Lament for a Lost Lover (19 page)

I only wanted to talk of Edwin. I made her tell me over and over again of his last minutes. She told it with drama and feeling, as I would expect her to.

“I had been going through that farce of gathering plants. Actually, I spent quite a bit of time in the arbour. … Do you remember that old arbour—relic of more splendid days? I would go over some of my parts and see how much I could remember. I had hoped to find something to read, but there was nothing but sermons and I wanted none of those. I took some satisfaction in just sitting there idling, thinking how that would have upset them if they had known. I was clever, Arabella. I had made them think I had some special knowledge and I believe Ellen was a little afraid of me. She thought I might be some sort of witch, that was why she let me get away with my plant hunting.”

“Yes, yes, but tell me about Edwin.”

“That day I was there in the old arbour … and I heard horses’ hoofs in the distance. I peeped out and there he was coming towards the house. I called to him and he stopped and dismounted. He said, ‘Hello, idling away the hours God gave you, as usual.’ He was laughing at me. … And then … suddenly there was the man with the gun. Edwin pushed me into the arbour, trying to cover me. There was an explosion and then … It was instant, Arabella. He didn’t suffer. He was laughing at me one moment … and dead the next. …”

“I can’t bear it, Harriet. It is so cruel.”

“It’s a cruel world. You didn’t know how cruel till now.”

“And now,” I said, “the cruelest thing of all has happened to me.”

“You must remember your blessings, Arabella.”

“Blessings … with Edwin gone.”

“I’ve told you so often. You know what I mean. Your family. They love you so much. Rouse yourself. Think of them all. The children are wretched … Lucas is unhappy. We all are.”

I was silent. It was true, I knew. I was imposing my grief on them.

“I’ll try,” I promised.

“You are so young. You will grow away from it.”

“I never shall.”

“You think that now. But wait. A short time ago you did not know him.”

“You can’t judge what we had, by time.”

“Oh, yes you can. You were a child when you met him. You are not fully grown yet.”

“As you are, of course. Don’t talk down to me, Harriet.”

“That’s better. A spark of anger. I do talk down to you because you have so much to learn.”

“Before I become as knowledgeable as you, you mean?”

“Yes. Life doesn’t go on all the time being one happy dream, you know. It wouldn’t always have been so pleasing to you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your marriage was so brief. To you it was idyllic. It might not have gone on like that. You might have found Edwin wasn’t quite what you thought. He might have been disappointed in you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just that you are a romantic and life is not as simple as you think it.”

“Are you trying to say that Edwin did not love me?”

“Of course, he loved you. And you loved him. But you are so young, Arabella, and you don’t understand these things fully.”

“How can you understand my feelings for Edwin or his for me? Surely I am the best judge.”

She laughed suddenly, throwing her arms round me and hugging me.

“That’s better. You’re hating me … now. That’s good. It’s taken the place of that overwhelming grief. Oh, Arabella, you’ll grow away from it, I promise you, I promise you.”

Then I returned her embrace, and she was right, I did feel better for my anger against her.

My mother came to Château Congrève. She must have set out as soon as she heard the news.

I was so glad to see her that my grief seemed less intense than it had since I had known of Edwin’s death. The children were so overjoyed that it was impossible not to rejoice in their happiness. But I was the one she had come to see.

We were so close to each other. We always had been in the days when we could be together, and I found our enforced separation had made no difference to our feelings for each other.

We were alone together quite a lot, although she contrived to spend time with the others. But I was her chief concern.

She made me talk to her. She shared a room with me so that we could be together through the night, and if I could not sleep she would talk to me. It amazed me how, when I was sleepless, she would always wake up as though she knew at once that I was in need of comfort. She could not explain it. It was some bond between us.

She made me tell her everything. She wanted to hear in detail about the play and how I had been Juliet to Edwin’s Romeo, how we had married so hastily and I had followed him to England.

“If I had not, this would never have happened,” I cried. “But I wanted to be with him. You understand that.”

She understood perfectly.

