Out with Lanterns, page 26
When all five of them had discussed how the work might continue in Ophelia’s absence and worried through things she might face at her father’s house, the other women retired to bed. In the dark kitchen, Silas rose and stood behind her chair.
“I wish I didn’t have to go back to the estate,” she into the dark room. “I’d like to let him vanish without a single thought . . . but I’ve accused him of ignoring the people and the estate, and it would be wrong of me to do the same thing. As far as I know, I am all that remains of our family, and I think that might mean that I will inherit the estate,” she said, the thought so absurd she wanted to laugh. “What am I supposed to do with that now, Silas?”
“It feels like a right bloody mess at the moment,” Silas said soothingly, his strong fingers pressing into the knots of her shoulders. “I suppose there is more to it than I understand, but we can figure it out.”
She nodded, miserable. It felt strange and empty to be utterly alone, the only one left from her small, unhappy family.
She rested her head back against Silas and let the sadness wash over her.
“Would you like me to come with you, Fee?”
She wanted to say yes, but knew she couldn’t. “I want you to come, but it’s more important that you stay to meet the War Ag requirements, Silas. We only have a few weeks until the inspection, and I can’t even think about leaving Mrs. Darling without your help. Promise me you’ll stay?”
“I promise, but I’m worried sick about you going on your own, Fee.”
“I’ll be fine, Silas. It’s only the estate, not the other side of the world, and without my father, there’s no threat to me. But I will write, I promise. I should be there tomorrow night, and I will send word when I have a sense of how long it all might take. A fortnight, I should think.”
“Thank you.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I miss you already,” he whispered against her hair, before leaving through the kitchen door.
Ophelia sat looking across the table at the stove, not seeing the bright embers fade to ash, while her tea grew cold in the cup. She wanted to soak up every second she could of this house, the farm. She was afraid to leave Mrs. Darling’s farm, worried that it was the talisman that prevented her from being swallowed up by the estate. She felt safe here and didn’t want to give that up to face her father’s mess. Finally, hours later, she stood, legs stiff, chest tight, and instead of climbing the stairs, crept to Silas’s room in the barn. She shed her uniform and climbed under the eiderdown. He hugged her to his warm body, chest to back, and she fell asleep to the sound of his breath in her hair.
CHAPTER 36
The first days of Ophelia’s absence were hard enough, but by the time the second week was crawling toward him, Silas felt he might go mad. He missed her at all hours of the day, inconveniently; the sound of the horses in their traces reminded him of her capability, the empty chair at meals, her conversation, the Ophelia-scented spot on his pillow, her body under his. It was all a bloody disaster. Her letters had come, just as she promised, but they spoke mostly of the tangle of the estate. Her father had gambled away much of the land, and the estate was in significant debt. She wrote that Mr. Bone was looking through her father and mother’s wills and had promised to have news within a few days. Silas hoped that at least that part of her family might be straightforward.
A new letter sat waiting for him when he returned for lunch from the field where he was repairing fences. His heart lifted to see Ophelia’s handwriting and he broke the seal quickly.
Dear Silas,
I received your letter by the afternoon post the day before last and have been carrying it with me so that I might reread it at my leisure. It seems to me that if you are unable to make a living farming, there is good potential for you as a romantic novelist; your words made me positively shiver. I miss you more than I thought possible; everything here reminds me of you and what you sacrificed for my sake. I wish we could take one of our old walks and talk everything through. I await word from Mr. Bone, but in the meantime, Mrs. Greene and I are packing up the house and putting aside anything that might be of value to be sold. It is a sobering thing to be here again under these circumstances, and I can’t help but wish that this house, the land, might be put to better use than it has been under my father. I will write as soon as I hear from Mr. Bone.
Yours, yours, yours,
Ophelia
PS: Give my love to Bess, Hannah, and Mrs. Darling.
He tucked it into the pocket of his trousers, sliding the slim paper down against his thigh so it wouldn’t slip out while he was working. Finishing the last bite of his bread, he was rising from the table when Bess and Hannah came into the kitchen. They clattered about pouring tea, cutting bread and cheese, settling themselves at the table.
“Any letter today?” Hannah asked. “You and Ophelia are surely keeping the Royal Mail in business lately.”
Bess and Silas laughed. “One from her today, as it happens.”
“How are things progressing with the estate?” Bess asked.
“About the same, it seems. She and Mrs. Greene are making headway and there’s no word from Mr. Bone yet. She said she misses you all,” he added. “It’s hard for her to be there alone, all those bad memories.”
“I know Ophelia a little now, and she’s not one to shirk her duties,” said Bess.
“There’s more than just her father’s death in those buildings,” said Hannah. “She’ll be properly closing the door on her old life, if I had to guess.”
Silas nodded, trying to understand the shorthand that seemed to pass between the friends. He should have understood from their conversations that Ophelia would want to finish this off neatly; it was not only the bad memories of her father there, but also her mother’s legacy. He had thought that he might take on the burdens of her life for her; take on her father, protect her from what Merritt was capable of doing to hurt her, but she didn’t need him to shield her from her life. Ophelia needed him to support her in it, to take the journey with her, not instead of her. He wanted to tell her that he understood now, and that he could see that he needed her beside him, too. The war and his injury had shattered his confidence, made him doubt what he had to offer, but in his time on the farm, he had realized that he could be flexible, could adopt new ways of thinking, understand his role as a man differently.
