The door creaked open, and Mrs. Craib entered carrying a tray laden with a teapot, shortbread, neatly cut rectangles of roast beef sandwiches, and Victoria sponge dripping strawberry jam.
The housekeeper set the tray on the table before the settee, curtsied, and retreated.
“Would ye be so kind?” Alistair gestured toward the teapot.
With a nod, Chris poured for them—her elegant fingers grasping the teapot and dispensing the tea with confident verve.
Once upon a time, that phrase had nearly been her personal motto—confident verve.
It had manifested in the way she troweled away dirt from a Roman mosaic, hand sweeping boldly as if she could already sense what lay beneath. Or in the way she skipped ahead as they strolled through the pine-forested hills behind Fiesole, walking backward to face him as she explained the difference between Etruscan and Roman pottery sherds, arms gesturing in her excitement.
Now, watching her drop a sugar cube and healthy splash of cream into his tea—remembering how he took it after all these years—
She seemed...thinner. Not just in her person but in spirit, too. As if the weight of living had dampened the vitality that had once shimmered like a ruby-chested hummingbird in the sun.
Perhaps...perhaps those months had simply been magical, in the way of conjuring or witch’s spells. Perhaps Alistair had merely romanticized Chris and their time together. Had the Christiana Rutherford he knew ever truly existed? Or had she merely been a construct of his eager heart—the beautiful girl wrapped up inextricably with archeology and the glory of summer in the hills above Florence?
He took the saucer and teacup from her with a murmured thanks. “Tell me of yourself then, Mrs. Newton. Of your years since our last meeting in Fiesole.”
Painfully formal, those words.
She stirred sugar and cream into her own tea.
“There is not much to say.” She placed a roast beefsandwich and triangle of shortbread on her plate. “As you know, I left Italy immediately after...”
She rolled her hand, as if that simple motion could somehow encapsulate the detonation of their relationship. Was it his imagination, or did her hand tremble slightly as she lifted her cup and saucer?
Perhaps she wasn’t as unmoved at seeing him again as she appeared.
The thought cheered him. Misery always loved company, as his gran would say.
“And Dr. Stephen Newton? How did your marriage come about?”
“Yes, well...” Chris cleared her throat and sipped her tea, as if choosing her next words carefully. “I was rather...bereft, as you might imagine, upon leaving Italy. Once back in Oxford, I found myself often at loose ends. Stephen was caring and attentive to my needs, given that my father was still out of the country. As an old friend of the family, Stephen wished to ensure my well-being.”
Of course he did.Oldbeing the most significant word of her description.
Alistair, thankfully, managed not to say as much.
“Our friendship grew,” she continued, “and we married. Stephen welcomed my insights and ‘youthful energy,’ as he called it, toward his archaeological work. And we were happy, after a fashion, for several years.”
After a fashion.That phrase again.
“And then my father fell ill and passed away.”
“I was sorry to hear of it.”
“His loss was difficult.” She looked to the window, eyes a wee bit too bright. Rallying, she took in a long breath. “Stephen followed the year after.”
“And that was two years past, was it not?”
“Yes.”
“And since then?”
She shrugged and shot him a wan smile. The sort that did not touch her eyes. “Since then, I have been doing what women do, my lord...getting on with life.”
Getting on with life? What did she mean by that?
