Lament for a lost lover

“Don’t say it like that. As though I’m some ... monster...”

“You are’ I said with a return of my old spirit.

He bent down and kissed me. “Get well, quickly, Arabella,” he murmured.

Matilda came.

“Oh, my dear, dear child, how wonderful that you can now have visitors. I have been beside myself with fear. It was so dreadful ... my dear husband, Toby ... and then you. It was as though there was some evil spell on the house...” She stopped. I noticed that Sally was in the room.

“It was just an unfortunate chain of circumstances,” I said. “Let’s hope this is the end of our troubles.”

“It must be because you are well again. Sally tells me that you are picking up very quickly. That’s so, eh, Sally?”

“I know how to treat her, milady. I’m going to have her on her feet before the week’s out. You’ll see...”

“I’ve always trusted you, Sally. Ah, Charlotte.”

Charlotte had come into the room.

“Charlotte, see how well Arabella is looking,” went on Matilda. “Almost her old self, don’t you think?”

“You look much better,” said Charlotte. “I am so glad and very sorry that it happened.”

“It was an unfortunate accident.” I said. “I should have been more careful.”

“Yes,” said Charlotte quietly.

“Do sit down, Charlotte,” said her mother. “You look so awkward standing there.”

Charlotte meekly sat and we talked for a while of the children. Poor Edwin had been heartbroken. Having been introduced to death through his grandfather and Uncle Toby, he had feared that I was going to die.

“It was hard to comfort him’ said Charlotte. “Leigh could do it better than anyone.

How close those two boys have become.”

We talked of Priscilla and how bright she was. She too had missed me and kept saying my name and crying for me.

“So you see how glad everyone is that you are getting well,” said Matilda. Then Sally came and said that I ought not to tire myself and she thought I had talked enough for a while.

So they went out and left me alone with my thoughts. I could not stop thinking of Carleton’s disappointment, and I wondered how deeply he blamed me ... and perhaps Priscilla ... for what had happened.

It was two days later when Harriet came to see me. I was much stronger then, sitting up and even taking an occasional walk round the room.

“We must not go too fast,” Sally ordered, and she was undoubtedly mistress of the sickroom.

I had insisted that she take a rest that afternoon, for I knew how tired nursing me made her, for she insisted on keeping her eye on the children as well, and she was lying down. I guess that that was why Harriet had chosen this time to come. She tiptoed into the room, her lovely eyes alight with a kind of mischief. “The dragon is sleeping,” she said in a dramatic voice. “Do you know she has been breathing fire at me every time I approached.”

“So you came before?”

“Of course I came. You don’t think I would stay away when you were ill, do you?” Her presence made me feel alive again. She exuded vitality. I was pleased to see her.

“You don’t look as though you’re dying,” she said.

“I am not,” I answered.

“You had us all very worried, I can tell you.”

“I feel so angry with myself. After all that waiting ... it is gone.”

“You mustn’t fret. That’s bad for you. You must be thankful that you were not taken away from your beloved family. Edwin was distrait.”

“I know, they told me. He is a dear boy.”

“So devoted to his mama and so he should be. So should we all. Arabella ... I haven’t told anyone yet. I want you to be the first to know. It’s wonderful really. It’s made me feel happy again. I did love Toby. I know you doubted my feelings. You’ve never really forgiven me for Edwin, have you?”

“Oh, that ... It’s so long ago.”

“I know your nature. You forgive but you can’t forget. You’ll never quite trust me again, will you?”

“Perhaps not.”

“I’m going to make you. I’m so fond of you, Arabella. That makes you smile. You think I couldn’t do what I did and be fond of you. I could. What happened between me and Edwin was outside friendship. Those things always are. The attraction arises quite suddenly sometimes and it’s irresistible. One forgets everything but the need to satisfy it. When it’s over, the rest of one’s life slips back into shape and it’s just as it was before...”

I shook my head. “Let’s not discuss it. We shall never agree.”

“I was brought up so differently from you, Arabella. I always had to fight. It’s become natural with me. I fight for what I want and take it and then consider the cost. But I didn’t come to say all this. It’s just that when I’m with you, I feel I have to justify myself. Arabella, I am going to have a child.”

“Harriet! Is that possible?”

“Obviously. Toby wasn’t all that old, you know.”

“I can see you’re happy.”

“It’s what I need. Don’t you see? You, of all people. Didn’t it happen to you? Think back. Your husband died suddenly and afterwards you found you were going to have a child. That is how it is with me. Come, rejoice with me. I feel like singing the Magnificat.”

“When ...?”

“Six months from now.”