Only Enchanting by Mary Balogh

22

My love, he had called her at Marianne’s party, entirely for the ears of all the guests there. My love, he had called her a short time later in the refreshment room, in order to tease away the stress of the past half hour or so.

My love,he thought now, sitting beside her in his carriage, watching her profile as they approached the top of the rise above Candlebury after turning through the gates a short while ago. He wanted to see her expression when she saw the house. It almost always took the breath away, even when one had a lifetime of familiarity with it.

My love.The words sounded silly when spoken in the silence of his own thoughts. Would he ever speak them aloud so that she knew he meant them? And did he mean them? He was a bit afraid of love. Love was painful.

He watched her, he realized, because he did not want to have that first glimpse of Candlebury himself. He really did not want to be where he was, moving ever nearer to it. Yet he would not be anywhere else on earth for all the money in the world. Was there anyone more muddleheaded than he?

She was looking prim and trim and beautiful beside him, clad in a dark blue carriage dress, which was expertly and elegantly cut to hug her figure in all the right places and to fall in soft folds elsewhere. Her chip straw bonnet trimmed with tiny cornflowers had a small enough brim that he could see around it. Her gloved hands were folded neatly in her lap. Her head was half-turned from him, and he knew she was gazing at the half-wild meadowland beyond her window and seeing all the wildflowers growing there and imagining herself tramping among them, an easel under one arm, a bag of painting supplies in the other hand.

And then the carriage topped the rise, and her head turned to look into the great bowl-like depression below. Her hands tightened in her lap, her eyes grew larger, and her mouth formed a silent O.

“Flavian,” she said. “Oh, it is beautiful.”

She turned to smile at him and reached out a hand to squeeze one of his, and if he had been in any doubt before this moment, he doubted no longer. He loved her. Idiot that he was, he could not be content with safety. He had had to go and fall in love with her.

“It is, is it not?” he said, and he looked beyond her shoulder and felt somehow as if the bottom had fallen out of his stomach.

There it was.

The house was built on the far slope of the bowl, a horseshoe-shaped mansion of gray stone that often gleamed almost white when the sun shone on it at a certain angle in the evenings. To one side of it and connected with it were the remains of the old abbey, most of them virtually unrecognizable moss-covered ruins, though the cloisters were still almost intact, and usable with their walkway and pillars and central garden, which his grandmother had made into a rose arbor.

It was the only really cultivated part of the whole park, apart from the kitchen gardens at the back. The rest was rolling, tree-dotted grassland and wooded copses and graveled walking paths and rides, in the style of Capability Brown, though not designed by him. This inner bowl had been planned to look secluded and rural and peaceful, and it succeeded admirably, Flavian had always thought. There was a river and a deep natural lake and a waterfall out of sight over the rise to the left of the house. And a genuine stone hermitage. Follies had always been unnecessary at Candlebury.

“It is very d-different from Middlebury Park,” he said.

Middlebury was actually rather old-fashioned, with its carefully tended topiary garden and formal floral parterres forming the approach to the house. But it was grand and lovely, nevertheless.

“Yes.” She looked back out through the window, but her hand remained covering his. “I love this.”

And he felt like weeping. Home. His home. But the latter thought served only to remind him of how he had always been quite adamant about thinking of it as David’s home, even though he had known from a relatively young age that it would be his before he had grown far into adulthood. But David had loved it with all the passion of his soul.

“We will p-probably be called upon to inspect the servants,” Flavian said.

They had remained in London for two days after deciding to come here. He had felt obliged to give the servants some notice of his coming. And there was a tea at his aunt Sadie’s that Agnes had promised to attend. Delivery of the rest of her new clothes, as well as a pair of new riding boots for which he had been fitted at Hoby’s, was expected within a day or two. And Agnes wanted to call upon her cousin, who lived in London—or rather the late William Keeping’s cousin, Dennis Fitzharris. He was the man who published Vincent and Lady Darleigh’s children’s stories, so Flavian gladly accompanied her and enjoyed himself greatly.

