Dearly Beloved

  "Then he must learn to fall properly."

  Diana turned to Gervase, her face indecisive. He stopped also and took her hands, holding them between his. "You'll be here several weeks—let him learn the basics of horsemanship. I'll teach him myself if you like. There will never be a better time. He's a good age to begin learning, and your fears aren't likely to be any less in the future."

  As she hesitated, he added persuasively, "There is some risk, but life is full of risks. Even though he is obedient now, eventually he will resent you if you try to hold him too close. Isn't that a danger as great as any physical one?"

  She bowed her head and nodded, staring down at their joined hands as her chilled fingers warmed between his palms. Gervase's words forced her to face thoughts she would rather ignore. Would it be a blessing or a disaster to let the most important males in her life get to know each other better?

  She consulted her intuition, but her emotions were too involved for her to get a clear answer. Geoffrey might be hurt riding, yet he craved the attention of a grown man so much. How could she deny it to him when Gervase was willing?

  Sensing that she was wavering, Gervase said softly, "I won't let any harm come to him, Diana."

  "You are very good," she said in a low voice. "Much better than I deserve."

  "On the contrary," he said, his voice dispassionate. "I am the one who is undeserving."

  She glanced up then, wondering what thoughts lay behind that austerely handsome face. When she had first seen him at Harriette Wilson's, she had been both attracted and frightened by his aura of tightly focused power. She had soon discovered that he was quite different from what she expected, that behind that cool mask lay a man who could be both generous and sensitive. Yet she was always surprised by his kindness, perhaps because she never expected kindness from men.

  He might never speak words of love, but his deeds, his protectiveness and reliability, were far more precious. She was glad that he was worthy of love, for she could not help loving him. Standing on her toes, she kissed him lightly. She lingered a moment, feeling his lips warming under hers, then withdrew and whispered, "Thank you, Gervase."

  He had such beautiful eyes, light and clear like winter sky. Gervase was an honorable man and she was behaving less than honorably to him. Once more, she considered revealing her past.

  Once more, in her fear of destroying the sweetness of the moment, the opportunity passed.

  Chapter 13

  Since time was limited and the weather unlikely to improve, the riding lessons began that very afternoon. After consulting with his head groom, the viscount arranged to borrow a well-trained, docile pony from a tenant whose children had outgrown it. His face taut with excitement, Geoffrey was thrilled speechless, a state Gervase didn't expect to last long.

  On the viscount's advice, Diana was not present for a lesson that could only be nerve-racking for her. They started in the barn, with hay piled belly-deep around the pony. As Dapple munched in contentment, Geoffrey practiced falling, learning how to tuck his body and roll, how to relax and minimize the chances of injury. The boy took it as great good sport, hurling himself down into the hay with squeals of delight, until tumbling into a ball started to become habit.

  The next stage was learning to hold a secure seat, and Gervase made the boy bend, twist, and turn in every direction. The trick was to stay in the saddle without touching the reins. Inevitably Geoffrey sometimes bent too far, which gave him more chances to practice falling.

  After an hour and a half, Gervase judged that his hay-covered student had had enough for the first day, and they repaired to the nursery for tea with the rest of the party. The next day they progressed to walking the pony around the paddock, with part of the path through an area padded with hay. Gervase would unpredictably push the boy off on some of the circuits. The hay was thinner than it had been inside, and the falling not as soft, but Geoffrey took it all with undiminished enthusiasm.

  The viscount had originally offered the lessons as a way of expiating his guilty conscience, but he found he enjoyed them almost as much as Geoffrey. It was impossible not to respect the child's resilience and good nature, and Gervase was beginning to appreciate him in his own right, rather than just as Diana's son. It was even possible to forget the nagging questions about the boy's father, and what that man had meant to Diana.

  Watching his student carefully, Gervase observed several of the staring spells, when Geoffrey's eyes would slip out of focus and his words would stop in mid-sentence if he was speaking. Fortunately for his riding future, his body didn't slacken and his knees and hands remained firm through the duration of the spells. Unless he was moving at a gallop, the petit mal seizures might never cause a significant problem. Perhaps not even then, though jumping would be a different story.

