WINSTON'S SMILE was looking somewhat forced. "Of course, ma'am," he said. "I would have suggested it myself, but I seem to have become accustomed to you and Lady Cavendish being inseparable, and I heard her at breakfast say that she means to spend the morning in the library writing letters."
"I hate writing letters," Lady Murdoch said amiably. "I would prefer to travel halfway across England to pay my friends a visit than to write one page to them."
"Quite so, ma'am," Winston said with a bow. "And I am sure that they are infinitely more gratified."
Lady Murdoch gestured for his arm to help hoist her to her feet. "So you see, young man," she said with a grunt when the mission had been accomplished, "you know what to expect when you and dear Sarah are married. You will never know when to expect me on your doorstep. And I usually make my visits extended ones. Otherwise, the journey seems hardly to have been worthwhile. Would you not agree?"
"Quite so," Winston muttered again.
Sarah could not quite suppress a gleam of enjoyment. It was so rare to see Win discomfited. But he was clearly rattled now. It had all started the evening before when the party had been about to go into the dining room. Win had been moving confidently toward her to lead her in when Lady Murdoch had yoo-hooed from across the room and indicated a rather red-faced Benjamin Fairlie.
"Oh, Sarah," she called, "do allow Mr. Fairlie to take you in to dinner. He wishes to ask you himself but is afraid that you will reject him."
While Benjamin squirmed with visible mortification, Lady Murdoch smiled coquettishly at Win and announced that he would be granted the honor of leading her in. And once inside the dining room, she steered her unwilling escort to the opposite end of the table from that occupied by Sarah.
Later, in the drawing room, Winston crossed to Sarah's side while they both drank tea and suggested that they take a turn in the garden while the air still retained some of the heat of the day. But Lady Murdoch seemed to have ears everywhere.
"Oh, Lord Laing," she called, "you are never thinking of taking dear Sarah outside, are you? The evenings at this time of the year are much too chill, my dear sir. I really cannot allow it for all that I am not Sarah's mother and therefore do not have a maternal right to forbid her to do anything. But I am just a foolish old woman, you see, and dear Sarah has come to indulge my whims. Anyway, I really must beg your partnership in a hand of cards. Lord Fairlie has been trying this quarter of an hour to make up a table, and he lacks one player."
Winston looked incredulous for one unguarded moment, but his smile of great charm instantly took its place. "I should be delighted, ma'am," he said. "I perceive you are treating me as a son already. What greater honor could I wish for?"
When the game was over, much later in the evening, Lady Murdoch immediately called Sarah to her. Winston stayed for a while, but when it became obvious to him that he was not to have Sarah to himself that evening, he wandered off. For the half-hour before bedtime he sat on the window seat t?te-a-t?te with Hannah.
And now this morning it had started again. Cranwell and several of the gathered guests had decided to ride out to view the farms, the expedition that had been canceled the previous afternoon. Those who had decided not to go seemed to have something with which to occupy themselves. Sarah had no particular plan and felt helpless before Win's suggestion that they go walking. She knew beyond a doubt what he had in mind. The events of the previous afternoon had merely whetted his appetite.
But again Lady Murdoch overheard the invitation and had chosen to assume that she was included in it.
They walked as far as the bridge, Lady Murdoch leaning on Sarah's arm and moving at a snail's pace. Sarah was convinced that they moved even more slowly than usual. And she talked constantly. They stood on the bridge for all of half an hour, spaced between the graceful Grecian columns that supported the high roof, leaning on the stone parapet. And even Sarah began to feel boredom as her elderly cousin prosed on about the house, the gardens, the hills, and the wonderful hospitality of his grace. Sarah's eyes met those of Win over the head of Lady Murdoch at one point, and he pulled a face. But she refused to participate in the silent communication. She smiled only slightly and turned away to look down into the slow-moving water beneath.
They made their slow way back to the house when it must have already been long past the middle of the morning. As they entered the hallway, Lady Murdoch patted Sarah's arm and released it.
"Now you run along, dear," she said, not looking at Winston to note the brightening look on his face, "and fetch that green bonnet of yours to my room. You know, the one that you have been talking about altering? I believe I have the very thing with which to trim it. I found it last night and, 'Bless me,' I thought, 'if that is not perfectly made for dear Sarah's bonnet.' We just have time to make the alteration before luncheon."
Sarah turned to Winston and smiled. "You will excuse me?" she asked.
He took her hand and raised it to his lips. "I shall look forward to seeing you in the transformed bonnet, my love," he said.
