Page 64 of The Earl Takes All
Taking his seat, he stared at the flames burning in the candelabra in the center of the table while his wine was poured and soup was served. The room was so blasted quiet, the only sound his silver spoon periodically clinking against china. He’d never thought to miss the screeching winds of Havisham Hall, but at that moment anything was better than being surrounded by the silence of Julia’s absence.
Chapter 16
My dearest darling,
How I wish you were here to enjoy this adventure with us. Edward is quite the tyrant, constantly pushing us forward. He seems to be in his element, thriving on his role as leader of our little expedition. He does not drink as much. I have yet to see him inebriated. Perhaps it is because he is at home here. Or maybe it is that he is fully aware that once our stores of liquor are depleted there is no more to be had within these jungles. If the latter is the case, he is showing remarkable restraint.
Although we have made many journeys together and he has always ordered people about, I don’t know why it is that this time I am appreciating the manner in which he takes charge. Watching him, I cannot help but believe that he is better suited to being the earl than I. I have always found being responsible for others a chore, while he revels in it. It seems to me that something more than exiting the womb first should determine who inherits a title.
Closingher husband’s journal, Julia set it carefully in her lap and gazed out her bedchamber window. She was a dozen days into their journey. She didn’t want to read about how Edward made him laugh, or taught him how to prevent blisters, or ensured they were served proper tea in the teeming wilds. She wanted to read about how much Albert missed her. She wanted to read a passage that said, “I had a premonition last night. I want you to forgive Edward for what I am going to ask him to do. Know I do it out of love for you and our unborn child.”
But as of yet, she discovered no such revelation. He’d penned no words of comfort, no words to confirm that he had known he would die. No final words reaffirming his love for her, no parting message, no tender goodbye. Everything was inconsequential, nothing of import. It was as though he had fully expected to write in his journal a thousand more times.
While she dearly wanted to read the final entry, she refused to read the entries out of order. She wanted to experience his last few weeks as he had lived them. While she had never had any interest in traveling, she suddenly found herself wishing that she had been at his side the entire time he’d been away, as though her presence would have been enough to prevent the horribleness of what had transpired.
She was a widow, had been one in truth for more than four months. Yet time with Edward had tempered her sorrow. She thought she might hate him for that most of all. When she should be thinking about her husband she was thinking about his brother. The way he had made her laugh, the way he had held her, how he hadn’t left her side as she had brought her daughter into the world. The admission that he had fallen in love with her.
If he truly loved her, how could he have allowed her to live a lie, how could he have withheld the truth? Perhaps she could forgive him for the weeks before Alberta’s birth, but the ones after—
The rap on the door barely caused her to stir. “Enter.”
Torrie cautiously strolled in, looking somewhat wary, and handed her a note. “From his lordship.”
Julia took it, unfolded it, read the words inscribed in his neat, precise script, almost identical to Albert’s but not quite. Now she found herself searching for the most mundane differences between the brothers, swearing beneath her breath each time she noted one, wondering how she’d missed it before.
I shall be in the nursery from two until half past.
—Greyling
She wasn’t surprised. He’d had the same message delivered every day for the past week. And she knew that he knew she couldn’t deny him visiting Lady Alberta without causing speculation and gossip among the servants as to the reason she would not allow the child’sfatherto spend time with her. While staff was not supposed to blather about what went on upstairs, Julia wasn’t fool enough to think they held everything they observed to themselves. With a harsh unladylike curse, she’d torn the first note into tiny shreds. She’d ripped the second in half. Balled up the third. Did little more than sigh and refold all the others.
At least he forewarned her about his intentions so she wouldn’t cross paths with him in the hallway or the nursery and have to endure seeing him.
“Would you like me to deliver a message to him?” Torrie asked.
Go to the devilwas probably not what her maid had in mind. “No. Let Nanny know that she should prepare Lady Alberta for the earl’s two o’clock visit.”
“Yes, m’lady. Shall I press a gown for you to wear to dinner?”
That question had also become part of her daily ritual. “No. Have dinner brought to my room.”
“Yes, m’lady.” She heard the disappointment and sorrow in Torrie’s voice. Her maid knew something was wrong. The entire staff no doubt knew something was wrong. They simply couldn’t imagine what it could be. Why would they—why would anyone—suspect the truth when it was preposterous and unfathomable?
“It’s not the nanny, m’lady,” Torrie suddenly blurted.
Julia looked at the young woman who was rubbing one hand over the other as though apprehensive she’d said something she shouldn’t. “I beg your pardon?”
“Everyone knows he goes to the nursery each afternoon. The scullery maid, she’s a bit dimwitted, she said he fancies the nanny and that’s why he goes, that no father takes that much interest in a baby. But he sends the nanny down to the kitchen for a cuppa when he’s in the nursery. He’s just spending time with Lady Alberta. He’s not being unfaithful to you.”
She’d never considered that he would be; perhaps she should have. He was a young, virile man—
What was she thinking? He owed her no faithfulness. Why did that thought bother her? What did she care who he might bed? She looked back out the window. She did wish spring would arrive, that the weather would warm, that she could go riding.
“He likes to go into your relaxing room.”
Into the room where she worked with her watercolors. She’d once told Torrie that it relaxed her, and the maid had taken to calling it her relaxing room. And now she was offering up this tidbit as though that would somehow redeem him in Julia’s eyes when the poor woman didn’t even know what he needed redemption for. “When?”
“Different times, but at least once a day.”
