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But if she could not trust him…And she was rig
ht not to. She sensed the haunted darkness inside him, the unworthiness. And then through his misery he saw that she had indeed handed him a weapon, the one he needed to convince her he did not desire her for every reason a man could desire a woman. He tried to feel glad, glad that here was an excuse to break with her, one that would surely cut the tie between them with the sharpest knife.
‘I realise,’ he said harshly, ‘that for a lady like yourself to admit desire for a man like me it might be necessary to dress it up as an elevated emotion, as love.’
‘No,’ Maude whispered. ‘Oh, no, Eden.’ Her hand fluttered at his breast and the need to hold her, rain kisses on her, was agony to resist.
‘I would enjoy taking you as a lover, Maude, but if you think I am insane enough to entangle myself with a society virgin just for that, you are far and away wrong. I have no desire to find myself called out by your friends, my cousins.’
‘You don’t love me?’ she asked. ‘No, I can see that you do not. You cannot find it in you to forgive me my lack of trust.’ There was bleakness in her eyes now, pain. ‘I will go now and send Benson round in the morning to discuss selling the theatre to you.’
‘You want me to buy back your investment as well?’ he asked, wondering why he was still able to speak of such matters when he had just denied his own feelings and wounded Maude to the very heart. But talking of business suited the image he wanted her to have of him. It was the true image, after all. In a day or two she would be grateful for her escape, he had to tell himself that.
‘No.’ She pushed back out of his arms and he let her go. The last time he would hold her. ‘I will not come to the theatre again, I will not interfere. I do not think I could bear to return. But should I consider marriage in the future, I will sell my investment back, never fear.’
Maude opened the door. His last chance to say those three words. He was hurting her now; to say them would be to ruin her. This, if ever, was the time to pretend to himself that he was a gentleman. Eden held his tongue. ‘Goodbye, Maude.’
She turned, looked back and now he could see one tear sliding down her cheek. ‘Goodbye.’ Then she was gone.
She should go home, or at least to Jessica’s. Maude passed down the passageway like a ghost, her surroundings as insubstantial as a dream, She had told Eden of her love and he had rejected her. She had shown her lack of trust and wounded him—but surely, if he had loved her, he would have told her so, despite that?
Her mind could hardly touch the hurt with thoughts; she knew she could not speak of it to anyone, not yet. Maude came up against a closed door and stopped, disorientated, before she recognised that this was the dressing room where she and Eden had found the two lovers. It would be deserted now, she could sit in there a while. Time would pass and perhaps she would be able to think what to do next, where to go.
How long she sat there in the dark, she did not know, nor what she had been thinking about. Her consciousness just seemed to be full of pain, a dull, bruised ache that stabbed like a knife wound if she let her thoughts drift to Eden.
But her limbs were cramped and she felt so tired. Maude got to her feet and went out again into the silence that seemed to fill the old building. She should go now; the stage door-keeper, who doubled as a night watchman, would find her a hackney. She felt her way through the darkness until she realised where she was. This was the door to Eden’s office.
Just once more, she told herself, pushing it open and finding by touch the box of Lucifers he kept on his desk. She had never lit the gas before, but she had seen Eden do it. Maude struck a light, then turned the tap, jumping as the gas lit with a loud pop. His great chair loomed out of the shadows and she went to sit in it, curling up under the grasp of the eagle’s claws. She would just rest there for a few minutes, absorbing one last memory.
She was so tired, as though she was ill. Perhaps a broken heart was an illness. So very tired. Maude’s head drooped and she slept. Above her, the shadow of the eagle on the wall dipped wildly as the gas flame fluttered and dimmed, then strengthened again.
The shouting brought Eden bolt upright in his bed. Hell—had he managed to sleep after all? The noise was approaching his room, raised voices, three at least. The candle on the nightstand had almost burned out, but gave enough light for him to see the face of his watch: three o’clock.
He flung back the covers and got out of bed, stark naked, just as the door banged back.
‘You cannot go in there! My lord, my lord, I will have to call the Watch!’ Greengage, his butler, was giving ground before the bulk of a much larger, taller, older man whose arm was held by one of the footmen, quite ineffectually, for he was being towed along despite his efforts.
‘Sir, I tried to stop him, but he has run mad, I think!’ Greengage gasped. ‘I’ll go for help, sir.’
‘No.’ Eden had seen who the furious intruder was. ‘Leave us.’
‘But—’
‘Out!’
‘Where is my daughter?’ Lord Pangbourne advanced on Eden, clenched fist raised. ‘Where is she?’
‘Not here, my lord.’ Eden moved quickly, catching the earl’s arm as he stumbled. ‘Is she not with Lady Dereham or Lady Standon?’
‘No, I went there first, when she was not returned by one. And to Lord Sebastian’s house, too. That left only you.’
‘I give you my word, she is not with me and I have not seen her since she left my office at the Unicorn.’ The older man’s eyes were fixed on him with painful intensity and he felt his colour rise. ‘I realise that I am not a gentleman, that you may not be willing to accept my word, but I give you leave to search this house, cellars to attics.’
‘Of course I take your word, Hurst, damn it,’ Lord Pangbourne snapped. ‘Do you think I would allow Maude to associate with you if I did not consider you a man of honour? Your parents may have acted without much; that’s not to your discredit. I make my own judgements about men. But where is she?’ he asked, suddenly looking desperately anxious and vulnerable.
‘We parted…angrily. It may be that she is still at the theatre, I can think of nowhere else. I’ll go, right away.’ Eden went to drag on the bell pull, his heart pounding. Maude.
‘I’m coming, too, and for God’s sake, put some clothes on, man.’ The earl sounded more himself.