  With a mixture of pleasure and embarrassment, the viscount realized that the boy was starting to develop a kind of hero worship for his teacher, striving to please, repeating his words to others, even copying gestures and movements. Since Geoffrey had no father, it was natural for him to become attached to a man whom he saw much of. Gervase felt heartily unfit for a pedestal, but supposed he could appear worthy for three short weeks.

  The first lessons were held in the early afternoon, when the day was apt to be warmest, but the day before Christmas they went out in the morning so Geoffrey could help gather greens later. That session gave Gervase a brief, horrifying glimpse of what Diana had lived with for years.

  Geoffrey was making rapid progress, and this morning Gervase held the pony with a long rein, directing it in circles first to the right, then to the left. They were halfway through the lesson when Geoffrey said, very distinctly, "Damn!" He pulled on his snaffle reins, then slid from the pony's saddle as it halted.

  Before Gervase could question why he had stopped, Geoffrey's body arched back in the first stage of seizure, hurling him onto the soft ground as he made horrible gagging sounds. The other time he had been present at a seizure, Gervase had been a spectator. This time, he was the only person around, and responsible for the boy's welfare.

  Yelling for a groom, he released the startled pony and raced across the paddock to Geoffrey's side. Although he knew the fit was unlikely to harm the boy, it was impossible not to feel primitive panic at the sight of the violent convulsion. There was nothing he could do but wait until the seizure was over, and ensure that Geoffrey didn't hit anything that would injure him.

  After a minute of so, Geoffrey relaxed and his breathing returned to normal. The change was so dramatic that it was easy to understand why seizures had been considered demonic possession in the old days. The deep blue eyes were dazed, but the boy knew what had happened. Apologetically he murmured, "I'm sorry, sir." The long dark lashes, so like Diana's, fluttered. "If you help me back on Dapple, I'll do better."

  As an example of pluck, it was hard to beat. Swallowing the tightness in his throat, Gervase brushed at the dirt on the boy's face, then said casually, as if having a lesson interrupted by a fit was perfectly normal, "I think that's enough for this morning, old man. If you don't get some rest, you might miss the Christmas Eve celebration."

  Still hazy, Geoffrey nodded agreeably as the viscount scooped him up and carried him back to the house. The boy had slipped into a doze by the time they reached the nursery. As Gervase was laying him on his bed, Diana arrived, alerted by a servant, her eyes wide with apprehension. Gervase said reassuringly, "Nothing to worry about. He just had a seizure, not a riding accident. A little rest and he'll be fine."

  Relaxing, Diana took charge of preparing her son for bed as Gervase left to wait for her in the old schoolroom next door. After ten minutes she emerged, no longer alarmed but with signs of strain in her face.

  He took advantage of the fact that no one was around to give her a quick comforting hug. "Something very interesting happened. Apparently Geoffrey knew he was going to have a fit. He reined in the pony and dismounted before it began. If he can always do that, riding may be no more dan
gerous for him than for anyone else."

  "Really?" Diana's eyebrows shot up. "He seems to be telling you things about his seizures that he never told me." A slightly querulous note was in her musical voice.

  "Perhaps he thinks he has already told you." Gervase paused, remembering what Geoffrey had told him. "Or perhaps he hasn't spoken because he knows you don't like talking about his epilepsy."

  Diana's jaw tightened as she faced the idea that her son was unwilling to discuss something with her. Gervase added gently, "Not because he is afraid of you, but because he doesn't want to hurt you. It's common to try to protect those one loves."

  It was very tactfully put. Diana slid an arm around his waist and leaned her head against his shoulder for a moment. "You're perceptive for a man with little experience of children."

  His arm tightened. "I don't know about children in general, but Geoffrey and I seem to understand each other tolerably well."