"Thank you so kindly for escorting us on that walk, Lord Laing," Lady Murdoch said graciously. "So stimulating. And it is so generous in you to think of inviting a slow old woman like me. Not but what I was once as slim and as spry as Sarah. But age slows one down, alas."
"You may have lost your youthful looks, ma'am," Winston said gallantly, "but they have been replaced by the handsomeness and character that develop with wisdom."
Lady Murdoch tittered.
"Now, my love," Lady Murdoch said ten minutes later when Sarah appeared in her room dutifully carrying the green bonnet, "I have been obliged to search my belongings for something with which we might trim that bonnet. Do you think these cherries from the bosom of my black satin dress will took anything like if we sew them beneath the brim over your ear like this?"
She pinned the bunch of bright red cherries in the chosen spot and watched while Sarah tried the bonnet on. "Indeed," she said in some surprise, "they look most charming, my love, though I never would have thought of them if I had not been forced to find something. Take it off. I shall find a needle and thread and have them sewn on in no time. I must write a letter before luncheon, too. Would you like to run back to your room, dear, and fetch some work or a book? I shall be poor company for the next hour, yet it must seem that we are busy together."
Sarah grinned at Lady Murdoch, whose face was bent over her workbox. She went toward her impulsively and hugged her. "Thank you, Mother dear," she said. "I love you so much I could squeeze the life out of YOU."
"There!" Lady Murdoch said. "Now look what you have made me do. I almost had this needle threaded. Now I shall have to start all over again." She kept her head bent low over the needle as Sarah left the room.
Cranwell was apologetic at luncheon. He must use at least a few hours of the afternoon, he said, to visit his bailiff on business. His guests did not seem unduly perturbed. The Earl and Countess of Cavendish and Lord and Lady Fairlie were to pay a return visit to some neighbors who had called on them the afternoon before. The dowager Lady Cavendish and Lady Murdoch announced their intention of resting before tea. Most of the younger people, led by Fanny, decided to ride into the village a few miles distant. There was a Norman church there to look at and a graveyard full of ancient and interesting tombstones. And there was a cook shop where they could indulge themselves with cakes and pastries before riding home again.
Fanny invited Winston almost before anyone. She was sitting next to him at luncheon. And she smiled at him most engagingly, Sarah noticed from across the table. In fact, Fanny's general behavior since their arrival had shown a preference for Win. Poor Captain Penny, whose silent admiration she appeared to take much for granted, was not offered near as much of her attention. Sarah was once again almost glad of the betrothal between her and Win. Even though she did not now intend to honor it, its existence would still perhaps prevent Fanny from falling in love with him.
Fanny turned to Sarah at last and smiled warmly at her. "I know you do not enjoy riding, Miss Fifield," she said, "and there will be six miles of it altogether. Would you prefer to stay at home? I do know that you enjoy reading, and George has a splendid library. I do not believe you have seen it yet?"
"How rag-mannered you are, Fanny," Cranwell said sharply from the head of the table. "Perhaps Miss Fifield would like to ride rather than be doomed to a solitary afternoon in the library."
Fanny flushed and looked stricken as she turned back to Sarah, but Sarah was the first to speak.
"On the contrary, your grace," she said. "I am delighted to find that I will not offend anyone by remaining behind. Indeed, I should prefer to stay here."
She smiled at Fanny and turned back to the conversation she was having with Mr. Stonewall. He was disappointed that she would not be one of the riding party, but she laughed off his regrets and turned to a different topic. Inside, she was feeling a certain elation. Unexpectedly, she had been granted a whole afternoon to herself. It was a rare luxury these days. She frequently found herself looking back almost with nostalgia to those quiet days in her cottage when sometimes she saw no one but Dorothy for days at a time.
After everyone had left about his own business, Sarah planned her afternoon. She could go to the library and read, as Fanny had suggested. But it seemed such a waste of beautiful weather and lovely scenery. She could take a book and sit in the ornamental gardens. Yet she knew that she would not be able to concentrate on reading. There was just too much turmoil in her mind these days. She thought of the walk they had taken the previous day. Despite all the emotional events that had happened then, she could yet remember just how beautiful the valley and the house had looked and how lovely the hills and the trees themselves had been. She would walk up there again and see if she could draw some peace from the loneliness of her surroundings.
