Page 97 of The Rebellious Lady and the Phantom Lord
“Make her promise.” Although he had never so much as glanced around, Phaedra was startled by both James’s perception and his strained command.
When her vague pledges of good conduct did not satisfy Gilly either, she snapped, “Oh, very well, I swear it in blood. I will keep silent. I hope that satisfies the pair of you.”
Gilly grinned. “Then be off with you while I change my own clothes. I am not so free and easy before the ladies as Jamey lad. My extreme modesty, you know.”
James glared at Gilly, a blush overtaking his pale cheeks.
It was a bare half-hour later when Phaedra trailed after the two men to the small stable yard at the back of Jonathan’s house. The grooms had fetched both Nemesis and Gilly’s sorrel.
After bestowing upon her a brisk hug, Gilly mounted his horse.
Phaedra was relieved to see that James was looking stronger, although still quite strained. She wanted to help him up into the saddle, but knew he would resent the gesture. His expression caused her heart to break.
She saw no trace of warmth in his face-no trace of the man she’d known. His mouth appeared so hardened she doubted if he would ever smile again. Ever since she had given him the news of his sister, all fragments of youthfulness had disappeared. Suddenly Phaedra envisioned him as an aging, embittered man, ever bound to his angry resentment. She had tried to break those chains for him, but now she saw that she had attempted the impossible.
It was so ironic. Both of them had sought a freedom-he from memories, she from dependence upon any man. But he would never know his freedom, and she didn’t want hers.
As he reached for Nemesis’s reins, he paused, his gaze drawn back to her against his will. “It would seem,” he said, “that this is farewell.”
She nodded numbly. “I wish you …” What was there for her to wish him? She doubted he would find any happiness in his reunion with his sister, a broken woman, so mad she would not even know him. “I wish you peace, James Lethington,” she finished sadly.
He vaulted into the saddle, his eyes empty, his voice hard. “I won’t find it. Not this side of the grave.”
Without waiting to see if Gilly followed, he reined Nemesis about and was gone.
A fortnight passed. Sawyer Weylin improved enough for Phaedra to consider moving him back to Blackheath. Jonathan, however, argued vehemently against it.
“Your grandfather will never again be strong enough to leave his bed. It will be entirely too much for you to cope with that vast house and an invalid.”
“But we have burdened you with our presence here long enough,” Phaedra protested.
“Never!” Jonathan pressed a fervent kiss against her hand. “It has been the greatest happiness of my life to have you safe beneath my roof.”
Phaedra disengaged her hand. “I want my grandfather to spend his last days in his own house.” She did not add that she had another reason, equally compelling. The look in Jonathan’s eyes had waxed far too ardent of late. She had no desire to give the man false hope. She herself had known too much of that kind of pain to inflict it upon Jonathan.
Although Jonathan continued to resist the notion, Phaedra prevailed in the end, and her grandfather was conveyed back to his cherished Heath. September had come, but the summer did not slowly dissolve into fall; it died. The summer-Phaedra’s season of fire and love, had snatched away all its greenery and warmth and fled. The chill of autumn blighted the Heath’s gardens; brittle leaves and withered stalks now stood• where theroses had bloomed. To Phaedra it was like watching the promise of life itself dying, the passing of dreams that were to never come again.
She began to fear that returning to the Heath had been a mistake. It did not give her grandfather the ease that she had hoped, and his condition seemed to worsen with each passing day. He spoke less and slept more, and the right side of his body was paralyzed. In spite of Weylin’s dreadful crime, and the pain the old man’s ambitions had brought both herself and James, Phaedra could not help pitying him.
Never before had she realized how much her grandfather’s presence had filled the Heath. It was as though the ostentatious, overlarge rooms had been scaled to match his enormous bulk and blustery temperament. Now he was but a sunken shadow of himself, and the vast house seemed like a suit of clothes that no longer fit.
At least the cool winds of autumn had eased tempers somewhat. For a long time, Phaedra had gone in dread of another attack upon her grandfather. Despite her promise to James and Gilly, she had been fully prepared to confess that she was Robin Goodfellow. But the Londoners were quick to find new interests, and the Gazetteer and Goodfellow were both forgotten in the heat of new political matters. The king and his ministers were now being harried by the prospect that France would almost certainly sign a treaty with the American colonists. Jessym had paid a fine and been duly released.
Phaedra was astonished with what indifference she received the news of colonial affairs. Once she would have been ecstatic to hear of the treaty with France, certain that with such aid the colonists would be bound to emerge victorious. In a burst of enthusiasm, she would have reached for her quill to applaud France’s intervention. But now she regarded all such political tidings with indifference. The struggle for liberty being wagedacross the sea seemed but a small matter compared with her own heartbreak.
Because no housekeeper had been engaged to replace Hester Searle, Phaedra filled her own days by directing the servants’ activities at the Heath. She found herself increasingly grateful for such mundane tasks, and she had neither the heart nor the mind for greater exertion. Listlessness had taken possession of her. She was frequently ill, especially upon rising in the morning.
At first she had supposed her fatigue was merely so much stress, finally taking its toll upon her. But when she studied her body in the mirror, she was forced to admit that the tenderness of her breasts and the slight thickening of her waist were not caused by any illness. She could no longer delude herself. She was with child.
After her initial shock, she experienced a rush of anger at the perversity of fate. How oft she had longed for a child! The prospect of knowing a mother’s joy had been the only reason she had ever tolerated those brief, humiliating couplings with Ewan. And now she was carrying the child of the man she loved, yet the knowledge filled her with sorrow and dread.
How would James react when she told him? Phaedra doubted that she would ever know, for she had a feeling that when he found his sister, he would never return. Two weeks had stretched into a month with still no word from him or Gilly. She wondered why her cousin had not at least returned. Surely it could not be taking this long to locate Julianna. Phaedra suppressed a dread that they had found the girl in worse condition than anyone could possibly have imagined.
Turning away from the mirror, Phaedra dressed herself, feeling more depressed than ever. She went down to her grandfather’s study. She felt an intruder there, but someone hadto keep track of the accounts and see that the bills were paid. Shortly after returning to the Heath, she had taken on the task.
It was not so difficult, considering her grandfather’s meticulous accounting. She had even located a private ledger in which he had recorded with great detail, every sum, every item he had sent to Mrs. Link for the care of Julianna Lethington.
After Phaedra finished toting up the reckonings of the household expenses, she proceeded to clean out the center drawer. Jonathan had very kindly offered to take charge of all matters dealing with Weylin’s many investments, an offer she had gratefully accepted.
