Mary Balogh - Web of Love

Except that her room faced the front of the house and she had been unable to resist the temptation to cross to the window, standing well enough back so that she would not be observed from the outside, in order to see him when he left.

Just like a lovesick schoolgirl!

He looked so very familiar, despite the unfamiliarity of the clothes. Certainly no worse for his ordeal, though she could not, of course, see his face. He looked quite as splendidly built as ever.

Would he come back? She must prepare herself. She must know very clearly how she would react next time. She must certainly not rush away like that again. Dorothy would think she had taken leave of her senses. Or would perhaps suspect the truth. And Jennifer might begin to wonder. It was a good thing she had not been at home this first time.

She must prepare to meet him as an old acquaintance. She must inquire about his health and about the members of his family. She must prepare herself to look him squarely and coolly in the eye.

It should not be difficult. She had known him and been on friendly terms with him for more than three years. There had been only six days of the other. No more.

Of course there was a good deal more. Ellen’s hand was spread below her waist as she watched horse and rider leave the square and disappear from sight.

A great deal more.

Her mind had been in a deep torpor for two months. She had made no plans whatsoever for her future apart from the ones she had made on the boat home. It was as if life had been suspended. And yet all the time-a great irony indeed-life had been developing. New life. Her future.

There was no doubt left in her mind. And there was no panic and no fear either, though perhaps there had been a little of both at the end of the first month. No thought to how she would cope with the reality, how she would explain to other people. To Jennifer and to Dorothy.

She was going to have his child. Lord Eden’s child. There. She had said it in words in her own mind. Charlie and the army surgeon had been right. It had been something to do with him. Not with her. She was able to conceive, and she had conceived at some time during those six days.

She was going to have a child. And she must be taking leave of her senses-she was glad! There was an excitement in her that she had not until this moment admitted to herself.

Here was her future. Something-no, someone-to live for now that there was no longer Charlie. She could wish fiercely that the child were his, but it was not, and it could not have been. And so she could not after all feel as sorry for that affair as she should have felt, for without it she would be without this child growing in her. She would be without a future. No, not that. She did not think she was the sort of person who could ever give up entirely and permanently on life. But without the child she would be starting at the age of five-and-twenty with a blank life ahead. A frightening prospect.

She would have her child to live for. And it did not matter that it was not Charlie’s. It did not matter that it was Lord Eden’s. What did matter was that it was a living being and growing in her, that it would be hers, and that it had been conceived at a time when her love for Charlie had been too great for her mind to be willing to let him go. And at a time when she had felt a great tenderness for its father.

For the child had not been conceived out of lust. She had been wrong to say that. There had been a closeness, a tenderness. Nothing that would last. Nothing that could be called love. But not just lust, for all that. Nothing ugly. Nothing sordid, despite what she had said to him at the time.

Ellen’s free hand joined the other over her abdomen.

LORD EDEN WAS RIDING along Oxford Street when he spotted his cousins Anna and Walter Carrington walking along toward him, Walter’s arms loaded with parcels. Anna saw him, smiled dazzlingly, and waved.

“Dominic,” she called when he drew rein beside them. “You wretch. You have been going to take me walking this age. But I might be sitting at home gathering dust for all you care. So I have come shopping with Walter.”

“And I can see why you need him,” Lord Eden said, grinning down at them. “I suppose you can’t balance something on your head too, Walter, so that Anna can buy a few more things?”

Walter grimaced.

“And besides, Anna,” Lord Eden said, “once when I called, you were entertaining a dozen guests, at least half of whom were male and young. And another time you were out driving with young Pendleton. I concluded that a mere cousin was of no account now that you have grown into the beauty I always told you you would grow into, and have been the belle of a London Season.”

“Oh, nonsense!” she said. “You know that I would have consigned Mr. Pendleton to the bottom of the sea, Dominic, if I had known you were going to choose just that afternoon to come for me. And you really must not smirk at me in that odious way, Walter, as if I were a child still.”

Walter turned and smirked instead at his cousin, who grinned back.

Three young ladies were coming out of a shop just behind Anna and Walter, one of them wearing deep mourning. Miss Jennifer Simpson, by some strange coincidence, Lord Eden saw when he looked more closely. She saw him at the same moment, smiled uncertainly, and blushed. He swept off his hat, which he had returned to his head after greeting Anna.

“Miss Simpson!” he said. “Well met. I have just come from your aunt’s house, but neither you nor your stepmother was at home.”

She curtsied and looked up at him. “You have been to call on us, my lord?” she said. “But Ellen is at home. She had no intention of going out.”

“I left my card,” he said, “and told your aunt’s butler that I would return tomorrow.”

“I shall look forward to that,” she said, her voice breathless. She looked over her shoulder, but her two companions had strolled on. “And I am sure Ellen will too.”

“May I present my cousins?” he said. “Anna Carrington and her brother, Walter. Miss Jennifer Simpson is the daughter of an army friend, Anna. She was in Brussels earlier this spring.”

Anna smiled. Walter dropped two parcels and took Jennifer’s hand in his. She looked at him and blushed anew.

“I have not had a chance to express my sympathies,” Lord Eden said. “I do so now, Miss Simpson. Your father was a fine man.”

“Yes.” She smiled briefly up at him and stooped at the same time as Walter, to pick up one of his parcels.

