Her aunt sniffed. “Oh, stop it. You’re going to make me cry. And don’t I look ridiculous enough already, without adding that to my crimes! Beauty… I don’t know where that ever went. Or not mine. It was a girlish thing, not lasting. The bloom on a rose. Butyou…” She squeezed Madelaine’s arm back. “You’ll be beautiful when you’re grey and old…”
“Oh, tosh. Look what a day around ribbons and bows has done to us. Can’t we talk of more sensible things?”
“But itissensible,” her aunt said, a thoughtful frown in her voice. “Or it’s important, anyway. My dearest Maddie…do you think…do you think you might ever marry again?”
Her blood turned cold.
“Seeing that dress today…” her aunt continued, “and all that white muslin and that coral ribbon… Can’t you just imagine it?”
Get married with Alfred’s beads around her neck?
No.
Never.
Not at all.
“I hoped, after a year or two had passed that you might…that you might love again. That you might be blessed with children, with family…”
“I am perfectly content. And as for family, I have more than enough with four brothers still at home or school—and Edmund andhisfour children down the road, and William’s wife expecting any moment.Youare an aunt. You know the joy of it.”
“Oh, yes, yes,” her aunt said quickly. “I adore all my nephews, and my dearest niece most of all! But there is…there is a difference. There is something different about being a mother… And you are still so young…”
“Eight-and-twenty! You call that young?” She laughed, though she was very far from laughing on the inside. She’d been married for two years, and there had been no children. And though, at the time it hadn’t been a concern—Alfred, and Alfred only was her life and joy—when he had gone, she’d wished so very, very desperately, that there had been a baby, a piece of him left behind to live
Even when the letter had come six months after his boat had left England, even when she’d known it to be impossible, she’d vainly hoped against hope that there was some seed miraculously growing inside her, something for her and Alfred’s parents, their only child gone…
But there wasn’t.
Two years and no child… She’d come to wonder whether she was able to produce a baby at all. Perhaps she was barren, as some women were. But the fecundity of her family—seven children!—suggested the issue didn’t lay in her blood. Perhaps it was Alfred, an only child, born late to an older mother…
Or perhaps it was just chance or luck or fate. But there was no child. Would never be.
“Ofcourseit’s young,” her aunt said. “Youare young, Maddie. Young and beautiful, and though I try to keep it to myself, it breaks my heart sometimes to see you with nothing in your life but work and care—near enough a mother to your younger brothers, or a maid…”
“Aunt, my parents have little enough money. You know from your own upbringing how little a country parson earns. And with such a large family… Of course I am happy to help out. More than happy. I have to say… I don’t wish to argue with you, dearest aunt, but can we please change the subject? I do not like this conversation at all.”
“I’m sorry, my love…” Her aunt sniffed again, having to stop now and root through her reticule for a crumpled handkerchief. “And here I go, bawling in public, just like I didn’t want…”
“Oh, Aunt…” Madelaine’s heart wrenched. She squeezed the woman’s shoulder. “I’m not angry. Not really.”
“No, no, it’s me… It’s just me thinking on things I shouldn’t. But ever since Lord Cotereigh came and stirred me up with all this talk of fancy things and high society, it’s been bringing to mind things I haven’t thought of in years… Of being young and what it was like when Charles married me and took me to town, and all the fancy folk I met, and how beautiful everything was… And it made me look at you like I haven’t done in years…andhopelike I haven’t done in years that maybe there’s some new happiness waiting for you—I’ve seen how Reverend Moore looks at you, don’t think that I’m blind; I’ve seen a dozen men look at you, and why wouldn’t they, with you being so lovely, and so deserving…” Her aunt gave another great sniff. “That’s what breaks my heart, Maddie. You deserve so much happiness, and instead, instead…you’ve had…”
She sobbed loudly, face buried in her handkerchief, passersby looking askance. Madelaine steered her to the side of the street, under the awning of a bookseller.
“There, Aunt, there, please… Don’t cry on my behalf. I’m happy. Perfectly happy! And we get along just fine, don’t we? Us two old widows, fixing the world one small brick at a time? It’s not as though we’re living for nought, life passing us by. This world of ribbons and tassels is the frippery, pointless one. I’d be far sadder as some grand lady in my grand house being of no use to anyone. And I’ve more freedom now than I would as any man’s wife. Though I suppose I could be of some use, married to a reverend.”
She saw the long, thin tapping fingers and fought back a shudder. She had no wish to marry the reverend. She had no wish to marry anyone. It was a pointless subject, given she was already married. She’d sworn it—she was Alfred’s until death, herowndeath, and then she would be with him once more. Her life was only a period of waiting, and she would use it as she’d always planned to use it: to leave the world a better place than it had been.
Thatwas what she lived for. For others, not herself. This body, whether it be beautiful, ugly, young, or old, was only a vessel to make helpful things happen. She cared not what it looked like or how it must dress—if blue and white and gold would help her meet her aims, then so be it. She would wear the right dresses and say the right things, smile at the right people. It was all a means to an end.
“Come, dearest, loveliest, aunt.” Shifting her parcels more firmly under her arm, she took hold of her aunt’s elbow with her free hand. “You are hot and tired—what a beastly crowd! But the carriage is only a little further. Let us go home and drink some tea, and we’ll feel much more like ourselves.”
“Will…will you think on it?” her aunt near-whispered as they stepped out once more into the stream of pedestrians. “I could invite Reverend Moore to tea…”
“Aunt, there is nothing to think of.” She hitched her parcels more securely—her arm was beginning to tire. “No man is Alfred, and that’s the end of the matter. No more, please.”
Her aunt nodded, sad, but subsiding.
