“W-wait another week,” he pleaded. “Give me that much time. Stay for s-seven more days, and then I will t-take you to Candlebury if you s-still want to leave me. We can say we are going d-down there for Easter, and you can r-remain there afterward, and anyone who s-says you ought to be presented to thetonas my v-viscountess may go hang. You may have your s-sister come to live with you if you wish and if she wishes. She will find music pupils enough if she w-wants them, and you will find enough wildflowers to p-paint to last a lifetime. But g-give me a week first.”
She had not moved and did not now.
“Or if you must leave t-today,” he said, “then l-let me take you to Candlebury now. I’ll not s-stay if you do not want. I’ll never go near the place again unless you invite me. Agnes?”
“Do you still love her?” she asked.
He expelled his breath audibly, tipped his head back against the doorframe, crossed his arms, and gazed upward.
“The f-funny thing is,” he said, “and I think itmustbe funny because it makes no sense whatsoever—the funny thing is that I am not s-sure I ever did. I mean, I want to be honest with you because I think it is my only chance. I must have loved her, mustn’t I? But I c-can’t remember how it was or how it felt. And when I saw her again the day you and I arrived here, I d-didn’t know if I loved her or hated her. I still didn’t know when I called on her yesterday. I was afraid I loved her. But I did not want to. Idonot want to. I w-want to... I want to be married toyou. I want to be safe with you. And I could not sound more selfish if I tried, could I? I want, I want, I want... I would like to try to m-make you h-happy, Agnes. I think it would be good to make someone h-happy. I think it would be the best feeling in the world. Especially if it were you. Don’t go. Give me a chance. Giveusa chance.”
There was a longish silence while he closed his eyes and waited for her decision. He wasnotgoing to impose his authority on her, though he could do it as her husband, he supposed. If she must leave, then he would let her go. Even by the stage, if that was what she chose.
And, good God, he could not even assure her that he did not still love Velma—or that he ever had. Why the devil had the physician at Penderris ever released him upon an unsuspecting world? He was a walking lunatic.
“There is a terrible pain,” she said softly, “about being abandoned by someone who loves someone else more than you. A pain and an emptiness and a determination never again to give anyone that power.”
He was bewildered for a moment before he realized she was talking about her mother, who had left her own children in order to be with her lover.
“Marriage with William brought peace and tranquility,” she said.
“I am not William.”
She looked back at him, her eyes still blank, until suddenly they crinkled unexpectedly at the corners, and she laughed with what sounded like real amusement.
“That must be the understatement of the decade,” she said.
“Stay,” he urged her. “You may decide to leave me later, Agnes, and I will not s-stop you, but I will never abandon you. Never. I swear it.”
It was not literal abandonment she feared, though, he knew, but emotional abandonment—his loving Velma instead of her. Good God, he had never thought of Agnes in terms oflove. Love—romantic love, that was—always made him feel slightly sick, though he had no idea why. Hugo loved Lady Trentham, and there was nothing at all nauseating about what they obviously felt for each other. The same was true of Vincent and his wife, and Ben and his. Why could it not be true of him?
She was looking steadily back at him, her smile gone.
“For one week,” she said at last.
He rested his head against the doorframe again and closed his eyes briefly. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“Go and get some sleep, Flavian,” she said. “You are exhausted.”
“There is n-nothing like having your w-wife of one week s-saying she is going to l-leave you for keeping you awake,” he said.
“Well, she is notgoingto leave you,” she said. “Not for another week, anyway. But if I am to stay, Flavian, then I am going to call upon Lady Hazeltine and Lady Frome, preferably this afternoon, if by chance they are at home.”
He frowned. “You will take my m-mother with you? Or m-me?”
“Neither,” she said.
He continued to frown, and had mental images of Daniel walking into the lions’ den. Which was a strange way of thinking of Frome’s house.
“I shall take Madeline for respectability,” Agnes said, “since this is not the country. Will it be very badtonanyway to go essentially alone?”
“Very,” he said.
“I hope theyareat home,” she told him, “and I hope they are alone. There needs to be some plain speaking.”
He had married a brave woman, he realized, quiet and unassuming as she always seemed. Such a visit would surely be incredibly difficult for her.
“Go and get some sleep,” she said.
