The Land of Summer (38 page)

Emmaline stared at her. What did she mean? What did it matter when it happened? Julius was dead, and she was a widow. She was too stunned to cry, but pushing away the brandy spoon she turned her tear-stained face into her pillow. What kind of life was it that could take Julius from her when they had had no life at all?

‘I loved him, but I never told him. I never told him that I loved him,’ she kept saying to Agnes, until both women could be forgiven for wanting to shake her to stop her saying the same words over and over again.

There was the sound of a carriage in the drive, and, later, muttered voices.

‘I must go to him before they take him away,’ Emmaline protested, but Agnes tried to restrain her.

‘You go to whoever it is. I expect the doctor has sent for help to remove the poor man to hospital,’ Mrs Carew said in a low voice, not wishing to say more, knowing that there would be a need for an examination.

Agnes nodded, and walked slowly down to the hall. Seconds later the women upstairs heard a prolonged scream, whereupon they both flung themselves downstairs to see Julius Aubrey standing at the front door, a shy, hopeful smile on a face that said he was very much alive.

Chapter Eleven

EMMALINE STARED UP
at Julius. Everything was making sense, but a great deal of the sense that it was making was as upsetting as it was bewildering.

‘He was my elder brother by an hour,’ Julius was saying.

‘He was your twin—’

‘He was a blackguard, a liar, and not a little depraved, and although he should have been heir to everything, he was heir to nothing but his own sins.’

Emmaline waited as Julius walked down the drawing room and stood looking out. He was glad that Theodore was dead. He found only relief in the fact.

‘My father was a hopeless businessman,’ Julius continued. ‘He was an artist – and a very fine one too. A man with a great imagination but not a man born to run a business, that was why he left it to Theodore to run. It seemed ideal. He loved to travel, enjoyed being in America, which was so alive to new ideas, new businesses. It was
when
he was in New York that he met these so-called entrepreneurs who had all sorts of schemes. You had to buy into them, of course, which Theodore did, with company money – and that was where all the trouble began. In the end, when it became necessary to buy him out in order to give the company any chance of survival, I agreed that if he concluded an agreement to have Aubrey & Aubrey recommended in Nesbitt & Nesbitt’s catalogue, I would sign over to him fifty per cent of any sales made through the catalogue, and a very handsome cash settlement. So that is what he did. He made a bargain with your father, and your father made a bargain with him.’

Emmaline rose to her feet.

‘My father – my father – don’t tell me—’

Julius looked at her, shrugging his shoulders helplessly. ‘What could I do? I had no idea that marrying you would be part of the contract made with your father, but I have to say that when I saw you that first time, I felt no regret. Why should I? I thought you were beautiful.’ Emmaline was holding on to the mantel, probably whiter than he had ever seen her. He sighed. ‘The truth is I fell in love with you, Emma, but it was only when I had married you that it came to me what a terrible thing I had done, and I couldn’t make love to you as I should, because I doubted that you could possibly love a man so base as to go through with such an agreement.’ He stopped and went over to Emmaline, then guided her
gently
back to the sofa and stood opposite her to continue his story. ‘There is more, I am afraid. I began to feel that no one could accept me as I was, that I was unacceptable, because – because my first wife died only a week after we married, and once you were in the house it seemed to me, time and again, that I might be betraying her by loving you, which is why I—’

‘Which is why you hid her portrait.’ Emmaline shook her head. ‘And the wedding gown – that was hers too, wasn’t it?’

‘No! That was my mother’s wedding dress, it’s been in her family for over fifty years. I am not that – no, I
am
that callous, of course I am. I fully admit it, but I wouldn’t do that.’

Emmaline was silent, and Julius continued.

‘The works had dwindled to nothing by the time I picked up the reins, which was why I took up advising and helping with restoration work. The two combined very well, and Ralph, you know, he is an excellent fellow, he looked after that side of it, but we would have been scuppered without this business agreement, and your father, you know, he was all for it, and now it seems he is more than pleased with the way things are going, orders are flooding in—’

‘And my sisters can all marry now
I
am married. What a very happy ending,’ Emmaline said in a flat voice. Then she looked up at Julius as something came to her.

