Children,
Emma thought, an ache growing inside, one she had forgotten.
Spence’s pace was slow, and when they came to the fork in the lane leading to Kellworth, she said, “If we take the path across the field, it will be a shorter walk.”
He glanced at her feet. “You do not fear the ruin of your new shoes or to dirty your skirt?”
The truth was, she preferred to cross the field. One came upon Kellworth Hall from a high vantage point, and the grandeur of the house and grounds never failed to take her breath away. “The ground is dry enough.”
Soon they could see no more than the spire of the church as Kellworth land surrounded them. The field was green with new grass and fragrant with spring. Pink lady’s-smock, white clover, and wild pansies dotted the hillside. A flock of gray partridges darted into the hedgerows, while a lone sparrow hawk soared in a sky worthy of a Cozens landscape.
“I had forgotten.” Spence spoke so low Emma was uncertain he meant her to hear.
“Forgotten?”
“How beautiful it is.” He stopped and, leaning on his cane, seemed to drink in the sight of the verdant rolling field, the thick copse, the blue sky.
Emma sighed. “I think Kellworth the most beautiful place in the world.”
He turned to her with an amused expression.
She felt herself blush. “You must think me ridiculous. I have hardly been anywhere else.”
“I do not think you ridiculous.” His eyes met hers with the same look of appreciation with which he’d viewed the scenery around them.
Her face grew warmer.
They resumed walking. “Paris is very beautiful,” he went on conversationally. “Versailles, spectacular. There are views of the Alps that defy description, and in Spain, the villages that dot the Pyrenees look nothing like our villages here.” He seemed now to be gazing at a more distant landscape. “There is a whole world of beautiful places.” He turned to her. “Is there not some place in the world you pine to see, Emma?”
She shook her head.
He smiled and the faraway look in his eye returned. “I should like someday to visit the ancient ruins in Greece or Egypt. The Parthenon. The Pyramids. Would you not like to see such sights?”
Emma shuddered. It had taken a long time for Kellworth to become familiar to her. In the first days she would get turned around in the house and discover herself in the wrong corridor. When taking a walk, she took special care, lest she lose her way. Now that Kellworth felt as familiar as the land where she had grown up, she was loath to leave.
“I would prefer Kellworth,” she said firmly.
“How do you know until you have seen Cairo first?” he asked in a teasing tone.
She answered quite seriously. “I should detest Cairo.”
His smile faded and they began walking again. He barely used the cane over the uneven path.
Emma felt a sinking dismay. He was recovered. There was nothing to prevent him from traveling to Cairo, if that was what he wished. She would be alone again. The anger that burned within her during the three years of his absence sparked and rekindled.
They reached the crest of the hill, below which was Kellworth Hall. Its stone glowed golden in the sunlight. It looked timeless, as solid and secure as it had stood since the reign of Elizabeth.
Emma extended her hand toward the view. “Do you truly wish to leave all this?”
He put his hands on his hips. “Since I was a boy.”
Her anger flared. “How could you?”
“This is not new to you, Emma,” he countered. “We talked of this before our marriage. I have no wish to be a gentleman farmer. There is too much in the world to do and to see.”
Though she’d been only seventeen at the time, she had perceived this talk as a young man’s dreaming. Life was not so much about what one wished to do, but what one ought to do. And it was foolish to pine over what one could not have.
“That was three years ago,” she replied.
“I have not changed.” He looked back out to Kellworth Hall. “This was my brother’s destiny, not mine.”
Emma pursed her mouth. She could have argued that Kellworth
had
been his destiny. As it had been his brother’s destiny to die tragically, leaving Spence to be earl. But she was in no mood for a metaphysical discussion.
Not waiting for the offer of his arm, she started down the hill in a hurry to be back within the walls of Kellworth Hall.
He caught up with her and grabbed her by the arm. “We made a bargain, you and I. Do you not remember? You would have the security of Kellworth and I would have my freedom.”
