Page 60 of Reforming Lord Ragsdale
He decided that it was as he watched, bleary-eyed an hour later, as the maid put more coal in the grate and started the fire. He knew he looked worse than usual because of her darting glances and the way she almost ran from his room.Even if Emma continues to be disappointed at every turn, at least she will know that we tried everything we could, he reasoned.This is far better than going through life never knowing.
Dressed and ready for the day, he came downstairs at six, surprising Lasker. “There is no breakfast yet, my lord,” he apologized, even as he hurried to light the candles in the breakfast room.
Lord Ragsdale shrugged. “Tea then, Lasker,” he said and sat down at the empty table with the newspaper. He looked up at his butler, whose face wore a quizzical expression. “Tell Emma to come here.”
“Yes, my lord.” The butler hesitated. “I do not believe she slept last night,” he said. “The scullery maid heard her crying in the next room.”
Emma, and I was not there to hold you?he thought.I would have. I was sleepless only one floor below you.He considered the paper a moment, then rejected it, struck by the fact that he was the best friend she had at the moment. “She’ll be awake, won’t she?” he asked and turned back to the paper. “Bring two cups.”
She was there in a few minutes, pale and serious in the deep green wool dress he had commissioned for her. He gestured to a chair, but she did not sit. He looked up.
“My lord, it is not my place to sit here,” she reminded him.
“It is if I say so. Sit.”
She perched on the edge of the seat, as if ready for flight if another family member were to appear. He filled a teacup and pushed it toward her. She sipped it slowly, cradling her hands around the cup as though she were cold inside and out.
He read through the newspaper without comment, then folded it and looked at her. “I am remiss in something, Emma,” he said.
She looked at him then, curious.
“Do you remember when I asked you what would make you happy?”
Emma nodded. “That seems so long ago, my lord.”
“I think it was longer ago than either of us can really appreciate,” he murmured. “You have your own bed and your own room, do you not?”
She nodded again, obviously mystified and wondering where he was leading.
He stood up and gestured for her to follow him. “I believe you also wanted to hear Mass. Let us go.”
She took him by the arm. “You don’t need to do this, my lord,” she said.
He took her hand and pulled her after him into the hall.“Of course I do, my dear. I will take you to St. Stephens, where you will have ample time for confession first and then Mass.”
“You want me to tell this whole story to a priest,” she asked, but it was more of a statement.
“I do indeed.” He allowed Lasker to help him into his overcoat, and then he waited for Emma to retrieve her cloak. “Unless I have been misjudging the Almighty all these years—and I probably have—you are about to discover that you have nothing to be forgiven for.”
She said nothing as they rode toward the city, only beginning to stir now with carters and other early risers. She stared straight ahead, but he knew it was not the angry, sullen mistrust of their earlier acquaintance. Again, he had the feeling that she was seeing things out of his vision. He looked down at her hands and noticed that they were balled into tight fists. He put his hand over hers.
“Don’t worry, Emma. Have you ever considered the possibility that the Lord might be on your side?”
He could tell from her expression that she had not, and he wisely gave himself over to silence too.
There were only a few worshipers in St. Stephen’s, a small Catholic church on the outskirts of the financial district that he knew about only from driving by on several occasions. The earlier Mass had just finished, and the smell of wax was strong in the low-ceilinged chapel. Emma took a deep breath of the mingled ecclesiastical odors and sighed.
“It has been so long, my lord,” she murmured as she started toward a confessional. She looked back at him once, real fear in her eyes, and he longed to follow her, but he only smiled and seated himself in the back of the church, crossing his fingers and hoping that the Lord was the kind of fellow Lord Ragsdale thought He was.
She was a long time in the confessional, but he knew it was a long story and felt no impatience. He was content to breathe deep himself and allow the aura of the place to workits way into his spirits. When she came out, he made room for her on the bench.
He wanted to speak to her, but she dropped immediately to her knees and began to recite the rosary, murmuring softly. She had no beads, so she ticked off the litany on her fingers. He watched Emma and resolved to find a rosary from somewhere for her.What a paltry gift for someone who has given me so much, he thought.
When she finished, she sat beside him. “You were right,” she whispered.
He leaned closer until their shoulders touched. “I thought so. Any penance?”
She smiled at him, and his heart flopped. There was nothing in her smile of reticence, calculation, or wariness this time, only a great relief probably visible to ships at sea or Indians in distant tepees. “He told me to recite one rosary,” she whispered back.
