A Summer to Remember (19 page)

It was only with his family that he had ever felt gauche and worthless. With his family he had been a massive failure—beginning with Sydnam’s intrusion upon his other life. But only beginning there. It had culminated, he supposed, in the year he had just wasted in London, behaving more like a callow youth than the Lieutenant-Colonel Lord Ravensberg known to his colleagues in the army. Almost as if he had felt compelled to prove to the whole of the fashionable world just how worthless he really was. Almost as if he had wanted word to get back to Alvesley so that his father and the rest of his family would be confirmed in their opinion of him.

He had never even tried to think this all out before. Was he really so immature?

“Does Syd always ride out with you on business?” he asked abruptly when they were finally on their way home.
Except this morning.

“Usually,” his father said.

“I am surprised he is able to ride,” Kit said, broaching a topic he had no wish to pursue, except that it could not be avoided forever.
Syd had no right arm
.

“He has always been stubborn,” the earl said. “He was out of his sickbed long before the doctor advised any movement at all. He kept walking, even though he had to grit his teeth against the pain, until he could do it without limping. And he bruised himself over and over—and caused your mother many a bitter tear—until he could ride without losing his seat and falling off. He practiced for long hours until he could write legibly with his left hand. And he started spending whole days together with Parkin, learning the duties of a steward. When Parkin retired at the end of last year, Sydnam asked me if he could have his position.”

“But Syd was not cut out to be a
steward,
” Kit protested.

“He has made a life for himself,” his father said firmly. “He will accept no salary from me, of course, but he has been talking to Bewcastle about employment on one of the numerous Bedwyn estates. It seems that an opening is to be expected in the autumn—a salaried position even though Sydnam has independent means and does not need it. He is determined to be his own man. He does not wish to stand in your way here.”

But Alvesley would need a steward. Why not Sydnam if he was already doing the job? It was at least something he could do at home, where he had family to care for his needs. But of course that family now included Kit. That was explanation enough for Syd’s determination to leave.

“Why did he not come with you this morning?” Kit asked, though the answer was, of course, obvious.
Because I am with you.

“The account books needed bringing up to date,” his father said.

They were riding past a neat row of freshly thatched cottages, and the earl pointed them out as some of the laborers’ homes, which had been leaking during the spring. He hailed and exchanged pleasantries with a woman who was outside sweeping the threshold of her home while three young children played in the grass nearby.

“Your mother and I would like to have the first banns for your nuptials read on Sunday,” his father said abruptly as they rode on. “Our family members and Miss Edgeworth’s can be persuaded to stay on here for a month, I daresay, to attend the wedding. I suppose that after what happened at Newbury last year, she will not wish to be married there. There is no reason for delay, is there? We approve of her. She is a true lady. The embarrassment over Lady Freyja is an unfortunate one, but there is no point in dwelling upon what cannot be helped. What do you say?”

Kit had been listening in dismay—the more so, perhaps, because his father appeared to be asking rather than telling him. Another of the olive branches Lauren had spoken of yesterday?

“I would not wish to rush her, sir,” he said. “There will be bride clothes to shop for, and there are many other relatives she will want at her—at
our
wedding. The Duchess of Portfrey, her aunt, for example. The lady is to be confined soon—within the next month or so, I believe. We were thinking more of a winter or perhaps a spring wedding.”

“I just do not want your mother or your grandmother disappointed again,” the earl said.

Again?
Was he talking about Jerome and Freyja? Of course, he must be. But no one had mentioned Jerome’s name since Kit’s return home. He could not mention it now. Neither, it seemed, could their father. They rode through the village in heavy silence and spoke with false cheer to the porter, who opened the gates for them and delayed them for a few moments while he squinted upward at the heavy clouds and speculated upon the likelihood of their lordships getting rained upon before they reached the stables.

“I would rather not have the idea of banns pressed upon Lauren too soon, sir,” Kit said as they rode onward into the darker shade of the deer forest. “She suffered a severe and humiliating disappointment last year. I want all to be perfect for her this time.”

“Hmm. The thought does you credit,” his father said.

