The Temporary Wife/A Promise of Spring (56 page)

The expected guests at Amberley Court were the earl’s new fiancée and her mother and brother, no less. And it seemed that the betrothal had been contracted in great haste and under somewhat scandalous circumstances, Miss Purnell—that was the lady’s name—having been hopelessly compromised by one of Lord Eden’s pranks, which had been intended for Lady Madeline.

“Then why is it that Lord Eden is not marrying the lady?” Miss Stanhope asked with great good sense.

“No one seems to know,” Mrs. Morton said, nodding sagely as if to indicate that she knew very well but felt it indelicate to gossip about such matters. “But the earl gave a grand garden party for his betrothed in London. The Carringtons were there.”

“I daresay his lordship considered dear Lord Eden just too young to take a bride,” Miss Letitia suggested. “But is she pretty, Mrs. Morton?”

“Quite handsome, according to Mrs. Carrington,” Mrs. Morton replied. “Very dark in coloring.”

“And do you suppose the nuptials will take place here?” Miss Stanhope asked. “It would be entirely fitting. And before the summer is out, do you think?”

The ladies had a comfortable coze about all the possibilities surrounding the news. And Mrs. Morton went home with the satisfaction of knowing that she had created a stir in one household and that she would be sure to call upon Lady Lampman and the rector’s wife and Mrs. Courtney and Mrs. Cartwright the next morning before the Misses Stanhope, whose morning it was to decorate the church with flowers, were abroad.

G
RACE WAS GLAD
of the diversion presented by the new arrivals. Her pregnancy had made her restless. Nine months seemed altogether too long to wait for an event whose outcome was so very uncertain. And once the increased tiredness of the first months was behind her, she found herself full of energy and compelled to be busy every moment of the day. Even her embroidery, always one of her favorite pastimes, seemed far too passive an activity. She wanted to be out digging in her garden, striding along lanes and roadways, cleaning the books in the library from ceiling to floor.

Dr. Hanson had told her that she must rest, that physical activity must be cut to the minimum, that she must remain indoors except when she had a carriage to take her somewhere. And even then she must be sure not to travel on the rougher roads—and that command excluded almost every road in their neighborhood. Unfortunately, he had given this professional advice in Peregrine’s hearing, though he had not mentioned the dangers that he had told Grace of during her first consultation with him.

And Perry was being very protective, fetching pillows for her back and a stool for her feet whenever she sat down, forbidding all work in the garden, and allowing sedate walks that were all too slow and all too short only under the severest of protests. It was very irksome.

And quite gloriously delightful. She had been so very alone for years and years. And now she had a man fussing over her, worrying over her health, giving her commands, and being quite insistent that she obey most of them. She saw a new side to Peregrine during those months. He had never been a man to give orders. He commanded respect entirely through the kindliness and integrity of his character. But he had been very angry the morning he had caught her on her hands and knees at the edge of a flower bed, picking out some weeds with her fingers, and had taken her quite ungently by the arm and conveyed her to the privacy of the library.

There he had told her, without the merest glint of humor in his eyes, that if he caught her doing any such thing again until after her confinement, he would forbid her to leave the house without his escort. She had not asked how he would enforce such a rule. She had had no doubt as she had listened to him in silence that somehow he would. It was only the second time she had ever seen him angry.

Memory of that incident could make her smile secretly for weeks afterward. And she would sit, restless and impatient, quietly sewing, her feet resting on a stool, for many hours when Perry was with her, his nose inevitably buried behind a book, glancing down with satisfaction and hidden excitement at the swelling that was her child, feeling him move in her and kick at her, knowing that when she got to her feet again she would feel the extra weight of him. And she would think that it was quite impossible to be any happier in this life. And she would shift in her chair, often drawing Peregrine’s eyes
and the offer to bring her another cushion, and wonder if the nine months would ever, ever be at an end.

