The Gilded Web (33 page)

“I insisted on going down that path,” she said, “just like a child who must have its treat now. We would have been home a couple of hours before if I had not.”

“Nonsense, Alex!” he said, taking her by the shoulders and turning her to him. “You are developing a conscience like Papa's. Don't do it. Of course you are not to blame. You are Amberley's betrothed, Alex, and a guest in his house—by his invitation.”

“Last night,” she said, “he asked if I would go to the village with him to meet some of his laborers. I said no. I was feeling spiteful and I said no, I had promised to go riding with Lord Eden.”

He dropped his hands. “I had hoped that this was going to work for you,” he said. “I thought perhaps you could be happy with Amberley. But there is something between you? Some problem?”

“I don't know,” she said, turning from him wearily. “He has been kindness itself. I could not ask for someone more courteous or more willing to please. And now that has become the problem. I feel oppressed with kindness, hemmed in, totally inadequate. And the one time when I might have helped, offered a word of comfort perhaps, done something for the widow and her children, he is behaving as if I do not exist. As if I am of no importance. Do I make sense to you, James? I am afraid I don't to myself.”

“Yes, I think so,” he said. “You have never had a relationship with anyone but me, Alex. And we have always sympathized with each other to an amazing degree. Now you are discovering that it is not easy to be a part of someone else's life.”

“I don't think I can make him happy, James,” she said. “How can I? I do not know anything about giving happiness.”

“Yes, you do,” he said. “You are the one ray of happiness in my life, Alex. You do not have to try. You can just be. But listen to me. You must not blame yourself for what has happened today. Amberley does not, I am sure. He chose quite freely to go with you this morning, and he seemed not to be regretting the choice the last time I saw him. Tell me you will give up this feeling of guilt.”

“I will try,” she said. “But, James, he got there fifteen minutes after Mr. Peterson died. Fifteen minutes! And the man had wanted to talk to him.”

Purnell was tight-lipped as he looked at his sister. “Come on downstairs now,” he said. “Captain Forbes has called and wants Lady Madeline to go walking with him. She wants you and Eden to accompany them. You had better go, Alex. I don't like to see you brooding like this.”

“All right,” she said, her tone flat, “I will go walking, James. Are you coming too?”

“No,” he said. “I had my fill this morning. I am going to play billiards with Sir Cedric.”

“You do not like Madeline, do you?” she said, fetching a straw bonnet from her dressing room. “I do. She tries her best to be friendly, and I do admire her lighthearted way of facing life.”

“Her frivolity, you mean,” he said. “No, she and I do not quite see eye to eye, Alex. Are you ready?”

And yet, James Purnell found, watching the four of them leave on their walk several minutes later, it seemed strange not to be going with them. It was a subdued group that set out, both Lord Eden and his sister seeming genuinely upset by the morning's fatal accident.

It was a novel experience, Purnell thought, to see Lady Madeline without some of her customary sparkle. But she looked quite as pretty as usual in her sprigged-muslin dress and chip-straw bonnet. And the captain was certainly appreciative.

Well, he thought, turning away in the direction of the billiard room, let her flirt. She had a man with her this afternoon who was likely to be willing to accept her flirtation for what it was worth and return its like. She would not be forced into anger this afternoon or be subjected to insults.

She would be a great deal happier. And so, he thought as he let himself into the billiard room and found the older man already there and waiting for him, would he.

L
ORD AMBERLEY WAS LYING ON THE STRAW mattress in the stone hut, his hands clasped behind his head. The door was propped open. The afternoon sun slanted through it, its rays almost touching him.

His mind had calmed. It had been one of those freak accidents that are so upsetting because they seem so utterly meaningless. He himself was in no way to blame. The equipment had been quite sound. Spiller had assured him that it had been checked only the week before. It was regrettable that he had been unable to talk to Joel before he died, but the man must have known somewhere at the back of his pain and his knowledge that he was about to die that his wife and sons would be well-cared-for.

Perhaps the most upsetting aspect of any death to those left behind, he thought, was the feeling of terrible helplessness. One always wants to do something, but very rarely is there anything to do. His own sense of frustration had been distressing. He had known that he was not needed at that cottage. Appreciated, yes. But needed, no. His people could not be themselves in his presence. So rather than put a constraint on them when they were already overwrought, he had left.