His mother had been less upset than he had expected by their decision to come to Candlebury. Perhaps it would be as well, she had said, for them to leave town over Easter and even for a few weeks after. By that time the new Lady Ponsonby and her story would be old news and only sufficiently interesting to bring everyone out in force to meet her at the ball they would give at Arnott House. Flavian had let his mother believe they would return in a month or so. And who knew? Perhaps they would.

At least she had not suggested accompanying them.

“Will that be a formidable experience?” Agnes asked, referring to the parade of servants that probably awaited them at the house.

“One must remember that they will be agog with eagerness to see us,” he said. “Both of us. They have not seen me since I inherited the title. And I am returning with a b-bride. This will be a h-happy day of celebration for them, I daresay.”

“And for us too?” she asked him, turning her face back to his.

He raised their hands and kissed the backs of hers.

“I understand,” she said, though he had said nothing, and he believed she probably did.

Magwitch, the butler, and Mrs. Hoffer, the housekeeper, were standing side by side outside the open front doors. Within, Flavian could see a row of starched white aprons on one side and a row of white Vs—shirtfronts, he guessed—on the other. The servants were lined up to receive them.

He was home. As Viscount Ponsonby.

David was gone, a part of family history.

*   *   *

Agnes really did think the house and park beautiful. Indeed, she thought Candlebury Abbey must be one of the loveliest places on earth. She would be happy if she never had to leave it.

They spent three days together, she and Flavian, wandering about the park together, hand in hand—yes, indeed. She made no remark upon it when he first took her hand in his as they walked, and laced their fingers. She almost held her breath, in fact. It seemed so much more . . . tender than walking with her arm drawn through his. But it was no momentary thing. It seemed to be his preferred way of walking with her when they were alone.

The park was larger than she had thought at first. It extended beyond the bowl-like depression in which the house was situated. But all of it—lawns and meadows and wooded hills, paths and rides, all of it—was designed to look natural rather than artificially picturesque. The lake and the waterfall too were natural, and the stone hermitage to one side of the falls was not a folly but had at one time been inhabited by monks for whom the abbey was too crowded and busy a place.

“I always l-liked to think,” Flavian said, “that they all left behind them something of the p-peace they must have found as they meditated here.”

She knew what he meant. It seemed to her that they found peace together at Candlebury during those days—almost. Except that there was a depth of brooding in him just beyond where she could penetrate with her companionship. It was understandable, of course. She had expected it.

He had shown her about the house and about the ruins of the old abbey. But there was one set of rooms he avoided, and he pretended not to notice when she stopped outside the door, waiting expectantly for him to open it. He walked on past, and she had to hurry to catch up to him.

They had a few callers, among them the rector of the village church. But although the rector expressed the hope that he would see them at church on Sunday, Flavian returned a vague answer that sounded like a resounding no to Agnes.

“We will not go to church on Sunday?” she asked after the rector had left.

“No,” he said curtly. “You may go if you wish.”

She looked closely at him and understood in a flash. The churchyard must be where the family graves were. And his brother’s grave. The set of rooms they had not entered while exploring the rest of the house must have been his brother’s.

The loss of parents, siblings, spouses, even children was something all too many people experienced. The death of loved ones was all too common an occurrence. It was almost always sad, painful, difficult to recover from, especially when the deceased had been young. But it was not rare. She had lost a husband. His brother had been dead for eight or nine years. But Flavian had never let him go. He had come home from the Peninsula because his brother was dying, but he had left before David actually died. Flavian had been on his way to rejoin his regiment when it happened and had not returned until after he was wounded.

Those details at least were not among his missing memories. She knew he felt deep shame and unresolved grief.

“I will not go to church without you,” she said. “Is there a way to get to the top of the waterfall?”

“It is a b-bit of a scramble,” he said. “We used to make d-dens up there as boys and hold them against trolls and pirates and Vikings.”

“I can scramble,” she told him.

“Now?”

“Is there a better time?” she asked.

And off they went, hand in hand again, and she might almost imagine that he was happy and relaxed and at peace.

They shared a bedchamber, the one that had been his as a boy, without any pretense of having a room each. A small room next door had been made into her dressing room. They slept together each night, always touching, usually with their arms about each other. They made love, often multiple times in the course of the night.