I told her about Chastity and the button. Who would have believed that such a trivial thing could be so important?

“It is often the trivial things in life that are,” she answered.

Harriet came into the story. It was Harriet who had gone with us to the Eversleighs. It was Harriet who thought of the play, Harriet who had suggested we follow Edwin to England, and Harriet who had been with him when he had died.

I noticed that my mother often brought Harriet into our discussions. Harriet had come in the first place with some travellers, had she not?

Although I might deceive my mother by half-truths in a letter, I could not do so face to face. She had a way of probing, and soon the whole story had come out about the strolling players, but I did manage to hide the fact that the hurt ankle had been a ruse.

“How odd,” said my mother. “So she was with this troupe of players. How did she join them?”

So I had to tell her then how Harriet’s mother and stepfather had been drowned and how she had been saved and taken to a family where she had been governess. My mother wanted to know the name of the family. I said I would ask Harriet if she really wanted to know.

My mother said she would ask her.

I hastily said: “One of the sons of the household made advances to her and that was why she left. They might speak ill of her.”

My mother nodded.

I had a feeling that she did not greatly like Harriet. That disturbed me, and I tried to make her understand how much we had all enjoyed her company and how good she was with the children.

“I can see they have a very high regard for her,” she said.

How she comforted me I could not tell, but she did. She made me see that I had had great happiness and must be grateful for that. It was sad that it had been so brief, but at least I had something to remember.

She told me that she was going to call on Lady Eversleigh on her way back to Cologne to join my father, and she thought that I should come with her to the Château Tourron and be with Matilda for a few days. She was sure it would comfort her. Then when my mother left for Cologne I could return to Congrève.

This I arranged to do.

Poor Matilda. She was, as I had expected her to be, overcome with grief. She embraced me, called me her dear daughter and talked continually of Edwin.

She said: “He was the hope of our house. And he is gone. … Our only son. There is nothing left to us but to mourn.”

My mother said to me later: “I’m afraid this does little to assuage your grief, my darling, but it comforts her to have you here. That I know. So for her sake … bear with it.”

She was right. I found myself comforted by comforting Matilda Eversleigh.

Charlotte was like a sad, grey ghost. Poor Charlotte, who had lost her lover and her brother. She was like one who was wondering what blow could be dealt to her next.

I walked with her in the gardens and she asked me about Edwin’s end. I told her as Harriet had told me.

“So she was the last one to see him alive. It would be so.”

“She happened to be in an old arbour and heard him come towards the house. Someone must have been lying in ambush there.”

She narrowed her eyes and said: “What could she have been doing in the arbour? Did you ask her that?”

I answered quickly: “We were all expected to do tasks. She went out gathering herbs and she used to rest there.”

Charlotte’s lips tightened. Of course she would never forgive Harriet for taking Charles Condey from her.

Then I poured out my feelings to her. I told her about the button and how foolish I had been and how it had aroused suspicions against me.

“You were not to know,” she said. “It was all so innocent. You must not reproach yourself.”

She was gentle and kind to me and I felt I had a friend in Charlotte.

What a house of mourning that was and how poignant I felt when Matilda thanked me for making Edwin’s last weeks so happy.

She said: “We are a military family. He died for his King and that is something of which we must be proud. He died as bravely as his ancestors have died on the battlefields. Let us remember that.”

My mother mentioned Harriet one day when we were sitting together—Matilda, she and I. Charlotte was not present. I guessed my mother knew that the subject of Harriet would be too painful for Charlotte to bear.

“A strange young woman,” said my mother. “Arabella has been telling me how she came. What did you think of her, Matilda?”

Matilda Eversleigh hesitated. “She was very good with the play,” she said. “We thought her a great asset … in the beginning …”

“And afterwards?” asked my mother.

“Well, there was Charles Condey.”

I said: “It was scarcely Harriet’s fault. He fell deeply in love with her.”

“She is very attractive,” admitted my mother.