‘Tell me the truth, Julius. Did you imagine that I had fallen in love with the man who had wooed
me
in America, and that put you, in your mind at least, out of the running?’

He nodded miserably. ‘Naturally. Why wouldn’t I imagine it? Theodore was always more captivating than I was, rogues so often are. He had inherited my father’s charm, and his way with women.’

Emmaline threw up her hands in despair.

‘I hardly knew him, I hardly had time to get to know him before he was gone, and all I knew was that he sent me a mirror with a sweet message—’

‘No, it was I who sent you the mirror. He had told me this cock and bull story that – well, that your family considered you plain, and thought you would never marry – I felt so sorry for you. I wanted to give you courage, and I was, I must confess, expecting just that, a plain little American girl who had never been able to capture a husband. But what I met was so far from that, I was bowled over. For me you were, and still are, just beautiful.’

‘How do I know?’ Emmaline demanded after a long silence. ‘How do I know that you are not as big a liar as your twin brother?’

‘You don’t, Emma. Alas, you do not.’

Emmaline stood up suddenly, and leaning forward she kissed Julius on the lips.

‘Oh, dear Lord,’ she said, moving away from him. ‘So it was him that night. It was Theodore who kissed me, and I fainted – I knew there was something different, so terribly different.’

As Julius stared at her, she went on to explain.

‘I had taken a sleeping powder on Dr Proctor’s orders, but even so I awoke thinking that I had heard you coming in. I went downstairs and thought I saw you in your study at your desk, going through some papers, and you kissed me, but everyone told me that it was not possible, that you were away, which of course you were—’

‘That must have been the night that Theodore broke in and stole my copy of our agreement. Fool that I was, I should have locked it in a safe. Had I known that he was still kicking his heels in England I would have done, but I was so sure that he was in Australia.’

Emmaline sat down slowly, shocked, remembering how frightened she was, and how repulsive the feel of that mouth on hers had suddenly seemed. She looked up at Julius. Was there so much in a kiss? There must be. She had just kissed Julius and it had been different from anyone else’s kiss. It had been the kind of kiss that leads to another and another, the kind of kiss that needs no biology book to explain what might happen next. She frowned. Was this then what love was? She looked up at him in understandable bewilderment.

‘What will happen next, Julius?’

Julius looked away. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, moving towards the drawing-room window. ‘What should happen next is Christmas, but that is not possible now, is it?’

Emmaline frowned, and then, to the
astonishment
of both of them, she heard herself say, ‘I do not for the life of me see why not.’

So Christmas was celebrated in some style at Gorran Lodge, if only for the benefit of Mrs Carew and Agnes, although it seemed to both Julius and Emmaline that, forced as they were to pretend, for their sakes, that it was a joyous time, it was far merrier than they could have thought possible. The roast goose was one that Mrs Carew had fattened herself, the many side dishes were delicious, and even Emmaline, who could not have supposed that after so many shocks she could have swallowed even a mouthful, enjoyed every morsel.

The following day Julius took his leave of her. ‘You will stay here to get better,’ he said, and it was not a question.

‘Yes, Julius.’

He cleared his throat, one eye on the waiting carriage outside. ‘I have made all the arrangements for my brother to be buried in France, going from here at the first opportunity. He will be buried beside our mother, whose fault it was that he was as he was.’ As Emmaline looked up at him, surprised, he went on ‘I was not expected, you see. My old nurse told me I arrived an hour later, to the great and horrified shock of my mother, who had to go through the same labour again. I do not think, in all candour, that she ever forgave me, nor was she able to share the first love that she had felt with the first son with another.’

Emmaline went to put a hand on his arm, so affected did she feel by this revelation, but Julius had moved away from her towards the drawing-room door.

‘I do not expect you to forgive me for the suffering I have caused you, Emma, but I do so hope that in time you will come to understand that I have been more the victim of sin than the sinner. Goodbye, my Emma.’

He was gone before she could reply, and for a few seconds she remained where she was before going to the window and watching the carriage leaving the short carriage drive and turning awkwardly into the country road beyond.

Julius was right. She could not be expected to forgive him. He had made her suffer too much, but in time, if he was right, perhaps he could be expected to receive her understanding?

A few days later Mrs Carew came to the drawing-room door with an announcement.

