The Loves of Leopold Singer (22 page)

He was amused by her hints about his hygiene. “My wife’s a funny one,” he said once, “with her baths and her haircuts.”

When Mr. Brennan first told the squire in her presence that he must leave off the marital relation or risk the health of his unborn child, she had gone to her room, locked the door, and cried herself to sleep with joy and relief. Then came his diagnosis, and she was free. She was sorry for him, but for herself she was elated.

The squire did try her door once, which she reported to Mr. Brennan. He must have spoken to Dr. Devilliers about it, for she later overheard the rector reacquainting the squire with the notion of the afterlife. The squire had listened eagerly enough, as the opportunity to see the place had become so much more proximal. He didn’t’ approach her again.

He stayed alive long enough to know that he finally had a living son. “He is as beautiful as you are, my lovely Elizabeth.”

“Save your strength, my dear.” Guilt had gripped her when she’d said that. She had never called him dear, and it would have given him such pleasure.

“No need, no need. I am leaving you, dear girl. You were a good wife to me, and you’ll be a good mother to our son. I am sorry...”
 

She never did hear what he was sorry for. He left this world believing he had treated her like a queen and that she had loved him for it.

Laurelwood went to Geordie, and Elizabeth had been named his legal guardian. Of course, though she was twenty-eight years old, being a woman she had her own guardian. Carleson had made Dr. Devilliers the trustee.

She received a shock when they met to discuss the estate’s management. “Laurelwood’s five thousand acres bring in about three thousand pounds a year from the leases alone,” Dr. Devilliers told her.

“How can that be? That’s more than enough to keep the place.” With that kind of money, how could her husband have let the place go to ruin as he did? Every repair could have been—and should have been made the moment it was wanted.

“The squire put almost all the income into investments. He wanted his son to have a fortune. Geordie is already a very wealthy little boy.”

She couldn’t touch what had been invested in trust, but Dr. Devilliers let her access present and future income as long as he approved all expenditures. He agreed to all her plans. It took a year to get the house and the stables clean and neglected repairs made and a while longer to purge and replenish the household staff.

She had everything she had always wanted, a place to grow plants and keep sheep, with no father or husband to tell her what she could or could not do. She’d accepted Sir Carey in a moment of weakness.

It wasn’t, as some might imagine, that she loved him or wanted to be called Lady Asher. The moment she heard his ridiculous proposal, she’d intended to refuse him with her next breath. But he had paused in mid sentence, and as she’d waited for his next words, she’d looked at him. Really looked. He was extremely handsome and young, yes. But more than that, he was clean. Fastidiously clean. And so well-dressed. She thought about what care he took with his person.

The more she looked, the more she saw until his elegant manliness quite simply captivated her imagination. She’d thought of welcoming him into her bed with a reaction entirely opposite to what she had become accustomed. It made her curious. She had to have him. She said yes. It was too late now to consider whether she’d made a mistake.

Dr. Devilliers had been a most agreeable trustee. She wondered if he would find her news today agreeable. She passed the church and turned toward the rectory whose front perimeter was framed by Philomela’s daffodils. The trellis over the gate was obscured by a swath of tiny pink roses, the year’s first bloom, and blue wisteria covered the arch over the front steps.

Between gate and door, a lilac in full bloom made a perfect picture until she noted the rectory roof was in need of repair. There was still so much to do at Laurelwood, and the prospect of all that good work made her happy. Dr. Devilliers stool on a tall stool, nearly buried in purple fronds. He dropped cuttings into a basket on the ground and stopped to breathe in the fragrance of the lilacs.

She was a fool.

How could she have missed it? There was more between them than the regard of a cleric for his benefactor’s widow. She felt most at ease in his presence, most naturally herself. Not once did he ever raise an eyebrow or offer a patronizing sigh when she spoke of improving the livestock and the corn or seeing to the welfare of her tenants. If anything, he applauded her efforts and contributed advice where he could.
I am a snipped blossom, and gathered by the wrong gardener.

