“I would ask that we discuss another subject.”
“Ah,” said Lenox, nonplussed.
A silence.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“I think my health has returned,” she said. Her voice was still so terribly cold. It was jarring, when he was so used to her good spirits lifting his. “Thank you.”
It was as if she had decided Lenox belonged to McConnell’s camp, Jane to her own. Some barrier had gone up between them, after years of the closest intimacy. He didn’t know quite how to break through to her.
He sighed. “I came here for two reasons.”
“Oh, yes?” she said, without any apparent interest in this piece of information.
“I was worried about you, of course.”
Here she softened slightly. “Thank you, Charles.”
“I also need advice.”
“Do you? Thomas can’t help you?”
He waved a hand impatiently. “Not like that,” he said. “It’s about Jane.”
“Oh?”
“About our wedding. You know I’m fond of travel, perhaps?”
“I do know that, Charles.” The roll of her eyes as she said this was the first glimpse of the Toto Lenox knew.
Indeed, it might have been a rhetorical question. Travel was one of Lenox’s great passions, and he spent much of his leisure time planning elaborate trips to far-off lands — the Middle East, Asia, the Americas. Sadly, these trips (which always included Graham) remained largely theoretical. True, he had spent a blissful two weeks in Russia some years earlier, and after Oxford had toured Italy and France, but every time he was on the verge of leaving London nowadays something interrupted his plans. Usually a case, which he could never resist. Nonetheless, he was an enthusiastic member of the Travellers’ Club, whose charter decreed that all its members should have traveled at least five hundred miles in a straight line from Piccadilly Circus, and a frequent patron of several mapmakers, purveyors of durable luggage, and travel agents.
“I’ve promised Jane that I would decide on the itinerary of our honeymoon and surprise her with our destination on the day we left.”
“Charles,” said Toto with a scornful laugh, “she won’t want to go to India or somewhere dreadful like that!”
Lenox laughed, too. “Precisely. That’s why I need your help.”
“How can I help? You know the capitals of all the countries, and which rivers are where, and how many windmills are in Holland, and all the tiresome things I could never remember at school.”
Again he laughed. “I’m afraid none of that will do me any good in this situation. Therefore I propose that the two of us form a committee and choose the best spot for Jane’s honeymoon. I want it to be perfect, you see, and you know Jane as well as anyone.”
“That’s awfully sweet,” she murmured and seemed to favor him with a smile. “Perhaps Switzerland?”
Sternly, he said, “No, no, idle suggestions won’t do. I’ve brought several travel guides for you to look over, with watercolor drawings and picturesque descriptions and — I’m afraid — a very few facts. The sort of thing that drives me mad.”
He pointed to the parcel he had left on a nearby table.
“I love that kind of book!” she said.
“I know. That’s why we’ll make such good collaborators — I can look for train schedules while you look for beauty. Shall we meet the day after I next return from Stirrington?”
Perhaps it was the idea of a project, or because Lenox spoke so earnestly, but Toto laughed, a real, genuine laugh, and with far more animation than before said, “We shall call it an appointment, then.”
She stuck out her tiny hand, and with a show of solemnity Lenox shook it. “Thank you,” he said. “What a weight off my mind!”
“I warn you that I’m a slow study.”
“Where did you and Thomas go, remind me?”
The smile vanished from her face. “We went to Scotland and then to Paris,” she said.
“Ah. I recall now.” In an attempt to rectify the mistake of mentioning McConnell, he said, “Did you like it?”
“I loved it,” she said with emotion in her face. “It was the happiest I’ve ever been.”
It was easy to forget, Lenox thought, how in love they had been — how profoundly in love. McConnell’s manly, kind bearing, Toto’s enthusiasm and loveliness — how happy they had seemed! The thought disturbed him for some reason.
“At any rate, I know Jane has been to Paris half a dozen times, and even I managed to spend a few months there.”
She laughed, her goodwill reinstated. “I’m glad I can help you,” she said. “I’m so looking forward to the wedding.”
“As am I,” said Lenox. “In that case, I shall take my leave.”
She stood and accepted another kiss on her cheek. “Will you tell Jane — do you mean to see Jane?”
“Yes.”
“Will you tell her, just one more night, perhaps?”
She had been staying there, then. Poor Toto. “I certainly shall.”
“I said she needn’t bother, before — but —”
“I’ll tell her first thing,” Lenox said. “Of course.”
Some moments later he was out on the steps, and in the cold evening air he stopped and gazed at the horizon. It was pink and blue, and overlaying those colors a deepening violet, and seemed to reflect back to him all the sorrow that filled his heart, cheerful though he had tried to be. Poor, innocent Toto, he thought. For so long, even through her troubles with Thomas, she had been everything fresh, everything unblemished, everything pure. Now, no matter how well she recovered, that was gone. How various, he thought, are the punishments this world may inflict on us. He stepped with a burdened heart toward his carriage.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Eating supper with Lady Jane restored Lenox’s good cheer. His own dining room was low-slung and comfortable, with a casual air about it even when he had a dinner party; by contrast hers was a marvel both of grace and intimacy, with candles glowing along rosewood walls. To eat they had a hearty beef and vegetable stew, which Lady Jane knew was Lenox’s favorite autumn supper, and for dessert what had gradually come to be called Victoria sponge, after the queen — an airy cake with cream poured over it. Jane offered Lenox the wine she kept in for him, but he declined it. They spoke of every subject that occurred to them, ranging between old memories and new gossip, and by the end both felt that despite their separation all was again well in the world.
He had told her straightaway about Toto’s request that Jane return that evening, and she had ordered an overnight bag prepared. As a consequence there was less time to sit in the parlor after supper than either would have liked, but they were happy moments, Lady Jane quizzing Charles about Stirrington, Crook, and Roodle and expressing over and again her wish that she might visit him there.
Finally, as a gentle rain began to slope down over the city, she left.
“Good-bye, my love,” he said.
“Good-bye,” she answered and kissed him swiftly on the lips before he handed her into her carriage. “Be well there. Don’t worry, Charles. I know you worry.”
With that, he knew he wouldn’t see her for another fortnight.
He made the short walk back to his own house as slowly as he could, savoring the raindrops on his tired face. Indeed, on his steps he stood and smoked a pipe, looking up and down the small, tidy lane they lived upon. It saddened him. The trees, the shops, they were his own, and he hated to leave again. Especially without having