She glared at him. “But Kellworth was not a place of security, was it? You broke your word to me.”
He had the grace to look chagrined.
She did not relent. “You have repeatedly said you owe your life to me and that you will do anything to make up for Kellworth’s neglect. But how can I believe anything you promise? You will leave. That will be the end of promises, will it not?”
His eyes flashed. “I did not know my promise was not kept, did I? And I am making it right now. Everything is being done that can be done.”
“But you will leave again and forget us.”
“I never forgot you!” he protested.
She pulled from his grasp and proceeded on down the hillside path almost at a run, not caring that she could hear him breathing hard as he tried to gain on her.
“Stop, Emma.” His voice sounded strangled.
She turned. His hand clutched his side and he bent over. With effort she refrained from rushing over and lending him a supporting arm.
“I will not forget you,” he said again, wincing. “But I cannot stay here. I cannot breathe here.”
Nonsense,
she thought.
You do not wish to stay here.
“I want a new bargain.” She met his eye, ignoring his grimace of pain.
“What?” he panted.
“I want an arrangement that will guarantee Kellworth’s money will come to me in your absence, with permission to draw directly from the bank.”
He nodded. “I never wished otherwise—”
She held up her hand. “There is more.”
“Anything, Emma. I have told you I will give you anything you desire.”
She turned toward Kellworth Hall and then back to him, holding her head high. “Give me a child.”
A
child?
Spence felt as if fingers of panic were firmly clamped around his neck. “A child?”
Emma’s eyes shone as green as the field of grass. “A child. A baby. An heir. Or not. A daughter would be sufficient.”
A child. His vision turned dark, his mind’s eye seeing a lonely little boy, a boy like himself. “This was not in our bargain, Emma.”
“Not in our
original
bargain,” she countered. “But neither was all the hardship Kellworth endured.”
He swung away, forcing himself to take long, even breaths, willing the darkness to recede.
A child.
The idea of bedding her flashed through his mind, the act that would create a new life inside her. Her wish to indulge that desire made it burn more hotly.
But he had no wish to create a child, no wish to be responsible for bringing a child into a world only to die again, as Stephen had died. Besides, a child would tie him to Kellworth and the old memories that lived in every corner. Spence craved new experiences, new lands, new people.
When they were schoolboys, Spence, Blake, and Wolfe made a pact to circle the globe like Sir Francis Drake, but even at that tender age, he knew his friends would renege. Blake and Wolfe needed to marry. Blake for fortune. Wolfe for status. Spence had been the only one who had no such need. He’d never planned to marry at all.
Until he met Emma.
He dared another glance at her. She glared back at him like a French cuirassier ready for battle. How different this Emma was from that doe-eyed girl he’d first seen in the London drawing room, who flinched under his uncle’s frank admiration. How foolish he’d been, thinking he could rescue her and make her happy. Emma had been much too young to imagine a woman’s desire to have children. And he had created the youthful illusion he could rescue her and leave her and still make her happy.
Instead she had rescued him.
They started back down the path past the copse, its elms thick with new green foliage.
“This is all I ask of you, Spence. A child and the financial means to rear him.”
“Emma—” he began, but something zinged past his ear and the crack of a musket firing broke the air.
“Down!” He pushed her to the ground.
Daring to raise his head, he spied the shadowy figure of a man retreating through the trees.
Spence scrambled to his feet to chase the shooter, forgetting his cane and the need to use it. He managed no more than thirty feet before his legs gave out and he dropped to his knees.
Emma ran over to him. “Are you injured?”
“No strength,” he panted, shaking his head. He looked in the direction the man had disappeared, and sat on the ground to catch his breath.
Emma sat down beside him. “He was after game, Spence. Gandy has turned a blind eye to poachers. No one abuses the privilege and only take what they need.” She placed her hands against her cheeks. “I never sent word that the poaching should stop.”
“He was a poacher?”
“He must have been. These years have been difficult. Some families were near starving. You cannot blame a man for hunting food.”