A half-hour later, Sarah stood on the little knoll where Fanny had taken Winston the day before. The view indeed looked like an artist's picture. Carefully placed trees on the slopes below framed the house and the bridge, emphasizing the classical symmetry of their lines. How wonderful it must be to look from here and know that the house was one's own home and all the land within sight too. She was glad it all belonged to George. It suited him so well, and she knew that it was not a possession he took for granted. He put a great deal of both work and love into his home. One could almost tell. There was a beauty about the place that had nothing to do with the merely picturesque. That building seemed more home than stately mansion. How could Hannah possibly feel otherwise?
Sarah strolled on upward until she was walking along the crest of the hill, looking down to the house on one side and rolling farmland on the other. Could this be all his too? But yes, it must be. Fanny had said that their nearest neighbors were five miles away. The nearest landowners, that was. The duke had numerous tenants, Sarah knew.
She turned eventually downward again, following a different path from the one by which she had ascended. This one led soon through a copse of trees, but she did not turn back. The path looked well worn, and the trees on the hillside did not form woods dense enough for anyone to get lost. She turned her face up to the early autumn sun, which shed warmth despite the coolness of the air. She took deep breaths. She felt relaxed for the first time in days. It was a great burden off her mind to have told Lady Murdoch. She could not now understand why she had not done so a long time before. And it was wonderful to know that she was alone yet safe here. Everyone was accounted for and far away.
It was as she was smiling over this last thought that Sarah suddenly became aware of the sound of hoofbeats behind her. She looked hastily back, but the horse was still hidden over the brow of the hill. She felt instant panic turn her insides to jelly. Win! Of course, he would have guessed what she would do. He knew she liked to walk when alone. He had caught her at it numerous times in the past. He had left the others on some pretext and was coming for her.
And she was completely alone, far from the house, far from Lady Murdoch. If she screamed as loudly as she could, no one would hear her. If she could not reach the cover of the trees before he came over the hill, she was lost. She would be ravished again.
Sarah began to run, the trees suddenly seeming a long way distant. But the uneven ground caused her to stumble. She began to sob and burry onward, quite beside herself with terror. The sounds of the approaching horse were getting louder. She did not look back, but she knew finally that she was not going to reach safety. Win must be over the top of the hill already. He must have spotted her. He was even now riding down to catch her. She stumbled on, though she knew that to do so was pointless. She was sobbing with terror. She was almost at the first tree.
"Sarah," the rider called, "why are you running? What is it?"
"No," she wailed. "Please, no. Please."
"Sarah!" Cranwell flung himself from his saddle and let his horse go free. "What has happened? You are terrified. What is it?"
Sarah looked over her shoulder at last and saw who the rider was. "Oh," she said, pressing her closed fists against her mouth. But she was still distraught, unable to bring herself under control. Her eyes were wild, her cheeks tear-streaked.
Cranwell caught her by one arm. "What is it?" he asked again. "Were you frightened of footpads? You are on my land, Sarah. You need not fear that anyone will harm you here. You see, it is only me."
His free hand went to her other arm and he pulled her against him. Then he impatiently lifted the same hand to her chin, pulled loose the ribbon there, and tossed her bonnet to the ground. He cupped the back of her head and held it against his shoulder. He held her close and rocked her as she continued to sob wildly against him.
"Don't cry," he said, his mouth against her hair. "You are quite safe, Sarah. You are with me. There is nothing to fear. Can you not feel my arms about you? Do you think I would let anyone harm you?"
The sobs were beginning to hurt her chest. Sarah clutched the lapels of Cranwell's coat and buried her head more deeply against him. "I thought," she said. "I thought…" But she could get no farther.
"You thought what?" he asked gently against her ear.
But she could not reply. Her hands were trembling on his lapels, and indeed her whole body shook against his.
"There is nothing to fear now, my love," he said. "I have you and I shall see that you are safe. I shall hold you until you realize that you need not be afraid."
"George," she said. "Oh, George, I thought-"
"Hush," he said. "It does not matter. Hush. You do not have to explain yourself to me."
He held her while her sobs gradually subsided and her body stopped shaking. He stroked his fingers through her hair, which had come free of its knot, and kissed first the top of her head, then her ear, her wet cheek, and her eyes.
"I must dry my eyes," she said shakily, feeling around in the pocket of her pelisse, her eyes lowered.
"Here, use mine," he said, and he lifted her chin and dried her eyes and cheeks himself with a large linen handkerchief. "You never have one when you need one, do you, Sarah?"
She laughed shakily and took the handkerchief blow her nose. She stuffed it into her pocket and then felt all the utter impossibility of looking back up into his face. They still stood almost touching each other. Her heart began to pound so heavily that she could feel it in her throat. They both stood very still, unnaturally still.
