Page 72 of Scandalous Nights With the Earl
‘Could I have a word with you, my lord?’
‘I hope there is not a problem.’
‘None, I assure you. Mrs St Claire is a perfect patient but it is a warm, sunny morning and I was wondering if you might walk with her outside for a little while.’
‘You think her up to such an exertion?’
‘We have located a wheelchair in one of the attics and have had it brought down. I think the sun on Mrs St Claire’s skin and a bit of fresh air will be good for her. She has eaten some breakfast and the maid watching over her said her sleep, although broken, was also deep. Mrs St Claire has asked if it is possible for you to push her, Lord Elmsworth.’
At the front porch Phillip found Wilhelmina waiting there in the sun, face turned up to the rays and in a pretty yellow gown.
‘I understand you would like to go out in the sunshine on this warm summer morning.’
‘I would.’
‘Then you will have me as your companion and we will begin in the garden.’
It was so beautiful here, Willa thought. Elmsworth Manor in the sunshine had turned into a different building altogether than theone she had left from in the rain and wind after kissing Phillip Moreland in his kitchen. Today the pale stone glowed in the light and the circular driveway was not full of puddles.
The gardens, too, were so much closer to the main body of the house than she had realised, for they surrounded the stone in a wild array of colour: the blue of cornflowers, the yellow of daisies and the white of a rose that scrambled over the portico, the same shade as the one outside her bedroom window.
It was joyous and uplifting and it was also fragrant. Willa breathed in and the perfumes engulfed her, warmed and potent in the morning sun. For the first time in weeks she felt…alive again.
He slowed down and turned the chair into an arbour of purple, the long blooms hanging down towards the soft green of the manicured lawn below.
A seat was placed beside it in the shade of small topiary bay trees and it was this he pushed her over to, positioning her chair at one end of the bench before sitting down next to her.
‘This is the most beautiful garden I have ever seen.’
‘My mother planted it and tended it. It was her masterpiece and so the gardener here has kept it up just as it was once years ago.’
‘When she died?’
Leaning forward, he plucked a small blue cornflower from its stalk and handed it to her.
‘Everyone has good times and bad times. Everyone makes mistakes. The thing is, my mother never learned from hers and so she made them over and over again. Not so much with plants but with people.’
‘Were you one of those people?’
‘Yes.’ She saw the shock in his eyes and also the sorrow.
‘Could I hold your hand?’
He did as she asked and she cradled it in her lap, her fingers tightly wound around his as if she might keep him from all his hurt.
Their first real touch since…
Pushing that thought away, she felt the sun and his warmth and the history of Elmsworth all around her. The world kept turning despite all that had happened and it was comforting that it did. She hadn’t trusted him enough to help her but perhaps this small truce marked a beginning here in the garden of his mother.
Closing her eyes then, she slept.
Phillip did not move. He didn’t pull his hand away either because in all the hours of searching for her he had not thought this sort of closeness would ever be his again.
He simply watched her. He watched the way the small curls at her hairline blew in the wind and the peaceful expression on her face. He saw how the black circles under her eyes were actually a dark blue, like bruises from sickness, and that her nails, usually so short, had grown.
These weeks apart had changed them both and they were tiptoeing around one another trying to regain what they had lost. He could feel her reticence and he knew his wariness. Their balance was gone and in its place sat a carefulness that allowed nothing meaningful.
Rock the boat and you might lose everything. Yet they were losing it anyway in their refusal to discuss what had happened.