Page 64 of These Violet Delights
Him have I lost; thou hast both him and me.
He pays the whole, and yet am I not free.
Sonnet 134
Robert and Lillian’s things were being loaded into the carriage when Alasdair charged up the drive to Sampson. There were plenty of staff to attend him as he leapt down from his horse and watched the last of their luggage being stowed away. It was a crisp, clear day and growing warmer, and the ride had left him breathing heavily. Those breaths curled away on white streamers, scattering as Robert and Lillian appeared from within the house.
“Leaving so soon?” he asked, not without surprise.
“That’s hilarious. Truly. What sort of buffoon invites his friends for Christmas and then leaves them that very same day!” Robert’s gaunt face burned with outrage as he bumped his chest against Alasdair’s stomach.
“Dr. Fornwell said you mustn’t get so upset, dear,” Lillian begged at his side.
“Oh, to hell with Dr. Fornwell! Myupsetis very much deserved! I am a man insulted,” Robert raged on. He had the good sense to lower his voice for the next bit of complaining. “By God! Where were you, man? How could you leave me with the two most depressing souls in England? How many sermons can a man stomach before he is sick with boredom? Take a guess! No, do not, for I will tell you the answer. Seventeen. Seventeen sermons. I came to heroically rescue you from that exact fate! I feel swindled, Alasdair,swindled.I can be very unpleasant when I feel swindled.”
Alasdair rocked back on his heels. “Indeed. I feel confident that if you think long and hard, you will hit upon why I left that evening.”
“Over…over…that woman?” Robert stammered, not even willing to use her name. “Incomprehensible. You have always been an odd one, Alasdair, but this is a degree of inscrutability I cannot unravel, and believe me, I have had ample time to do so while listening to seventeen sermons!”
“Thank you for your hospitality,” Lillian added softly, trying to pry her husband away. “It was charming to meet your family.”
“I do apologize for any confusion or discomfort you suffered, Mrs. Daly,” said Alasdair.
“Apologizing to Lillian? Of all people! Apologize tome,you scoundrel, at once.”
“No,” said Alasdair, stepping away.
“Here!” Robert yanked a folded letter from his coat pocket and shoved it with both hands against Alasdair’s chest. “This was the surprise I spoke of in my letter. I don’t even feel like giving it to you now, but I am a gentleman. Do you remember what that’s like? Being a gentleman?”
Alasdair stared down at the note, unblinking, recognizingJulianna’s handwriting. With two more exasperated huffs, Robert stormed into the carriage, bumping his head, swearing, then dropping down onto the bench hard enough to rock the whole apparatus. Lillian offered a helpless shrug and followed her husband.
He watched the carriage roll down the drive, realizing he had given little thought to what he would say and do once he was back at Sampson. There had been a vague urgency to remove himself from Pressmore, a rising awareness that his presence was no longer to be tolerated after the benefit had concluded. Standing alone in the cold, he found himself missing Violet already. Her scent was all over him, like a dream persisting into waking hours.
And he was awake now, painfully so.
Inside, Sampson was roaring with heat. The Yule log still burned dutifully away; he could hear the snapping and cracking from the front hall. Nobody in the family appeared to greet him, and he did not pretend to be disappointed. Instead, he dispensed with his gloves and hat and bounded up the stairs, knowing he could do with a wash and a shave.
With creeping guilt, he stood at the window of his bedchamber and slid out of his boots, stretching his toes and working a cramp out of his calf. He opened Julianna’s letter and read it, surprised at the indifference it inspired. Something in him had shifted, a new stubbornness unfurling—he knew it, but how long until the world caught up?
My dear Mr. Kerr,
It will be Christmas when you receive this, and I will be thinking of you fondly. Do you remember last winter in Vienna, when we strolled the Innere Stadt and I took you to my favorite fountain? There was a man with the funniestlittle dog, and he fell right into the waters of the Donnerbrunnen chasing it away from the edge. Nobody at dinner understood why it was so ridiculous. That was the day with me you laughed the most; I keep that day close to my heart.
Perhaps it is folly to continue this. You were not yourself when we last met. I know the man who laughed at that dog and the fountain is still there somewhere. How do I reach him? What is the right thing to say? I think you loved me once, but you have never spoken freely about your feelings. You are a man enclosed. Still, it is not altogether unpleasant to be with a person so self-possessed. Something tells me to return to the memories of us, again and again. It’s maddening. Come to see me in London; I will be there until 7 January.
If you do not come, I will consider you lost to me forever.
Yours still,
Julianna
Behind the indifference was a brief surge of sympathy. He would not go to her, but she should know that his heart belonged to another. It was strange to see himself described like a stranger—he was not a man enclosed, or rather, he had found a way to give himself over, it had simply required a like-minded soul.
Julianna was kind and clever; life had been easy for her. She was elegant, she moved elegantly, her manners were elegant. The refinement never seemed to restrain her, and it seemed like she could laugh at anything. Knowing that, he hoped she could laugh at the rejection he must send. Someone better suited would swoop in to love her, he was sure of it.
He tossed the letter onto his desk and remembered needinga shave. Yet he was reluctant to wash Violet off of his skin. Well. The sooner he made their engagement real, the sooner he could have her again. He wanted to do it the proper way, nothing sloppy; she deserved to be treated as honorably as any woman of quality.
Still. What was the harm in reminding himself of her brash beauty? He knelt to retrieve the painting from beneath his bed; he found nothing but empty space, a faint impression in the dust where a rectangle had once been. Alarmed, Alasdair righted himself and dusted off his breeches, then caught sight of someone watching him from the open doorway. Lady Edith.
