Page 7
“In that case, I will.” Esme walked toward the door.
“I apologize if I offended you.”
Esme paused for a moment and then turned. “I am sorry as well, but forgiveness is hardly the issue, is it?”
“What did I say that was so terrible?” Helene said, looking her straight in the eyes. “One of the things I have always loved about you, Esme, is that you don’t lie to yourself. You have never hidden from me the fact that you bedded Sebastian Bonnington the night before you reconciled with your husband, and therefore you initially had no idea who fathered William. Why would it wound you to hear that fact repeated by me?”
“You called my wish to have children a whim,” Esme said, feeling as if Helene were stealing the ground out from under her feet. Just a moment ago she had been righteously furious and now—
“I shouldn’t have said that,” Helene said, her voice wavering a bit. “I only said it because I have so desperately wanted a child for years. I am sure that no one has ever wanted a child as much as I. I spoke out of jealousy. I’m sorry. You’re my closest friend, and if you throw me over, I might as well jump in the river because—because—”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake!” Esme said, walking back and plumping down next to her. “All right, I forgive you, you sharp-tongued viper!” She wrapped an arm around her.
“Rees always said I had the temper of a devil,” Helene said with a wobbly smile.
“What temper? We’ve been friends for years, and you have always been calm, to my memory,” Esme said in honest bewilderment.
“I have to be in control because I’m a true witch otherwise. Rees couldn’t live with me. I threw a chamberpot at his head.”
“You what?”
“I emptied a chamberpot over his head.”
“My goodness,” Esme said with some fascination. “I presume it was…in use?”
“He keeps a chamberpot in the sitting room so that if he has the urge to use it, he doesn’t have to waste time visiting the water closet,” Helene said wearily.
Esme shuddered. “That is truly revolting. Rees got what he deserved.”
“So I try to remain collected. Otherwise I might throw plates at people’s heads regularly.”
“Thank you for the warning,” Esme said with some amusement, moving the lemon tarts to the far side of the table.
“Not at you. But I doubt that I could live with a man at this stage in my life. I’m all of twenty-seven years old. I don’t think I could put up with their disgusting habits.”
“Sebastian hasn’t any disgusting habits. And what does that make me, an old woman? I have twenty-eight years myself. Are you telling me that I’m too old to live with a man? Or that men aren’t attracted to me due to my advanced years?”
“Don’t be silly! You will always be enticing. I expect that men are even more attracted to your figure now that you’ve had a child.”
“You’ve bats in your belfry,” Esme replied. “I’m plump, and I know it.”
“I’m like a board, all flat and dried up, whereas you are even more curvy than before.”
“As you said earlier, cut bait. If my body curves, it only curves out!”
Helene stood up again and walked over to the window, wrapping her arms tightly around her chest. Finally she said, “I have to do something. I cannot go on like this.”
The raw misery in her voice caught at Esme’s heart. Sunlight was falling on Helene’s hair, making it look like spun sugar, gleaming white-blond.
“I can’t bear this life anymore,” she said. “I’m warning you, Esme, I am about to create a far bigger scandal than Rees ever did with his tawdry little singer and his Russian dancing troupe. And it will all be his fault, the utter unmitigated bastard.”
Esme blinked. “What are you thinking of?” she asked cautiously. “Do sit down, Helene.”
“I’m going to have a child,” Helene said, setting her jaw so that she looked as bullish as a Norse goddess. “I’m going to have a child, with or without a divorce. I’ve been thinking of nothing else for months.”
“Are you certain that Rees won’t—”
“Absolutely,” Helene said, cutting her off. “I’ve spoken to him about divorce repeatedly. And why would he ever change his mind? He’s cosily tucked up with that singer of his. Rees was never one to consult a book of etiquette on any matter, let alone in questions of marriage.”
