His housekeeper looked at him as though she did not want to respond.
“She left the day after you did.”
CHAPTER 24
“Isuppose I should return home soon,” Anna sighed at breakfast that morning.
“There is no need to,” Evelina reassured her. “You can stay here as long as you need. We are happy to have you, and you know that.”
“I do, but someone has to manage the Wutherton estate. I know that my staff know what to do, but I have to help run it, especially in Spencer’s absence.”
“I could come with you,” Theodora offered. “My sister would appreciate the quiet.”
Anna smiled, but she knew she would have to do it alone. It was her household, and though she did not want to face it, she knew she would have to eventually. She also knew that the longer she waited, the worse it would be. Whether she liked it or not,she would have to return to her empty home and continue as if nothing was wrong.
She was, after all, a duchess.
“I was hoping that, after a week, it might have been easier to be without him,” she explained. “I thought that with some time away, I might remember who I am, but it has not happened. All that I can think of is Spencer, and how much I miss him. I was not supposed to need him like this.”
“There is no shame in needing your husband,” Evelina promised. “I know that we speak ill of those ladies who do not do anything for themselves, and of the gentlemen who leave said ladies in such situations, but this is different. You cannot help that you have fallen for him, just as he cannot help having a family that needs him.”
“Do you know what I think?” Theodora asked.
“I hardly ever seem to, no.”
“I think that you need to speak with him when he returns, and when you do, you need to tell him how you truly feel. Yes, you have both acted—well, surprisingly warmly toward one another—but you have not told him with your words. We have spent enough time proclaiming that men are simple beings, after all. If you have something to say to him, then you must tell him.”
“But how can I do that when he is not here?”
“He will return. It may be soon, it may not be, but he will come back. When he does, you need answers from him, and you need to tell him the truth, too.”
Anna knew that her friend was right, and that she did indeed want to tell him everything. Perhaps, if she did, it might have been enough to make him stay.
But the idea that it might not have been was enough to make her feel unwell.
That afternoon, they planned to practice their embroidery together. It was truly for Theodora, for she refused to do any of the activities that ladies engaged in in order to attract a man, but Anna was also grateful for the distraction. She made neat rows of roses, one in each color, and then moved on to tulips. She had never enjoyed embroidery, for she had pricked her fingers far too many times, but it was good to have something to think about other than her husband.
“I shall never be any use with a needle,” Theodora proclaimed. “If this is what I must do to find a match, then I shall have to live unmarried all my life.”
“There is more to it than embroidery, you know that,” Evelina reminded her. “You will also have to be interesting, good in conversation, and pleasant. You have two of those three things, so you should be more pleased about your prospects.”
“I do not want prospects. I shall care about them when I have my faith in gentlemen restored, and that does not seem too likely.”
“If you insist,” Evelina said brightly.
For the most part, Anna had always wished that she had a brother or a sister to have by her side. She often envied Evelina and Theodora, for they had one another, but when she watched Theodora acting as she was, she was pleased that she did not have a younger sister after all. She was not capable of keeping a light tone as she explained the same thing over and over again, and it was a patience that she wished she had.
“I cannot continue to say the same thing,” Evelina sighed when Theodora went to her room for a moment. “I do not know what to do with her.”
“I do not believe that there is anything we can do. She shall have to see for herself that it is for the best, even if it takes a long time.”
“But she does not have a long time. Eventually, she will be placed on the shelf, and she will never know what it is to be a wife.”
“It is not as though you know very much about it, either,” Anna joked. “Nor do I, for what it is worth. Theodora will find her way, and perhaps by not trying to force her hand, it will help her see that it is nothing to be afraid of.”
“I suppose that you are right. What I fear, though, is that–”
They were interrupted by the arrival of Evelina’s butler, who was standing in the doorway with a perfectly polished expression but a hint of surprise in his eyes.
