Epilogue
The morning sunlight poured in broad, golden bands through the tall, mullioned windows of the Penwood Manor library, brushing the worn spines of leather-bound volumes and illuminating motes of dust that hovered lazily in the quiet air.
Outside, early bees traced erratic paths through the flowering vines just beginning to climb the southern walls, but within, all was calm, ordered, and thoughtful, the way Catherine liked her mornings best.
She sat at the central worktable with a soft shawl draped around her shoulders despite the warm weather. A freshly unwrapped fragment of Romano-British pottery sat in a silk-lined tray before her; its ochre clay still faintly scented with earth.
With delicate care, she turned the shard between her gloved fingers, noting the unusual curvature of the rim and the intricacy of the moulded pattern. The notation parchment beside her already bore several neat lines in her fine script.
Her figure, slightly bowed over the table, revealed the gentle swell of her abdomen beneath the empire waist of her morning gown with unmistakable evidence of the child growing within her.
It made her movements slower these days, her silences more reflective. And yet, despite the months of discomfort and changing rhythms, she had never felt more content.
Across the table, Marcus glanced up from his own work. He had been cataloguing the accompanying fragments, but his pen had stilled mid-line. His gaze lingered on his wife, his expression unreadable to any but her.
When she looked up, she caught him watching her, and her lips curved in a smile that was both knowing and amused.
“You are meant to be examining the tablet, my lord,” she said lightly, arching a brow.
“I am,” he said without apology, leaning back slightly in his chair. “And yet the composition is flawed. The artefact is notable, but the woman holding it rather outshines the find.”
She shook her head, though her smile deepened.
“You flatter outrageously,” she said.
Marcus gave his head a non-negotiable shake.
“Entirely factual,” he said. “You are more radiant than any artefact in this room.”
Catherine gave a soft laugh and dipped her quill once more in ink.
“Do not think I failed to notice your deliberate delay in transcribing the Latin gloss,” she said.
Marcus grinned wickedly.
“I plead distraction,” he said. “Though the culprit is most becoming.”
Catherine laughed heartily.
“Flatter me again, and you shall be left to review the symposium correspondence alone.”
He leaned forward, pressing a kiss to her temple.
“For such a privilege, I would endure it gladly,” he murmured.
She shook her head again but did not protest the affection.
They returned for a time to their work in companionable silence.
The labours of the past year had borne fruit: two co-authored papers for the Society on artefact authentication and regional pottery typologies, both warmly received, bringing with them an invitation to lecture at the March symposium in Bath and a glowing letter from William Hartwell, who praised their partnership as “a marriage of minds, equal in insight and method.” Catherine treasured the phrase.
She had never imagined their skills would prove so well matched—Marcus’s breadth of technical expertise and her own intuitive sense for patterns and social usage. Together, they had reconstructed catalogues that had once confounded entire committees.
“Should we inquire about the Sussex excavation after the naming celebration, do you think?” Marcus asked, glancing over the edge of his current notes.
She nodded thoughtfully.
“We can,” she said. “Although I believe the site’s administrative steward wrote me yesterday with an update. The soil sample results were delayed by weather, but they expect to resume digs by the twenty-ninth.”
He nodded appreciatively.
“I shall need to write Hartley again if we intend to offer commentary on his report,” he said.
Before Catherine could reply, the sound of distant carriage wheels crunched along the gravel approach.
She looked up.
“They are early,” she said.
Marcus’s brow lifted, but a soft smile followed.
“Thomas was ever inclined to punctuality—at least when not confined by court schedule,” he replied.
Catherine giggled again.
“I suspect little Margaret dictates the household hours now,” she said wryly, rising carefully from her seat.
A moment later, Mrs Thornberry appeared in the library doorway.
“Your brother and sister-in-law have arrived, my lady,” she said. “The footmen are attending to the luggage, and I have directed Nurse Ellison to the drawing room for the child’s comfort.”
Catherine inclined her head warmly.
“Thank you, Mrs Thornberry,” she said. “Please show them in.”
The housekeeper stepped aside, and Thomas entered, holding a sleepy bundle wrapped in white linen and lace. His expression brightened the instant he saw her.
“Dear sister,” he greeted with unrestrained affection, crossing the floor in measured steps.
Catherine’s arms lifted in welcome, her heart leaping at the sight of him. Marriage had given her a household of her own, and now—as wife and soon-to-be mother—she was simply his sister again, and she relished it.
“Brother, how I have missed you,” she said.