  "I'm glad." Without looking up at him, Diana asked hesitantly, "Do you ever think about having children yourself?"

  He stiffened and pulled away from her. "I sincerely hope that this is a theoretical discussion?"

  It took a moment for her to realize what he meant. Then she laughed and crossed the schoolroom to perch on one of the battered birch desks that generations of Brandelins had occupied.

  "I have no reason to suppose that I'm breeding. Whenever I am near you, I take precautions." She gazed through her long eyelashes flirtatiously. "I have learned from experience that anything might happen, at any time, and I had best be prepared."

  He relaxed at her teasing words. Then, because she was very interested in the answer, Diana returned to her earlier question. "Have you never wished for children of your own? At the very least, most men in your position want an heir to carry on the name; some men even want children for their own sakes."

  His face shuttered instantly. "There is no place in my life for children." Briefly she saw a flicker of expression that she couldn't interpret—anger, perhaps, or regret?—but his voice was flat when he said, "My line is flawed and deserves extinction. There are other heirs, more worthy ones."

  His harsh words chilled her. What could cause him to repudiate the very thought of children? Was there madness in his family, or some other affliction that had skipped him, but which might reappear in his offspring?

  Quietly she said, "As you told me two days ago, there are risks to all living. Is your blood so tainted that you would forgo the chance to discover what a child of yours would be like? Have you never wished to share your experience, or to rediscover the world through young eyes?"

  A spasm of uncontrollable emotion crossed his face. "I do not choose to discuss this with you," he said brusquely. "Now or ever."

  His words could not have been clearer, and it was a line she dared not cross. But though he might try to withdraw into his practiced detachment, she sensed some of his feelings through the invisible bond that connected them. That connection thrummed with tension, like a tether drawn too tightly. Diana felt his pain, both the hurt of their conflict and an older, deeper wound she could not begin to understand.

  There was nothing to be gained, and much to be lost, by pursuing the point, so she bowed her head in submission. The desk she sat on had been carved by generations of bored students, and she skimmed her hand over the corner, where the words "St. Aubyn" appeared in precise letters that slanted downward. Carved by Gervase, or a more distant Brandelin? What had Gervase been like as a child? Grave, certainly, and conscientious.

  She said musingly, "Did you know that bees in their hives are said to hum the Hundredth Psalm on Christmas Eve? And they say farm beasts speak of the glorious coming among themselves, but woe betide the human who tries to overhear them."

  Gervase was no more fond of discord between them than she was, and he grasped at the change of subject. "I never heard about the bees. I always thought that during the winter they hibernated or some such."

  He strolled to the window set low under the eaves, glancing out at the sunless morning. The grayness of the light gave his face the cool tones of a marble statue. "Here in Warwickshire, the story is that on Christmas Eve the farm animals turn east at midnight and bow in homage to the newborn king."

  Diana gave a ripple of laughter. "What wonderful things to have happen on the night of your birth."

  He glanced back with pleased surprise. "You remembered."

  "Of course." Then, tentatively, "I have birthday presents for you. I was going to wait until tonight, but it will be late when we retire, and it won't be your birthday anymore."

  Gervase looked startled, as if far more used to giving than receiving. "Perhaps now would be best."

  "Very well," Diana said, glad to have those moments of strain so easily set aside. "Shall we go down to my room?"

  Downstairs, she checked to be sure that the corridor was clear before beckoning her host into her bedchamber. He had always entered by the secret door before, and this seemed rather daring. Once inside, she went to her wardrobe and brought out a man's dressing gown, a richly luxurious one in dark blue velvet, nearly floor-length to protect against drafts.

  As he accepted it, she said, "I made it from this fabric because it's marvelously soft. I expect that you never pamper yourself much, so I wanted to."

  He smiled and thanked her as he stroked the velvet, feeling its sensuousness on the sensitive skin of his palm. Diana was right, he would never have chosen this fabric himself, but it had a welcoming warmth, much like Diana herself. And he was deeply pleased that she had made the robe with her own hands.