Life seemed idyllic.

And then, one night, Agnes awoke to find herself alone in bed. She listened, but there was no sound of him in his dressing room. His dressing gown was gone from the floor beside the bed. She donned her nightgown and fetched a shawl from next door. And she lit a single candle.

She looked in the drawing room, in the morning room, in the study. She even looked in the dining room. But there was no sign of him. And when she peered out of the drawing room window, she realized that she would not see him even if he was out there. It must be a cloudy night. All was pitch-dark.

And then she thought of somewhere else to look.

She picked up her candle, went back upstairs, and made her way to the door she had never seen open. There was no light beneath it. Perhaps she was wrong. But part of her knew she was not.

She rested a hand on the doorknob for a long time before turning it slowly and silently. She pushed the door a little way open.

The room was in darkness. But her candle, even though she held it behind her, gave sufficient light that she could see an empty bed in the middle of the room, with a still figure seated on a chair beside it, one hand resting on the bedspread.

He must surely have seen the light, even if he had not heard the door opening. But he did not turn.

She stepped inside and set the candle down upon a small table beside the door.

*   *   *

It had felt amazingly good to be back, to be home. It always had. Even though he had quite enjoyed school, he had always longed for the holidays, and on the few occasions when Len had tried to persuade Flavian to go with him to Northumberland for the long summer holiday, he had always found an excuse not to go. This was where he had belonged, where he had wanted always to belong.

His very love for Candlebury had been his pain too. Why did that pair always go hand in hand? The eternal pull of opposites? For the only way Candlebury could belong to him for the rest of his life was through the death of David without male issue. And though he had known it would happen, he had not wanted it to happen. His love of home had made him feel guilty, as though he resented the fact that his brother stood in the way of his happiness. It was not like that.

Ah, it was never like that,he was telling his brother when he awoke with a start. It never was, David.

Fortunately he had not been speaking aloud. But he was fully awake and rattled. And feeling guilty again. He had not been to see his brother. Idiot thought, of course. But he had been avoiding David since his return, avoiding his rooms, avoiding the churchyard, avoiding all mention of him or thought of him.

Why had he never felt this way about his father, much as he had loved him?

It was clear he was not going to go back to sleep, even though Agnes felt warm and comfortable against him and he was tired. Briefly he thought of waking her, of making love to her. But there was a strange blackness in his head. It was not exactly depression. Or a headache. Just . . . blackness.

He eased himself out of the bed, found his dressing gown on the floor and drew it on, and let himself quietly out of the room. It was an unusually dark night, but he did not light a candle. He knew his way without needing any light. He let himself into David’s bedchamber and felt his way to the window. He pushed back the curtains, though there was not a great deal of light to let in. He could make out the shape of the bed, though, and of a chair against one wall. He drew up the chair to the side of the bed and sat on it. He set one hand flat on the bedspread.

It was where he had always sat when his brother was too unwell to get up. It was where he had sat for many hours both day and night during those final weeks. And he had always set his hand on the bed so that David could touch it whenever he wanted and so that he could touch David.

Why had they always been so much closer than any other brothers he had known? They were as different as night and day. Perhaps that was why. The balance of opposites again.

The balance was no longer there.

The bed was empty.

What had he been expecting? That a ghost or spirit would have lingered? That there would be some sense of his brother here? Some comfort? Some absolution?

Why did I leave you to die alone?

He knew why. He had been head over ears in love, and he had wanted to celebrate his betrothal before returning to the Peninsula.

But why was I going back there?

He had known David was dying when he came home on leave. He had not really expected that he would go back, although he had set a date for doing so. He would inherit the title and properties and have all sorts of responsibilities to keep him at home. He certainly had not intended going back while his brother was still dying.

Why did I leave you?

Flavian did not hear the door open behind him, but he was aware of dim light and then of a slightly brighter light, of the door closing softly. He had woken her. He was sorry about that. And strangely glad. He was not alone any longer. He did not have to do his living alone.

He did not turn, but he waited for her to come close, as he knew she would. Then he could smell her familiar fragrance, and one of her hands came to rest lightly on his shoulder. He raised his own hand to cover it and tipped back his head until it came to rest against her bosom. He closed his eyes.

