Page 70 of The Quiet Wife
“How do you feel?” she whispered when Fannie opened her eyes.
“Tired,” she snuggled into her pillow.
“Like I might like to eat some cake,” Florence offered, looking hopeful. It was all Frances could do not to cry with relief.
“Then you shall have some cake, my love.” She squeezed Florence’s hand.
She moved to check on Elinor who still felt too hot, but her youngest smiled up at her. “Cake please.”
“I shall make arrangements forthwith,” she promised.
She kissed each precious girl on the head before leaving to find Anna and Nanny to give them the good news.
She found Anna in the parlour with Jemie. She burst in and clapped her hands to her mouth.
“Oh God. Oh, my dearest.” Jemie immediately jumped up.
“They want…” she waved a hand about in a helpless way as her chin wavered uncontrollably… “cake,” she said and burst into tears, the relief overwhelming her.
Jemie wrapped her in his strong arms, holding her tightly. She clung to him and buried her face in his neck again because his warmth strength was where she needed to be.
“Come,” Anna said after a moment, stroking her back gently.
“Let us arrange some cake for the girls.”
Frances awkwardly broke apart from Jemie and accepted his handkerchief to dab at her eyes.
She recovered herself enough to look up at Anna. She could see the concern behind her gentle smile. She had the feeling that the concern was nothing to do with the girls, but she was too weary to care, or pretend otherwise.
She walked with Anna to the kitchen, not knowing quite what to say. She knew she would not have managed without either of them these last few days. Without Jemie’s solid presence, his seemingly endless ability to listen to her and take seriously what she said, she would have been lost. Being listened to, she had discovered, could make a woman wish for the moon.
“I’m afraid I don’t how to thank you and Jemie for this last week,” she said, settling on something that she truly felt. “I don’t know what I would have done without you both.”
Anna took her hand as they walked. “I was glad to be here to help. They are precious girls, as are you.”
Frances clung to her tightly. “Hopefully, I’ll stop being so emotional and crying all over poor Jemie. He must think me a complete watering pot.”
“Jemie is a big boy. He knows what he’s doing, and he’s very fond of you,” Anna assured her.
“I’m terribly fond of him,” Frances whispered.
“I know you are, my dear.”
“There is nothing like… that… between us. We truly are just friends. It’s just… these last days have shown me how much I can rely on him and it’s…” She didn’t even have a word for it. What it meant to have someone to count on, someone who didn’t ridicule everything she said, didn’t treat her like a pathetic child with no will of her own. Didn’t behave as though he was the great fount of all knowledge never to be challenged.
Her palms became damp.
Anna squeezed her fingers. “Would you like some advice from a pushy old American woman?”
“Yes, please.”
“Stay friends who are terribly fond of each other.” She paused and brought them to a halt in the corridor when she was certain nobody else was about. “Your husband is not a good man. Nor, I think, a kind man or a gentle one. I strongly suspect he is, or can be, cruel and vindictive.”
Frances studied the floor, utterly shocked at how much Anna had seen of Frederick. Her throat was so tight she couldn’t speak, so she just nodded.
Anna sighed softly. “All I’m saying is, don’t give him a stick to beat you with, my love. Because he will most assuredly use it.”
“If your husband suspects even for a moment that you have… tender feelings for Jemie, he will make your life a misery. Jemie’s too, I suspect.”
