He got to his feet, even though she signaled him with one hand to stay where he was, and made her a courtly bow.
“You look beautiful,” he said.
“Despite the sunburn?”
His own face was ruddy with color, but attractively so. He looked healthy and virile.
“The sun turns your complexion bronze instead of scarlet,” he said. “Yes, beautiful despite the sun.”
Mrs. Price appeared in the doorway at that moment to inform them that she had set the hot dishes on the table and they must come now if they did not want their food cold and spoiled. And she would, if it was all the same to Mrs. McKay, hang up her apron and walk home with Gladys.
And so they dined alone together, Samantha and Ben, though Tramp came padding in from the kitchen to plop down in front of the empty fireplace and keep an eye out for fallen morsels of food. None did fall, but Ben fed him a few morsels anyway, to Samantha’s amusement. He pretended to dislike the dog, but she had never believed him, for Tramp liked him, and dogs did not like people who disliked them.
The food was plain but wholesome and delicious.
He told her some stories from his military years—not anything about the fighting and the violence, but amusing anecdotes. She told him stories about her year with Matthew’s regiment, mostly funny little incidents involving the other wives that she had not thought of in years. He told her stories from his Penderris years—again light, entertaining incidents involving his friends. She told him about the kittens at Leyland Abbey. A groom had discovered a litter of them in the loft of a barn and had concealed them and tended them in secret so that they would not be drowned—until Samantha had caught him at it. But she had not reported him. Rather, she had aided and abetted him and had loved those kittens until they grew into cats and deserted in order to earn their living and their daily bread as mousers.
“Ungrateful wretches,” she said, laughing softly.
She had forgotten until now that there was anything at all good about that year in Kent.
“But you would not have wanted them at your heels for the rest of their lives, would you?” he asked.
“Oh, heavens, no,” she said. “There were eight of them.”
“The dog’s nose would be severely out of joint,” he said.
“Yes,” she agreed. “Poor Tramp. He would have been grossly outnumbered and would doubtless have slunk along at the back of the line instead of asserting his superior size. He does not know he is large, you see. He believes he is a puppy.”
They both laughed, and Tramp thumped his tail on the floor where he sat.
Samantha cleared the table and carried the dishes into the kitchen, where she stacked them on the counter. She made the tea and carried the tray into the sitting room and lit the lamp. And they sat and talked more—mainly about books this time—while they drank their tea and the sky beyond the window turned a deeper blue. And then indigo.
Then it was dark.
She got up to close the curtains.
And suddenly there was no way of reviving the conversation. The very fact she had moved had acknowledged the fact that night had fallen and they were here together in her cottage, quite unchaperoned. She stood facing the window for a few moments even though she had already drawn the curtains.
“Should I leave?” he asked. “Do you wish me to leave?”
Perhaps she should simply say yes. Nothing much had happened between them so far, despite a rather lengthy journey that had thrown them into proximity. In another few days he would be gone. And it had to be that way. There could be no future together, for any number of reasons. Perhaps it would be better not to take that extra step into the unknown, the unpredictable.
Perhaps it would be disappointing if they did proceed. No, that was not what made her hesitate. Perhaps it would be painful. Not the act itself, but its aftermath. For he would leave. There would be a goodbye. Which would be more painful? Not to have slept with him and forever regret it? Or to have slept with him and forever … regret it?
He had asked her a question. Two, actually.
She shook her head as she turned. “No, don’t leave.”
And so she committed herself.
She watched as he got to his feet, using his canes, and she moved toward him until she was standing in front of him.
“Don’t leave,” she said again, and she lifted her hands to cup his face. He had even shaved, she realized. He must have brought his razor with him. He must have expected to stay.
“Are you sure you will not regret it?” he asked her. “I cannot take you with me, Samantha. I am, at least for the present, a nomad. And I cannot stay. There is nothing for me here. Besides, it is too soon for you to remarry. And I cannot … ever marry. I do not have wholeness to offer.”
Because he was half crippled? Strangely, she would have agreed with him just a few weeks ago. She had wanted nothing more to do with wounds and disfigurement. But, slow as he was in his movements, it was hard to think of him as disabled. Except that he could not hold her now because he needed his hands for his canes.
“I was once promised a lifetime,” she said, “and was given four months. Not even that, actually, as it was all illusion from the start. It was all a lie. This afternoon you promised me a week. Let us make it a week to remember.”
“An affair to remember?” he said.
“With pleasure and affection,” she said. “And no regrets. Will you regret it? Would you rather go back to the inn?”
For a few moments she thought he was going to say yes. Then he dipped his head closer to hers, closed his eyes, and set his forehead against hers.