“I know it. I have read so much about Italy, Spain, Portugal, and all these wonderful places. “It shall be most enchanting.”
“Juliet!” Mrs. Greaves called. “Come help me make sure they sent the portmanteaus to the right accommodations.”
Juliet nodded and waved at Marianne, hastening forth toward the boat. Marianne joined Lucien, who had lifted Henry up onto his hip.
“Mrs. Greaves already appears unsteady,” he said as they watched Mrs. Greaves make her way along the gangway and into the interior of the boat with Juliet beside her.
She wrapped her arm around him, and he placed his around her shoulders. “I cannot believe we are really going,” she said. “It has all happened with such rapidity.”
“I know, but that is something you should learn about me. Once I am resolved upon a course, I'm quite determined to do everything I can to make it as I desire. Especially if it is something that is for the woman that I love.”
Her heart felt warm as he spoke these words. He had said it to them many times since they had resolved their differences, and she knew it to be true, too. He showed her in every possible way how much he adored her. He brought her flowers, had her favorite meals prepared, and he would rub her feet when they sat in front of the fire. He would stroke her hair. Most of all, he would ask her opinion and her desires, never assuming that she would acquiesce to whatever struck his fancy.
There were moments of quarrel between them, of course. But they both knew now to address them directly rather than allow discord to fester.
She was growing accustomed to his manner, and he to hers. He was not entirely cured of his habit of pushing her away whenever old guilt resurfaced, but she understood now where those moods came from and could manage them better.
And he understood now that giving in to his feelings of guilt was misplaced and would only harm the happiness that they had found together.
They were each a wounded spirit, but they had found that together they could not only bind but heal those wounds.
As for Henry, he had begun calling her Mama again a few weeks after her return, and this time Lucien had not withdrawn. He had not closed his heart once more.
In fact, he had embraced it. She had even heard him encourage Henry to call her Mama when the boy had been unsureafterwards. They truly were a family now. And their union had not only had a positive effect on them and Henry, but on her entire family.
Rhys and Charlotte had been delighted to find that they were now truly together. Charlotte relished the thought that her sister was married to her husband's best friend. Evelyn and Nathaniel likewise were pleased. But no one was more pleased than her Aunt Eugenia. Even though Eugenia had never found out that their union had been arranged in the beginning to defy her attempt at marrying off Marianne, their felicity had only confirmed her wisdom. She thought she was quite right to push Marianne to leave the convent.
It was fortunate that there were no further sisters left that required suitable establishments, for otherwise she certainly would be doing it.
As for the convent, Marianne smiled as she thought about the nuns. No, she hadn't taken her vows, and no, she hadn't found the peace she had sought there the second time around. But the convent had still changed her life forever.
If not for Sister Bernadette's actions, she would never have forgiven Lucien. They never would have become a family.
“What are you smiling about?” Lucien asked.
“Sister Bernadette,” she said. “I am so pleased that she and Mrs. Greaves are once again writing to one another. Although I knownow the letters will take much longer since we will be on the continent.”
“Indeed. But Mrs. Greaves was most delighted to have the connection again.”
“I still cannot believe that Sister Bernadette was once a lady of high society. How very bizarre.”
“I'll say,” Lucien replied. “But it is as you have said. The Lord does work in mysterious ways. For how extraordinary is it that the very nun whom Mrs. Greaves used to serve was the one who had the ability to bring us back together again?”
“Extraordinary, indeed,” Marianne replied.
“I had a mind to make a donation to the convent. I know they aid unfortunate women and those less fortunate in general. And they have given us so much that I thought it was the least I could do.”
Marianne beamed at him. “Yes, I agree. That would be wonderful.”
“Good. I have already left word with Stuart to make it so.”
They smiled at one another, and then Henry's laughter broke through their comfortable silence. “Look,” he said. “Look, more people are coming.”
Indeed, more carriages were arriving. Luggage was being unpacked by busy footmen and valets. Finely dressed gentlemen boarded the boat, while down the pier, she saw those in steerage boarding as well.
“Even here we must differentiate people between the so-called Quality and those who are less fortunate,” Marianne said, shaking her head.
“Such is the world we inhabit, my dear,” he said. “But I agree it is rather silly, for should the vessel flounder, we should all sink into the same ocean and go to the same place, I presume.”