He wanted company. For the first time in his memory he wanted someone with whom to share his emotional turmoil. He wanted Alex.

He turned the idea over in his mind with some surprise. But it was true. He wanted to be with her as he had been that morning—quiet, relaxed, knowing that she shared his mood. And he wanted her with him as she had been the previous afternoon for a brief while. He wanted to make love to her.

And for the first time he felt sorry that he had not gone to her when he had returned home earlier. He could have talked to her, brought her here with him. Perhaps he would not even have needed to come if he could have walked with her as he had that morning, or sat with her somewhere quiet—the conservatory perhaps. She had been in the hall, had she not, when he went into the house with Dominic? Had he even spoken to her? He could not recall.

He sighed and pushed himself into a sitting position. He had a great deal to learn about sharing his life with someone else. It was all very well to think of love, to dream of the perfect marriage. But nothing could be accomplished if he retreated to his private world whenever anything happened to ruffle his calm. Love was not just a word, a passive emotion. It was a full-time, lifelong commitment.

T
HE MORNING ON THE
cliff path and the beach might never have been. There was a tension between Lord Amberley and Alexandra again that both had hoped on that morning to ease.

Alexandra did not turn entirely inward upon herself, but she could not let go of the guilt that had nagged at her after the death of Joel Peterson. Had she gone with her betrothed to the village as he had asked, he would have been there when the injured man was brought in. He would still have died, of course, but Lord Amberley would not have been left with the feeling that he had neglected his duty—playing truant, as he had jokingly put it when they were on the beach.

She knew that he grieved for Mr. Peterson and felt for his family, but he had said nothing to her. He had shut her out of his innermost feelings with his usual calm, kindly manner. She felt more punished than she ever had by her father. She was being treated as a person who had not taken his life seriously and who would not be invited to take a glimpse into it again.

When Lord Amberley and his mother visited the cottage in the village the following morning, they seemed genuinely surprised when she asked to accompany them.

“You really do not need to do this, Alex,” Lord Amberley said, taking her hand in both of his. “Such a visit is painful even when it is clearly one's duty to make it. It is not your duty.”

She went anyway, but she felt chastised by his words. Was she to be an ornament in his life, not a participant? She might have used the moment to look into his eyes, to smile, and to explain that if she was to feel any freedom, any meaning in the marriage she must make, then she must become involved in his life. But she looked at his hands that held hers and drew back her shoulders.

“I would like to express my sympathies to the widow,” she said in a voice she had not meant to sound cold.

“I think it a splendid idea, Alexandra,” Lady Amberley said. “The people of the village will not forget it, you know, and they will respect you for it as they do Edmund.”

Nothing improved between them in the following two days. They went to church together on Sunday with the rest of their families, and sat next to each other in Lord Amberley's pew. They greeted acquaintances together afterward, and Alexandra was presented to other people she had not met before. They took tea at the Carringtons' in the afternoon. She attended the funeral with Lord Amberley and his family the following day, again insisting on going despite his gentle insistence that she was under no obligation to do so.

But there was no closeness. And it worried Lord Amberley as well as Alexandra. He wanted to atone for his
faux pas
of the day of Joel's death. He wanted to talk to Alexandra, to penetrate behind that barrier and draw her into his inner life. But she was unapproachable again. She was not hostile or sullen or silent. But she was far away from him. He was left to wonder if he had imagined the afternoon in the hills and the morning on the beach.

He must find the opportunity to talk to her once more. He must bring that bright, vibrant Alex to life again. He must. He thought he was growing to love her. And he did not want to discover that he loved a dream, a woman who did not really exist. But how was he to begin? He was a man who could do a great deal for others when occasion demanded it. But he had no practice in giving himself. He had tried with Alex, more than once, but he was not successful. They were no nearer now to having a close relationship than they had been the morning they had become betrothed.

T
HE
C
ARRINGTONS HAD PLANNED
a picnic for the day after the funeral. All the residents at Amberley had been invited, as well as the Courtneys and the officers of the regiment. Madeline was in high spirits, the gloom of the previous few days behind her. She arrived in Alexandra's dressing room just as Nanny Rey was dressing her mistress's hair.