He did not pause before bending carefully to kiss her cheek, his free arm encircling her in a gentle embrace, cautious not to disturb the child between them.
“You are blooming,” he said with a smile. “I daresay Penwood air has proven restorative.”
Catherine nodded, smiling.
“Scholarly debates in Latin have their charms, but the fresh air certainly contributes,” she said. “And you have brought Margaret.”
“Priscilla would sooner go somewhere without me than without the child,” he said, grinning over his shoulder at his wife, who entered a moment later—regal in her travelling attire, though visibly winded by the stairs.
Priscilla inclined her head in greeting, then fixed her gaze upon the infant in Thomas’s arms.
“She slept most of the way, thank goodness,” she said. “If she learns to endure carriage travel, I may yet attempt a visit to Bath without six valets and a nursemaid’s tribunal.”
Catherine peeked carefully at the sleeping child.
“She is beautiful,” she murmured, peering at the child’s face. “I believe she has your cheeks, Thomas.”
Her brother rolled his eyes, though pride lingered in his smile.
“Poor girl,” he said with mock solemnity. “Perhaps she may at least inherit her mother’s temperament instead.”
Priscilla sniffed.
“Let us hope she inherits no Beaumont stubbornness at all,” she retorted.
There was a pause, then Thomas chuckled.
“We are agreed at last, my dear,” he said.
Catherine laughed, and Marcus came to her side, his hand resting lightly at the small of her back as he inclined his head toward their guests.
“Welcome to you both,” he said. “It is a pleasure to see you again. I trust your journey was uneventful.”
Thomas nodded eagerly.
“Remarkably so,” he said. “Though Margaret may tell another story once she learns to speak of it.”
“Give her ten months, and she will be composing scathing letters to the coach-maker,” Priscilla said dryly.
Catherine laughed aloud.
“I shall look forward to reading them,” she said.
The library, once filled only with the rustle of parchment and the murmur of scholarly debate, now warmed with the gentle noise of family.
And when Marcus returned to her side, his hand finding hers with instinctive care, Catherine gave it a soft squeeze.
It was a life she had scarcely dared to hope for, and yet now she could not imagine any other.
***
The late spring air drifted in through the drawing room windows, carrying the scent of lilac and the distant bleating of lambs along the hills beyond the orchard.
Penwood Manor stood dressed in the colours of May.
Sunlight warmed the stones, ivy climbed new inches up the southern chimney, and bees swept lazily over the herb garden.
Within, laughter and conversation rose from the parlour, where Catherine sat surrounded by faces grown dear to her through shared trials, scholarship, and a kinship forged by time and choice.
Rosalind sat nearest the open window, her ankles tucked neatly beside a tasselled cushion, one hand resting lightly against the curve of her abdomen.
The child was due in August, if Eleanor’s predictions proved correct, and though Rosalind claimed she felt nothing but clumsy these days, she moved with the same unstudied grace Catherine had always admired.
Alexander lingered behind her chair, one hand resting protectively at her shoulder while the other cradled a cup of tea he seemed in no hurry to finish. His presence in the room added a quiet gravity, but his smile softened every glance he offered his wife.
“We have settled on a name,” Rosalind said, with the practised air of someone braced for opinions. “If it is a girl, she will be Susan. If a boy, he will be Julian.”
Catherine’s face brightened.
“Julian was your grandfather’s name, was it not?” she asked.
Alexander nodded.
“A decent man with very little patience for fools and no ambition for Parliament,” he said proudly. “I consider it excellent lineage.”
Rosalind grinned.
“We briefly considered Margaret as a nod to Thomas’s daughter, who has made her opinion of everyone known since mastering a full sentence,” she said.
Catherine laughed, resting her hand across the growing curve of her abdomen.
“Margaret Beaumont is already lobbying for breakfast wine and a dog of her own,” she said. “Thomas swears she will manage Parliament before twelve.”
Rosalind laughed.
“Priscilla is only slightly alarmed by her daughter’s independence,” she said.
Alexander held up a finger with an impish grin.
“Which is to say that Priscilla has written to Margaret’s governess with suggested reading lists and a preferred walking regimen,” he said.
Catherine shook her head fondly and turned her gaze toward the small table at the centre of the room, where letters had arrived earlier by the morning post.
Two bore familiar seals. One of them was from Eleanor Morrison, the other from Beatrice Hartwell.
Catherine reached for the first; Eleanor’s precise script a balm even before the envelope was unsealed.