Passion's Joy (38 page)

His son! He was not imagining it! There was something truly remarkable about the little fellow, something that spoke of health, well being and happiness. Joy and Sean were both absolutely convinced—they knew as fact—that little Sean, like him, had escaped the curse. His enormous love aside, and though little Sean was only six weeks old, did boy sing this blessed song. So one part of his nightmare was dismissed day to day, while the other part grew.

A picture emerged against his will in his mind's eye: On the island shortly after the birth, he had left Joy and little Sean asleep in the small makeshift hut. Upon returning with two fair sized fish, he found the hut empty. He could not explain the irrationality of his sudden fear; they were, after all, alone on the island, no one but his men on the other side and with Sean there, too. Perhaps it was her unmasked vulnerability of those days, the thought of her alone with little Sean, of one of

the island's wild boars, a fall or a step onto a rock fish, but a panic fueled his race down the beach, then on to the only navigable path into the jungle.

He came upon the waterfall, the cool clear pool surrounded by a profusion of ferns and growth, with a sudden stop. Little Sean lay on a blanket at the water's edge. Joy was swimming, gliding gracefully over the water, long hair trailing behind her. He heard the music of her laughter, and watched as she dove in and out. The innocence of an Eve playing in the water of her garden, and he only knew he had been smiling at the enchanting scene when she stepped out of the water and his smile disappeared.

Unknowingly, and with a song to his son, she presented the unclad beauty of her changed shape. Water slid from the white silk of her skin, sliding over the rounder, fuller lines of her slender curves. Curves, he knew, that to touch would render the very word softness. He was shaking, barely perceptible, but felt violently as he stared at what was simply too beautiful to believe—

He stifled the thought and turned toward the wind, striding toward the ladder to descend onto the main deck. Joy and little Sean would be asleep. The time for distance had arrived. He would just gather the necessities and leave.

Ram quietly lifted the latch of the door to his quarters and stepped inside. A moment stretched endlessly as his eyes fell on her sitting in his bed, Little Sean cradled in her arms. A brush lay to her side; her long dark hair cascaded neatly behind her shoulders, shining as though touched by moonlight. Her eyes were shadowed, lowered as she stared at their son, one hand caressing his face. A thin cotton night dress was unbuttoned to her waist, carelessly hanging on her bent arms.

Peace was shattered in the instant as his gaze lowered from the delicate loveliness of her face to her shoulders and the pearly-white smoothness of her round, full breasts. Hot, hard desire shot through him again, and he was held helpless by it, unable to move if his life depended on it.

Joy's eyes lifted to see him standing there, staring like that. She blushed, the rising color not helping him at all, and nervously she tried to straighten her gown. "Oh, I—" She was tongue tied, ridiculously tongue tied as she pulled up one side of her gown but was stopped on the other side by Sean's head resting on the gathered material. He saw she at least comprehended his trouble. With a new mother's caution, she managed to lift little Sean's head and disengage her gown. She looked back up but he was already opening the door.

The time to put distance between them had passed, long past. "Ram, where are you going?"

He stopped but just for a moment. "Where? Joy"—he almost laughed—"I could no more sleep in this room than I could on a battlefield."

"Battle ... what?" she asked but was answered with a slam of the door. Within days Joy began to realize something had come between them, and like a slowly lengthening shadow, it was growing, ever so slowly; she felt it growing…

* * * * *

After writing four pages about little Sean and another ten pages trying to describe London,

it was close to midnight when Joy finished the long letter home, a letter that concluded with an explanation of the situation. She was at an inn, where the entourage awaited Ram's delayed departure from London before going on to Barrington Hall, Ram’s ancestral home where she and Sean would live. It was not just the grandeur and unparalleled opulence of Ram's London town home that they had just quit, a place that surely matched the grandeur of any royal dwelling, though this was part of it. Tension and discomfort sprang far more from the uncomfortable position brought by the small army of servants. These servants included a personal maid whom she neither needed or wanted, and a Madame Bouvia, whose sole occupation was to teach her protocol and the manners of a lady, all of which she loathed and thought ridiculous in the extreme. Thankfully, Madame Bouvia would be at Barrington Hall for only one night! All this was in addition to the unendurable and endless sittings with the famous dressmaker.

