Spring Proposal in Swallowbrook (13 page)

‘Hugo, I can’t go without telling you the truth,’ she told him. ‘I’ve kept it from you long enough because I couldn’t face the telling of it, but I need things to be honest and straightforward between us before I leave this place.’ She took a deep breath and rising to stand before him said, ‘The reason I don’t want children and can’t marry you is because…’

‘You’ve got the haemophilia gene,’ he said gently, and saw the colour drain from her face and her eyes grow huge in the whiteness of it.

‘Who has told you that?’ she whispered.

‘No one. A chance remark made in all innocence set me thinking and the more I thought about it, the more it seemed believable, so is it true, Ruby? I have to know.’

‘Yes, it’s true,’ she said wearily. ‘
That
is why I can’t marry you, Hugo. I can’t deny you what should be rightfully yours because you feel sorry for me, or at this moment might think that my problem doesn’t matter, because one day it will matter a lot.’

‘And you were prepared to walk out of my life, throw away what we’ve got, without my opinion being asked?’ he said gently. ‘How could you do that to me, Ruby?’

‘I once told a guy that I was dating about the faulty gene. He was a medical student like I was and he dropped me like a hot potato. When I met you I couldn’t face the hurt of it happening again because I’d met the love of my life.’

‘And so you feel that what you are doing is the least hurtful thing?’

‘It has to be, hasn’t it?’

Apart from holding her hand as he led her into the sitting room, he hadn’t touched her so far, but it wasn’t for the want of doing so. He ached to hold her close and bring Ruby the comfort and reassurance of
his
love for
her
,
but first he had to say his piece, make sure that she wasn’t going to feel anything other than cherished beyond her wildest dreams.

‘You are beautiful and generous,’ he told her, ‘ready to give up on love for my sake and the children that you won’t put at risk, but if we don’t have any of our own, what is to stop us from caring for the children of others? There are children everywhere who desperately need loving parents, either through adoption or fostering. We have an example of the joy that can bring to both the child and those who have chosen to care for them in Toby, happy and contented with Libby and Nathan.’

‘And you would be content to do something like that?’ she asked in slow wonderment. ‘You once said that you would like a house full of children like Toby, but were referring to children of your own flesh and blood.’

‘Maybe I was, but we could still have happiness and fulfilment in the way I’ve suggested. I love you, Ruby, love everything about you, and want to be there for you every step of the way for the rest of our lives. So will you marry me? If you’ve given the ring to a charity or dispensed with it some other way, we can soon replace it.’

‘Yes. I will marry you, Hugo,’ she told him tremulously, ‘and we don’t have to replace the ring.’ She slipped the robe off her shoulders, and he saw that beneath it, around her neck, was the chain, and on it centrally placed was the ring, as close to her heart as she could get it.

He held out his arms and she went into them on wings of joy and delighted disbelief as he took the chain gently from around her neck and slipped the ruby ring off it and onto her finger.

Her pallor had gone, her eyes were sparkling, she was glowing like the gemstone she was named after. He raised his eyes to heaven and gave thanks for the treasure in his arms that he had so nearly lost.

When they met John at the lakeside the following day, where Nathan was going to pick them up in his boat to take them to the island, the older man’s glance went to the ring on Ruby’s finger and said, ‘So the gods
were
good, Hugo?’

‘Yes, they were good,’ he replied, with Ruby smiling up at him. ‘More than I ever dreamed they could be.’

When Nathan came chugging alongside in his boat to take them to the island and heard their good news he was on the phone to Libby on the island straight away, asking her to have champagne ready.

Her response was, ‘Wow! Fantastic! We’ve still got our clever young doctor, then?’

‘It would seem so,’ he told her, beaming across at them.

Ruby and Hugo made their wedding plans that night, strolling around the island in moonlight. Summer would be well advanced by the time they could make the necessary arrangements with the vicar and the caterers, but they didn’t mind. They were going to be together for the rest of their lives and that was what mattered.

Nathan was to be Hugo’s best man, Toby a page boy for the second time, and a friend of Ruby’s from university was to be her bridesmaid.

On the home front Robbie would be an usher and her father would give her away. They’d rung her parents the night before to tell them their good news and her mother especially had rejoiced because the love of her daughter’s life was a man who from the sound of it would never demand anything of her that she couldn’t give, and who adored her as much as she did him. For the first time in years the burden of guilt that Jess carried around with her had lifted because the blight in their family was going to be wiped out in the present generation.

Her father had been just as happy to hear her news as her mother had been, but had said when they’d finished the call that he would feel better when he’d met the doctor that his daughter had given her heart to. She was very precious and had already had misery in her life. If Hugo could help take away the pain of what the fates had done to her, he also would rejoice.

The wedding banquet was to be held at Lakes Rise. Ruby and Hugo were hoping that the sun would shine on them, but even if it didn’t, nothing could take the edge off their delight in each other.

It was hazy in the morning but by midday the golden ball was shining in the sky, and her mother and her bridesmaid smiled at Ruby in her wedding dress of cream satin and lace. Hugo, Nathan, Robbie and her father were making their way to the church resplendent in their male finery, and there was a satisfied smile on the face of the father of the bride.

He approved wholeheartedly of the man who was going to marry his daughter. He knew that Hugo would love and cherish her.

The organ sprang into life with the joyful strains of the wedding march. The bride had arrived. As Hugo rose to his feet Ruby walked slowly to meet him, holding her father’s arm, and when she stepped forward to be beside her bridegroom, tall, slender and beautiful on her special day, all those who loved her were rejoicing, most of all the man at her side who had taken her in out of the cold on a dark winter night.

* * * * *

ISBN: 9781459221352

Copyright © 2012 by Abigail Gordon

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