to Laura.”
“Naturally. But Gareth, while I am delighted that you see a way through your difficulties, I feel obliged to caution you not to let your spirits rise too high. I must reluctantly approve your disregard of Lord Medway's possible refusal—a most unnatural father!—yet there is one whose consent is both uncertain and indispensable.”
“Laura,” he said flatly. “Will she have me, Aunt?”
“My dear, only she can say.”
* * * *
Laura smiled at Gareth as he came into the breakfast room at midday. She found it more and more difficult to smile as the time for her departure drew nearer, though fixed by her own choice. It was difficult to talk of indifferent matters, too, so she was glad to see he carried
The Times
.
“Any news worthy of note?”
“I have not yet had a chance to look.” He unfolded the newspaper and glanced at the headline. “Good God, Bonaparte has escaped from Elba!”
The news, now a week old, that the ex-emperor had once again raised his standard on French soil naturally superseded every other topic. Gareth at once announced his intention of hurrying up to Town to find out what was going on.
“I shall go with you,” declared Cornelius, who had dropped by for luncheon. “Renfrew can take the service on Sunday.”
By mid afternoon they were gone.
Laura tried not to feel hurt that Gareth should go away when she had so little time left at Llys. He might even have forgotten, she told herself. She had not mentioned the painful subject to him for some weeks.
In some ways, his absence was actually a relief. She had prepared herself for arguments, which she knew she would find difficult to resist. She had come to think of Llys Manor as her home, of its inhabitants as her family, and she knew she would miss them desperately.