Joy picked up her letter, and by the light of a bright lantern, she read over the part where she tried to explain what being Lady Barrington was like:

I know that to be rich without cares is a thing every human being seeks; to have plenty of food and nice clothes, to have a pretty home and monies left over for necessities and bills—well, who could not want these luxuries?

I assure you, Sean and I are not in this position. Nay, we fly so far above comfort I am afraid to land for I can no longer see the earth. I cannot so much as lift a teapot before a servant jumps up and does it for me. I sit down to eat with three people standing by to watch me with blank, impassive stares. My chair is held for me, my napkin unfolded and laid upon my lap, my tea is poured, my portions served to my plate and alas, the servants stop only at actually placing the food in my mouth. They are polite and solicitous in the extreme, but distant, so distant, my friends, that no attempt on my part has yet been able to bridge the enormous gulfs of the English class system; gulfs that are larger than the distance between a Negro field hand and the planter himself in our country. Why, the twenty or so servants at the townhouse had a hierarchy more stringent than the social stratification found in an ant colony. It goes like this: The butler is absolute monarch in the house, sharing his throne with the queen, the head housekeeper. Beside them, but not beneath them, are Ram's secretaries and the chef. Directly beneath these lofty beings are the maids, footmen, grooms, and kitchen or scullery help. It goes on from there. For instance, the maid's hierarchy goes in rank order: the serving maids, the upstairs maids, the downstairs maids and lowest, the kitchen maids. So, it is with the grooms and the footmen and all others. Queer, nonsensical status rises and falls in what seems to me utter capriciousness; for instance, a footman can be free with the upstairs maids but must condescend to talk with a downstairs maid or kitchen maid. One downstairs maid, a kindly and simple Mrs. Grose, took me into her guarded confidences

—this after a ridiculous amount of prodding on my part—to tell me it is her fondest hope that her daughter aspires to the lofty position of upstairs maid! Because of my look of dumfounded disbelief, the poor woman took fright, looking like she expected me to scream, 'You uppity sod! Off with your head! Off I say!'

It is all so awkward; I know not where or how to begin! From my hastily drawn picture you can imagine where I, Lady Barrington, sit in this hierarchy. How can I make a friend of someone whose fondest wish is to polish my boots, so to speak? It is as though I live in a glass cage. I am trapped; I see and hear the people around me but I cannot touch them. If not for the joy of my son, I fear I should be very lonely indeed. I miss you all so much ...

Tears formed against her will as she thought of Cory's, smile, the Reverend's quick laughter, Sammy's gentle eyes. She thought of a simple life, small pleasures like fixing breakfast in a predawn light with Cory, reading to the family by the firelight, of Sunday church outings and riding Libertine bareback and barefoot into the bayou wildness beneath a hot Louisiana sun .. .

Joy stopped the tears with a deep breath and a quick wipe of her cheeks, and knowing the real conflict of her heart, she opened her diary and tried to confront what had happened.

Dear Diary,

When had it changed? I try to think back over these last months, searching for the exact moment that marked the change in his affection, all in the hope that if I found this moment and saw it clearly, I'd understand what caused the distance between us, for if I could understand the cause, then perhaps I could provide a solution.

There is no single moment though; I can see that now. It seemed to start when we finally left the island of blue lagoons and thick green foliage. His men were recovered from the fever. I was recovered; I felt free again, light of foot and weight, filled with laughter, a previously unimaginable joy, a mother's new love. I never knew such happiness before ...

There were no more feelings of awkwardness, helplessness or neediness! My joy spilled over into everything I did and was, and that was it; it seemed the better I got, the more he changed.