God help him, but he really did want that, Kit thought. Absurdly, he believed he would gladly give his life to make something perfect for Lauren. Perhaps he would find pardon and peace if he could bring about her happiness. But he could do just that, he thought rather bitterly. He could set her free.

By the time they rode clear of the trees an occasional large spot of rain splashed down onto them. Pretty soon it was going to be raining in earnest.

“We had better make a dash for it,” the earl said, looking upward. He added rather stiffly, “It has been a good morning, Ravensberg. She is a true lady.”

Yes. It had not escaped Kit’s notice, either, that they owed this morning together, earl and heir together as they ought to be, to Lauren’s gentle maneuvering last evening.

He smiled ruefully as he urged his horse to a gallop and clattered over the bridge in his father’s wake.

The guests began arriving in the rain soon after luncheon. Lauren spent much of the afternoon in the great hall with the earl and countess, with the dowager countess and Mr. Sydnam Butler, and with Kit, receiving the visitors, being presented to all of them, trying to impress names and exact relationships upon her memory.

It was not easy. It might have seemed impossible if she had not trained herself long ago, when she had expected to spend her adult life as the Countess of Kilbourne with all the duties of a hostess. She would remember Lady Irene Butler, the late earl’s unmarried sister, because she was white-haired and frail and severely bent over. And she would remember Viscount Hampton, the dowager’s brother, because of his shiny bald head and loud laugh, and Mr. Claude Willard, his son, who closely resembled him. Then there was Daphne Willard, Claude’s wife, and their three not-quite-grown children, two sons and a daughter—three young people who were on their very best behavior, doubtless in the hope of being included with the adults rather than with the nursery group during the coming days. Then there was the placid and smiling Marjorie, Lady Clifford, the Earl of Redfield’s sister, and her florid-complexioned, wheezing husband, Sir Melvin. Boris Clifford, with the eyeglasses, was their son, the buxom Nell his wife. This latter couple had three infant children, who were whisked up to the nursery after a brief inspection by the dowager, their great-grandmama.

There was a lull in the arrivals before Lauren had to memorize more names and faces and relationships. Mr. Humphrey Pierce-James arrived next with his wife, Edith, their daughter Catherine and her husband, Mr. Lawrence Vreemont. The latter couple also had two infant children. Mr. Pierce-James, Lauren understood, was the dowager’s nephew by a deceased sister. Last to arrive were Mr. Clarence Butler, the earl’s younger brother, with his wife, Honoria, their daughter Beatrice and her husband, Baron Born, and their brood of unwed offspring, varying in age from Frederick, who must be Kit’s age, to Benjamin, who was eight. Doris, one of the daughters, had her fiancé, Sir Jeremy Brightman, with her.

Lauren did not promise herself that she would remember every name and face and relationship immediately—there were so many of them—but she thought she would within a day or so. She smiled with some relief when it seemed the last guest had arrived and disappeared upstairs to freshen up before tea. Everyone had been amiable. If any of them knew about the projected engagement to Lady Freyja Bedwyn, none of them looked as if they held a grudge.

She had not had a chance to ask Kit about his morning. But he had spent the whole of it with his father about estate business—a promising sign indeed. Neither of them had been at home to receive Lady Freyja Bedwyn and her two brothers, but they had indeed called and spent fifteen minutes with Kit’s mother and grandmother and with Aunt Clara. They had expressed their intention of riding over again before the day of the birthday celebrations. A permanent rift had been avoided, it seemed.

It must be time to go back upstairs to the drawing room, Lauren thought. But the butler, peering discreetly through a window, announced that yet another carriage was approaching across the bridge.

“Perhaps
this
time,” the countess said, speaking to the earl but smiling at Lauren. “Do have a seat, Mother. You will be exhausted from having been on your feet all afternoon.”

“I will not . . . sit,” the old lady said. “Miss . . . Edgeworth, let me . . . take your . . . arm again.”

But Sydnam Butler stepped forward and offered his instead. The newly arrived carriage was drawing up before the steps, and the butler himself had gone down with a large black umbrella to escort the gentleman who was alighting from it indoors. Two footmen held the doors wide open. Lauren shivered from the chill of the wet, windy outdoors. But she donned her sociable smile again and prepared to be presented to yet another member of Kit’s family.