No, Spence could not blame a man for hunting food, but Gandy had always taught him that the fowl and hares and deer must be protected or there would be no game left for future generations. Had the gamekeeper gone soft or had matters been that desperate?
Whichever it was, a poacher’s shot could kill a passerby as effectively as it could kill a pheasant or hare, and this ball missed them by inches.
“I’ll speak to Gandy.” He struggled to his feet and extended his hand to help her rise.
Her delicate, gloved hand clasped his with surprising strength. “You might ask him if he wishes to be pensioned. He is very old.”
Thinking of the strong, rugged Gandy, who always smelled of woods and earth, as an old pensioner depressed Spence, but he said, “I will.”
He pulled her up, but she stumbled and almost collided with him. She regained her balance and stepped away.
They descended to the house and the subject of a child was lost for the moment, to Spence’s relief. Still, he could not erase the picture of a little boy—his son—sitting alone in a huge dark room, as he had done when his parents were gone.
The house loomed more majestic with each step they took, making Spence feel small by comparison. Like it or not, he was responsible for this house, this land, and all the people who depended upon it. It had become his responsibility the moment he held his brother’s limp body in his arms.
He suddenly felt as if he were a little boy again and the darkness closed in on him. He gulped for air, and his step faltered. Emma shot him a worried look, letting him lean on her while he concentrated on breathing in and out, repeating in his mind the word Arjun had given him.
They continued walking to the back entrance of the house. Emma did not call for Mr. Hale or Tolley, or one of the new footmen to attend them, but brushed off their clothes herself and cleaned their shoes. Her ministrations felt pleasant, soothing him as she’d once soothed his feverish panic.
But she did not dispel the feeling of being trapped by the walls of Kellworth.
Emma went through the motions of the day, swinging from rage to desolation, with no backbreaking, mind-numbing toil to distract her. The desire for a child, now voiced, grew inside her like a wild vine. Spence had not precisely said no, but his unwillingness to respond to her request was tantamount to a refusal.
They had breakfasted together after returning from church. She did not bring up the subject of a child during the meal, when a footman or Mr. Hale might at any moment enter the room. But in between their stilted, sparse attempts at conversation, she pondered her impulsive request, its truth more and more apparent. She needed a child. She needed someone to be hers, someone she could love wholeheartedly, someone who wouldn’t leave her.
After breakfast she wandered into the library. Spence sat there reading the newspapers from London. She grabbed a book and retreated to her room, but the day was too fine to remain indoors. She gathered up her kittens and took them into the walled garden. Like the unused rooms in the house, it had been neglected and allowed to become overgrown. Now the space had been weeded and clipped and trimmed. She sat on the grass and teased the kittens into play with a flower she’d plucked. They lost interest quickly when a yellow butterfly fluttered nearby, jumping over each other in an effort to catch it.
The gate opened and Spence appeared. “I could not stay inside.” His countenance was as gray as her mood.
He joined her on the grass, placing the black kitten in his lap. The little fur ball just as quickly jumped off and ran after the white one, who’d found a tiny toad to pounce upon. As the toad hopped away, both kittens scrambled in pursuit. The lines of stress in Spence’s face eased as he laughed softly at their antics.
Emma found herself feeling sorry for him, which only made her more furious, this time at herself.
He sat so close his scent filled her nose and each rustle of his coat sounded in her ears. She remembered how he’d placed his lips so gently on her skin and how he’d held her in his arms, like some valued possession.
She knew little of men’s desires. All those years ago, when she’d known instinctively that Spence’s uncle had wanted to couple with her, it had frightened and repelled her. But it had never troubled her to think that Spence might want her in the same way. In his absence and neglect she’d given up such foolish notions, but perhaps now he was present, she could make him want her.
Growing up in a country house gave her some vague knowledge of how animals copulated, though she had always been scooted away before totally figuring it out. She used to listen to the maids giggling about what men and women did in bed, but she’d been too shy to ask them directly.