One Night for Love

Lily. The terrace was crowded with people saying and hugging their farewells—even Gwen and Lauren had come up from the dower house for the purpose. Lily had her share of hugs, Neville noticed as he took his leave of everyone else; neither Lauren nor Gwen was dry-eyed after saying good-bye to her. She was wearing the pretty blue carriage dress that had recently been made for her—he had been very much afraid that she would refuse to take any of her new clothes.

He turned to her last, and he was aware of everyone else moving tactfully away, giving them a modicum of privacy. He took her gloved right hand in both of his and looked into her eyes. They were huge and calm and clear of the tears that were flowing free among the others.

He reached for something to say to her but could think of nothing. She stared mutely at him. He raised her hand to his lips and kept it there for several moments while he closed his eyes. But when he looked back into her face, there was still nothing to say. No, that was not right. There was everything in the world to say but no words with which to say any of it. And so he said nothing.

Until she did.

'Neville.' There was almost no sound, but her lips unmistakably formed his name.

Ah, God! How he had longed to hear her say his name again. She had spoken it yesterday afternoon. She was saying it now. But he felt as if his heart had been pierced by a sharp dagger.

'Lily,' he whispered, his head bent close to hers. 'Stay. Change your mind. Stay with me. We can make it work.'

But she was shaking her head slowly.

'We cannot,' she said. 'We cannot. Th-that night. I am glad there was that night.'

'Lily—'

But she tore her hand from his grasp and hurried toward the open door of Elizabeth's carriage. He watched in wretched despair as a footman handed her inside.

She took her seat beside Elizabeth and stared blankly at the cushions of the seat opposite. The footman put up the steps and closed the door. The carriage jerked slightly on its springs and was in motion.

Neville swallowed once, twice. He fought panic, the urge to lunge forward, to tear open the door, to drag her out into his arms and refuse ever to let her go.

He raised a hand in farewell, but she did not look back.

Perhaps never. The words echoed and reechoed in his brain.

Ah, my love. Once dreams were shattered, there could be no assurance that they could ever be pieced together and dreamed again.

 

PART IV

The Education of a Lady

 

Chapter 17

'Amuse me, Lily,' her new employer commanded her after the first hour of near silence and raw pain had passed, 'and answer some questions. You must answer truthfully—that is the one cardinal rule of what- ifs.'

Lily turned a determinedly smiling face to her. She still did not know how she could possibly be a competent companion to Elizabeth, but she would try her very best.

'If you had the freedom and the means to do any one thing in the world you wished to do,' Elizabeth asked, 'what would it be?'

Go back to Neville. But that would be a nonsensical answer. She had the freedom to go back. He had begged her to stay. But going back to him would mean going back to Newbury Abbey too and all it involved. Lily thought hard. But the answer to the question, she found eventually, should have been obvious to her from the first moment.

'I would learn to read and write,' she said. 'Is that two things?'

'We will consider it one,' Elizabeth said, clapping her hands. 'What a delightful answer. I can see that you are not going to be a disappointment, Lily. Now something else. Perhaps we will gather five wishes altogether. Proceed.'

Yes, there were other things to dream of, Lily thought. Nothing sufficient to replace the dream she had lost, of course, but perhaps enough to give life some purpose. These new dreams would probably prove unattainable, but then that was the nature of dreams. It was their very attraction. But probably was the all-important word. It allowed for hope.

'I would learn to play the pianoforte,' she said with conviction, 'and to know all there is to know about music.'

'Now that is definitely more than one thing,' Elizabeth protested, laughing. 'But since I have made the rules of the game, I will allow its essential unity. Next?'

Lily glanced at Elizabeth, who looked both lovely and elegant in carriage clothes that were coordinated in colors of brown, bronze, and cream, and that were perfectly suited to her age and rank and figure and coloring.

'I would learn how to dress correctly and elegantly and perhaps even fashionably,' she said.

'But you already look all those things in that particular ensemble, Lily,' Elizabeth told her. 'Pale blue is certainly a good color for you.'

'You chose everything I am wearing,' Lily reminded her, 'except my shift and my shoes. I could do nothing alone—I would have no idea. To me a garment has always been something that is comfortable and decent and warm in winter or cool in summer.'

'Very well, then.' Elizabeth smiled. 'It is number three. And numbers four and five? Do you have no wish to