Louise Allen Historical Collection (57 page)

‘Not at all. As well to be safe, not sorry, my lord. Your wife is in excellent health, I am glad to say. However, if you would like me to call every few weeks or so, I would be more than happy to do so.’

‘Thank you.’ With Anne Baynton and Dr Hamilton both aware of Arabella’s secret she should worry less, he was sure. ‘I will be happier when we can abandon this pretence about the pregnancy,’ he added.

Hamilton nodded. ‘It will start to show in about another week,’ he said. ‘Perhaps if I call in a fortnight, just to check things out?’

‘Thank you,’ Elliott said, shaking hands. ‘I must confess to finding this a somewhat unnerving experience.’

‘Oh, it gets better after the third one,’ the doctor said, still obviously amused by Elliott’s nerves. ‘I’ll show myself out, my lord.’

Elliott went to open the door into Arabella’s room and stopped, his hand on the handle. All he had cared about, he realised, was Arabella. He had not worried about the child, only the effect it would have on her if she lost it. The treacherous thought had even flashed into his mind that if she did miscarry, then they could have another.
His
son.
What kind of wretch does that make me?
he wondered, resisting the impulse to kick the door panel out of sheer self-disgust. The child she was carrying was his blood, his nephew—somehow he was convinced it was a boy—he should be prepared to do whatever it took to keep it safe.

It was his duty. Elliott fixed a smile on his lips and opened the door.
Duty. And what a cold word that is.

Arabella was sitting up in bed, looking relaxed, and he felt his smile relax, too, into something almost genuine. She was such a trouble to him, yet he could not resent her.

‘I am so sorry to cause a fuss,’ she apologised. ‘Doctor Hamilton was very kind and explained that it was quite normal to have those little cramping pains at this time. He says it is my body adjusting itself to the growing baby.’

‘You were not to know, it must have been alarming.’ Elliott sat on the edge of the bed and held her hand. ‘And now you had better stay in bed for the rest of the day, nursing your fictitious bad back.’

‘I suppose I had,’ she agreed ruefully. ‘I will plan what to do with the decoration of this room. I have to admit to becoming very weary of pink and frills, which, when you consider that at the vicarage I had a room half the size of my dressing room here, with faded chintz curtains and a rag rug on the floor, is very ungrateful of me.’ Her mouth thinned as she looked around. ‘I suppose Rafe had a very conventional view of female tastes.’

‘Of some female tastes, certainly,’ Elliott said drily.

‘That is true.’ He saw her give herself a little shake as though to push away an unpleasant memory. Then she frowned; obviously another troubling thought had arrived. Elliott made a conscious effort not to frown too. This marriage business, this being aware of another person’s feelings and moods and fears all the time, was unsettling. He had not realised how much a wife would take over his thoughts.

‘I wonder how Papa is managing without me,’ Arabella said.

‘Doubtless he will hire a housekeeper. He will be able to select one to suit his temperament.’

Arabella chuckled. ‘How very gloomy’ Elliott watched her face as sadness took her again. He wanted to make it go away, but couldn’t think how to. ‘He wasn’t always like this, you know. When we were little he was pious, of course, and quite strict, but there was laughter. I can remember flowers in the house and Mama singing and reading books that I am certain were not volumes of sermons.’

‘What happened?’

‘She died. She went to visit her sister in London quite unexpectedly, for I can recall Papa was out and when he came back and she had gone he was furious. And then, a few weeks later, he told us she was dead of a fever.’ She frowned. ‘That must be the aunt Lina ran away to—she had found a letter from her, but all that was left in Lina’s room was the torn bottom edge. Her name was Clara.’ Arabella bit her lip, deep in memory. ‘Mama said she would send for us to visit our aunt, too, so we must not cry. And there was a carriage outside, but I do not know who was in it.’

‘And your mother’s body was returned home. What a terrible thing for three little girls,’ Elliott said, a suspicion beginning to grow in his mind.

‘No. That was so sad too. Papa told us she had been buried in London. I do not even know where her grave is.’

And it was after that your father became stricter, obsessed with sin, especially female sin?’

‘Yes. I suppose her death made him…strange. The responsibility of bringing up three motherless daughters, perhaps.’

‘Or three daughters whose mother had run off with another man?’ Elliott suggested, thinking aloud and not watching his words.

‘Run off?’ Arabella pressed one hand to her mouth as though to shut off the words. ‘Mama left him? Oh, no!’

T
he words were out now, he could not take them back. ‘I think she must have run away, don’t you? I imagine you never thought to consider the evidence as an adult, but she left when he was out, there was a carriage waiting for her. If that was your aunt, why not come in and see her nieces? Why leave when your father was away from home and promise that she would send for you? Why did your grief-stricken father not want her body returned home?’

‘But she never sent for us,’ Arabella protested. And she would have done.’

‘How do you know? Would he have let you go to her and another man, do you think? How old were you?’

‘Seven,’ she murmured. ‘No, you are right. I would never have known if she had tried to make contact. Like Meg and Lina now—I am certain they will have written and that he destroyed the letters.

‘He kept us close, I remember that. It seemed an age before we were allowed to go out without Cousin Harriet: she lived with us until I was seventeen.’ She stared at him, eyes wide. ‘Oh, poor Mama. She must have been desperate to have left us.’

Elliott caught her hands, which were clenched in the bedclothes, and stroked until the stiff fingers relaxed into his.

‘How could she bear to leave her own children?’ she wondered and she put her own hand, bringing his with it, to lie over her belly.