‘It’s that madman again, Mrs Aubrey. You don’t want him coming in here, do you, my dear? Seeing that he is mad, and come on that dreadful hireling of his too, and unannounced I’ll be bound!’ She frowned at Emmaline, looking more like a member of the Praetorian guard than a housekeeper.

‘Oh dear, if he has come to visit, perhaps I had better see him,’ Emmaline said, after a pause, sighing.

‘Well, don’t let him tire you. You are tired
enough
, heaven only knows, my dear, heaven only knows.’

There was the sound of a scuffle in the hall, as if Mrs Carew was holding back a large dog, and in a moment a dishevelled-looking Bray Ashcombe appeared at the drawing-room door.

‘I do declare,’ he said, looking back at the closing door, ‘I do declare that your goodly housekeeper does not think much of me, Emmaline – Mrs Aubrey.’

He stopped, shocked by Emmaline’s appearance.

‘You look dreadful,’ he said tactlessly. ‘Were you made ill over Christmas?’

‘No, no, it is not Christmas that has made me ill, Bray,’ Emmaline told him in a weary voice. ‘It is life, my life in particular.’ She indicated for him to sit down. ‘You have always been most sympathetic to my circumstances, and, as it turns out, with good reason.’

Bray leaned forward to take her hands in his, but Emmaline shook her head.

‘No, please, you must understand that there is a certain decorum to be followed. I am a married woman, even if in name only.’

Bray stared at her, not understanding. ‘There must be something I can do to help you,’ he said in a genuinely compassionate voice.

‘Oh, there is,’ Emmaline admitted. ‘There is. You can listen to me, be my friend. I am so much in need of friendship. Indeed, if it were not for Mrs Carew here, and my dear little Aggie, and
this
beautiful place, I think I might have taken my own life, so despairing have I become.’

‘But this is terrible—’

‘Oh, it is more terrible than I can admit, even to you.’ Emmaline sighed. ‘It all began, you understand, with the misfortune of being the oldest of four sisters. I had an obligation to marry, or rather my father had an obligation to marry me off, and so it seems he did, to Julius Aubrey, and that is how I came to England, and that is the start of all my unhappiness.’ She shook her head suddenly. ‘I cannot tell you more. It is too distressing, and too shaming.’

She had never looked more ethereal, as if a light breeze would take her off. Bray felt desperate. He was not used to dealing with real emotion, only the poetic variety, and now he was faced with the real thing he wanted to get back on his hireling and gallop off. Instead, he took up the book of poems by a Lady.

‘See what you have here? You have a work of great beauty that will be read by many, a work of such beauty that no one who reads this slender volume can ever come away unaffected. You must see.’ He leaned forward, trying to take her hands again, but once again Emmaline rebuffed him. ‘You must see that your suffering has not been for naught. Here is something good that has come out of your misery, here is something deep and true. I have told you – these are enviable. I envy them!’

Emmaline stared at him. He was such a boy still, so transparent.

‘You have been a guiding star to my own creativity, a muse to me these last months. Seeing how much you suffered has deepened me, I am sure of it.’

Emmaline nodded. It might be true.

‘There is something more that could deepen you further, Bray,’ she said in a kindly voice, after a short pause during which he looked at her questioningly. ‘You could marry your “sister” and put her out of your misery. You could marry Arabella, before the birth of your child, and make an honest woman of her. It would be a happy outcome for one of your many muses.’

Bray stood up, quite put out.

‘I, er – I, er – I cannot marry Arabella,’ he said. ‘It would be wrong to marry.’ He walked down the room. ‘After all, if I marry her, she might spend the rest of her life thinking that I married her for the sake of the baby.’

‘I can think of many circumstances that would be much worse than that,’ Emmaline told him in a suddenly lightened voice, and then her tone changed, and she too stood up. ‘Can you not understand that all the misery I have suffered comes, as the Bible has so often told us, from the sins of the past? Will you not understand that I am the victim of my husband’s past, of my father’s past, of everything that has gone before, ancient shibboleths to do with the subjection of women, old familial customs to do with traditions that should long have been shaken off? Is Arabella to be spurned and your
child
not even allowed a baptism because of illegitimacy?’