Samantha spread both hands over her knees and pleated the fabric of her dress between her fingers.
“The next morning,” Mr. Bevan said, “I took her to Dilys at the cottage where you now live, Samantha. We had never seen eye to eye. She had thought me wild and irresponsible as a boy. She had thought my marriage insanity. She was furious when she discovered that our father had left almost everything to me when she was the one with the business head. But I took your mother to her and asked her to take the child until I got myself properly sober. She told me I never would, that I would always be a worthless drunkard. She said she would take Gwynneth but only on condition that she had the sole raising of her, that I would give her up and never see her again except by chance.”
Samantha was looking at him now. Ben was looking at her.
“I drank for six more months,” Bevan said, “and then I stopped. I did not drink at all for years. Now I do occasionally, but only in a social way, never when I am alone. I applied myself to my work. I challenged myself by interesting myself in industries other than just coal. Hence the ironworks. And in the meanwhile, every penny of the money I ever sent to help Dilys with the upbringing of your mother and every gift I sent for birthdays or Christmas was returned. Every time I glimpsed Gwynneth, she was whisked away by my sister when she was younger—she turned away of her own accord when she was older. I wanted her back. I wanted to get her a proper governess. I wanted to get her ready for the life she could have lived as my daughter. I wanted to…Well, I wanted to be her father, but I had forfeited my chance with her. When I heard she was not allowed to go on picnics with the local lads and lasses, though, and was not allowed to go to the village assemblies even though she was seventeen and ready for a bit of life of her own, I went and had it out with Dilys, and we both ended up shouting like fools and behaving like two snarling dogs fighting over the same bone. And Gwynneth was in the house and heard it all. The day after, she was gone. Just like Esme all over again.”
“And as before, you did not go after her,” Samantha said.
“I did,” he said. “She would not have anything to do with me. She would not let me pay for her lodgings. She would not let me give her some spending money. She would not let me help her find decent employment. And she would not come home with me. She got a job acting. I was…proud of her spirit of independence at the same time as I was terrified for her. And then she met your father, who was close to me in age and was everything I was not. I think maybe she was happy with him. Was she?”
“Yes,” she said.
“It was the old story after her marriage,” he said. “She returned my letters and my wedding gift and my christening gift to you and all the other gifts I sent. Though after she…died, the letters and gifts I sent you stopped coming back, and sometimes your father would write to tell me about you and to include little messages of thanks from you for the gifts. I often thought of suggesting that I come to see you, but I could never quite get up the courage. You were the daughter of a gentleman, and his letters were always polite, but not exactly warm. I thought maybe the two of you would say no. And then all hope was gone. You married the son of an earl, and it seemed to me the last thing you would want was a visit from your maternal grandfather. I even stopped sending gifts after the wedding one.”
Samantha was pleating her dress again.
“I daresay your father felt sorry for me,” Bevan said. “But I suppose he felt even more loyalty to his wife, your mother, and agreed with her that it was best you not know me. You did not read any of those letters or see any of those gifts, did you?”
“No.” Her voice was a mere whisper of sound.
“It was not wicked of either your father or your mother,” he said. “I had done nothing to earn her love, and I did not deserve yours. I ruined my own life and your mother’s over grief for what I could not have. And all the time I had a treasure in my grasp that I did not recognize until it was too late.”
“You married again,” she said.
“A year after your mother went to London.” He sighed. “I wanted a son. I wanted someone to hand everything on to. Perhaps I wanted some redemption too. I wanted to try again, to see if I could do better than I had done the first time. Isabelle was a good woman. She was better than I deserved, and we were contented together despite the age difference. But we never did have children. We were denied that blessing. She died two years ago.”
Samantha said nothing. But she turned her head to look at Ben, her eyes wide and blank.
“I am sorry,” Bevan said. “The most useless three words in the English language when they are used together. I wish I could go back. I have wished it year after year since the night I smashed that glass above your mother’s head. But that is something that is not granted to any of us. None of us can go back. I thought at least you must know about me, though. I thought your mother would have told you.”
“No,” she said. “But she ought to have done. Ben said to me yesterday that we all have a story to tell. My mother had a story, but she never told it. Perhaps she meant to. Perhaps she thought I was too young. I was only twelve when she died. My father did not tell it either, but I suppose he felt it was not his story to tell. Except that I ought to have known.”
“You know now,” he said, and he got to his feet to pull on the bell rope, “and it is not a pretty story. I cannot think of anything to add that might make you think it worth your while to accept me as your grandfather, Samantha. I wish I could, but I can’t. I obviously did terrible damage to another human being, my own daughter, and I have no excuse for that. And no right to lay any claim to the affection ofherdaughter.”
“I have no one,” Samantha said.
“Your brother?”
“Halfbrother,” she said. “No.”
“Your uncles and aunts and cousins on your father’s side? Your father- and mother-in-law and your sister- and brothers-in-law?”
“No.”
He turned his eyes on Ben and gazed steadily at him.
“And when are you leaving, Major Harper?” he asked.
“Tomorrow,” Ben said.
They looked at each other for a few moments longer, taking each other’s measure, until a servant answered the summons of the bell.
“You can remove the tray,” Bevan told him, “and have Major Harper’s carriage brought around to the door.”
He waited until the servant had withdrawn and then looked at Samantha’s bowed head.
“You can haveme,” he told her. “If you want me.”