“It was rather unfortunate. Poor Charlotte …”

“But a happy escape if he was so fickle,” my mother pointed out.

“Ah, yes, perhaps,” sighed Matilda.

“And that was all?” went on my mother. “Until that happened you were quite happy about her being here?”

“It was the best house party I have had since I left England.”

“And it was all due to her,” I said quickly.

“Oh, yes, yes,” agreed my mother-in-law.

My mother appeared to be satisfied, but I who knew her well realized that she was thinking deeply. I had a feeling that she was not completely happy about Harriet.

I said good-bye to my mother and the Eversleighs, and when I reached Château Congrève there was a great welcome awaiting me. Madame Lambard had baked a pie with “Welcome home, Arabella” worked on it with strips of paste, and the three young children sang a song of welcome which Harriet had taught them and which she whispered to me they had practised every day, so I must be pleased with it.

“No tears,” she whispered. “They’ve worked so hard. You can’t disappoint them.”

Nor could I. I was surprised to find that the gloom which had till now enveloped me had lifted a little.

It was a revelation which came to me suddenly.

I had awakened to a bright morning, and as usual as soon as I opened my eyes and remembered that I was a widow, the terrible desolation swept over me. I lay for a while thinking of waking with Edwin beside me, and how I would watch him until he suddenly burst out laughing because he had only pretended to be asleep.

Then I would shut my eyes and wallow in my grief and assure myself that life was over for me. I would force myself to get up and remember that I had to be bright because of the children.

And as I lay there that morning it flashed into my mind. It was possible. Could it really be?

If it was, it would make all the difference in the world to me.

Of course I could not yet be sure. But if it were. Oh, God, I thought, I should begin to live again.

I lay there as though wrapped up in a cocoon of hopefulness.

The next weeks would tell me, and if it were true, I should have something to live for.

I could only keep saying to myself: I shall begin to live again.

They noticed the change in me.

“You’re getting over it,” said Harriet, and she looked so happy that I knew she was truly fond of me. The children noticed it. They leaped about making strange contented noises as they used to. Lucas, dear Lucas—who seemed to have grown up so much in the last months—was quietly happy.

Oh, indeed, I owed it to them to shake myself out of my misery. And if this were true … oh, if only this were true … I should not have lost Edwin entirely.

By the end of July I was sure.

I was going to have a child.

Madame Lambard, who had acted as a midwife when she had had the opportunity, confirmed my condition.

She was so delighted that she burst into tears and became emotionally voluble.

The good God had answered her prayers, she told me. She had prayed to Him to give me this. He had made me suffer but He had his reasons. Now He was giving me this blessing.

They were going to take care of me—she and the good Lord together, and with such guardians I could rest assured I should come to no harm. I should have every care … every attention. I would be happy again.

Yes, I thought, I can be happy again. When I hold my child … mine and Edwin’s … in my arms, I
shall
be happy again.

Of course I told Harriet.

She was amused and went into fits of laughter.

“What is funny about it?” I demanded.

“It just strikes me so,” she answered. “I’m happy for you, Arabella. This is going to make all the difference to you, I know.”

“It is, Harriet, it is.”

I wrote immediately to my parents and then remembered Matilda Eversleigh. After all, this concerned her.

Her response was immediate. She wrote:

My dearest daughter,

This news has filled me with such happiness as I feared never to feel again. Oh, blessed day when you came to us. Edwin will live on for us. Let us pray for a boy. Though a little girl will be a comfort. But a boy will recompense us in so many ways. You see, my dearest child, I can talk to you like this because you are one of the family now. Edwin was the heir to a great name and a title, and it is a tragedy that we had no other son. His inheritance would have gone to my nephew Carleton whom you met in England. He is worthy enough, of course, but if your child is a boy, it will be kept in the direct line and that is important to us. My dearest grandson! Lord Eversleigh will be delighted. I am writing to him without delay. Oh, this is such a blessing. What a joy it is to have good news. You must take the greatest care of yourself. Perhaps you should come to me. I cannot convey what joy your letter has given me. …