Simply Love

“Yes.”

Her lips curved into a smile, and he knew she was having similar thoughts to his-that this ought not to be happening but was, and all they could do was make the best of it.

Their prospects were not utterly bleak. They liked each other-he knew she liked him. He was in love with her. Perhaps he even loved her.

They had the rest of their lifetimes to work on the sort of warm marital relationship he had always dreamed of.

“Anne,” he said, “what about your son? Does he know?”

She shook her head.

“Until you came,” she said, “I did not know what I would tell him.”

“I will support him and care for him and educate him and love him as if he were my own,” he assured her. “I will give him my name if you wish, Anne, and if he wishes it. But will he accept me?”

“I do not know what he will feel,” she said. “He longs for a father figure in his life. But…” She bit her lip again.

But his longing was for a whole and perfect man, like Hallmere or Rosthorn or any of the Bedwyn men.

“Shall we summon him now,” he asked her, “and tell him together? Or would you rather talk to him alone first?”

She drew a deep breath and released it slowly.

“I’ll go and fetch him,” she said. “Tomorrow his life will change drastically. He needs to know as soon as possible, and he needs to meet you face-to-face.”

His heart plummeted as soon as she left the room. Tomorrow his life will change. All three of their lives would change tomorrow. And they would be changed irrevocably and forever. It was not just he and Anne who were involved in all this. There would be a new child, whom he already loved with a fierce, almost painful tenderness. And there would be the boy, David Jewell, whom he had pledged to love though he did not know how easy it would be or if the boy would willingly reciprocate that love.

And who could blame him if he did not? What child would choose a one-eyed, one-armed father whom most children and even some adults feared as a monster?

Choices.

He and Anne Jewell had chosen to make love together during that afternoon at Ty Gwyn, and their lives-and David’s-had been forever changed.

Only time would tell if they had been changed for the better or the worse. Not that it would matter. They could only continue to walk the path of their lives to the very end, and for now at least their paths had converged.

It was Saturday again, the sun was shining, and it was a relatively warm day for October. But though the boarders at Miss Martin’s school and a few of the day pupils too were out in the meadow playing games as usual, it was Lila Walton who was supervising them rather than Susanna Osbourne.

Susanna was in Anne Jewell’s room, laughing as she attempted to thread a string of seed pearls through her friend’s hair, which she had just succeeded in pinning up into a more elegant style than usual.

“There,” she said, standing back at last to view the results of her handiwork. “Now you look fit to be a bride.”

Anne was wearing her best green silk.

Claudia was standing silently just inside the door, her hands clasped at her waist.

“Anne,” she said, meeting her friend’s eyes in the mirror, “are you quite, quite sure?”

It was a foolish question, of course. When one was with child and the father was due to arrive in five minutes’ time to marry one, it really did not matter if one was sure or not.

“I am,” she said.

“He was so very, very handsome,” Claudia said with a sigh.

“He still is.” Anne smiled into the mirror.

“You told me,” Susanna said, “that he was tall, dark, and handsome, Anne. You did not say anything about his war wounds.”

“Because they do not matter,” Anne said. “I also told you that he and I were friends, Susanna. We were. We are.”

“I am looking forward to meeting him,” Susanna said.

But Claudia turned at that moment and opened the door upon which Keeble was about to knock.

“They are downstairs,” he announced as if he had come to tell them that the devil and his chief assistant had just stepped into the school. Although a man himself, Mr. Keeble always carefully guarded his domain against the wicked male world beyond its doors. He looked across the room to Anne, who was getting to her feet. “You look good enough to eat, Miss Jewell.”

“Thank you, Mr. Keeble.” She smiled at him, though her heart felt as if it were lodged somewhere in the soles of her slippers.

Sydnam had arrived with the clergyman who was to marry them. The wedding was going to be solemnized in Claudia’s private sitting room, the visitors’ parlor having been rejected as too gloomy.

It was her wedding day-her wedding day-yet she felt nothing but a heavy heart. She was fond of him, and he was fond of her, but they had not intended to marry, and it seemed somehow worse to be marrying Sydnam than someone of whom she was not fond at all-foolish thought.

She should be able to offer him everything, but she did not believe she had anything but her fondness to give.

And he should be able to offer her everything. But he had never spoken of love. He had twice offered marriage, yesterday in a touchingly romantic way, but both times it had been from duty rather than inclination. It would have to be enough, though. He was a gentle, kindly man. He would take his responsibilities seriously.

Ah, but a bride should feel very differently on her wedding day, she thought wistfully.

“I’ll go up and fetch David,” she said.

“Let me go,” Susanna offered.

“No.” Anne shook her head. “But thank you, Susanna. And thank you, Claudia. For everything.”

Keeble had disappeared, though his squeaky boots could still be heard descending the stairs.

She hugged them both quickly and climbed the stairs to the small room next to Matron’s that had always been David’s. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, wearing his best clothes, his hair carefully combed.

“It is time to go down,” Anne said.

He looked up at her and got to his feet.

“I wish,” he said, “my papa had not died. I wish he had not. He would have played cricket with me like Cousin Joshua and taught me to ride like Lord Aidan did with Davy and he would have climbed trees with me like Lord Alleyne and taken me boating like Lord Rannulf. He would have winked at me and called me funny names in French like Lord Rosthorn. He would have held me when I was a baby like the Duke of Bewcastle with James. He would have kept you away from…from him, and he would have loved us both.”

It was not a loud diatribe. He spoke quietly but distinctly. Anne quelled her anger and concentrated upon listening to him.

“David,” she said, as she had said half a dozen times yesterday, “I am not going to love you one iota the less after this morning than I have loved you all your life. The only difference will be that I will not have to teach here and will therefore have more time to spend with you.”

“But you are going to have a baby,” he said.

“Yes.” She smiled at him. “And that means you are going to have a brother or a sister. Someone to look up to you and see you as a great hero of an elder brother-as Hannah does with Davy. The baby will be someone else to love you and someone else for you to love. I will still love you as well as I do now. I will not have to divide my love in half between you and the baby. My love will double instead.”

“But he will love the baby,” he said.

“Because he will be the baby’s papa,” she said. “He will be yours too if you wish. He said so to me and then he said so to you. He also said that he will just be your friend if you would prefer that. He is not your enemy, David. He is a good and honorable man. Lord Alleyne and Lord Aidan and the others told you a great deal about him, did they