An Heiress at Heart (17 page)

The butler showed him up to the parlor. Ria stood by the window, the sunshine illuminating her face. Geoffrey paused, transfixed. A deep burgundy gown beautifully set off her features, and her hair was set in ringlets in the back that edged her graceful neck.

Only days before, he had viewed her as the cause of so much misery. Now he knew he could not allow it to overshadow all of his thoughts and actions. There was no changing the past; he and this woman must make the best of the present.

She walked over and clasped his hands warmly. “I’m so glad you could come.”

He was inordinately happy to find that neither Lady Thornborough nor James were present. “Are we all alone, then?” he asked.

“I’m afraid so. Grandmamma had another engagement this morning. She hopes you will forgive her absence.”

He nodded. “Of course.”

Ria looked uncertain about what to say next, and Geoffrey also felt suddenly tongue-tied. He sensed they were both growing embarrassed as the silence lengthened. Finally he said, “Would you like to take a drive? It is a fine day, and I brought an open carriage.”

Ria smiled, and Geoffrey was glad to see the tension subside from her manner. “That sounds marvelous.”

A few minutes later they stepped out of the town house. Geoffrey handed Ria up into the carriage and was relieved to find this task a shade less disconcerting than it had been yesterday. He hoped that, as he grew more familiar with Ria, he would not always find her nearness so diverting to all his senses. As soon as he sat down next to her, however, he realized he still had a long way to go.

“Where to, my lord?” the driver asked.

Geoffrey turned to Ria. “What would you like to see? Shall we go north to Regents Park, or down towards the river? Perhaps a visit to Saint Paul’s Cathedral?”

Her face lit up at the mention of Saint Paul’s, which was located in the original part of London still known as the City. “It would be lovely to see the City again.”

“Excellent.” To the driver he added, “Take us by way of Buckingham Palace,” and was gratified to see Ria’s look of delight.

The streets were filled, as always, with carriages, carts, and even livestock. There were a great many pedestrians, too, their ranks swelled by the visitors who had come for the Great Exhibition. Ria seemed to take
it all in with fascination. “How busy London is,” she observed. “The noise and activity never stop.”

“It’s a far cry from a sheep farm, I’m sure,” Geoffrey said.

She nodded. “It is also, I think, very different from your quiet little parish in the country?”

How kind,
he thought,
that she should think of that.
“Yes,” he agreed. “I wonder if I shall ever acclimatize to it.”

“I feel the same way,” she replied with a melancholy air.

They were alike in that respect, Geoffrey reflected. They were both facing extraordinary life changes. “A lot has changed since you were last in London, I expect.”

She gave a little laugh. “Yes, much has changed.” She cast him a teasingly critical look. “Have you perchance changed as well? I confess you are not at all like I had pictured you’d be.”

He should not have been surprised to hear this; after all, hadn’t he felt the same way about her? Even so, it gave him pause. “No doubt Edward’s descriptions did me no credit. What did he tell you about me, to give you such low expectations?”

“It’s not that Edward spoke ill of you,” she protested. “He just said that all three brothers were very different people. In his opinion, William was too bullheaded, Eddie himself was too easygoing, and you were too short on patience for either of them.”

“No doubt he was right,” Geoffrey said, shaking his head. “I only wish he might have confided in me before leaving England.”

“Perhaps he feared you would talk him out of it.”

“Undoubtedly. He knew I would vigorously remind him of his duties and urge him to do the right thing.”

“But would it have been right to stay in England? It would have meant seeing the woman he loved married to his brother. And she would have been forced into a loveless marriage.”

This seemed an odd way for her to phrase it. “Why do you speak of yourself in the third person?”

“I…” She faltered. “I—was merely attempting to lay the question out logically.”

Logic
was not a word Geoffrey would once have used to describe either Ria or Edward, but he thought it better not to say this. There was a time, he thought, for discretion.

Their carriage was forced to a stop while a man drove several cattle across the road. Geoffrey tried to imagine Edward in such a role. It still seemed incredible to him. “Ria, you said Edward was one of Mr. McCrae’s most trusted hands. What were his duties exactly? Did he truly enjoy the work?”