  She continued shyly, "I thought... it might be convenient for you to keep it at my house. Since you are there so often."

  It was a backhanded confirmation that he had a regular place in her life, and it made the gift even better. He thanked her with a kiss, the folds of robe crushing between them. Her mouth welcomed him, but before he could get too involved she pulled away. "There is something else."

  She went to the wardrobe again and brought out a flat rectangle about two feet square, wrapped in silver paper. Gervase undid it carefully, then caught his breath when he saw what lay within. He held a framed map of the Kingdom of Prester John, beautifully detailed with fanciful beasts and tiny drawings of imagined wonders.

  The map was very old, exquisitely drawn and colored, and must be valuable, but it meant much more than that, and for a moment he was too touched to speak. That she should have remembered that conversation about boyish dreams...

  He glanced up to see her regarding him anxiously, hoping that she had pleased him. "It's beautiful, Diana. More than that..." He stopped, then said slowly, "These are the two most personal gifts anyone has ever given me. Thank you."

  Her smile was as lovely as the dawn. "I'm so glad. I wanted to give you something that would be special."

  Laying the map on the table, he drew her to him for another kiss, one hand cradling the back of her neck, the other firm on her lower back as he felt the delicacy and strength of her. After a long, languorous interval, he said in the intimate voice he used only in the bedroom, "There is another present you can give me, which will be very special indeed and could only be given by you. We have almost an hour until luncheon is served."

  Her rich laughter filled the room. "Lock the door, my love, and I shall rejoice in giving it to you."

  * * *

  That evening was a family Christmas unlike any Gervase had ever known. Diana and her entourage could have been a closed circle, excluding him even in his own home; instead, in subtle ways he was drawn in and made welcome.

  The women had decorated the morning room with greens, male mistletoe and female ivy, prickly holly with bright scarlet berries. A Yule log burned in the wide fireplace and Diana had made a kissing bough, the traditional centerpiece of the Christmas festivities. It hung from the ceiling, its twined double hoops covered with greenery and adorned with candles and tiny ornaments cut from gold foil.

  Geoffrey had made "Christma
s pieces" for each of the adults, including Gervase. They were a traditional schoolchild project, and the bright bits of colored paper offered compliments of the season in the boy's best copperplate script. Gervase was unexpectedly moved both at the thought and at the boy's pleasure in having his work well-received.

  After the formal dinner, the servants retired to their own celebration in the servants' hall, leaving the lord of the manor and his guests to play Christmas games such as snapdragon. In his lavish, lonely childhood, Gervase had never discovered the simple pleasures of sitting in a darkened room and trying to pull raisins drenched in brandy from their bed of low blue flames without hurting one's fingers.

  Geoffrey was delighted to teach an ignorant adult the "Song of Snapdragon." (With his blue and lapping tongue, many of you will be stung, Snip! Snap! Dragon!)

  Simple pleasures to most people, but entirely new to Gervase. They sat and laughed and told stories as they drank hot lamb's-wool and ate tiny mince pies, fragrant with spices, the rich, warm crusts crumbling in the fingers. Edith had unexpected skill as a storyteller, holding the others rapt with tales from the old mummers' plays, acting out characters such as St. George, the Turkish Knight, and Ginger Breeches.

  There was no bedtime on Christmas Eve, and Geoffrey finally succumbed to sleep with his head on his mother's lap. It was Gervase who carried him up to his bed in the nursery, waiting while the boy was tucked into his bed, his face angelic and trusting. Afterward he also carried Diana to her bed, but with her he stayed, and they laughed and pleasured each other in the most ancient of all celebrations of life.

  * * *

  The days passed swift and timeless. Diana had never seen Gervase so relaxed. When they first became lovers he had been reserved, touching her only with desire, but now he was becoming affectionate in private, though he maintained complete propriety in public. He liked to have her near, and mornings when he studied dispatches delivered from London, she sat at the far end of the library within his sight as she went over lessons with Geoffrey.