“You’re right, Hannah,” he said, something coalescing in his mind. “And I want to be there with her when she opens the door to her new one.”
“Course you do.” Hannah’s smile was crooked and kind. “Been wondering when you’d realize it.”
“You could be there and back in two days, so the inspection could still go as planned. If we keep the horses fed and watered while you’re away, we could pick up again as soon as you’re back,” Bess offered.
“Thank you both so much.”
“We’re happy to.” She lifted her teacup to Silas in a mock salute and winked.
He laughed and returned the gesture. “Best speak with Mrs. D. about this, then.”
The following morning, they all breakfasted together, reminding each other of any tasks that needed looking to while both he and Ophelia were away. Mrs. Darling seemed as excited and nervous as he felt and kept assuring herself that he had everything he needed. Silas returned to the house from his room with his satchel to find Hannah standing at the kitchen door. She had an odd look on her face.
“What is it, Hann—” he began.
“I don’t know if you’ve need of a token,” Hannah blurted, cheeks pink, “but I thought this might be useful.” She pushed a thin silver band into Silas’s hand. “’Twas mine when I were in the movement in London, and I thought Ophelia might appreciate the sentiment. Only if you feel the same, o’ course,” she added hastily.
Silas looked at the slender band in his palm, noticing an inscription on the inside of the metal. Lifting it, he made out “deeds not words” in minute script. He looked up to Hannah’s face, stern, but also expectant, with a softness in her eyes that he was beginning to notice more often.
“It’s lovely, Hannah . . . I don’t know what to say. Are you sure you’re willing to part with it?”
“I’m sure,” she said, pressing his hand closed around it. “Ophelia is lucky to be loved by you, for you do love her, don’t you?” She waved her hand when his face heated. “It’s none of my business, really, but it was a new beginning for me when I got this ring, perhaps it can be the same for the two of you?”
He thought about this silver encircling Ophelia’s finger, about what it meant to belong to another person, how one might ask another to share themselves, their future, their body. He wondered if a ring like this, given in friendship, could be a token of something new, not a marriage born of the past? It occurred to him that he might offer his protection not to provision a house or shield Ophelia from strife, but to provide room for her to be herself, to discover all she could be in a world that wanted to infringe on her with demands and expectations. Perhaps, he could be her champion instead of her husband. Silas wondered what she imagined their future might look like without the bonds of marriage. He tended to be more comfortable with known situations, boundaries he could see, and this was one more instance where Ophelia was asking him to step out into the void with her. To his surprise, he found himself excited to ask her what she saw for them. He felt himself smiling, a bloom of warmth spreading through his chest.
“Thank you,” he said with a laugh. He grasped her strong hand in his and squeezed. “Thank you, Hannah.”
She nodded, smiling broadly. “You’re a good man, Silas Larke. To be sure, men are not of interest to me generally, but in you I begin to see the appeal.”
Silas slipped the ring in his waistcoat pocket, picked up his case, and nodding to Hannah, hurried out the door. He could hear Mrs. Darling and Bess calling “Good luck!” as he headed down the drive.
CHAPTER 37
It took a good part of the day to reach Wood Grange and the sun was sitting low in the sky as Silas headed along the long drive up to the estate house. His body sparked with nervous energy, the long train ride not having dissipated any worries he had about speaking with Ophelia. He moved steadily onward, passing along hedgerows and fields as familiar as the back of his own hands. The ancient oak that marked the turn past his family’s house and down toward the big house loomed ahead, and Silas felt grateful he had seen his mother so recently. The weight of the tenancy had been a heavy one, and it felt wonderful to know that Samuel and his mother were tucked into their house, safe and secure as they should be. He couldn’t wait to be able to visit them again without the spectre of Blackwood hanging over them.
Right now, he needed to find Ophelia and tell her that he loved her. The words he had been turning over in his mind the entire train journey ricocheted around his chest like caged birds. This desperate aching need to be near her, to watch her work and laugh, to touch her whenever she was within reach. It seemed so obvious now; how could he have mistaken it for anything else? He laughed aloud, his voice ringing in the country afternoon, and did an awkward little jig step, his body suddenly impossibly light. Passing under the oak, he lengthened his stride, covering the distance to the main house as quickly as possible. He arrived at the front door slightly out of breath and thinking it unlikely any of the staff was still about, turned toward the high green hedge that enclosed the kitchen garden at the side of the house. The wooden plank door in the hedge opened on silent hinges, but when he let go of the handle and stepped through, the door swung wide and crashed into a stack of terra-cotta pots, toppling them with a smash. A shriek drew his attention. On the bench under a window, nearly hidden by the wisteria slowly taking over the first floor of the house, was Ophelia, her knees still drawn up to avoid being hit by the avalanche of pots. She looked horrified, her cheeks hot, her eyes reddened.
