“Late enough,” he said, “to satisfy our servants and please our relatives.”
“Oh.”
“It is important,” he said.
“To keep up appearances?”
“I think perhaps it is more than that, is it not?” he asked.
I care, he had told her last night. You belong to me now, Wren. I have ownership of you. Not to tyrannize over you, but to keep you safe so that you can be free of these fears and horrors. I look after what is my own. It is more than a promise. Strange words, which might have sounded alarming but had not. For she had believed the intention behind the words. And after they had come back to bed, he had loved her slowly, gently, and surely with tenderness.
“Thank you for listening,” she said. “I try not to be self-pitying, but last night it all came welling up at your expense. My life has been hugely, wondrously blessed and continues to be. I will not inflict my darkness upon you again.”
“Avoiding self-pity can sometimes mean suppressing what needs to be spoken of and dealt with,” he said.
“You are going to be late for the Lords,” she told him.
“I am not going today,” he said. “I daresay the country will not fall into total collapse as a result. I am going to spend today with my wife. If she will have me, that is.”
“She will think about it,” she said. She raised her eyes and set one fingertip to her chin. “She has given the matter due consideration. She will have you.”
“Wren.” He laughed softly and touched his forehead to hers. “I may find myself capable of missing a day at the Lords, you know, but I am quite incapable of missing my breakfast.”
A short while later they entered the breakfast parlor together. Everyone was still there, though it seemed they had all finished eating. Wren felt acutely self-conscious as all eyes turned their way and was very glad indeed that they had had their wedding night and yesterday’s breakfast to themselves. There was a cheerful exchange of greetings.
“I hope I have left you enough sausage and bacon, Alex,” Harry said. “After twelve hours of unbroken sleep and those few ghastly days of nothing but gruel and jellies, I was ravenous.”
“There is enough for me,” Alexander said, peering into the dishes. “I am not sure about Wren, though.”
“If you did not leave me two slices of toast, Harry,” Wren said as she seated herself between her mother-in-law and Abigail, “I shall have to get the cook to put you back on broths.”
“I did. I swear.” He laughed. There was more color in his face this morning, and it was already surely a little fuller than it had been a week ago.
“You were very tired last night, Wren?” her mother-in-law asked, covering one of her hands with her own as the butler poured her coffee and set her toast before her.
“I was,” Wren said. “But I do apologize for not saying good night before I went upstairs. That was ill-mannered of me.”
“Oh, it was clearly more than just tiredness,” Elizabeth said. “It was exhaustion, Wren. Going to the theater must have been a huge ordeal for you in addition to everything else.”
“So it was for Viola and Abigail,” Wren said. “But we did it, and today we may bask in self-congratulation.” Just please let no one mention my mother.
“I am taking Wren out for the day,” Alexander said. “Yesterday was a mistake. Sometimes there are more important things than cold duty.”
“Ah.” Elizabeth laughed. “There is hope for you yet, Alex.”
“I think, Wren,” their mother said, patting her hand, “you are already having a positive influence upon my son.”
“You are not leaving for home today, I hope?” Wren asked Viola.
“No.” Viola shook her head. “Mildred and Thomas have organized a family picnic to Richmond Park.”
“You and Alex are invited too, of course,” Wren’s mother-in-law said. “But if you would prefer a day alone together, I am sure everyone will understand.”
“I think Wren needs a quiet day,” Alexander said.
She wondered how much any of them understood that even just this much was all new to her and a strain on her nerves—this sitting at a table with six other people, part of a conversation. For the past year and a bit there had been almost total silence in her life. But these people were her family now. So were the others—the other Westcotts and the Radleys—and they had been kind to her.
Alexander’s quiet day sounded infinitely desirable. But—
“It would be a pity to be the only ones missing from a family picnic,” she said.
He had the loveliest eyes. Not only were they a clear blue, but they had the ability to smile even when the rest of his face did not. “Yes, it would,” he said.
Was it possible now, Wren wondered, to move forward, to be happy, to be done finally with the past? Now that she had seen her mother again and felt the full force of the pain she had bottled up for twenty years? But she had spoken of it, so could she now forget? Or, if forgetting was impossible, could she at least let go of the feeling that the central core of her being was one bottomless pit of darkness?
Was it possible to be … normal?
Richmond Park had been set up as a private deer park during the reign of King Charles I, but although it was still royal property, it was now open for the pleasure of the public. It was a broad expanse of wooded areas and grassland and flower gardens, with a number of small lakes known as the Pen Ponds. It was a lovely piece of the countryside close enough to London to allow for a brief escape to those who must spend most of their days there. It was the perfect place for a picnic, and the weather had cooperated, as it had been doing for several weeks past. The sky was blue with just enough fluffy white clouds to offer occasional shade from the sun.
Alexander was glad to be with the family, though he hoped to be able to wander off for some time alone with Wren. He must make a decision about what to do with his new knowledge, but he needed to sense her mood first. She had slept deeply through the night—he knew because he had not—and had seemed refreshed this morning. She appeared to have recovered her spirits, though he was not foolish enough to believe that now she was healed.
Everyone remained together for a while, seated upon blankets on one expanse of grass, trees behind them, one of the ponds before them. Wren was holding the Netherbys’ baby, a bald, plump-cheeked little girl who was just beginning to smile in that wide, toothless way of babies. Anna was beside her on one side, Abby on the other, Elizabeth close by. Wren was totally absorbed in the baby, the child’s head on her raised knees, its little hands in hers, its feet pressing against her ribs beneath her bosom. She looked utterly happy, and it struck Alexander that motherhood would agree with her—as fatherhood surely would with him. Soon, he hoped.
Jessica and Harry had wandered close to the water. She was talking animatedly about something. The older people were in a group together, centered about the chair that had been brought for the use of Cousin Eugenia, the dowager countess. Netherby stood a little apart, as he often did, his shoulder propped against a stout tree trunk, his posture indolent and elegant. He was dressed as gorgeously as ever. He was flicking open the lid of a jeweled snuffbox.
Alexander used to dislike him. He had thought him effete and trivial minded, someone who did not take his position and responsibilities seriously. He had felt disliked in return, thought of, no doubt, as stuffy and humorless. Alexander had changed his mind during the last year or so with all the family turmoil that had followed upon the death of the former earl. He doubted he and Netherby would ever be close friends. They were too different in almost every imaginable way. But they respected, even perhaps liked each other, he felt. And they trusted each other. At least, he trusted Netherby. He approached him now, and Netherby closed his snuffbox unused and returned it to his pocket.