To Elizabeth, Devilliers was beautiful, though she knew the world would laugh if it heard her say so. His face was scarred, and he had one blue eye and one hazel eye. Oh, but when he smiled! His teeth were even and white. His eyes twinkled with world-weary bemusement. Sometimes, laughing, he seemed almost happy, but he carried a private sorrow.

She’d heard Philly’s version of his young romance and assumed there was something true in it. All she knew was, this was the one human being whose presence calmed her. The truth was she delighted in his company not because he was a kind and generous clergyman and trustee, but because she loved him.

“Elizabeth!” He dropped the shears into the basket and jumped off the stool to bring her a cluster of the lilacs. “I thought I might visit your patient this afternoon, Mrs. Carleson.” They both ignored his use of her Christian name.

“I would be so grateful,” she said. “I don’t think she quite understands her situation.”

“I was about to have my tea here among the flowers,” he said. “Would you join me?”

“Yes. There is something I want to tell you.”

He said what a good match and that Sir Carey was a lucky man, but he let his tea go cold and ate none of the scones. They sat for a while without talking, but there was nothing unusual in that. At last he said, “They say Napoleon is going to make himself emperor, to keep France safe from the Bourbons.”

She said, “The first time I cut my hair was as a protest against the Terror.” He smiled a little. “Yes, ridiculous, I know. What was the point? Who would see and understand? But
I
would see.
God
would see. I couldn’t go on as if everything were normal when the world was falling into madness.”

“I have always thought that, in your heart, you are a passionate woman.”

“My father laughed at me.” She couldn’t acknowledge the intimate comment or all would be lost. “Such a cruel laugh.
Hair grows
, he said. Later, when he engaged me to Mr. Carleson against my will, I cut off my hair again, to spite him.”

Dr. Devilliers said, “Perhaps you will let it grow now, Mrs. Carleson.”

A man with bad skin and a marvelous smile sat beside the bed. Susan thought he had been there before. Her left arm was bound, and it hurt. She wondered if it was broken. The room had wallpaper with birds and flowers, and there was a fire. A wide window with a window seat looked out on rolling fields and a clear sky. “Where am I?”

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Peter,” the man said. “Do you feel strong enough to take a little broth?”

So that was it. She had been mistaken for another person. “Where…”

“You are at Laurelwood, Mrs. Peter, and you are not to worry. Mrs. Carleson will take very good care of you until you are mended.” He put his hand on her forehead with a gentleness that made her wish she were indeed Mrs. Peter, the guest of Mrs. Carleson of Laurelwood, cared for in a beautiful warm room with kindness and broth.

-oOo-

“Is she awake, Dr. Devilliers?” said a woman at the door.

“She is opening her eyes just now, Mrs. Carleson.” The man was there again, in the chair beside Susan’s bed—though he seemed to have changed his neck cloth and shirt. Wind and rain now beat against the window. How long had she slept?

“A letter has come for her,” said the woman. “It was enclosed with one to myself from the Duke of Gohrum.”

The Duke of Gohrum. How good it sounded to hear a familiar name! Mrs. Carleson and Dr. Devilliers helped her to sit up, which made her nauseous. Her left arm still hurt terribly, and she still had a headache. Again, she was sensible of the quality of her surroundings. She stared at the letter in her good hand.

“Dr. Devilliers,” Mrs. Carleson said. “Perhaps you could read it for Mrs. Peter if she does not object.”

Susan shook her head, and Dr. Devilliers accepted the sheet of paper:

My dear Mrs. Peter,

Please accept my sympathy for your tragic loss. I am sure I will be very glad if the excellent Mrs. Carleson makes you comfortable until you recover. I am almost certain that very soon I will be able to relay that good news we spoke of not long ago.

Please accept my heartfelt condolences, poor Mrs. Peter.

Yours &tc,

           
Gohrum

“Well, then.” Mrs. Carleson smiled cheerfully.

