“And perhaps not,” he agreed with a sigh. “I wonder if this is how a man feels when he is on the way to his own execution. I would rather be doing anything else on earth than this. Lord, everything is starting to look familiar. I can walk over from your parents’ house if you wish, Clarissa. I did it often enough when I was a boy. I will probably not get lost.”
“The carriage will drop you off outside your brother’s door,” she told him. “You can walk over to us when you have finished.”
He turned to take her other hand in his and squeezed them both tightly, almost to the point of pain. “I love you so much, Clarissa.” She saw the dismay in his face as he realized what he had said. “I did not mean that quite as it sounded. I…I thank you so much. You are very good to me.”
She smiled and leaned toward him and kissed him.
They were driving by his own property, she realized. The house, a sizable manor, was prettier than she remembered it. She usually drove to and from her parents’ house by a slightly different route. Hollyhocks, hyacinths, and numerous other flowers were blooming against the walls of the house, and colorful window boxes hung from the upstairs windows. The garden surrounding the house was bright with smooth lawns and well-kept flower beds. White curtains fluttered at one open window downstairs.
And then the carriage was drawing to a halt outside the Taylor home, and even before the steps were set down, the front door opened and Reginald and Adelaide Taylor stepped outside, their son Philip with his wife behind them. The young people were smiling, Clarissa saw, while the older couple were not. This must be every bit as difficult for them as it was for Matthew, of course. But they had not fled on a day’s excursion. Nor had they barred the door against him.
They all raised a hand in greeting to Clarissa when she waved from the carriage window, and then they turned their attention to Matthew, who was walking up the long path to meet them, his tall hat in his hand. The coachman put up the steps and shut the door, and Clarissa leaned back in her seat while the carriage rocked into motion again. She did not look out her window.
Chapter Eighteen
The first half hour of Matthew’s visit felt unreal. Downright bizarre, in fact. He sat with Reginald and his wife and Philip and his wife in the drawing room, which looked familiar but different—somehow lighter, brighter, larger than he remembered it. They sipped on tea, though Adelaide informed him that luncheon would be ready within the hour and they all hoped he would stay.
They made polite conversation. Yes, the farm was doing well, far better than it had used to do, now that more modern methods were being applied. And yes, Anthony, their younger son, was doing well in London, and Mabel, their daughter, was a happy wife and mother.
And yes, Matthew’s business was going well, offering him a steady flow of work without overwhelming him. Yes, he was happy in Boscombe. He had some good friends there. It was a friendly place, in fact, a good place to live. And yes, he was proud of the sheep carving Emily had brought home with her last week, as he was of all his work. Yes, he carved during his spare time.
He ought to have brought another of his carvings as a gift for Adelaide, he thought too late. He had come empty-handed. That had been gauche of him.
Reginald and Adelaide had aged since he last saw them, a rather obvious thought to be having. They had been in their late twenties the last time. Reginald was sixty now. He had aged well, however. He was still lean. He still had most of his hair, though it was steel gray now. Adelaide had grown plumper and ruddier of complexion than she had been, yet she was still a pleasant-looking woman.
This was to be it, then? This uncomfortable meeting, filled with meaningless chatter? He was finding it impossible to shift the conversation to what was clearly in the forefront of all their minds. Half an hour was the expected limit of a social visit. Ought he now, then, to get to his feet, thank them for their kind hospitality, and walk over to the Greenfields’ house to tell Clarissa that he was ready to leave when she was?
But he had been invited to stay for luncheon. Had it been a mere polite offer, which they expected him to refuse? Were they willing him to take his leave and end the embarrassment they were all feeling? They could hardly just ask him to leave, could they?
“If you will excuse us,” Emily said, getting to her feet and smiling at Matthew. “We have promised to take the children outside for a walk before luncheon.”
Philip got up too. So did Adelaide.
“I believe I will come with you if I may, Emily,” she said. “The sun is shining nicely. But we will see you again at luncheon, Matthew?”
“Thank you,” he said without actually saying yes or no. “You are kind.”
And suddenly they were alone together, he and Reginald, and the silence in the room was loud.
Matthew drew a slow breath.
“Why did you do it?” he asked. No explanation. No context. Just the bare question about something that had happened more than thirty years ago. “I did not know. Not until Philip mentioned it when he came to see me last week. He assumed I knew. I did not. Why did you do it?”
“I assume you are talking about Grandmama’s will,” Reginald said.
“I could never understand it,” Matthew said. “The only way I could ever explain it to myself was that she changed the will for Poppy’s sake and the baby’s and forgot to change it back after they died. When I heard about it, I imagined that you and our father—you especially—were hideously disappointed and probably furious too. You had always longed for the day when you would have a home and farm of your own and the prospect of the amalgamation of the two properties in time. Though I suppose you never longed for the deaths of our grandmother and father. But why did you give up your dream?”
“It was always Papa’s dream more than mine,” Reginald said. “I was never an ambitious man. I was like you in that. I still am. We are happy here, Addie and I. We have everything we could possibly need. And we have our family, all happily settled. We have good neighbors and friends.”
Was it true, Matthew wondered—that Reginald had never been an ambitious man? He had always done his duty as the elder son of the family. He had worked hard. He had been an indulgent, affectionate brother—until he had not been. But ambitious?
“Grandmama never made a secret of the fact that she intended to leave her property and everything else to me when she died,” Reginald said. “It was her right, of course. She could leave it to whomever she wished. But I was never comfortable with the way she talked openly about it rather than keep the contents of her will confidential. I talked to Papa about it a couple of times. Since she had only the two grandchildren, I explained, and I was set to inherit everything of his, would it not be better, kinder, for Grandmama to leave everything of hers to the one who would not inherit from her son-in-law? Unfortunately, Papa did not see things that way. He visualized a time when the owner of the combined properties would rival the Greenfields in prosperity and social prominence.”
Why had Matthew assumed that his brother was just like their father? Perhaps because he had acted like their father?
“I wanted you to have that property,” Reginald said. “I wanted you to live there and farm there. I thought that having it might at last restore you to…yourself. You adored being on the farm with me when you were a young child. You would work to the point of exhaustion in an attempt to keep up with me. You would prattle constantly, peppering me with surprisingly intelligent questions. You were adorable. I adored you. I think the great change in you came after you understood that you would not live here forever and work here as my partner, that you would have to find your own way in life when you grew up, with some profession suitable for a gentleman. But not as a farmer, since you would not be a property owner.”
The great change in you…