The arrival of Lord Amberley’s betrothed and her family necessarily brought more activity and more excitement into their lives. The earl had always been Peregrine’s close friend. And she liked him too. He was rather like Peregrine in some ways. He was gentle and kindly. But he was far more reserved than Perry. One felt that one liked the man but that one really did not know him at all. But both felt that he deserved a good wife, one who would know him and understand him and make him happy.

Peregrine would not be able to forbid her to attend all the social activities that must follow upon such an event, Grace thought with satisfaction. She would be able to forget her restlessness for a while.

And she was right. The only matter on which he was quite inflexible was that they not host any grand entertainment themselves. Nothing more grand than an invitation to tea.

“They will take one look at you and understand perfectly, Grace,” he said with a grin. “And it is quite obvious that you have not been merely overindulging in food, or you would be fat all over.”

And so they went to the Courtneys’ dance and card party, where they met Miss Purnell for the first time. Grace liked her. She was darkly beautiful and quiet, though she was not shy. There was a poise and a charm about the girl that was somewhat at variance with her age. She must be about the age Grace had been when she had had Jeremy. And Grace thought that there was a fondness between the girl and her betrothed, though they danced together only once during the evening.

Grace was forbidden to dance, but she had accepted the command with a smile. “Very well, Perry,” she had said. “I will be good, as you will see. But on one condition:
you must not feel obliged to hover over me all evening. You must enjoy yourself.”

“And I cannot enjoy myself by staying with you?” he had asked.

“No,” she had said. “You know what I mean, Perry. You must promise.”

“I promise,” he had said solemnly, holding his right hand in the air.

But it was a mixed blessing, she found, this renewed spate of social activity. It curbed her restlessness, filled her days and her thoughts with activities that helped a long nine months to their end. But it reminded her again of how old she was to be bearing what everyone around her believed to be her first child. Much as she delighted in her growing bulk when she was at home, much as she liked to look at herself privately in a mirror, standing in profile, her hands over the rounded shape of her womb, which held Perry’s child, in public she sometimes felt ungainly and unattractive. And embarrassed.

And she found herself again, as she had used to do, watching Perry when they were in company together, watching his gaiety, his smile, and his dancing eyes, listening to his laughter, and feeling that she was too old for him, too serious, too unattractive. There was no jealousy in her, only an unwilling and an unreasonable sadness.

Unreasonable because Perry had shown her nothing but affection since their marriage. And because since she had sent Gareth away and since she had told her husband that she was with child, his every look and action had shown concern for her as well as affection. She was the most fortunate of women. She was the happiest of women, she told herself over and over again.

There was only one thing lacking in her happiness. Only one very small detail. Perry had never said that he loved her, that she was all the world to him. It was a
very small detail. His looks said those things. His actions said those things. And even if he did not feel that ultimate commitment to her, he was the kindest and most considerate of husbands. And he had given her a child and filled the one remaining emptiness in her life.

It must be her pregnancy, she decided, that was making her temperamental: delirious with happiness one moment, stirred by doubts and fears the next.

Peregrine, for his part, felt a similar mixture of emotions. On the one hand he was happier than he had been at any time in his life. Finally he felt that he could relax in the knowledge that his marriage would continue. And continue not just because it was too difficult and too troublesome to end, but because they both wished it to do so.

Grace had sent Sandersford on his way and claimed to feel nothing but indifference for him any longer. And her behavior during that dinner at Amberley had seemed to bear out her claim. She had shown no preference for her former lover or even any shrinking from him and no sign of distress after their final leave-taking.

The only apparent sadness she had shown since had been at the churchyard where he had taken her and her father the day before the latter returned home. The two of them had cried in each other’s arms at Paul’s graveside while he had stood quietly by. And of course she had been quiet and dejected for two days after the departure of her family. But that mood had paradoxically delighted him, showing as it did that her reconciliation with them was complete. Even the stern Martin had hugged Grace as if he had wanted to break every bone in her body before following Ethel and Priscilla inside their carriage.

