She kicked aside her drawers and fell away from him, onto her back, and for a few seconds the cold air intruded between them. But she was smiling at him. Her eyes shone with tears of happiness as, already, his hands explored the warm flesh of her thighs above her garters. And beyond.
They were not kissing when they became as one, and his eyes seemed to close of their own accord as he began to love her, nervously, gently, tentatively at first, then with growing urgency and a confidence that enabled him to look at her again. The expression of wonder in her eyes was matched only by his own feelings.Then her breathing deepened and her body arched. She wrapped her legs around his back and his instincts took over.
Olivia had loved him and yearned for him to love her for so long that she hardly believed this was happening. It did not matter that they were in the open air, cold breeze seeping through the gaps in the stone wall, their bodies entangled with their clothing.What mattered to her was that this was one realization of love on her part and - oh, joy - on his too. He kept whispering it between kisses. He loved her.
And as he showed her that love, she experienced it with a sensation that astounded and eventually overcame her. She had so much wanted to give herself to him that her body opened like a flower. Her whole being tingled, first in anticipation and then in a desire so strong it frightened her. She moved with him, finding a posture with her back and legs that she had not even known was possible. He was taking her on a journey she had not travelled before and she let herself ride in freedom with him. Her reward shuddered through her to burst in her head like a whole heaven of stars.
Afterwards he wrapped her in his cloak and sat with his back against the dry-stone wall. He was breathing shallowly, but steadily. She felt drained of all her energy. But loved. She loved and was loved. It was all she needed. She could not speak. She had no words.
‘This is not how it should be,’ he said quietly.
She supposed he meant out here in the open, beside a tumble-down cottage, in the lee of a crumbling wall. For her, it did not matter where they were, only that he loved her, she loved him, and he had fulfilled that love as none before him could.
‘Yes, it is,’ she replied firmly. If she were less ashamed of her recent behaviour she might have added, ‘This is exactly how it should be. Take it from one who knows.’
He put his head on one side. ‘I’ve never loved anyone else as I do you, and I never shall. This is for ever. We are for ever.’
She smiled at him, a satisfied smile, and began to pull on her drawers. ‘You will have to be my looking-glass,’ she said lightly.
‘It will be my pleasure.’ He returned the smile and retrieved her bonnet from where she had tossed it.
Chapter 34
It was several days before he visited again and Livvy’s overriding fear was that the constable would come for her before she saw him again. But she occupied herself gainfully as mistress of Hill Top House, feeling that gaol would not be quite so bad with Jared’s love in her heart. She was helping Anna to change the linen on Hesley’s bed when she glanced out of the window, as she often did, and saw Jared riding up the track from the town.
‘Go downstairs and receive him,’ Anna suggested. ‘I’ll finish here.’
‘He will have news of Toby and Harriet. Join us as soon as you can.’
Livvy removed her apron, tidied her hair, and hurried to the kitchen. ‘Mrs Cookson, we have a visitor. I’ll let him in. Make up the fire in the drawing room and bring some warmed ale. And Anna will want tea when she comes down.’
She opened the heavy front door as he approached and almost fell into his arms. ‘Let me take your cloak. There is a good fire waiting.’
He kissed her first, a warm, passionate embrace, then took her hand and led her into the house.
‘I have good news. I saw Mr Withers this morning and he is optimistic that you will not be summoned to trial for bigamy.’
Her heart turned over. Could this be true? Might she be tried for another crime instead? She dared not raise her hopes until she knew more. She hoped she sounded calm, even though she did not feel it, when she said, ‘Why is that?’
‘It seems that there is only rumour about your marriage to Toby. Jessup was not as thorough in his duties as he should have been and could not produce any record of the ceremony.’
‘Really?’ She tried to moderate the squeak in her voice.
Jared nodded. ‘Mr Withers went to his office and demanded to see the evidence. Jessup said that you had stolen it but no one believes him. He has fallen from favour with the town gentry as he is constantly distracted by the races and the card tables. Who would want to steal a record book, anyway?’
Livvy stared at him. He had to know the truth. ‘Me,’ she answered quietly. ‘That day I borrowed Toby’s trap. I threw it into the canal.’
