AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘Not this morning, thank you.’ She gave him a coy look. ‘Now hurry up and pack, Captain. We have a wedding to get to.’
* * *
Anna heaved a contented sigh as Samuel walked away. Despite the tension of living under the same roof as Lady Staunton, it was amazing how comfortable she felt with Samuel now. Even his smell was reassuring. Musky yet fresh-smelling with that distinctive hint of citrus. It made her wonder whether Henrietta was right and they ought to bring out a new type of biscuit. Lemon would be delicious.
She descended the terrace steps and wandered across the lawn and into the woodland. It was another gorgeous day, more like summer than spring. She’d have to dress lightly in the carriage or the heat would be stifling. It was going to be an arduous enough journey without having anyone to talk to and Samuel could hardly ride inside with her unchaperoned, no matter how appealing the idea sounded. She suspected that kissing him would pass the time quite quickly...
There was a sound of snapping twigs and she stopped at the sight of a woman walking among the trees up ahead. From a distance it looked like Clarissa, but there was something different about her, something about the way she held herself and moved. She seemed faster and more upright than usual...as if it were Clarissa and yet not Clarissa. A suspicion tugged at the edge of Anna’s mind, unbelievable at first, but gaining in strength the longer she watched. But it couldn’t be possible...could it? Surely she wouldn’t be so conniving?
She stepped hastily behind one of the trees, concealing herself as Clarissa passed by and then stepped out on to the lawn. As she did so, her whole posture seemed to change, her shoulders sagging forward and her steps slowing as if she were ageing ten years before Anna’s eyes.
She felt her stomach plummet to the floor, almost too shocked to be angry, waiting a few minutes to calm herself before following the other woman’s steps back to the house and through the terrace doors. To her surprise, Clarissa was sitting just inside the drawing room on a low chair, sobbing into a handkerchief.
‘Lady Staunton?’ Anna closed the terrace door softly behind her and leaned against it for support. ‘Can I help?’
‘You?’ The other woman gave a start at her sudden appearance, glaring at her through swollen, red-rimmed eyes. ‘Go away!’
‘I wish I could.’ Anna ignored her. ‘But I think that we need to talk.’
‘I’ve no desire to—’
‘You’re not pregnant, are you?’ Anna spoke quickly, willing the words not to be true, though she couldn’t think of any other explanation that made sense.
‘Of course I am!’ Lady Staunton’s expression registered both shock and guilt as she gestured frantically at her stomach. ‘Look!’
‘It would be easy enough to fasten some padding there, I would imagine.’ Anna lifted an eyebrow sceptically. ‘I saw you walking in the woods just now. You were moving too fast for a pregnant woman.’
For a moment, she thought that the Countess might actually throw something at her. She looked furious enough for anything, though fortunately there were no weapons to hand. Then her whole face seemed to crumple, anger turning to anguish.
‘No!’ She shook her head, her narrow shoulders heaving. ‘Almost twenty years of marriage and I’ve never once been with child. I tried everything. I’ve been examined by so many doctors, tried all kinds of medicines. Nothing ever worked.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Anna sat down on a sofa opposite, not knowing what else to say. She wasn’t entirely sure what to feel, either. Indignant as she was about the Countess’s deception, she couldn’t help but feel sympathy for her obvious heartache. ‘That must have been very hard.’
‘It was the one thing I had to do, the one purpose in my whole life. Just give him a son, my mother told me on my wedding day, give him an heir and everything will be all right. That was the reason he married me, you know, and my parents as good as promised him that I’d be fertile...’ She put her head in her hands. ‘I was only seventeen and it sounded like such an easy thing to do. I assumed I’d be a mother by the end of the year. And then when it didn’t happen, month after month...’
‘Was he cruel to you?’
Lady Staunton twisted her face to one side. ‘No. He was very loving to me at first. I told you, he built me those gardens as a gift.’
‘But later?’
‘He was never cruel, but he became...distant. Cold. Having a son became an obsession.’
‘Because he didn’t want Samuel to inherit?’ Anna tried not to sound too accusing.
Lady Staunton sniffed and nodded. ‘He was so afraid that he’d be like his father and gamble the estate away. He hired lawyers to try to do something about the entail, but it was no use.’ She screwed her handkerchief up into a ball. ‘You’ve no idea what it was like. We barely spoke to each other during the last few years of our marriage.’
‘You’re right, I don’t know what it was like.’ Anna placed a hand tentatively on her shoulder. ‘But why on earth did you tell everyone you were pregnant? Why pretend?’
‘Because this is my home!’ the other woman wailed. ‘I’ve nowhere else to go.’
‘What about your family?’
‘They think I’m a failure. My mother says it was a good thing my sisters were married off early or I would have damaged their prospects.’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘And they’ve all had children. Sons!’
‘That doesn’t make you a failure.’