And then the butler removed the sheltering umbrella and stood to one side while the visitor stepped over the threshold into the hall and looked about expectantly.

Lauren forgot her famous dignity in the surprise of recognition and the welling of joy. She hurried forward, both arms outstretched.

“Grandpapa!”
she exclaimed.

“Lauren. There you are, my dear!”

She was enfolded in his embrace then and inhaling the snuffy, leathery scent she always associated with him. And swallowing and blinking her eyes and trying—in vain—to hold her tears in check.

He had come.

He had come!

“I did not know,” she said, drawing back from him and gazing into his lined, dearly familiar face. “I did not expect . . .” She turned to look with tear-bright eyes at the earl and at Kit. “Who did this? Whose idea was it?”

“Mine,” Kit said. He was grinning. “As soon as Mother and Father asked me which of your relatives should be invited.”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling at each of them in turn. “Oh,
thank
you.”

“Present me, please, Lauren.” Kit stepped forward and brought her back to a sense of duty.

She proceeded to present them all, her arm linked through Baron Galton’s—her very own relative—her heart brimming with happiness. They had invited him for her betrothal celebrations, and he had come all the way from Yorkshire. Just for her! Surely because he loved her. And it had been Kit’s idea to invite him and surprise her in this way. What a delightful surprise it was.

It was only as she led him up the grand staircase a short while later to the room that had been prepared for him, Kit on his other side, that she remembered something. Amazingly, alarmingly, it had totally fled her mind for all of ten minutes.

It was not a real betrothal.

13

F
or the rest of that day and all of the next Lauren felt that she would have been entirely happy if she had not kept remembering that she was living a lie. She pushed the thought aside as much as she could. She had committed herself to doing just what she was doing, and it was too late now to withdraw. There would be time enough to deal with her guilt over the deception when she had put an end to it.

She set herself the task of acquainting herself with Kit’s relatives. It was not difficult to do. They were a close and basically cheerful family and were quite prepared to take Kit’s betrothed into the fold and to be kind to her family too. Aunt Clara was appropriated by Lady Clifford and Mrs. Butler, Kit’s aunts, and by Mrs. Vreemont. Viscount Hampton, who had a previous acquaintance with Baron Galton, was pleased to renew it. Gwen became an instant favorite with Baron Born’s numerous offspring, especially with Frederick and Roger, who were soon vying with each other over her smiles and attention.

Lauren was everyone’s favorite, simply because, she thought, Kit was everyone’s favorite too. The quarrel with his family three years ago had certainly not tainted his relationship with his numerous aunts, uncles, and cousins. It felt seductively pleasant to be the focus of attention much of the time. Lady Irene Butler liked to pat her hand and tell her what a pretty child she was. The aunts and older cousins liked to talk to her about London and the latest fashions. The uncles liked to tease her about anything they thought might draw her blushes. The younger female cousins wanted to know who her modiste was, who chose the lovely fabrics and the elegant designs and the perfectly coordinated colors of her clothes. And how her maid styled her hair so perfectly just so. They wanted to know what she was planning for her bride clothes. The younger male cousins paid her compliments, some of them very extravagant and foolish indeed. They called Kit a lucky dog and he agreed with them wholeheartedly, his eyes twinkling at her. The young mothers took her to the nursery to meet their children, assuming that she liked infants. She was rather afraid of them, in fact, having had little to do with children during her adult life. But she learned all their names and was touched when they wanted to ask questions and show her their treasures and be picked up and played with.

She was careful to give much of her attention to Kit’s immediate family since it was his full reconciliation with them to which she had pledged herself. The Earl of Redfield was inclined to look favorably upon her, she believed. And he and Kit were no longer avoiding each other even if they were still treating each other with a somewhat stiff cordiality. The countess was pleased to accept the help she offered. Apart from all the plans for the birthday itself, there were meals and activities and floral arrangements to think of each day with such a large number of guests. Although she was perfectly capable of handling everything alone, she seemed grateful to listen to a second opinion on some details and even a few new suggestions. The countess seemed well inclined to treat her elder son with affection.

