He lowered his head and kissed her. “As I thought,” he said. “I cannotseethe blushes. But your cheeks feel fieryhot.”
“For shame,” she said again. “Where are your manners, sir?”
But he knew she was pleased. She always called him “sir” when she was pleased.
He wondered suddenly how it was he had recovered from his consumption. He did not know of anyone else who haddone so. For what sort of miracle had he been singled out?And why? It must have been done as a reward for Adèle’sgoodness. Certainly there was nothing he had done in hislife to deserve such a reprieve. And then he felt dizzy—and remembered exactly what the miracle had been. Exceptthat it seemed too fantastic and too bizarre to be believed.Had it really happened?
Their arrival at the assembly rooms was greeted with avid curiosity and great enthusiasm. The assemblies wereopen to everyone, he and Adèle had been told, there notbeing enough people of the upper classes to make themworth holding. There was a certain charm, he thought,about mingling with people of all classes, about watchinggroups of farm laborers performing an energetic and intricate Welsh folk dance, and about hearing the Welsh andEnglish languages mingling in the conversations aboutthem.
Not many of those present knew the steps of the waltz. Only two other couples apart from him and Adèle took thefloor when the dance was announced. Everyone else gathered about to watch the new dance, which was reputed tobe somewhat scandalous. Adèle looked rather alarmed.
There had been a time, he thought as the music started, when he had waltzed as an excuse to get a female bodyagainst his own—a body that he hoped to put beneath hisown on the bed at his flat after the dance was over. Hecould not for the moment remember when that time couldhave been. But now he danced the waltz as it was meantto be danced, keeping Adèle at arm’s length from his body, twirling her to the steps of the dance about the perimeter of the ballroom.
There were murmurs of appreciation from the nondancers, a smattering of applause. There was the exhilaration of moving to music and no thought for the moment of hisweakness. And there was the beauty and grace of his partner. She soon forgot her alarm at having to waltz for thefirst time before an audience. She kept her eyes on his andfollowed his lead as if she were a part of him.
He forgot the audience. He forgot their surroundings. He forgot they were waltzing. They danced together as theymade love—in perfect rhythm, in perfect harmony, a worldand a universe unto themselves.
He loved her. He had always loved her—from the beginning of time, it seemed. She was part of him, more a part of him than his own heart. Closer than that. She wasall that was good in him, all that was loving.
It was over too soon. He was dazed when the music stopped and he realized that he had been merely waltzingwith her in the assembly rooms at Awelfa. She was flushedand bright-eyed and so beautiful that he found himself looking around jealously at all the other men present.
She is mine,he foolishly wanted to warn them all.
“John.” She stepped a little closer to him as a crescendo of applause and laughter greeted their efforts and those ofthe other two couples. “You are tired. Sit down for awhile.”
“Yes, little guardian angel,” he said, grinning at her. But she was quite right, of course. His energy was not yetboundless.
He spent an interesting hour sitting and talking with a group of men on a variety of topics, including the state offarming in West Wales and the dangers of the coast fornavigation. There was great need for lighthouses and otherwarning devices in the area, it seemed. Adèle—he scarcelytook his eyes off her all the time—talked and laughed withother women and danced one quadrille with a portly tenantfarmer who had two left feet and no musical sense at all.Yet she smiled at him throughout the set with sweet charm.
She was at home in this sort of place with this sort of people, he thought. As was he. The thought surprised him.He had always loved the country, but he had always beenrestless and eager to get back to the bustle and the sophistication of town life. He felt no such eagerness now. Hestill felt, as he had felt a few weeks ago, that he could stayhere forever. Provided Adèle was here, his whole worldwas here. And perhaps there would be children. Now wherehad he heard recently that there would indeed be children?Who had predicted something so unpredictable?
But of course he knew it himself. He knew it from his own studies of family history. He found himself frowning.How could he have studied thefuture? But then it was notthe future he had studied. It was the past. He was from thesecond half of the twentieth century. How could such amomentous fact keep slipping away from him?
It was long past midnight when he and Adèle finally rode home. She curled up against him on the carriage seat whenhe set an arm about her shoulders, and yawned.
“Sleepy?” he asked, rubbing his cheek against her hair.
“Mm,” she said. And then she sat up hastily. “But you are the one who must be tired, John.”
He chuckled and brought her head back where it belonged. “Did you enjoy the evening?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Everyone was kind and very friendly. Mrs. Beynon was trying to teach me some Welsh. Buteveryone went off into peals of merriment at something Irepeated after her. I dared not ask what it was I had actuallysaid.” She giggled.
He yawned.
“John,” she said, spreading a hand on his chest. “It must have seemed quite pathetic in comparison withtonballs. Did you find it very—provincial?”
He understood her insecurities far better than she realized. He had taken Adèle and her constant, unconditional love so much for granted in the past. He had given her nosuch constancy in return.
“I have never enjoyed a ball as much as tonight’s,” he said, shrugging his shoulder so that he could touch her lipswith his own. “Because you were there with me, Adèle.Because all evening long I could feast my eyes on you andtell myself that you were mine.”
“Oh.” Her lips formed the shape of the word against his. He felt the warm exhalation of her breath.
He kissed her.
Sometimes, he thought, he could almost persuade himself that he had died and gone to heaven after all—only to findher there before him, waiting for him so that she could lovehim for all eternity.
And so that he could love her for an equal length of time.
