Page 106 of Marry in Secret
“What does it say?” Rose asked. Thomas passed it to her. In Cal’s distinctive scrawl it said:
Saw this fellow at Tattersalls the other day and thought he might suit you.
We never did get you a wedding present.
From Emm, me and the family.
Yours etc. Cal.
She glanced at Thomas and saw he was stunned by the gift. Dear Thomas, he expected so little and deserved so much.
“Isn’t he splendid! What are you going to call him?”
But Thomas was too overcome to speak. He kept running his hands over the horse, getting to know him, letting him snuffle down his front, and feeding him chunks of an apple he had in his pocket.
Rose rubbed her own horse’s nose affectionately. “Yes, Midnight, he’s very pretty, but you’re still my favorite. Can we take them out for a ride today, Kirk? Or will they be too tired from the journey?”
Kirk was his usual phlegmatic self. “I’ll give them a drink and a rubdown and a good feed of oats, m’lady. Come the morning, they’ll be ready for your morning ride.”
“Bucephalus,” Thomas said at last. “I’ll call him Bucephalus, after the brave horse ridden by Alexander the Great.”
After that they rode out every morning, taking a different direction each day. While the beautiful weather held, Rose was determined that Thomas would have a holiday. There was no need for him to bury himself in estate matters, and besides, it was obvious the property was in good condition and Ambrose was doing an excellent job.
Time enough when the weather confined them to the house for Thomas to turn to the books and Rose to redecorating the interior of the house.
One aspect of redecoration, however, couldn’t wait: The walls of almost all the public areas of the house were adorned with the heads, horns and antlers of dead animals. With glass eyes that either followed Rose around the room or stared balefully at her. She set a couple of manservants to clearing them out, room by room.
“But what shall we do with them, m’lady?” one of the men asked.
“Whatever you like. I don’t want them in the house.” Emm had done the same at Ashendon Hall, and the effect was wonderful, Rose remembered. Much lighter and happier. She enjoyed venison, but not with a deer’s head staring reproachfully at her.
Thomas approved. He hunted, but only for food, not for sport. “George would like that about you,” she told him.
The next few weeks sped past. Each morning they rodeout, and wherever they went, tenants and local villagers came out, giving them a warm welcome, greeting Thomas like one of their own returned to them by the grace of God.
At first they hung back shyly, not wanting to bother the earl, but of course, Thomas being Thomas, he saw and spoke to them all.
He’d left this place when he was sixteen, she recalled, and had gone to sea, and yet he was remembered—and with fondness. And not just because he was the earl. Rose was welcomed as their new countess, and also as Thomas’s wife. But Thomas was liked for himself, though he showed no awareness of it.
Wherever they went, people came shyly forward, pressing simple but heartfelt hospitality on them, along with small gifts of eggs, honey, cakes, biscuits, a mug of milk or mead or a tankard of home-brewed beer. And to talk to Thomas and tell him how glad they were he’d returned to them.
Thomas was stunned by the welcome. To Rose, he tried to laugh it off, to hide how deeply moved he was. “Oh, they’re just glad they don’t have to deal with Cousin Cornelius.” But she knew better.
“It’s not just because he’s the earl, is it?” Rose said to Ambrose one afternoon. “They really seem to like him for himself. Even though it’s been more than ten years since he lived here.”
Ambrose nodded. “Thomas always did have the gift of seeing people, not simply their role. He listens and he always did, even as a boy. The old earl and Gerald always had a touch of ‘high and mighty’ about them, as if they were doing people a favor by speaking to them. Thomas never did,” Ambrose told her. “People remember that, and when they speak to him now they see that inside the man, he’s still that kindhearted boy. So yes, it’s genuine, the regard these people feel for him. It’s not just for the position he holds.”
He said it with a touch of sadness, or perhaps a little envy, and it occurred to Rose that though people referred toAmbrose often enough in conversation, and did it with respect, there wasn’t that edge of fondness for him that was revealed in their attitude to Thomas.
This was what Thomas needed that Rose’s fortune could never have provided—to be needed, to have a home, and to have a role that meant something. The people here looked up to him. Ambrose was a good estate manager, but Thomas was a natural leader. Their leader.
The days were long, lazy and golden. Day by day she saw the tension in Thomas visibly lift. They rode out, revisited many of Thomas’s boyhood haunts, explored the estate and made love long into the night. And again in the morning.
And if he didn’t say the words she longed to hear, he showed her in so many ways that she was precious to him. So she tried not to mind when she told him she loved him, and he replied with a kiss, a glorious, soul-stealing wonder of a kiss. But no words.
It made her a little sad, though she told herself it shouldn’t.
He was damaged, he’d told her, outside and in. The damage to his body had healed itself, but the scars still showed. The damage to his soul, his heart? That wasn’t so clear.