‘You did?’ He swallowed. ‘You take far too many risks for my liking.’
‘But you do not despise me for it? You will not send me away?’
‘How could I? I love you. I would forgive you anything.’
‘I - I was desperate. There is more to tell you about Jessup.’
He placed a finger lightly over her lips. ‘Perhaps I should not know. It will stir my anger and I should want to kill him. As I wanted to kill Hesley. Then I should be the one in gaol.’
She thought that she would tell him at some time in the future. But she would not spoil their joy today with more miseries from her past. ‘So, I do not need to watch and listen for the constable any more.’
‘You were not at the top of his list anyway. There are still plenty of folk in town who do not think chapel ceremonies are proper marriages. Their bigotry plays in your favour.’
‘Hush! Do not let Anna hear you say that.’
‘But it’s true,’ he whispered. ‘It’ll take years for the South Riding to change its ways.’
‘Well, in that case, I shall never be accepted as respectable by the town’s matrons, shall I? I am an adulteress, if not a bigamist. It is hardly a lesser crime in their eyes.’
‘You will not go to gaol for adultery and I, for one, shall thank the Lord daily for that blessing.’
They sat in companionable silence, staring into the fire. Mrs Cookson brought in their ale. ‘The tea will be a few more minutes, madam,’ she said. When neither replied, she bobbed a curtsy and retreated.
Jared got up to pass Olivia some ale. ‘Perhaps my mother will relent when my sisters are married. She is very shocked by our relationship and fears you will corrupt them. My father is more understanding and - and when—Oh, never mind.’
‘When what?’
‘I was thinking about - well, about Hesley.’
‘When he dies, you mean?’
‘I’m sorry, it was insensitive of me.’
‘But it will happen,’ she said.‘What do you want to say about when he dies?’
He had returned to his chair and stretched out his feet towards the hearth. ‘We shall marry, of course.’
She had hoped he would say that. ‘Yes, we shall,’ she agreed.
She smiled, sadly in a way, because they must wait. But they had waited so long that a little more time would not be such a hardship. Not now they were together. She noticed that working at the pit had taken its toll on his fine leather riding boots. He needed new ones.
After a few more minutes’ staring into the fire, she asked, ‘Shall we live in the town?’
‘Do you want to?’
‘No, but Hill Top House will belong to Hesley’s heir, whoever he is.’
‘Oh!’ Jared sat bolt upright, almost spilling his ale. ‘I forgot the other thing Mr Withers told me. I’m the heir. It’s in old Samuel’s will. I’m the nearest male relation. Actually, the
only
male relation. That is why Mr Withers suggested I run the pit. Mexton Pit and this house will be mine.’
Olivia sipped the ale, enjoying the warmth that spread through her veins. It wasn’t just the ale, she thought. Her life was beginning to glow. She could think of no one better than Jared to inherit. ‘There is some justice in this world, after all,’ she murmured, ‘but I shall miss the mission.’
‘Now that you live here you can have your own mission.’
‘My own?’
‘You can do something to help the poorer folk and their children in these parts.’
‘Such as?’
‘Well, I don’t know, but I’m sure you, Harriet and Anna can think of something. If anyone can turn this building into a house of help, you can.’
The next time Jared visited he brought the trap and took Anna to visit Toby. When she returned to Hill Top House, Harriet came with her.
‘Shall I ask Harriet to live here with us?’ Olivia queried, as she and Anna tended to Hesley in his chamber.
‘I don’t think she will want to. She spends much time at the farmhouse, getting it ready for the new school. With Toby.’
‘She has talked about him all the time since she arrived.Your brother is a fine gentleman. I am truly sorry I treated him so badly. I hope he does not think ill of Harriet because of me.’
‘Quite the opposite. He speaks highly of her when she is not present, her ideas, her teaching and her sound sense. I have not seen him so genuinely enamoured of a lady before. Not even you.’
‘We didn’t truly love each other.’
‘I know. Harriet loves him, though. She has loved him for a while, now, and I believe he has fallen for her, too.’