"Sarah," he said very quietly. One hand reached out to touch her hair again, and the other hand went beneath her chin to lift it.
She looked up into his searching blue eyes so close to her own. "George." Her lips formed his name, though she was unaware of any sound coming from her mouth.
And then it was impossible for either of them to say anything. Their arms went around each other and their mouths met, searching, urgent, demanding. Their bodies, pressed together, caught fire. Their hands explored, caressed, excited. Sarah's heart was beating wildly against his chest. She ached and ached to be closer, closer. She wanted him, wanted him now, inside her. She opened her mouth to his questing tongue, moaned against its welcome, tantalizing invasion. Not just this. More than this. Oh, please, more than this.
"Please, George. Oh, please, my love. More than this. More than this."
His mouth was against the pulse at her throat. His hands had undone the buttons of her pelisse and thrown it to the ground. Now they were at her breasts, molding their fullness, caressing them, bringing an almost painful tautness to them.
"My love," he was saying against the side of her face, into her ear. "Oh, my love, I cannot live any longer without you. I need you. I need you, Sarah. I want you, my love."
He reached down suddenly and scooped her up into his arms. He strode toward the trees and amongst them, away from the path. He knelt before releasing her, and laid her down on the longish coarse grass. They gazed into each other's eyes, passion eliminating any embarrassment as he stripped off his coat and lifted her head to set it beneath.
And then he was kissing her again, the upper part of his body across hers, his hands tangled in her hair, his breath warm against her cheek. He eased his weight aside so that he might caress her breast again, and then he groaned and reached down to pull up her dress and remove her undergarments. Sarah lifted her hips to aid him and looked through the haze of her desire into his face above her.
She lay still and watched him as his hand caressed her: her thighs, her stomach, up under her dress to her breasts, down between her legs. She felt desire grow in her until the ache of wanting him grew unbearable. Her breasts were painful beneath the occasional touch of his hand. Her womb throbbed with unfulfilled emptiness. His hand, the touch of his body, the look in his eyes could no longer satisfy. She closed her eyes and arched toward his hand, which was close, close. But not close enough. She turned her face into his shoulder and moaned.
A lifetime seemed to pass while he fumbled with his own clothing, a lifetime of longing, which was nevertheless not unpleasurable. He was going to take away the emptiness. He was going to stop the ache. Soon he would satisfy her. Soon. Now!
Cranwell had covered her body with his own, first placing his hands beneath her to cushion her against the hard ground. She parted her legs to accommodate him. And he pushed inward, meeting immediately that throbbing ache, making it many times more acute so that she had to lift herself against him, twist against him, urging him with frenzied hands and hips to thrust into her with ever deeper and faster strokes. It was becoming unbearable. Oh, dear God, she would not be able to endure it much longer. It was getting beyond her. It was "George!"
All her passion shattered against him. She jerked convulsively and clutched him to her, terrified by the power of her own release, opening her eyes wide in the shock of discovering that such ecstasy was possible. And she pressed her head against his shoulder, closing her eyes tightly again as she realized afresh who had opened this world of wonders for her, with whom she lay and loved.
Cranwell wrapped his arms tightly around her as his body relaxed in the aftermath of its own passion. He did not move out of her or away from her until her trembling had stopped. Then he carefully disengaged himself and lifted himself away. He lay on his back on the ground beside her, not touching her. He was soon aware from the sound of her breathing that she slept.
He clasped his hands behind his head and stared up through the branches of the tree above him to the sky. He could easily sleep too. He felt relaxed and drowsy. But he did not want to sleep. He wanted to feel. He turned his head and looked at Sarah. She lay on her back still, her lips slightly parted in sleep. Her face was flushed, her bright hair in wild disarray around her face and over her shoulders. One arm lay across her waist. The other was flung out toward him but did not quite touch him. She looked beautiful. He had never before seen her asleep.
He tried to feel guilt, disgust with himself, anger with her, shame at his own lack of restraint. Surely he would feel all these emotions soon. He was betrothed to one woman and had just made love to another. A guest in his home. A woman who had been terrified not long before that someone was about to do her harm. His former wife. A woman whom he had divorced for fornication and adultery. A woman now herself betrothed to someone else. He recited the list slowly and deliberately to himself.
Soon enough surely he would feel satisfyingly guilty. But now he could not. Now his body knew that it had achieved perfect fulfillment. He was physically contented as he had not been for a long time. He had not had a woman, in fact, since Sarah. He had even felt uneasy about the fact that he had not desired another in all that time. Now he knew that there was nothing at all wrong with him. It was merely that, having once had Sarah, he could never possibly desire another woman in the same way. Now he had had her again and he was content. Happy, even.