“I shall hope to see you and your stepmother tomorrow, then,” Lord Eden said. “Perhaps you would care to join me for a walk in the park?”

“Thank you, that would be pleasant.” The slight breathlessness was back in her voice.

As Lord Eden gave his horse the signal to move on, Anna was linking her arm in Jennifer’s. “Where is your carriage?” she was saying. “We will walk you to it, since your companions have left you behind. Won’t we, Walter? You must not worry about my brother’s having to carry so many parcels, Miss Simpson. They are all as light as a feather.”

Anna was laughing merrily as Lord Eden rode away.

So she was at home. She had refused to see him.

Miss Simpson was very pretty. It was sad to see her in black, and to know that she wore it for Charlie. Lord Eden recalled the very last time he had seen the girl. She had begged him to keep himself safe. And he had asked if he might call upon her in England. He had had every intention at that time of falling in love with her, of courting her as his bride when he came home.

He hoped she had not realized that. He hoped that by planning to call upon her the next day and even take her walking, he was not about to get himself into some nasty tangle.

Would Ellen refuse to see him the next day too?

JENNIFER’S FACE WAS GLOWING with color and her eyes sparkling when she returned from her shopping trip with the Misses Emery, Ellen was happy to see. It seemed a long time since the girl had looked on life with her characteristic eagerness.

“Did you have a nice time?” Ellen asked. “And did you buy anything?”

“I bought a comb that matches exactly the tortoiseshell brush Papa bought me in Brussels,” Jennifer said. “Nothing else, Ellen. I won’t need anything else until next summer, will I?”

No, they would not need anything new until the following summer. They had quite enough black outfits.

“You will never guess whom I met.” Jennifer caught at Ellen’s hands, the color in her cheeks heightened.

“Who?” Ellen smiled at her.

“Lord Eden!” The girl paused for effect. “Looking quite, quite gorgeous, Ellen, even though he was not in uniform. But he said he had called here and we were both out. Did you go somewhere?”

“I was here,” Ellen said. “I am afraid I turned craven, Jennifer. I could not face meeting him.”

“Of course,” the girl said, squeezing Ellen’s hands and looking at her with sympathy. “I am being insensitive, am I not? It will bring back so many painful memories for you to meet him again, won’t it?”

“But he is coming back tomorrow,” Ellen said. “I will pluck up the courage then. We will meet him together, shall we, Jennifer?”

“He wants to take me walking,” the girl said. She smiled. “You too, Ellen, probably. You always came with us in Brussels, did you not? Will you come tomorrow too? He presented me to two of his cousins. Anna Carrington is very lovely, Ellen. She made her come-out during the spring. She told me that she is going to marry Lord Eden, but her brother just laughed at her and told me that that is her idea, and she has had it since she was ten years old. I like them, Ellen. I don’t think they take life too seriously. They laugh a lot. They both said that they hope to meet me again, and I think they meant it.”

“I am sure they do,” Ellen said. “And I hope you do meet them again, Jennifer. It is time you started enjoying yourself again just a little, though of course you may not go to any formal party or anything like that for a long time.”

“And have no wish to do so,” Jennifer assured her. “Oh, Ellen, I wish Papa were here. He could come with us tomorrow, and the two of you would be able to walk ahead of Lord Eden and me in the park, and I would be able to watch you talking and laughing together. Oh, I do wish Papa were still here…But I am sorry. I should not say such things any longer, should I, for it only makes you feel sad. Forgive me, Ellen. I am so self-indulgent. I won’t say such things again, I swear I won’t.”

Ellen smiled and kissed her and asked to see the tortoiseshell comb.

LORD EDEN DID NOT AFTER ALL CALL AT Bedford Square the following day. He sent a note excusing himself after his mother received a hastily scrawled letter from Dover to say that Madeline expected to be home sometime that day.

She arrived late in the afternoon in a carriage belonging to Mr. Septimus Foster, the cousin with whom Lieutenant Penworth was to stay in London. She was looking tired but incredibly happy.

“Mama!” she cried, hurling herself into her mother’s arms. “It seems like forever. Oh, how good it is to be home. And Edmund and Alexandra have come too. But not the children?” She hugged both of them hard and turned to her twin. “Dom. Oh, you horrid man. You look quite as healthy as you have ever looked. And when I think of the fright you gave me in Brussels!”

She was in his arms then, and he was rocking her against him. “You are looking pretty good yourself,” he said. “I have been expecting to see you a mere wraith of your former self after months of playing nurse. But you look as if you are in the middle of a very successful Season.”

“Allan and I are betrothed,” she said. “It was all decided before we left for home. The official announcements are to be made as soon as he has spoken with you and Edmund, Mama. He does not have to do so, of course, because I reached my majority long ages ago, but he is going to do so anyway. Wish me happy?” She smiled brightly and a little uncertainly around the room.

Lord Amberley got to his feet again and put an arm about her shoulders. “You look quite happy enough already, dear,” he said. “And of course I have never wanted anything else but your happiness. If you have decided upon Penworth, then he is a fortunate man.”

“I could not have said it better myself,” the dowager said, beaming at her daughter.

“Where is he?” Lady Amberley asked. “When are we to meet him? If I had only known back in the spring that he was to be your husband, Madeline, I would have taken far more notice. I can picture only a very young man in scarlet regimentals.”