Livvy stopped folding the sheets and straightened. ‘Oh, I am so pleased for them both. They will suit each other well.’
‘Yes, they will.’ Anna smiled and carried on washing her son.
Livvy relayed this conversation to Jared as he rubbed down his horse in the stable.
‘Well, that is good news. Toby has often talked to me of Harriet’s beauty,’ he said.
‘Her beauty?’ Livvy remembered a conversation years ago about beauty, on one of their Sunday walks when he had reproached her for her false modesty and mentioned Harriet’s appearance.‘He sees beyond her pretty face, then. Into her good character as well.’ She added lightly, ‘I hope you did not feel you had to put him right.’
Jared glanced at her and remembered. ‘He knows of her past and I - well, I was hasty in my condemnation of her.’
‘And of me.’
‘I did not condemn you. Ever.’
‘Not even for marrying Toby?’
‘I know why you did it. I admire your courage.’
He stood back from the horse to look at his handiwork. As he did so, she reached up on tiptoe and stole a kiss from him, intending to step back straight away. But he did not let her. He gathered her in his arms and returned her kiss, deeply, passionately and lovingly.
He paused for breath and whispered, ‘Let’s climb up to the hayloft.’
She groaned. ‘I cannot. Harriet has something important to say to me. We are to have tea together. Alone, she said. In the library.’ Before he could speak, she rushed on, ‘When are you coming to live here?’
‘As soon as I can arrange it.’
‘Sooner,’ she replied, and he nodded.
Harriet was standing in the gloom of the bookshelves, the place where she had lingered and watched on the day she had arrived at Hill Top House. The place where she had first met Olivia, a scruffy little urchin who would have seemed more at home scavenging by the canals and was now a beautiful young woman, who had survived such dreadful events and had, at last, found happiness. Harriet watched her with pride and love.
Olivia carried in the tray and set it down near the hearth. ‘This is where we first saw each other. Do you remember? You didn’t beat me and I knew from that moment you were different.’
‘You were wary of me, though,’
‘I didn’t know you. But I realized quite soon that you were special to me.’
‘Special?’ Harriet’s heart surged.
‘You always tried to protect me, and I was a difficult child, wasn’t I?’
‘You were intelligent, strong-willed and sometimes too impulsive.’
‘I’m sorry—’
‘No, don’t be.’
‘I was going to say that I am sorry I was so cross with you when you found me in Mexton.You stirred the anger I had when you left me. I missed you very much and I am so pleased we are friends again. In fact, we have something more than friendship, don’t we?’
Harriet felt tears well in her eyes and her words stuck in her throat.
When Harriet didn’t reply, Olivia stood up, walked over to her and wrapped her arms around her. ‘We are like family to each other. Now, come and pour the tea while I toast the bread. What is it you want to say to me?’
Olivia thought Harriet was going to tell her about Toby. She was happy that Harriet had made a match with him. So she was surprised when her friend said, ‘Do you remember your father, Olivia?’
‘Not really. My mother, yes. But he - he was a shadow in the background.’ Olivia knelt on the rug and skewered a piece of bread on a brass toasting-fork.
‘At least you knew him.’
‘You knew yours, didn’t you? Until the fever took him?’
‘He wasn’t my true father. I was farmed out to the Trents when I was born. They were my foster-parents.’
‘You were a foundling?’
‘I was born out of wedlock to a servant.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘No one did. Did you ever wonder why I came here?’
‘To get away from Blackstone, I should imagine.’
‘But why here?’
‘Harriet, what is this?’
‘When I was a teacher at Blackstone I had privileges.Teachers were trusted to clean the principal’s office where the keys were kept.’ Harriet came into the firelight and picked up the silver teapot. ‘And papers about the pupils. Including me.’
Livvy turned the piece of bread carefully on the fork.‘Nothing in your past will make me think ill of you, Harriet.’
‘Perhaps I should have told you before now,’ Harriet said quietly. ‘The principal had letters and notes from a gentleman to my foster-parents, which had, at the time, enclosed sums of money for my care.They were from a Mr Copley. Oliver Copley. A drayman who delivered coal to Blackstone once mentioned a Copley girl living at Hill Top House.’