“Fee?” Silas stammered, caught off guard. Relief crashed through his body and it took every ounce of restraint not to crush her to him.
“Silas!” she cried in surprise and bolted up from her seat on the bench.
“I know you don’t need me here, but I had to see you, Fee,” he said, still trying to find his bearings. Words rising to his lips almost faster than he could think them through. “The longer you were gone, the less I could bear that you were facing this task without knowing . . .”
She walked toward him. “Without knowing what?”
He tried to recover some of his composure, but his heart was banging at his ribs and he didn’t think he had ever seen anything as beautiful as Ophelia standing in this abandoned kitchen garden. She had disposed of her WLA uniform and wore a grey pinstriped skirt he recognized from before. An embroidered shawl hung loose around her shoulders, a whitework blouse buttoned primly up the side of her elegant neck. He wanted to reach out and touch her cheek so badly his fingers itched. The stood awkwardly for a moment before Silas remembered what he had come to say.
“I’ve had almost a fortnight to think and I realized how wrong I’ve been; I haven’t been able to let go of the idea of protecting you, clung too hard to what’s past. I was afraid this injury had broken me, that I couldn’t protect you, and what good was I then? It blinded me to what I can offer; companionship, a champion in equality, a promise to withstand the storms beside you. I can shield your dreams, help you with the privilege of this body, scarred as it is. Until women’s bodies and minds command the same respect as men’s, I will use mine in your stead.”
Silas took a deep breath and met Ophelia’s eyes. She was watching him, taking everything in, her grey eyes cloudy and uncertain.
“The thing is, Fee . . . I don’t care about the land, certainly not the way I care for you. I’ll walk away and not look back, we can start somewhere new . . . anywhere you choose. You are everything to me. I love you.”
He felt her gasp and then her hands were reaching for him, and she was looking at him, surprise and joy warring in her eyes.
“This summer you taught me we can make anything we want, a family, a farm, a partnership, or nothing at all but two bodies pressed together for a space of hours.”
“Silas,” Ophelia breathed, tears pooling in her eyes. A silvery trail snaked down one cheek and slid into the crook of her smile. “Say it again. Say it all again.” She laughed and reached for the collar of his coat to pull him toward her. “I don’t want what your parents or mine had, and you’re right that I don’t wish you to live like a shadow, hovering around me in case something goes wrong. It will, probably many, many times and all I want is you right beside me, facing it all together.”
Silas leaned forward, his mouth millimetres from Ophelia’s, feeling the warmth of their breath mingling between their mouths. “I can do that. I want that,” he whispered.
She let go of his lapel to reach a hand up to his face, pushing a few strands of hair back off his forehead, then running her palm down the plane of his cheek and along his jaw. He growled in satisfaction, wanting to push into her cupped hand like a house cat.
“Come here,” she said and pulled him to her, arms surprising and strong around his back.
Silas laughed and wrapped both arms around her, feeling his blood leap at the long, lithe body pressed eagerly against his.
“God, but I love you, Silas Larke. Thank you for coming all this way to tell me,” she said with a glorious smile.
“I’d go to the ends of the earth, Fee. Truly.”
“I know, but luckily you only had to go across Somerset.” And then she pressed up on her toes and kissed him.
CHAPTER 38
Ophelia smiled against Silas’s lips and pulled her arms tighter around his broad back. He felt heavenly; warm and solid, the linen of his shirt and waistcoat rumpled from travel, his cheek against her hair rough with a day’s stubble. It all spoke to the rush in which he had left the farm, a rush to find her, and Ophelia couldn’t help the flush of happiness that unwound in her chest. She slid her arms farther up Silas’s back to loop them around his neck and deepened their kiss. He sighed into her mouth and tightened his grip on her, lifting her right off her feet. She liked the feeling of weightlessness and wriggled against him, trying to get even closer. Silas drew back, his eyes impossibly dark green.
“God’s sake, woman, I love you, but I’ll not ravish you in public,” he said.
“As it happens, I know this place quite well. There’s a nice quiet spot just back here,” she said, looking back at him with what she hoped was a saucy smile.
The kitchen garden had an air of elegant abandonment; the leafy structure of boxwood and yew topiary still visible among perennials gone to seed, the fruit trees left unpruned. But the sturdy oak bench still sat by the back door, and it was here that Ophelia guided him. Silas sat down, taking in the garden, and she knew he was seeing the bones still there under the overgrown shrubs and bolting perennials. He turned to her and she squeezed his hand. She looked down at their hands twined on his thigh, the woollen fabric pulled tight against the muscles of his leg. He rubbed his thumb down the length of hers sending a flash of desire through her.
“How have you found it, being back here?”
The damp of the garden bench wound through the thin layers of her skirts and Ophelia missed the feeling of her legs in trousers, missed the movement available in her WLA uniform. She felt smaller and more vulnerable in these clothes.
“It is hard,” she admitted. “After we finished packing up the things that might be sold, I suggested Mrs. Greene take a week or so to visit family. I paid her as much as I could to cover her time away, but there’s not really much to pay her with, honestly.”
