Page 3 of The Widower Without a Will
“In the meantime, you shall have your choice of rooms at Northfield Hall,” Lord Preston said.Ahead of them, the house began to appear with its odd combination of a Tudor east wing attached to the rest of its red brick.“My children have all relinquished their claims to any specific suite, and for the moment, I have no other houseguests.”
He said it with the intonation of an upper-class toff who found everything amusing and nothing important.The tone did not come naturally from him.Martha turned her head ever so slightly so she could examine his profile: the patrician silver hair tied back in an old-fashioned queue, the heavy eyebrows that made him look perpetually serious, the lines—some deep, some fine as a feather—that defined his face.He watched the drive ahead of them, his mouth arranged in a facsimile of a smile.
This was a man who was unhappy—but didn’t want to admit it.
Or didn’t know how.
Martha resisted the urge to touch her fingers to his wrist.“Then we two shall fill up Northfield Hall until the younger and more interesting come along.”
Lord Preston looked from the horse to her with a quirk of his eyebrow.“Younger they may be, Mrs.Bellamy, but I can hardly think they would be more interesting.”
This time, he sounded sincere—and Martha was surprised to notice her heart flutter at the compliment.
Chapter Two
IfMrs.Bellamywerea lady of the realm, Martin would have known how to introduce her to Northfield Hall.He would have discreetly sent a message ahead of time so that the household servants could assemble in the front hall to greet their guest; he would have whisked Mrs.Bellamy into the garden drawing room for refreshments after her travel; when he gave her a tour of the house, he would have emphasized the architectural elements that great ladies appreciated.
But Mrs.Bellamy was not a lady of the realm, nor was she one of those rector’s wives who pretended to be one.She was more like the people who sought labor and refuge at Northfield Hall.In fact, he supposed she nowwasone of those people, since Northfield Hall would be her haven until someone in her family remembered they had a duty to her.Except Martin was not going to ask a poor widow to work for her supper, which meant she was his guest.A guest who would not care about the rococo furniture in the drawing room.
As the gig pulled into the carriage sweep, he shook off his ruminations.He was, as usual, spending too much time thinking and not enough time doing.One of the stable boys rushed over to help with the horse while Jacques, the head footman, descended the Italian marble stairs to assist Mrs.Bellamy to the ground.He greeted her with a familiarity no lady of good breeding would have tolerated:
“It is good to see you, Mrs.Bellamy!”
Martin corrected himself: his daughters would tolerate such a greeting.But then, they had been raised here, and he had never thought it important to impress upon them the finer distinctions of behavior because he had assumed it came naturally as one moved through the world.
He couldn’t quite remember how his late wife, Lolly, would have responded, had Jacques expressed such innocent delight at her arrival.
In any case, it was time to move on.He led Mrs.Bellamy up the marble stairs and into the entryway, hoping that the housekeeper Mrs.Chow would magically materialize to smooth over the transaction.Unfortunately, he did not keep the kind of household in which the servants anticipated his every need, and so he and Mrs.Bellamy stood alone in the entrance hall as Jacques unloaded the gig.
“Have you had a tour of the house?”Martin asked, suddenly unable to recall if she had ever visited before.She must have.She was a key part of the Thatcham community, and Martin made a point of keeping relations with Thatcham as warm as possible.
“No, I’ve only been on the grounds before.”Her voice came out a little squeaky, and she cleared her throat.Her eyes were on the walls, which were dark paneled wood adorned with oil paintings the family had collected over the years.
“Ah, then, I’m glad to remedy that before you leave these parts for your family in London.”Martin decided to pretend she was a great lady and beckoned her onward to the drawing room at the back of the house.“In comparison to the country houses of my colleagues, the Hall is nothing to speak of, but I am rather fond of it.My great-grandfather rebuilt it after a terrible fire in 1682, so this wing that we are in now is new, so to speak.More windows, better fireplaces, all that comes from modern construction.”
Mrs.Bellamy nodded.“From the aftermath of tragedy often springs something new and wonderful.”
The trite words felt meaningful from her, for she did not smile to soften them or look his way to see if they landed.She merely said them, as if they were for her and her alone.As if they were a prayer.Martin wondered what new and wonderful thing she had found after the tragic loss of her son—but he stopped himself from asking.
“Yes.In this case, my favorite is this drawing room.”With a bit of trepidation, he handed her down the step at the room’s threshold.
The great ladies who toured the estate were never impressed by this room.It was too small, its furniture outdated, its design entirely too unfocused on appealing to the eye.
The middle-class visitors who took day tours of Northfield Hall more often exclaimed, “What a lovely room!”But Martin sensed they viewed the aging yellow silk wallpaper—now half a century old—through a veil of judgment.Even the servants and laborers who worked the estate seemed to have little reverence for it, considering it only another room that needed cleaning.
No one ever saw what Martin did: a room for the family to hold fast to each other.A room too small for them to miss each other’s words, too beautiful with its picture windows and prospect of the gardens beyond to leave on a sunny afternoon, too comfortable to contaminate conversation with protocol and polite falsities.
Mrs.Bellamy moved into the room only a few steps before stilling, her head and shoulders the only parts of her body moving as she took it in.Martin watched her eyes rove over the amateur watercolors—by his children and Lolly and even a few of the laborers—to the rococo sofas with patched upholstery and the linen drapes tied back to invite in the afternoon sun.At last, she turned her shoulders to set those hazel irises on him.“I can see why you treasure this room.”
It was that very moment that the sun shifted to spotlight her in a gentle beam.The mantle ofwidowmelted in the golden light, almost like a witch from a fairy tale transforming into a beautiful maiden.There she stood, a sturdy woman with her chin held high, her hair pinned back in a proud bun, brave enough to face her fate.
If he were touched by a fairy’s wand, would he, too, transform into a soul strong enough to face fate alone?
The sun shifted, and Martin was freed from the force of such thoughts.He offered Mrs.Bellamy a seat on the pink settee that had been Lolly’s favorite.“As I’m sure you know, we don’t drink tea or coffee at Northfield Hall, but may I offer you a tisane of peppermint or chamomile?”
“Thank you,” she said, looking again like an uncertain old woman, “I shall take whatever you recommend.”
Marthahadsufferedthroughmany a tea-taking in her time as rector’s wife—especially back in Tolpuddle, when well-to-do people still invited her to their homes—and so she would suffer through this awkward exchange with Lord Preston.She could not precisely definewhyshe felt so awkward, for he made warm conversation and asked questions particular to her, unlike so many obligatory teas where the chatter remained on the topic of the hostess’s choice, whether the guest had anything to add or not.Nor did Lord Preston make her uncomfortable in any way: he took the seat diagonally across the low table from her so that she could naturally cast her eyes upon the garden beyond the windows rather than him, if she found looking at him to be too taxing.