“What a beautiful shade of pink your dress is,” she said. “Most pinks are thoroughly insipid. I avoid the color altogether, of course. With my dull hair color I have to choose something more vivid.”

“Your hair dull, Madeline?” Alexandra said, meeting her eyes in the mirror. “But it is so lovely—so shiny and healthy.”

“I wish I had yours instead,” Madeline said. “It is such a glorious color. Why do you not leave some of it unconfined?”

Alexandra met Nanny Rey's eyes in the mirror and laughed. “We were just having a dreadful row on that topic when you came in,” she said. “Oh, go on then, Nanny. Enjoy your triumph. Yes, the curls beside my face and on my neck, if you please.”

“I am glad I came,” Madeline said.

“So am I, my lady,” Nanny Rey said, regarding her over the top of her glasses and nodding her head.

Alexandra was rewarded later when Lord Amberley was handing her into the barouche with the other ladies. “How very pretty you look, Alex,” he said. “Quite dazzling, in fact. And what has set you to giggling, Madeline? Have I said something funny?”

Madeline raised her parasol over her straw bonnet, gave it a twirl, and grinned at Alexandra.

The picnic was to be held about a mile from the Carringtons' house, close to the ruins of an old abbey that had been destroyed centuries before, at the time of the dissolution of the monasteries. It was a quiet, picturesque spot among the trees, close to the top of the valley that led down to Amberley Court.

Everyone except Lady Beckworth and Mrs. Carrington walked to the picnic site. Lady Amberley looked vastly relieved when her sister-in-law good-naturedly offered to ride in the barouche with Alexandra's mother.

“Viola is just thankful to have an excuse to ride,” Mr. Carrington called out for all to hear.

“Oh, nonsense, William!” his wife replied. “I can outwalk you any day of the week, as you know only too well and Walter and Anna can attest to.”

“I would ride myself,” Mr. Courtney added, “except that I know there would be those to say I am incapable of moving so far of my own volition.”

Two of his sons laughed.

Altogether, it was a merry group that walked across fields and climbed over stiles. Lady Amberley walked thankfully on the arm of Sir Cedric, breathing in the warm smell of vegetation and declaring to him privately that she would have been compelled to scream or steal away on a midnight walk if courtesy had forced her to spend one more day either indoors or seated in a carriage.

“You must call on me if you ever decide on the midnight outing,” he said seriously. “I really would not wish to think of you outdoors alone at such an hour.”

“I might just come knocking at your door one night,” she said with equal seriousness. “Though what the servants would have to say belowstairs if we were seen would create a sensation to last for the next ten years.”

Lord Amberley walked with Mrs. Courtney, shortening his stride for her convenience and listening amiably to a detailed account of every plant that was flourishing in her vegetable garden and every one that was not, and assuring her at regular intervals that, no, she was not boring him in the least. And surprisingly, he thought, glancing around him in some contentment, she was not.

Susan walked with Lieutenant Jennings, blushing and lowering her lashes as he talked, peeping upward at James Purnell, who was with her brothers, and at Lord Eden, who was with Alexandra.

Madeline was happy to be with Captain Forbes, with whom she felt thoroughly comfortable. She was familiar with his particular brand of flattery and flirtation and knew well how to react to it. It was a relief to be able to relax her mind and prattle cheerfully on about topics that mattered little to either him or her. It was such a treat not to have to wonder what he was thinking of her intelligence or what was hidden behind dark, unfathomable eyes. The captain's eyes were gray and twinkling.

Lord Eden had taken Alexandra determinedly on his arm. He must speak with her. He had lost too much time, and his purpose had cooled. Her response might also not be as favorable as it had been several nights before. But despite all, he was contented to have her with him. As unlike his usual flirt as she was—or perhaps because of that fact—he liked her and found himself able to relax with her and talk sensibly on topics that really mattered to him. One did not have to talk trivialities with Miss Purnell.

It was almost impossible to imagine what the abbey must have looked like, Lord Eden explained to Alexandra, though one could still see the floor plan quite clearly, and the bases of most of the columns that had lined the nave of the large chapel were still in place. He took her to show her what he meant.

“What a shame it is that it was so completely devastated,” she said. “So much history obliterated in the name of religion.”