Lauren had grown truly fond of the dowager countess. It was never any trouble to walk with her or to sit and listen to her. The old lady’s left hand was stiff and curled inward as a result of the apoplexy she had suffered. But it was not quite paralyzed. Lauren took it in both of hers the evening after everyone’s arrival and massaged it gently, opening the fingers back with her own. It felt good, Kit’s grandmother said, and they smiled at each other. It was for her sake that Lauren felt most guilty, for she believed that her affection was fully returned.

It was only with Sydnam Butler that she had so far failed to set up any rapport—or any communication with his brother.

She did not see a great deal of Kit. Or rather, she
did
since it rained for the rest of that first day and most of the second and everyone was forced to remain indoors, but she did not spend much time in his company and none at all alone with him. Her swimming lesson had to be canceled on account of the weather, though why it should be when they were going to get wet anyway he did not know, he had added over her protests. She missed the morning outing, though, the sheer
fun
of floating and splashing in the water. She wondered how she was going to do without such activities when the time came, but she determinedly pushed such thoughts aside.

They played charades in the drawing room during the second evening, a game in which most of them participated and which gave rise to a great deal of noisy animation and laughter. The younger people were not willing to see the game end, with the result that they were all rather late going to bed. Lauren sat with Gwen for an hour after that, as she did most nights, talking. It was after midnight when she returned to her own room, and even after that she did not go immediately to bed, but blew out the candles and stood at the window, brushing her hair, enjoying the sight of the moon and stars again. The rain had stopped late in the afternoon and the clouds had finally moved off.

Was he sleeping? She knew that, like her, he suffered at least sometimes from insomnia. She had seen him more than once outside the house after everyone was in bed. On that one occasion he had walked off down the driveway until he had been lost to sight. He did not seem like the sort of man who would have trouble sleeping. He seemed always to be cheerful and laughing. But she knew too that the outer appearance was in some ways not the real Kit. There were depths to his character that he hid carefully from the view of most of his acquaintances.

What troubled him enough that he could not sleep?

It was as if her thoughts conjured him. He appeared below her on the terrace, wearing breeches and topboots and a riding coat rather than the evening clothes he had been wearing an hour or so ago. He walked across the terrace to the edge of the lawn and stood there, his feet slightly apart, his hands behind his back, gazing out into the darkness. He looked lonely.

Perhaps he wanted to be lonely or at least alone. Perhaps he treasured times like this, when everyone else was supposedly asleep and finally he could enjoy an hour of solitude. Or perhaps insomnia had driven him outside, and perhaps that sleeplessness was caused by a troubled mind. Perhaps he was tired, restless, unhappy. In need of a kindred soul to listen to him or be silent with him—a sympathetic presence.

Or perhaps it was she who needed company.

It would be terribly improper to go down and join him. Even if they were truly betrothed it would be improper before they were wed. But she was growing mortally tired of propriety, of her prim devotion to a way of life that put all the emphasis upon what was correct rather than upon what one’s heart knew ought to be done. Perhaps the heart was a poor and unreliable guide for behavior, but so surely was cold, blind propriety.

She was hurrying into her tiny dressing room even as she was thinking. If he did not want her, he could tell her to go away. She would not stay out long anyway. She would just stand beside him for a while and they would talk. Perhaps then he would be able to sleep. Perhaps then she would.

Descending the stairs and crossing the hall in the dark was no easy matter. And all the time she was afraid that perhaps he had gone out a different way and she would find the doors bolted and impossible to open. But when she turned the great handle of one of them, it opened easily, and she stepped outside onto the marble steps.

He had gone.

There was only empty space where he had been standing a short while ago. So much for her boldness, she thought, descending the steps slowly, holding the ends of her shawl crossed at her bosom. He had gone. But even as she thought it she saw him. He was striding across the lawn in the direction of the driveway. He was walking rather fast, she thought. She hesitated for one moment before going after him.

“Kit.”

He was on the driveway already, not far from the bridge. Lauren was half running over the grass. She could feel its wetness about her ankles and the hem of her dress.

He stopped abruptly and turned toward her even though she had not called out loudly.

“Lauren?”

He sounded surprised. Was he also displeased? Had she done entirely the wrong thing? She came up to him in a few moments but stopped several feet away.