Shaken by the emotion he could feel coursing through her, Elliott made himself keep still. ‘I am sorry, Arabella. I should have thought before speculating aloud. I did not mean to upset you.’ And upset her he had—her expression was tragic. ‘She must have been desperate, I agree. And she thought you would be able to join her later.’

‘Mmm.’ She nodded, deep in thought. ‘How will I tell Meg and Lina? If I ever find them. Oh, Elliott, I do miss them so.’

Ah, Arabella.’ Elliott pulled her into his arms and she clung while he rubbed her back gently, wondering how he could ever make this right for her.

‘I will check the Army List while I am in Gloucester,’ he promised. ‘The local militia headquarters will have the current edition. We can find where Meg’s husband is based.’

‘Oh, thank you. His name is James Halgate. I don’t know which regiment he is in, but he went to the Peninsula, I know that.’ She emerged, tousled, her nose pink, her eyes wet. Elliott was surprised to find himself still sitting there; the prospect of any woman weeping on his shoulder would have sent him running just a few weeks ago. Arabella took in a big, shuddering breath. ‘I’m sorry, I am making such a lot of work and worry for you.’ Elliott shook his head in denial. She was indeed a worry, but he wanted to help her. He wanted his wife to be happy.

And now two of us have run off with men and the third has gone and Papa suspects there must be a man involved there too. How right he has always been about us,’ she said with an attempt at lightness that made his heart contract with sympathy. ‘No wonder he is writing intemperate letters; he must be beside himself.’

Elliott thought of the plan he had conceived of asking his new father-in-law to stay at Hadleigh Old Hall, once his initial fury had subsided. Now, however he might pity the man, he was not going to allow him anywhere near Arabella. His wife’s desertion had obviously made a domestic tyrant out of a strict father; the loss of all three daughters could well have unhinged him.

‘May I be frank with Bishop Huntingford? I think it might help head off any future problems if he understands that your father is not entirely rational on some subjects.’

‘I suppose so—so long as it would not get back to his own bishop. I would not want his living to be in any danger. I have had no letter from him myself. I am not surprised, I confess.’

Bless her,
Elliott thought, squeezing her hand.
The man makes her life a misery and she still worries for him.
What a very warped model she had of men and how low her expectations must be. She seemed to be learning to trust him—but what would she think if she realised how he was increasingly feeling about the child she carried? ‘Of course, I will ask for his assurance of strictest confidentiality before I say anything.’ He got up and walked to the door.

‘Thank you,’ Arabella said, her smile making something inside him twist with guilt. ‘You look after me so well, Elliott. I feel safe with you.’

‘I will see you later,’ he said from the doorway. ‘I’ll tell Gwen to make sure you rest.’

The day passed surprisingly quickly, Bella found. The morning she spent deep in thought, trying to recall every nuance, every clue of the days and months before and after her mother’s departure. Elliott’s interpretation made more sense, the more she thought of it. She could vaguely recall the arguments, her mother weeping at night. Her eyes had been red when she hugged them goodbye. How miserable she must have been to have left us, Bella thought, her hand straying to stroke gently over her own child. And who was the man? Perhaps Mama was still alive somewhere. But instinct told her not. It was hard not knowing. Harder than believing Mama had died all those years ago. That had been a tragedy, but now, from the vantage point of her own bitter experience, her heart bled for her mother’s unhappiness and desperation.

If only she could talk to Meg and Lina about this. If only she could be certain they were safe. Bella closed her eyes, mourning her mother all over again, imagining her, for the first time, as a young woman in love and bitterly unhappy. Who was she to judge her after what she had done herself?

She felt strangely better after that and sent Gwen for paper and pencil so she could lie in bed making lists of things to be done to redecorate her suite and the nursery. And Elliott’s rooms—was he content to simply walk into the chambers his brother had occupied?

‘Have you used every sheet of paper in the house?’ Bella looked up and realised that the bed was strewn with lists and sketches. Her husband was standing in the doorway, his shoulder against the frame, his coat hooked on one finger over his shoulder. His shirt was open at the neck, rolled up to his elbows and filthy. His hair was in his eyes and there was a long graze up the length of his right forearm. He looked utterly male and quite breathtakingly virile.

Bella swallowed hard. ‘What on earth have you been doing?’ She tried to sound like any wife confronted by a filthy, sweaty man who had wrecked his clothes and who had arrived home late for dinner and in dire need of a bath. But she could not feel anything but shamefully aroused by the sight.

‘We’re building a new sawpit.’ Elliott sauntered into the room, shedding sawdust as he came and bringing with him an intoxicating scent of resin and fresh sweat. Any proper lady would shriek and order him from the room—Bella wanted to strip all his clothes off.

And I suppose
we
is the royal
we,
and means quite literally that you are involved,’ she said severely. ‘You have men to do such things, surely?’

‘I enjoy it,’ Elliott said, unrepentant.

‘And I suppose it was necessary for you to try it out from
inside
the pit,’ she said with a sigh. ‘Look at the floor.’

He regarded the trail of sawdust. ‘It is good for cleaning the carpet.’

‘That is damp tea leaves, not sawdust. Do
not
sit on the bed!’

Elliott grinned, leaned down and kissed her. ‘How are you now? Any more cramps and twinges?’

A few, but, now I know it is only to be expected, they are not so bad. I was just worried about the baby.’

‘I know you were.’

‘Looking at you now, I can only hope it is a boy. The pair of you would have such fun together.’