“Indeed,” Susan said. Nothing was any clearer to her.

“It must be comforting,” Dr. Devilliers said, “to have such a friend.”

It wasn’t at all comforting, but what could she say? She had been confused with a Mrs. Peter, the equal of these two kind people. How kind would they be when they learned she was only a housekeeper? She
was
a housekeeper, right? Her head pounded and her arm hurt, and sleep was all she wanted.

Dr. Devilliers gave up his place beside the bed to the surgeon, Mr. Brennan.

“I am not married, sir,” she told him.

“That isn’t important right now.” He checked the dressing on her arm. “What do you remember of the accident?”

“Nothing. I look for something in my mind and come to a blank, like there is a wall in my brain. I feel certain the answer is on the other side of that wall, but I cannot get around it.”

“You are in a delicate state, but with rest and quiet I feel confident you’ll recover in both body and mind.”

He turned to the others. “These are my strict instructions. In my patient’s presence, avoid all discussion of her identity and the accident. Her mind is in a fragile state. She must be allowed to recover her recollection without pressure.”

-oOo-

Jordan Devilliers was personally involved in Carleson Peak’s two most-talked-about events that spring: the coach wreck that left its one survivor with amnesia, and the wedding of Elizabeth Carleson and Sir Carey in mid June. Jordan performed the ceremony before a small group of witnesses: the Duke of Gohrum and Jordan’s sister the duchess, Baroness Branch, and little Geordie dressed in a blue velvet suit and bearing rings on a satin pillow.

Laurelwood’s tenants and household servants waited outside the church, and after the ceremony everyone walked through the park to the house. The duke ordered his carriage to trail behind, declaring that a walk on such a fine day would do him good, and Jordan took the opportunity to chat with his sister.

“I’m glad you don’t consider walking beneath your dignity, your grace.”

“I wasn’t consulted,” Delia said.

The wedding feast was served out of doors in the garden. No one thought the worse of Mrs. Carleson—Lady Asher—for this quirk. It was in keeping with her general odd character, her cropped hair and tendency to read Humphry Davy rather than Maria Edgeworth. As the servants ran to put on their aprons, Jordon saw Mrs. Peter on the lawn.

Mr. Brennan had forbidden Mrs. Peter to go to the church with the wedding party, but he’d agreed to her being taken out to the lawn wrapped in blankets and deposited on a wicker divan. She was reading the
Lyrical Ballads
.

“It’s good to see you taking the air, Mrs. Peter.” Jordan sat down beside her and drained a glass of wine in three swallows.

She closed the book and laid it on her lap. “I’ve just been reading the poem about the wedding guest, appropriately enough.” In a deft motion, she caught the eye of a footman, raised her good right forefinger, and the rector’s glass was refilled. “You had better take another for the speech.”

Mrs. Peter’s kindness touched him. A woman’s notice and care for such trifles made a man feel seen in the world. Valued. His heart wasn’t damaged by Mrs. Carleson’s marriage. That organ had sustained a far greater blow from Caroline, when he was younger and less able to defend it. He’d long since learned to dissemble. But he wondered if he should take the same treatment for loneliness as he prescribed to others. Perhaps he should marry.

Even Delia had taken that cure. It was against his sister’s constitution to admit she was happy, but as she fussed over the duke and made him comfortable, she seemed as happy as she’d ever been. She patted her husband’s hand almost kindly and surveyed the party with a bored expression. When she saw Jordan, a flicker of a smile passed over her face, though that disappeared when she spied the invalid in the lawn chair beside him. She frowned disgust and turned away.

Geordie climbed into Sir Carey’s lap and locked his hands around his new father’s neck. Perhaps the fearful responsibility of the pillow and rings had worn the boy out. He yawned and fought to keep his eyes open. Sir Carey tousled the boy’s hair as Elizabeth sat down beside them. She was indeed letting her hair grow. Sir Carey would have the right to run his hands through that hair now.