She brushed her hands over the creases in her traveling dress.
“This is what I wanted, Ralph,” she said. “Oh, not on quite as grand a scale, perhaps, and certainly not in London. But those are relatively minor concerns. I wanted a home of my own and a husband. I wanted to be able to run the one and care for the other. I will not be unhappy while I am at home here.”
“Only when you have to move beyond its doors?” he asked her.
Her smile became more rueful.
“I have had the chance to listen to only one of Graham’s sermons at church,” she said. “But I will always remember it. He said that if we can only face our worst fears and move forward into them and through them instead of cowering or turning tail and running as far from them as we can, then we will never have to fear anything ever again. It seems an overly simplistic idea, it is true. What if we face up to a charging bull instead of running for safety as we ought? We would never have a chance to fear anything again. But I am sure he went on to explain the sort of thing he meant, and I understood without even having to be told. I have always been inspired by his words and thought it must be wonderful to be able to act upon them.”
“Your worst fear is facing the beau monde again, I suppose,” he said.
“Yes,” she agreed, “it is, foolish as that may seem to you. By Graham’s standard, I have already been a failure two separate times.”
“Most of us have been,” he told her, “at least two separate times.”
She tipped her head to one side and regarded him in silence.
“It will be different for you this time,” he said. “You will have me by your side, and you will find the courage to make a stand.”
“And you will have me by yours,” she said, sending inexplicable shivers along his spine with her words. “And you will have courage.”
A footman carried in the tea tray at that moment, and a maid followed behind him with a cake. In former times the manservant would have poured his tea, and the maid would have cut the cake and set a slice on a plate for him. Today, however, Chloe dismissed them with a smile and a word of thanks and performed those offices herself.
There was something undeniably disturbing about the changes in his life, Ralph thought. There was a very definite loss of independence, of privacy. He could ignore servants, though never with unkindness, he hoped. He could not ignore his wife. And this was what she had wanted, what she had made her bargain for—a home and a husband. Him, in other words. She intended to care for him.
And beyond the home, he could no longer go wherever he wanted whenever he wanted, with no one to please but himself. For one thing, he was no longer just the Earl of Berwick with his relatively meaningless courtesy title. He was an altogether grander being from whom much was expected. And for another, he was a married man with a wife’s feelings and well-being to consider. And this particular wife had been brought to town against her will and dreaded having to set foot beyond their door. He could not simply abandon her.
It was one thing to accept responsibility for a role, an inanimate thing, a dukedom. It was quite another to feel responsible for another person—his wife, who was nervous and unhappy about what was facing her. It felt suspiciously like taking on an emotional bond, and he did not like it one little bit. Not liking it, however, would not make it go away.
“A little milk and one sugar,” she said, setting his cup and saucer down at his elbow.
Exactly right. He was almost irritated by the fact. He did not have any idea how she liked her tea even though he had watched her pour it and drink it numerous times.
He had the uncomfortable feeling that Chloe really was going to make him comfortable.
“It will not be long before it is widely known that we are in town,” he said as she seated herself and picked up her cup and saucer. “Invitations will start arriving in droves. People will be curious to see me in my new role and you in yours. And us as a married couple. We will need to decide which invitations to accept.”
He expected her to make some sort of protest or at least to beg for time.
“Yes,” she said.
“And we must start thinking about the grand reception or ball we will have here,” he said. “It will be expected of us.”
“Yes,” she said again.
“Lloyd will help,” he said. “And my mother.”
She set her cup down in her saucer. “Help us, yes,” she said. “But we will do the main work, Ralph.”
Face your worst fears and walk into them and through them, she remembered Graham saying in one of his sermons. She had run from her fears twice, she had just told him. He could see that she was not going to do that again.
“Yes,” he said, “we will do it.”
Slowly, inexorably, he realized, he was being drawn back into life. So was she.
* * *
If Chloe had hoped to bury herself in domestic contentment at Stockwood House, she was soon to be disillusioned. Not that she really had expected any such thing, of course. She spent a busy, thoroughly happy morning discussing household matters and menus with the housekeeper and the cook. The morning also brought a note from her sister-in-law Sarah, who had persuaded Mr. Toucher to spend a few weeks in town before returning home, offering to take Chloe up in her carriage at four o’clock on her way to visit her grandmother and great-aunt. Chloe sent a note of acceptance, since Ralph had gone out halfway through the morning and had not said when he would return. But even before four o’ clock the quietness of the afternoon was dashed a number of times by the sound of the door knocker and the arrival of visitors.