“I saw you from my window,” she said. “It is not the first time. Could you not sleep?”

“And could
you
not?” It was impossible to tell from his tone whether he was annoyed or not.

“I thought I might walk with you,” she said. “I thought it might be . . . comforting to have some company.”

“Do you have trouble sleeping, Lauren?” he asked.

“Sometimes,” she admitted. She had not used to. But despair after her aborted marriage had robbed her of the oblivion of sleep she had so longed for, and then sleeplessness had become a habit. It was the time when she most ached with nameless yearnings. She could usually keep herself well occupied during the day, but at night . . .

“We should stroll back to the house,” he said. “You would not want to come with me where I was going.”

“Where?” she asked.

“A gamekeeper’s hut in the forest actually,” he said. “I suppose I have spent too many of my adult years alone, living under rough conditions. A civilized home, especially one filled with other people, oppresses me. I feel that I cannot breathe freely. Since I came home I have equipped the hut with the bare necessities, and sometimes I go there at night. It somehow soothes my mind. Sometimes I sleep there.”

“Ah,” she said, wishing she had not acted so hastily. “You
do
wish to be alone, then. I am sorry. And you do not need to walk back to the house with me, Kit. Really you do not. Good night. I will see you in the morning. Will we—will we swim?”

He did not answer immediately. She felt awkward, rather humiliated. She turned to hurry away. But his voice stopped her.

“I would
like
you to come with me,” he said.

“Truly?” She looked back at him. “You need not say so just to be polite, Kit. I do not wish to intrude.”

But he was smiling at her and looking his usual self.

“Truly.”

She walked beside him, holding her shawl. He did not offer his arm.

“What sort of troubles keep you from sleep?” he asked her.

She shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“What happened last year?” he suggested.

She shook her head again. “I don’t know.”

“What masks we wear,” he said. “No one looking at the beautiful and dignified Miss Lauren Edgeworth in Lady Mannering’s ballroom a couple of months ago would have suspected that she nursed an utterly shattered heart. I am sorry that I did not have the sensitivity to know it or even suspect it. I am so very sorry, Lauren.”

“It was my
life
that was shattered more than my heart,” she said. “But looking back, I am not sure . . .”

“Of what?”

They were walking through the Palladian bridge. She could hear the water rushing beneath it.

“I am not sure it was quite the disaster I thought it at the time,” she said. “I was only half a person at that time. Don’t ask me to explain, Kit. I am not sure I know quite what I mean myself. Life was lived by a rigid set of rules. It had a set pattern. But that is not real life, is it? At some time surely I must have woken up to that fact. Life could not have continued placid and perfect to the end.” And maybe placidity and perfection did not go hand in hand, anyway, although she had used to think so.

He looked curiously at her, but they did not speak again. Soon after they crossed the bridge they reached the trees, and he took her arm and turned off the driveway. It was very dark among the trees. She would have been totally lost and not a little frightened if his own steps had not been sure. As it was, all she had to do was put her trust in him—a remarkably easy thing to do. She would always feel perfectly safe with him, she believed, even if a hungry wild beast were to step into their path. She smiled to herself at the thought.

She had no idea how he found the hut in the dense darkness, but he did. He felt along the top of the lintel, produced a key, and turned it in the lock. He left Lauren standing on the threshold and went inside. A few moments later the feeble light of a lamp sprang to life, and she stepped into the small wooden cabin and closed the door. He was on one knee, setting a light to the fire that was laid in the small grate.

It was a remarkably cozy interior. There was a low bed covered with blankets, an old wooden rocking chair, and a roughly hewn wooden table with a single chair pushed beneath it. There were two books on the table, and the lamp. Apart from those things and a rush mat on the floor, the hut was bare.

“Take the rocking chair,” Kit said. He had pulled the top blanket from the bed and was spreading it over the bare wood.

“Thank you.” She sat down and the chair rocked gently beneath her weight.

Kit sat on the side of the bed, his arms across his spread knees, his hands dangling between. It was an informal, relaxed pose. Lauren smiled at him, relaxed back in the chair, and closed her eyes. It was not a cold night, but the warmth from the fire felt good. She listened to the crackling of the kindling.