Page 11 of The Elusive Phoebe (The Widows of Lavender Cottage #1)
Chapter Eight
A rchie’s letter arrived that afternoon.
I wish I deserved to begin this letter with words of endearment, those lovely familiar terms that husband and wife use for each other. Or even the endearments of old friends which we have been the whole of our lives.
Tears sprung immediately to Phoebe’s eyes, blurring the page. She wiped furiously and blinked them away.
I wish I had been able to earn that sort of title from you or earned the right to call you such.
I might have used words such as bird, because you are a beautiful graceful creature, full of gentleness and grace.
Or I might have used Sunshine because of the light you carry, the brilliance that fills a room when you are present.
Daisy or Marigold. Or I could have simply called you my dear, for you are very dear to me.
I know you will never believe such a thing of me; my actions in every visible regard have belied such a sentiment, but it is true nonetheless.
I cannot call you that though, because it will only serve to bring up the hurt of what should have been.
So instead, even though I have used endearments before, I shall simply open this letter with the words, Lady Smalling.
Phoebe didn’t know if she dared read further. Already her heart felt near to breaking all over again at her plight, at all she missed
Lady Smalling. Even that brings pain. The fact that you had to take upon his name, his complete isolation from all you knew and held dear. But again I have no room to bemoan the situation as I was unable to do anything to alleviate it, prevent it, or to rescue you.
Her heart hammered inside. After the years apart, Archie’s words did not bring a balm or comfort.
All the urgency and panic of the moments leading up to her marriage, her desperation to be with him, her fear in being wed to an older gentleman she didn’t know, her father’s odd desperation.
It all came rushing back with Archie’s letter.
She wished to toss it in the fire and would have, had she not known her own curiosity would demand she at least finish the contents.
I have no way to aid or assist you or see how you are.
Your solicitor is a good man. He guards your secrets well.
If you are in any way amenable to a visit, I will come at your earliest convenience, I’ll drop everything at once and be at your side the moment you lift a finger of interest in my direction.
She placed a hand at her heart. She didn’t know if she wanted Archie anywhere near her.
She had no real hard feelings except a sense of danger.
Who could she trust? And how had he let her be taken away?
Knowing what she would go through, would it not have been better to run away with her dear Archie than be hidden away?
She placed her head in her hands. But then perhaps not?
Was she in a way protected from some hidden danger?
To know any further answers regarding her marriage, she had to read the papers from her husband.
She must know if he was a good or bad man.
Firstly that. Then she could decide how she felt about everything else.
I must declare all, though you might be in no state to receive the following.
But my dear, my beloved Phoebe. My feelings for you have remained as constant as the rise and fall of the tide, as the rising of the sun, as the appearance of the bluebird every Spring in the tree outside your window.
The flame of my love has only matured with me and my estate and holdings which are sufficient for any hardship you might be facing.
Allow me to at least assist you in whatever manner you might need to live.
And at most to be at your side in your life. Allow me to court you like you deserve.
She dropped the letter at her feet, her hands shaking. She shook her head, wrapped her arms around herself and rocked forward and back, forward and back. “No, Archie. Surely it is too late.” She stood, running from the letter, from the package of news from her husband. This was too much.
No.
She wanted…she wanted to walk among the lavender, lifting her face to the sun, soaking in the serenity and peace and freedom of her new home .
She did not want Archie, or any man, helping her or offering to court her, to be at her side.
No.
She didn’t want anyone at her side. She’d been betrayed one time, by all she knew and loved including the man who had wed himself to her.
Learning he might have had good reasons did not change two years of suffering.
But she might heal differently, if Lord Smalling was in fact a good man. How would she ever know?
It was all too much.
Her hand pulled the door open and she ran out into the yard without any thought.
Her feet took her out through the fields, the sweet scent tickling her nose, filling her with a sense of calm.
She ran down the rows, leaping over the next to the edge of the property, all the way to the tree with the swing.
Something about the trunk, the immensity of its size, the strength of its existence.
She ran her hand along the bark, smooth from years in the weather.
“You are the only sure thing in my life right now, aren’t you?
” She moved forward, resting her head against its strength.
“Thank you.” Her whisper filled the air around her.
Whether nature listened to the desperation of its inhabitants, whether the tree knew of her at all did not matter.
She knew of the tree and its strength helped her find something… her core? Roots?
Herself. She found herself. Pheobe, the young girl who ran through the forest, Phoebe, the growing adult who helped the children in the village.
Phoebe who had loved Archie but had left him, heartbroken and faced her future with hope and strength.
Phoebe who had survived her own broken hope and dreams of a happy marriage and faced isolation, who had now at last found a new home, new life, new friends.
Phoebe who could stand tall and move forward in whatever manner she wished as no one dictated to her further.
She stood taller, turned, and faced her house.
Phoebe who was now the heir to everything her husband had.
Phoebe, mother of the next heir. Perhaps she’d better go read about her new holdings.
A small smile tugged at her mouth. She’d figure out how to respond to Archie.
She didn’t know if she wanted him in her life.
She’d pushed him and her old life so far away, she’d never thought she’d ever have him back.
And opening up that possibility opened up pathways to hurt and vulnerability she was not ready to experience. Not yet.
Her mind wandered to her last conversation with Archie.
They’d both snuck out the night before she was to be married.
Nothing had been planned, no notes sent, but each seemed to know.
She collapsed into his arms, tears already falling, shoulders shaking.
“I cannot do this.” She lifted her tear covered face, pouring her pleadings into his eyes, his face, his heart.
“Please Archie, save me. Let’s go. Let’s run.
Now. I don’t care what happens, but I will be with you and not with this stranger, this old man I don’t know. ”
His eyes were pained, the kind of heart break she hoped to never see again in another. “Phoebe.” He kissed her tears, her hands, her fingers and then her mouth, a most desperate, longing, never ending tragic kind of kiss. “We cannot.”
She gasped, utterly shocked at his answer. “You…you won’t have me?”
“I cannot. Phoebs. It’s worse than we thought.
Our fathers…” He looked away, his face full of disgust. “They have lost everything. They’ll sell our homes.
Our reputations will be ruined.” He turned to her, a new noble expression on his face.
“But you. You will be spared all of that. Your children will be raised in love. You will take your place in society. And all will be well.”
She remembered his determination, his stubbornness.
Shaking her head now. These long years she’d not been able to forgive him. Cowardice. That’s what she’d always thought.
No, she was not ready to think about letting Archie back into her life.
When she entered the house again, she left his letter on the floor and reached for the files of information from her late husband. Lord Smalling.
She lifted the first envelope, sealed with the Smalling seal. Her seal now . She tried to wrap her head around such a thing, and it had definitely not sunk in yet. She felt no connection at all with the Smalling legacy, nor with his title or holdings. She broke the seal.
Her husband’s hand was at least familiar to her.
He’d communicated more through letters than she’d actually heard from his voice.
His neat and orderly letters flowed out on the page.
The first words caught her eye and tightened her stomach as they had with each letter.
Words of endearment were not typical from him.
My dear Lady Smalling.
When had he ever called her my dear anything? She pushed onward. Might as well do all the damage to her peace of mind in one sitting .
I must apologize again that you are having to read this, a widow, alone, with so little knowledge of me and the realities of our lives.
I don’t know if you will find comfort in these words, but I sincerely hope you do.
You are an elect lady, a wonderful wife, the choice of my mind and my heart.
Yes, my heart. I had hoped dearly that I could find at last the solace of a marriage of love to a wonderful woman.
Instead I am left with the knowledge I have spread the dangers of my situation to another human and have now left her alone and in possible danger.