It was like a dam had broken—in a good way. Ria began to speak freely of the life she and Edward had led in Australia. She was so animated as she spoke, and Geoffrey took pleasure in watching her as she described caring for the sheep, the intensive days of shearing in summer, and Edward’s vital role getting wool and supplies across the Blue Mountains. Edward’s excellent horsemanship, a hallmark of the Somerville family, had been his first greatest asset. His energy and leadership had been the second.

“I confess that you are giving me a picture of Edward I never had before,” Geoffrey told her.

“I’m not surprised. He never had the chance to prove himself in England. He was always just the second son—the ‘spare.’ In Australia it was like he became unbound.” She gave him a misty smile. “You would have been so proud.”

He took her hands, happy to hold them, happy to be able to share these moments with her. “I wish I might have known him then. Seen him…” He broke off. It was difficult to put in words his sense of loss, his regret that he had missed out on sharing what must have been his brother’s finest years.

Ria squeezed his hands gently. “He would have loved that, too,” she said.

“Were you happy there, too? Is that why you stayed so long after his death?”

She glanced away, looking at the passing buildings. “I believe I was content—so long as Edward was alive. We had some dear friends, too.” She paused to briefly touch a handkerchief to her eyes. “I did not want to leave Edward at first. Leave his grave, I mean. Even though he is dead, I felt like it would be abandoning him.”

“What made you change your mind?”

“I…” She looked at him apologetically. “I knew there was unfinished business here. I had to return.”

“Thank you for that,” Geoffrey said. “I know it cannot have been easy for you.”

“It was no easy thing to cross those mountains again, I can tell you,” she said with feeling. “To retrace the steps Edward had taken… There was a small group of us traveling together. Our guide knew where Edward had been attacked, but I specifically asked him
not
to point out that location to me.”

She dabbed again at her eyes, and Geoffrey felt it would be a shame to give in to sorrow now. “Let us not dwell on his death today,” he proposed. “Today, let’s rejoice in the life he lived.”

“Thank you,” she said. “That is a wise suggestion.”

There followed a moment of silence, however, when there seemed no good way to begin speaking of anything else.

Geoffrey saw that they were approaching Buckingham Palace. “I can see the royal standard,” he said, pointing to the ornate red, blue, and gold flag flying high atop the palace. “The Queen is in residence today.”

*

Lizzie marveled at how well Geoffrey received the things she told him about Edward. It was another important milestone, she thought, that she had been able to increase his appreciation for his brother. It was one way she was keeping her promise to Ria, and her heart was a little lighter because of it. “Thank you for bringing me out today,” she said.

“Thank
you
,” Geoffrey replied with a smile.

She loved his smile. It did not come as easily as Edward’s, but it was just as attractive. She wondered if Geoffrey was aware of the effect it could have on women. She suspected he did not. Lizzie turned her face toward the sun, basking in its warmth and in the satisfaction she’d already received from being with Geoffrey this morning.

They drove through Saint James’s Park and began to head east. This was her first real opportunity to see the city since her return. Her brief forays with James and
Lady Thornborough had been limited to Hyde Park and a few fashionable homes in Mayfair and Belgravia. What a treat it was, too, to see it all from the comfort of a carriage. In the past when she’d lived in London, she usually traveled on foot, and had rarely come this far west.

The traffic grew denser as they approached the heart of the city. The famous dome of Saint Paul’s Cathedral had been visible from a great way off. As they drew near to the cathedral, Lizzie saw many people milling about, admiring the two rows of double pillars and the two tall towers that framed the front of the edifice. She had fond memories of this place. In some ways, it was like seeing an old friend.

“Would you like to go in?” Geoffrey inquired.

She readily agreed.

The interior of Saint Paul’s was refreshingly airy and cool after the heat of the summer day. There were plenty of people inside, but they quickly dispersed among the smaller chapels and alcoves of the enormous cathedral. As she and Geoffrey walked slowly down the long nave, Lizzie enjoyed the hushed calm that pervaded the place—so quiet after the noisy confusion of the streets outside.