“Why did I leave him?” he asked.

It did not occur to him to offer her his chair or to draw up another for her.

“You were here for a few weeks after coming home on leave?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he said.

“Did you sit with him all that time?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“You joined the military three years before that,” she said, “because you did not want to be trapped into marrying Lady Hazeltine—or Velma Frome, as she must have been then. Yet after being home for a few weeks, all the time sitting here with your brother, you were so eager to marry her that you left him and went to London to your betrothal ball and then dashed off back to the Peninsula. How did that come about, Flavian? What else happened during those weeks?”

“I went out for w-walks and rides,” he said. “It was emotionally d-draining to be here in this room all the time, even though he was p-peaceful. He was just s-slipping away, and there was nothing I could do. . . .”

He closed his hand around hers and drew her forward to take her on his lap. He set one arm about her waist, and she twined one about his neck.

Ah, God, he loved her. He loved her.

“And did you meet Velma outside, as you had used to do?” she asked.

And suddenly that great yawning core of blackness exploded into the searing light of a crashing headache, and he gasped for air. He pushed her off his lap, staggered to the window, fumbled with the catch, and raised the sash until he could feel cold air blowing in. He rested his balled fists on the windowsill and bowed his head. He waited for the worst of the pain to go away. Everything was wide-open. He could remember . . .

. . . everything.

“They were in London for the Season,” he said. “But they came h-home. I think my mother m-must have written to Lady Frome. Velma had not taken well with the ton after a few years of trying. Frome is not well-off or particularly well connected. She could have found a husband even so, but she aimed too h-high. She wanted a title, the grander the better. None of this was ever said in so m-many words, of course, but it was not d-difficult to piece together the truth. But I was home, and David was d-dying, and . . .”

And they had come. He was not sure Sir Winston and Lady Frome had come from any other motive than concern for their neighbor. And he was not sure his mother had written to Lady Frome for any other purpose than to inform her of the imminent demise of her son. He hoped none of them had had any other motive.

Velma had come almost daily to inquire about David, though she never came up to the sickroom. Sometimes she came with one or the other of her parents, but often she came alone, without either maid or groom, and on those occasions his mother had directed him to escort her home. And whenever he went outside for a breath of air, whether on foot or on horseback, almost invariably he came upon her—or, rather, she came upon him. It was just like old times. And always there were tears and sweet sympathy and tender memories of when they had been younger.

He had been soothed by her sympathy. He had begun almost to look forward to seeing her. Watching life ebb away from a loved one must be one of the most excruciatingly wretched experiences anyone could be called upon to endure. Even though he had seen more than his fair share of death in the wars, none of it had prepared him for what he was going through now.

One afternoon, while they were sitting in a little clearing above the waterfall, looking down at the lake, listening to birdsong and the sound of water, he had kissed her. Quite voluntarily. He could not blame her for it.

And she had told him that she loved him, that she adored him and always had. She had told him she would make the best viscountess he could possibly dream of. She had told him they must marry as soon as possible, by special license, so that they would not be delayed by the year of mourning that lay ahead when David died. And she would be by his side to support him through that year. She looked good in black, she had told him. He must not be afraid that she would look dowdy and let him down. Oh, she adored him.

And she had thrown her arms about his neck and kissed him.

He had apologized stiffly for his kiss, begged her forgiveness, told her that he could think of nothing at that moment beyond the fact that David was alive but desperately ill, that his brother needed him, and he needed his brother. That all else in his life was on hold. He had apologized again as he scrambled to his feet and offered a hand to help her up.

She had been in tears, and he had felt like a monster.

The following afternoon Flavian had been called down to the drawing room from the sickroom and had found his mother there with a pale, marblelike face. With her were a weepy-eyed Lady Frome and a stiffly formal and clearly furious Sir Winston Frome.

Apparently Flavian had declared his love for Velma the previous afternoon before debauching her, but he had then informed her that there could be no question of their marrying for some time to come, what with all the uncertainty surrounding the illness of his brother.

