If he had intentionally not told Mother of the change in sailing time, then he intended for her to fail. Or had he expected her to arrive home earlier than she had because being early was better than being punctual, as it allowed for the slightest unexpected delays to be overcome? As she did not plan for such, she had failed.
However, that still did not change the fact that she never returned to England, and something he must remember despite the reason why she had not been on the same ship as his father.
“I waited for him to come back for me and truly thought that he would.”
“You could have gone to him,” Sterling reminded her.
“I feared that our ships would pass and he would arrive here as my ship docked in England, but after a year, I had to accept that he would not come for me.”
“That is when you should have returned home,” he insisted.
“I wrote and asked if I should or even could,” she said quietly. “He never responded to any of my letters. Which, I suppose, was answer enough.”
Her words momentarily halted all other thoughts until he started to doubt her words. Why would his father ignore her requests? Why wouldn’t he want his wife home?
“I considered returning anyway, but your father no longer wanted me and I had served my purpose. Not only had I provided an heir and a spare, but an additional three sons.”
“Who would have liked to have had their mother at home,” Sterling insisted, his resentment returning. He could forgive her missing the ship for the reasons she claimed, but not for what came after, even if his father shared some of the fault. She should have boarded the next ship and returned to her family but she hadn’t. Instead, she’d lived these past eleven years at Wyndview Farm while her husband and five sons lived in Southampton, England.
“For what purpose? It was not as if I were needed,” she argued, much to his shock and dismay.
How could she say such a thing when five children had waited for her?
“When we were in England, everyone was away at school. I was lucky to spend any time with my sons when they returned home for the few weeks of holidays each year. And you, you stopped needing your mother long before your father and I sailed with Hallaway and his family. You were your father’s first born, the heir, and he commanded your attention. I was given a kiss on the cheek when you returned home right before you disappeared into the library with your father to learn all there was to know about being the Earl of Wyndham and Trade Wynd, as did Damian and Elliot. If you weren’t in the library, you were riding the estate or spending your days in the Trade Wynd offices near the harbor. I saw you at dinner and when the holiday was over, you kissed me on the cheek, said a goodbye and were on your way again.”
Bitterness laced her tone.
“As for Jules, he could not wait to disappear into the former woodcutter’s cottage at the back of the estate to sculpt and Avery, well, he preferred to read the latest scientific texts and check on his experiments in the conservatory and gardens. As for the rest of the year, itwas spent living with a man who had no time to spare because his duties were too demanding and who thought so little of me that he left me behind.”
Guilt churned and absorbed some of the bitterness created by her abandonment. Sterling had spent little time with his mother before she was gone because he had been at school and his father had demanded his time when he was home. Still, she was their mother and should have been there if one of them needed her.
“Your brothers have written. You are the only one who never did. I assumed you were too busy, now I believe it was because you hated me and I suppose you still do.”
“My brothers wrote?” Was that how she knew that Elliot enjoyed living in Madeira?
“Not until they had completed their schooling, mind you, even though I sent regular letters to them.”
He received letters as well but stopped reading after the first three because she never offered a reason for not living with them. He also never wrote her back because he’d been so angry.
Sterling did not like this at all. He had arrived bitter and determined. Now he experienced guilt for how he had ignored her and sympathy for what she had endured. However, she could also be trying to manipulate his emotions by providing a version of events that suited her better.
It did not matter because she was a mother who had abandoned her children and it did not matter what the circumstances. No, his father should not have left her behind, but that did not excuse her guilt for not returning home.
He set his tea aside and stood. “I think I will bathe and unpack.” He then turned and marched from the sitting room, determined to remain defensive in further conversations because he was not so readily willing to forgive what she had done, nor was it easy to let go of an anger that had festered for eleven years simply because sheoffered an explanation, even if he was guilty of ignoring her.
*
“Do you understandthe importance?” Caroline asked her father.
She took the reports that she had managed to retrieve from the office before coming home and spread them on the dining table. “Wyndham may question you and you must be able to recall what has been in the reports previously sent to him and the accounting.”
“I am not concerned, Caro,” her father responded.
That was the problem. Her father concerned himself with very little. All that mattered were the grapes and the wine. Not the cattle or the milk cows, nor the horses in the stable rarely ridden, nor their garden, which while not vast, fed the family and servants, as did the grove of fruit trees that needed to be cared for, and the chickens and their eggs, and the ducks in the pond, nor even seeing that common repairs were made to an estate that was one hundred and fifty years old.
Sometimes she wondered if he even remembered what else needed his attention as the estate manager. “Please, Father. Read and memorize the reports. They are duplicates of what has been sent to Lord Wyndham.”
“I will,” he promised. “I will read each tonight.”
