Lady Trilling gave a nod of satisfaction. And so Catherine told her the details of the late duke’s will.
Lady Trilling appeared shocked, even scandalized, but she kept her composure.
“I hardly know where to begin. His GracehatedBaron Pierce Falk. He offered for Henrietta when she was still a child, looking only for her dowry. He told me himself.”
“I am well aware. It is my understanding that he never actually intended for Falk to inherit the money. It was to make sure John found my aunt Mary.”
“Goddamn it, Reginald,” the older woman swore. “That man.He would never let it lie.”
“What do you mean?”
Lady Trilling sighed. “We were all children together—Reginald, me, and your aunt Mary. Ever since I can remember, those two—they could never leave each other alone. I always thought they would marry one day. When we were young, it seemed they would. They courted—andmore. They weren’t careful. They were heedless that their parents would agree, because their properties bordered one another, and they had grown up together.”
Lady Trilling shook her head.
“But the duke—John’s grandfather, Wilberforce—didn’t agree. He refused the match. And threatened to cut Reginald off without a penny if he married Mary Forster.”
Catherine felt her heart plummet. “Why did the duke oppose it?”
Lady Trilling leveled Catherine with a gaze. Quickly the answer came to her.
“Her dowry. She didn’t have enough of a portion for a duke’s son.”
“You’ll excuse me for saying that the Forsters were good gentry, but they weren’t rich. A very old family, certainly, but no longer as moneyed or powerful as they had once been. The duke felt the match was beneath his son and heir.”
“And he listened,” Catherine said, as if she had always known the truth, even though she had never heard the story. “Reginald broke off the connection.”
It twisted Catherine’s insides to imagine her aunt and John’s father as a young couple separated by the cruelty of circumstance. She thought of Mrs. Morrison’s insinuation about Mary and the former duke. She too must know this story. Of course she did.
Lady Trilling continued, interrupting her thoughts. “Their engagement was never official. But to them it was very real. I saw it myself. And even though Reginald listened to his father, afraid to defy him, he never really gave Mary up. Even when he married Gloria, who came from a family worthy of a duke’s heir and who was a beauty in her own right. She wasn’t a hard woman to love and he loved her in his way. But she wasn’t Mary.”
“Why didn’t my aunt marry another man? She must have had offers.”
“She did. But your aunt—she wasn’t about to accept a man she didn’t care for. And she loved Reginald. And then your mother died and your father was wrecked. She stayed on at Forster House for you and him. And I don’t think she was even unhappy.”
“Even with the duke living next door? Married to another woman?”
Lady Trilling gave a shrug. “She didn’t like it, I know. But Forster House was her home. And a woman always knows when she has a man’s first affection. I think with Reginald, she always knew—she was first in his heart. For years, they didn’t do anything more than speak in passing, on county matters, in front of other people. And Reginald had real happiness with Gloria, who gave him John. He was a good father. And your aunt was happy with you and your father and her friends.”
“I don’t understand then. How…how—?”
“How did everything go wrong?” Lady Trilling arched an eyebrow. “I can’t say for certain, although the obvious is plain. They started up again. She has never told me how or why.”
Catherine caught the reference to the present tense. She knew that she had been right. Lady Trilling was the key. She knew exactly where to find her aunt.
“They had been so young when their plans for engagement were broken off—nineteen, twenty. When you are that young, you think life is infinite. They were heartbroken to give each other up, of course, but I think neither imagined it as a permanent separation. Then ten years passed and life seemed shorter. Gloria was lovely, but she wasn’t the woman who haunted Reginald’s dreams. And you and your father were impossibly dear, especially you, but still you weren’t her child.”
The words stung, but Catherine worked to keep her face impassive.
“I didn’t have a mother,” she said, quickly.
“Yes,” Lady Trilling said gently, “and you were so much like her own child that I believe for a long time it sufficed. But she still wanted to carry a child of her own. To have a child with a man she loved. She didn’t want to be a spinster for life. It wasn’t in her nature.”
“Then why didn’t she marry? Why begin things again with Reginald?”
“It was undoubtedly foolish. But they couldn’t help it. I tell you all of this because I want you to have compassion for your aunt.”
“She doesn’t want to see me,” Catherine said, looking down at her hands.