After the uncomfortable exchange that night he came upon me just after I finished nursing, I remember the afternoon I gave little Sean his first bath on the ship. I was laughing at how wide his enormous eyes were, his excitement registered in wild movements, and as I lifted him up and out, then guided him back, I suddenly realized we were not alone. I looked up to see Ram staring at us. I cannot forget the agony in his gaze, the tension etched into the hard lines of his face, filling me with such quick fear that my hands tightened instinctively on little Sean while my eyes darted to him, expecting to see something hurting him. Yet little Sean was wiggling and happy, and when I looked back at Ram with a question, he was gone.

I don't understand what has happened! A hundred times I turned to him with the question of what has happened only to find myself stammering, the question stopped before being voiced, all because I'm afraid of the answer. He married me for Sean, of course I knew this, but I thought nay. I knew he once loved me. Didn't he? Memories are vivid in my mind—memories of his kisses and

his touch, of the desire of his gaze that sent me swooning, filled with that wild rush of longing, sweet, warm longing! Memories that spin in my every dream...

How life changes unpredictably. I would have sworn my greatest fear would have been Ram's relationship with his son, that despite his efforts, his fear would manifest there. This is not so! I know of no two people who take more delight in each other's company than Ram and little Sean. I know most fathers ignore their children until they start talking, and even then the vast majority of child raising is by the designs of nature delegated to women. But not so with Ram!

When Ram's with us, he spends as much time caring for Sean as I do. Little Sean is always in his father's arms. Ram teases and tickles him, sings to him, talks to him like he is a boy of five. Why, he will even tell me how to care for him! Once when Rake accidentally stepped on little Sean as he lay on a blanket and I immediately rushed to comfort his cries, Ram stopped me. "No love, don't fuss over him. Try distracting him first." Sure enough, the second little Sean saw the jeweled belt buckle Ram held in front of him, the capricious little fellow forgot he was hurt. To watch Ram play with little Sean, to see Ram's pride and love is my greatest joy, except—

Lately, he takes little Sean from me, rather than including me in their time together. The distance between us still grows, ever slowly but awfully, and now indifference begins to take turns with the tension. The indifference seems somehow so much worse, too. He is always polite and considerate, too polite, too considerate, for I want none of that.

Once, in the beginning, his feelings for me were shadowed by the madness of his father, the idea he could never marry or have children, but now it is not that; I know it is not that. Little Sean's wellness has destroyed that idea; little Sean is absolute proof that the madness exists no more, that it shall play no part in our lives. So, what shadows have come between us now?

Ram, where has your love flown? What is happening? What have I done?

I have never been one to play with the conventions of society and yet, the more I lose him, the harder I find myself struggling to please him, to become the Lady Barrington he must want, to look and act a role most unnatural and uncomfortable to me. I persist in this fool's game, hoping, praying that some flicker of his response will guide my direction. Yet none has come. He leaves me alone in my struggle, leaves me with only hope, hope dying a little each day-

She stopped, standing at the light, her pen suddenly wavering unsteadily. Tears glistened in her eyes and she was lost again. She set the quill down, turned out the light, and not for the first time, tears saw her to sleep.

The two men riding through London's streets looked at first glance like two common travelers, until one noticed the quality of their mounts, their impressive stature and bearing, and on one of the men, the signature of his patch. They rode at a casual lope through Hyde Park, now dark and deserted, buried in the thick mist of a London fog. They came out of the park onto the King's road lined by the magnificent townhouses owned by the world's most elite personage, and they slowed their mounts.

It had been a fine stay so far. The gaming and politics of London were unmatched anywhere else in the world, certainly the politics were of a caliber high enough to keep Ram's interest. He had not realized how much he had missed London's pace. Of course, his affairs were in a shamble, a shamble that would keep him occupied for years and a day. The intrigue though, was almost over; this was the last of three houses he'd visit.

Less than a mile down, the famous thoroughfare, they reined their mounts to a stop in front of Lord Guiness's manor. Ram dismounted, handing the reins to Sean, wordlessly moving to the great wall surrounding and protecting the estate. With a catlike grace and agility, he vaulted the barrier and disappeared over the side.