He turned his head away from her and looked upward again. There was no point at all in trying to deny the truth. At the moment he did not even wish to do so. He loved Sarah, with all the passion and tenderness he had felt before he knew the truth about her. And it was not a renewal of that love; it was a continuation. He had never stopped loving her. One might be disappointed in a loved one, disgusted perhaps, horrified even, but one could not stop loving. "Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds." Now, where had he heard that before? It sounded like something Shakespeare might have written. It did not matter.
He loved Sarah. He verbalized the words very deliberately in his mind, savored them, repeated them. He waited for the denials to come, the protests. Nothing. His mind could not deny the truth. This was a strange, mad moment. It could not be true, of course. Soon-this evening-he would return to his senses. But for now it was the truth. He loved her. And he would revel in this temporary truth. It is very sweet to love, to be able to turn one's head and see one's loved one asleep and flushed from a recently satisfied passion.
One's wife. That was why he did not feel guilty, was it? She was his wife. One did not feel guilty making love to one's wife. It was natural. Right. He had just had marital relations with Sarah for the first time in four years. He was not going to feel guilty about that. She was not his wife, of course. He had divorced her. In a few months' time they would both be married to others. But in one way, in the way of the heart, she was his wife, his friend, his lover, and always would be. But he would never be sorry for this afternoon. He steeled himself against the return of rational thought. He would not allow himself to regret it.
It had been good for her too. He must never look back and doubt that, wonder perhaps if he had taken advantage of her when she had been in an emotional state. She had wanted him with every bit as much passion as he had felt. She had urged him on with both her body and her voice. She had even called him her love, he remembered. And there had been no misinterpreting her intense pleasure at the end of it all. She could not have faked that.
Perhaps many men had possessed her. He did not care to explore that thought at the moment. But there was no doubt of the fact that she had been wholly with him that afternoon. It was he she had made love to, not just any man. It was his name she had cried at the end. She had some feeling for him after all. Sometimes he wondered if she had ever felt anything for him beyond contempt. But she had loved him that afternoon, with her body even if not with her soul.
Cranwell turned his head to watch his sleeping wife. Her head had fallen over to the side, facing him. It was as if she felt his eyes on her. Her own opened almost immediately, looking into his vacantly for a few seconds and then with a returning awareness. She did not move or say anything for a while. They lay side by side, not touching, gazing into each other's eyes.
She spoke finally, very distinctly and unhurriedly. She did not look away from his eyes. "I am not sorry," she said, "and I am not ashamed. Perhaps you are. Without a doubt you soon will be. But I do not care. I am not and I will not be. I shall set the memory of this beside the memory of our wedding night. And that is precious little happiness on which to live for a lifetime. But I shall do it. Only don't ask me to feel ashamed, George. I have done with shame. I am who I am, and I make apology for the fact no longer."
She sat up and looked around her. She gathered up her discarded garments, got to her feet, and walked away in the direction from which they had come. She did not look back.
Cranwell stayed where he was. He had not moved at all. He still lay with his hands clasped behind his head. He considered going after her to protect her from whatever it was that had caused her terror. But no. She was over it now, and really there was nothing on his own property that she need fear. She must have been merely startled and had given in to an irrational panic.
He was still in the grip of the massive lassitude that had succeeded their lovemaking. He did not wish to move. If he did so, he might shake off forever this dream he was experiencing. She loved him. It must be so. She had described this afternoon's coupling and their wedding night as "precious little happiness" in her life. Even then she had loved him. Physically, at least. That night had not been such a mockery as he had. always feared. She must love him. Despite everything, despite her behavior before and after their marriage, despite her behavior of the afternoon before with Bowen, she loved him.
The situation could not possibly be that simple, of course. There were thousands of unanswered questions, hundreds of obstacles in the way of their love flourishing again, numerous facts which made a reunion totally impossible. He could not recall a single one of these things at the moment, but he was quite aware that they existed to throw cold water on his joy. Soon. Probably very soon. But not quite yet. For now he could lie here and dream. He could close his eyes and see Sarah again, that bright titian hair loose over her shoulders, silky to the touch, her green eyes heavy with desire, her lips soft and parted for his kiss. He could feel her softness, the curve of her waist and hips, the fullness of her breasts. And he could feel the soft, hot depths of her. His lover! His only love. His wife.
The Duke of Cranwell slept.