When they reached the center, they paused to look up at the inside of the giant dome. Lizzie saw at least a dozen people looking down at her. These were the intrepid visitors who had climbed the many stairs leading up to the whispering gallery, an area ringing the base of the dome. Lizzie turned to Geoffrey. “Can we go up?” she asked eagerly.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” he replied with surprise. “I believe there are over two hundred steps.”

“It’s two hundred and fifty-seven, to be precise,” said a man who happened to be walking by them at that moment. “The missus and I just came down.” He indicated the lady he was escorting. Both were well into middle age, and they were looking a little red-faced, as though from heavy exertion. Lizzie instantly recognized the man’s American accent. “It’s quite a hike, I can tell you,” the man declared. “I was so tuckered when I got to the top, I thought I’d peg out. But the view is bully.” Lizzie tried to suppress a smile at the look on Geoffrey’s face. Was he more surprised at the man’s colloquialisms, or at being thus addressed without an introduction?

She soon had her answer. After they had parted from the couple and found the entrance to the gallery steps, Geoffrey asked Lizzie with amusement, “Do you have any idea what that gentleman said?”

“Oh, yes,” Lizzie replied. “I had occasion to meet some Americans in Sydney. Their expressions can be quite colorful.” She translated for him as they proceeded up the steep and narrow staircase. They paused on a small landing halfway up. It was warmer up here, and Lizzie was still adjusting to the extra layers of clothing she was now required to wear. Dressing in Australia had been much simpler. She leaned on Geoffrey’s arm as they took a moment to catch their breaths, and she was happy to see that he seemed to take as much pleasure in this as she did. Thus fortified, they took the last flight of steps and at last exited through a door onto the whispering gallery.

Lizzie went straight to the iron balustrade and surveyed the immense nave far below. She had been up here once before as a child. She and Tom had enjoyed testing the peculiar characteristic for which the gallery got its
name. Tom had circled the walkway to the other side, and the two had been able to talk to one another in a normal voice despite the great distance separating them. “Have you been here before?” she asked Geoffrey as he joined her at the railing.

“Oh, yes,” he answered. “My brothers and I first came here as children, and we were naturally intrigued by the way the sound travels around the walls.”

“I can definitely picture that,” Lizzie said. How odd to think that they had all, in a way, crossed paths up here. What different courses their lives had taken since then.

She turned to look up. From here they had a closer view of the murals decorating the inside of the dome. “What do they represent?”

She was sure Geoffrey would know the answer to this question, and he did. “These are scenes from Saint Paul’s life. There are eight in all, as you see. This first one,” he said, pointing to the mural just above them, “shows Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. There is Paul on his knees, with the bright light of the Lord shining round about him.”

Geoffrey gave her a brief background of the stories illustrated in each of the paintings. When he reached the last one, he said, “And this is the shipwreck, when Paul’s ship was broken up during a fierce storm.”

“A shipwreck?” The word brought unsettling things to Lizzie’s mind: she could almost feel, as well as visualize, waves that were endlessly rolling, never ceasing. And then to be thrown into wild waters, taken away by a reckless sea, just as Tom had been. Her heart broke afresh at the thought of it. “It must have been horrifying,” she said, her voice strained.

“It was described vividly in the Book of Acts:
‘All hope that we might be saved was lost.’ ”

Lizzie gripped the railing. She looked across the open expanse to the other side of the whispering gallery, remembering how her brother had stood there, alive with the joy and excitement of youth. Now she saw that he had been standing beneath that mural of a shipwreck. “All hope lost,” she repeated sadly.

Seeing her expression, Geoffrey added, “The Bible says that all two hundred and seventy-six people aboard the ship made it safely to land. God protected them.”

He intended this as a good thing, Lizzie knew, and she said, “What a wonderful miracle.” But in her heart she sinfully wondered why the Lord could not have saved Tom. Of course, Paul had worked tirelessly to win others to Christ. Tom had boarded a ship with far different intentions. He felt he knew where Edward’s murderer was, and he was going after him.