All of which, Frome had declared, was monstrously unacceptable, to put the matter mildly. What if Major Arnott’s merrymaking of the previous day had consequences? Lady Frome had sniffled against her handkerchief, and Flavian’s mother had flinched. Major Arnott’s honor as an officer and a gentleman dictated that he make restitution and make it without delay.

The death of David might cause that delay. Frome had not said as much. None of them had, but his meaning had been clear. He had not demanded marriage by special license. That must have appeared unseemly to him, as it had not to his daughter. But he had demanded an instant and public betrothal. There was to be nothing havey-cavey about it. In fact . . .

They had leased a house in London for the Season and had not let it go when they returned home. They would go back immediately, have the announcement put in all the society papers, and invite the ton to a grand betrothal ball, after which they would have the banns called at St. George’s on Hanover Square.

Flavian had found himself unable to protest as vociferously as he would have liked, though he had denied ruining Velma. He had kissed her, though, and it could be said with some justification that he had compromised her. Her mother had wept. Her father had blustered and chosen to believe his daughter’s more extreme version of what had happened between them. How could he, Flavian, have continued to call Velma a liar in the hearing of her parents—his neighbors and friends? But it was so much like what she had done once before, three years ago, except then she had made her accusations only to David, in order to get him to cancel their betrothal plans. This time she had left nothing to chance.

“And so you went to London,” Agnes said, and Flavian awoke to the realization that he had poured out the whole story to her. “And then went back to your regiment.”

“David could see no honorable way out of my going,” he said. “But when I assured him I would rush b-back the morning after the ball, he m-made me p-promise not to come back at all. He could not be sure, he told me, that he would die within a month.” He paused and took a great gulp of the cold outdoor air. “If he did not die, and I could n-not be saved by the necessity to mourn, then I would be forced to marry and would be trapped for life. He m-made me promise to return to the Peninsula as I was scheduled to do. Perhaps, he s-said, Velma would find someone else to marry while I was gone. Or perhaps something else would crop up to save me. He made me promise, and I went.”

He swallowed against a lump in his throat, fought tears, and lost the battle. He tried desperately at least to weep silently until he could get himself under control.

And then her arms came about him from behind, and the side of her face came to rest between his shoulder blades. He turned and gathered her up into a tight hug and sobbed ignominiously against her shoulder.

“He died alone,” he gasped out. “Mother was in town with m-me. So was Marianne. There were only his v-valet here and the other s-servants. I was on the ship back to Portugal.”

She kissed him on the tip of one ear.

“I am so sorry,” he said. “I have soaked your shawl.”

“It will dry,” she told him. “Did you forget all this when you were brought back home later?”

He lifted his head, frowning.

“She had met Len a number of times,” he said, “when he came here to stay with me as a boy. But at that time he was not expecting to succeed his uncle to the earl’s title. He had it by the time I was brought home, though. She w-wanted it. I think I knew that, even though I did not know much of anything at all. And I knew she would get it if she c-could. I tried to warn him. I think I t-tried. And then she c-came to tell me she was ending our engagement and was going to m-marry him. And I tried to stop it—but all I could d-do was destroy the drawing room at Arnott House. I— He did not come. Len never came. George came instead and took me off to Penderris.”

Agnes moved her head so that her lips were almost touching his.

“Come back to bed,” she said. “Come and sleep.”

He had kept her up for what felt like half the night.

“Agnes,” he said, “were you waiting for me there? At Middlebury? Were you always waiting for me? And was I always waiting to meet you?”

She was smiling, he could see in the flickering light of the candle.

“All my life,” she said. “And all your life.”

“Does life happen that way?” he asked her.

“I think it does sometimes,” she said, “incredible as it sounds. And do you realize you have stopped stammering?”

“I h-have?” He raised his eyebrows in surprise. “You must be freezing, Agnes. Let’s go back to bed.”

“Yes,” she said.

He glanced toward the empty bed as he led her to the door. It was empty. David was gone. He was at rest. They had said good-bye to each other, and David had smiled at him. He remembered now. His brother had sent Flavian away to save him, and he had given him his blessing.

“Live happily, Flave,” he had said. “Mourn a little for me if you will, and then let me go. I will be in good hands.”