It was very good, Peregrine found, to be able to relax again, to know that his wife was his. It was good to talk with her again on any topic that interested him, read to
her, watch her about the tasks he was willing to allow. It was good to be free to love her again. And it was very good indeed to watch her growing larger with their child, growing more beautiful to his eyes with every passing day.

And he was terrified. Afraid that the child would die, either during the nine months or—worse—at birth. How would he ever comfort Grace if she should lose this second child, coming as it was so long after the first? After the beloved son who had died? He could survive the pain. The only person he really needed was Grace, though he did of course ache with longing to hold this child of theirs. But Grace? Would she be destroyed by the loss of her baby?

And he was terrified that Grace would die. Would he be as fearful if she were ten years younger? he wondered. Was it natural to fear for the life of the woman one had impregnated? He would not want to go on living without Grace. He would have done so, of course, had she decided to go with Sandersford. He would do it doubtless if she died in childbed or from any other cause. But he would not want to. And if it was the bearing of his child that killed her, he did not think he would ever be able to talk himself back to life again. Unknown to Grace, he had had a private talk with Doctor Hanson, and he knew full well that the dangers that faced both her and the child were only enhanced by her age.

He was aware of her restlessness, though he did not understand its causes. He knew that it irked her to sit indoors and allow him to coddle her, to watch the gardeners do every task in her beloved garden while all she could do was walk sedately through it, her fingers itching to get down among the flowers to perform their miracles. He knew that when they walked, she fretted at his slow pace and willed him to take just a few more steps before turning to go back home again. He knew
that she longed to do more visiting and more entertaining.

And he gave in, against his better judgment, when Amberley’s betrothed arrived and various social entertainments were planned in her honor. He took Grace to the Courtneys’ informal dance, the Carringtons’ picnic, Amberley’s garden party, among other things.

But he ended up feeling uneasy. She could do nothing strenuous, of course. She could not dance or walk any great distance. And he found himself watching her almost constantly, though she had begged him not to feel obliged to keep her company at every moment of every entertainment. He was proud of her, proud that their friends and neighbors would see that she carried his child. And he ached with love for her, observing her converse with Miss Purnell and others with her usual quiet charm.

And he wondered if she was happy. There was no reason in the world why she should not be. She had freely chosen to stay with him—or had she? She had been pregnant before that infernal letter from Sandersford had arrived. And she had told him that bearing a son was what she wanted to do—she very rarely admitted the possibility that it might be a daughter. And she seemed perfectly contented with his company by day and his lovemaking by night. Indeed, it could no longer be said that he made love
to
her almost nightly. To his wonder, he had found since their reconciliation that he made love
with
her.

There was no reason to believe her unhappy. But he found himself, quite against his will, watching her with ladies of almost her age, ladies with grown children, and he wondered if she perhaps found it humiliating to have a younger husband who had forced her into beginning a new family.

And always, returning to haunt him against all reason,
was that knowledge that when she had made her decision regarding Sandersford, she had not after all been free to make a free choice. He had begotten his child in her perhaps a week before that letter came.

It was absurd. He had every reason to be happy. He
was
happy. But he watched his wife with unwilling unease. Did she love him? She had never said she did. And it did not matter if she did or not. Love was only a word. She showed him love, or respect and loyalty and affection anyway. They were enough. Quite enough.

But did she love him? Absurdly, totally absurdly, he was afraid to ask. And afraid to say the words himself for fear they would be unwelcome and embarrass or even distress her.

G
RACE ATTENDED THE
wedding of the Earl of Amberley and Miss Alexandra Purnell in the village church during September, and the wedding breakfast afterward at Amberley Court. There were only two weeks remaining until her expected confinement, and she was feeling quite huge, but she assured Peregrine that she was quite well and that riding in the carriage could not do her the harm that it might have done a few months before.