Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Thus, the days passed. They had fallen into a routine that was both mundane and peculiar: living in domestic familiarity while maintaining the polite distance of strangers, barely seeing each other during the day, each going about their own lives.
They ate breakfast together, for both rose early, and then they conversed with stiff politeness while he read his mail and she drank her tea.
But most nights he returned late, when Viola had already gone to bed.
One morning, Viola went down to the breakfast room and found it empty; the butler informed her that Mr Fane had already left on an urgent matter pertaining to Parliament.
She drank her tea in silence.
There was one visit she had yet to do that she had postponed for as long as she could. It had been nagging at her since she’d arrived in London. The longer she pushed it away, the greater the weight became upon her shoulders, and she decided the best thing to do was to get it over with.
She sent a footman to Covent Garden for flowers. After he returned with a basket of what she had requested, she donned her pelisse and bonnet and gave instructions to have the carriage brought round.
“To St George’s church,” she told the coachman.
The church was empty. She walked along the side aisle, her eyes searching the wall.
Then she stopped.
There it was.
SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF THE HONOURABLE GEORGE EDWARD FANE LIEUTENANT IN THE 57TH REGIMENT OF FOOT THIRD SON OF THE VISCOUNT OF PENDERYN WHO FELL AT THE BATTLE OF TALAVERA ON THE XXVII DAY OF JULY MDCCCIX AGED XXIV YEARS
BELOVED BY ALL WHO KNEW HIM HE GAVE HIS LIFE IN THE SERVICE OF HIS KING FAR FROM HOME BUT NOT FROM HONOUR
THIS TABLET IS ERECTED BY HIS AFFLICTED FAMILY
She took the wreath out of the basket and placed it beneath the memorial tablet. Her fingers traced the cold marble.
“George, my dear. I am here. Lala.” She paused, gathering her thoughts. “I have come. Finally.” For the first time in nine years.
A vision of George flashed before her, in his red uniform, leaning nonchalantly against the mantelpiece, laughing at her.
“I am so…so…” Tired? Guilty? Full of regret? All of these.
“...sorry.” She nodded. “So very sorry.” She lowered her head. A tear slid down her cheek, and she swiped at it impatiently. “I daresay I should have come earlier, but I was rather busy, and so much has happened…”
The church bell tolled, slow and solemn, and when it stopped, its echo lingered in the silence.
Footsteps approached behind her. Someone stopped at her side.
Her head snapped round, and she drew a startled breath when she saw it was Sebastian.
He took in her stricken face, the wreath of flowers, the tears drying on her cheeks.
“It appears we have had the same thought,” he murmured.
They stood quietly together for a while, staring at the tablet.
“Do you come here…often?” Viola asked.
“Sometimes. When I have to think. It is a good place to be.” He lifted a hand. “When I crave solitude. George would have liked to know what was happening in my life.”
“Ah.” So he came to talk to George. She wondered whether he’d told him everything. Whether he’d told him about her.
Viola repressed a shiver. “Sometimes it still hits me,” she found herself saying. “That George never received any of our letters. That autumn. That day. He was already…”
“Dead,” Sebastian finished. “At Talavera. They say it was one of the bloodiest battles fought on the Peninsula. We thought he had survived. The news that he had not did not reach us for months.”
Months after that fateful day. Weeks after Viola had left Westwood Hall.
Communication from Spain had been catastrophically slow during active campaigning; everything was in disarray, and it was a miracle they had received letters from George at all.
Still, Viola found it difficult to understand why it had taken them so long to notify the family of his death.
By then, Viola had already returned to Scotland.
Sebastian had written to her with the painful news.
She had not replied because something else had happened…
She heard herself speaking again, as if from a great distance.
“George was one of the few people who saw me as I really was. We shared the same ridiculous sense of humour.” She wrapped her arms around herself.
“We met at an assembly ball in Inverness. I was a wallflower, of course; no one wanted to dance with me. But I did not mind. I sat by the wall, watching the others, watching George. He was the handsomest officer at the assembly.” A faint smile crossed her lips.
“What I did not know was that he had been watching me, too. When I left the room, he followed and introduced himself. Shocking, I know. But neither of us ever stood on formality. He asked me to dance, and I refused; I told him I would probably tread on his toes.” She gave a quiet laugh.
“So, he sat with me instead. And we talked.” And talked and talked…
She had been barely sixteen, and the assembly’s handsomest officer had singled her out and spoken to her as though she mattered.
“I used to think George and I were the best of friends. He just understood me like very few people did.”
Sebastian was silent for a long moment. Something crossed his face, too quick for her to read, before his expression shuttered.
“You still love him.”
She looked at him, startled, as though she had half-forgotten he was there. Had she really said all that aloud? To him?
“Well, yes,” she began. “But—”
The church door opened. A group of people entered, their voices echoing off the stone.
Sebastian cast a fleeting glance toward them. He opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it again, then changed his mind and stepped away from her.
Of course.
They were not supposed to know each other. They were supposed to be strangers in public. He couldn’t be associated with someone like her.
They’d agreed to that, and she’d thought it a fine solution.
Yet, somehow, it hurt to see him step away from her like that, as if being seen with her was an embarrassment. A bitter taste entered her mouth.
He gave her a curt nod and turned away.
Viola pulled her shawl tighter and remained sitting a while longer, with bowed head.
“You see, George, things did not at all turn out the way I expected them to. If I could do it all over again, I would…I would…”
What would she do exactly?
Love him more?
Love him less?
Not run when she did?
“Ah, George, George...” She’d run because of him, hadn’t she?
With a weary sigh, she rose and walked toward the entrance.
Outside, it had begun to rain again. She opened her umbrella and looked down the street, but of course he had already disappeared.
The next day, she took the carriage to Lady Penworthy’s home, for that afternoon she was to join her secret book club that was meant for ladies only.
In truth, she did not know what to expect.
When she arrived, Lady Penworthy hurried towards her with both hands extended. “What a pleasure to have you join today! You will see, you will enjoy this immensely.”
Viola hoped she would, but she had her doubts.
There were only four more women present: two older ladies and two around Lady Penworthy’s age. Lady Penworthy introduced Viola, and they appeared welcoming and kind. They were so talkative that it was unnecessary for Viola to say much, so she decided to just sit back and listen.
They were discussing Selina Sable’s The Monk and The Maiden.
Viola sat stiffly in her chair, in a circle, clasping the copy of her own book, a smile pasted on her mouth, nodding at whatever the ladies were saying.
“The monk, of course, is a universal metaphor for the maiden’s externalised sense of terror, anxiety, and desperation, juxtaposed to the ever present sense of female helplessness—which she overcomes.
Like Wollstonecraft writes, it is the female condition overall that the author so explicitly and expertly portrays in the book, of paralysis and fear.
She vanquishes it triumphantly. It is so brilliantly done… ”
Viola had absolutely no idea what they were talking about, but she supposed it did not hurt to agree with them.
“What do you think, Lady Viola? Do you think the author intended that universal metaphor which appeals to us all?”
All eyes were on her. “Ah. Err. Yes. Definitely so. Horror and fear. These are, huh, truly fearful feelings.” Goodness.
Just because she wrote a book did not mean that she really knew whatever kind of universal metaphor she’d used in it.
Accidentally, no doubt. As far as she knew, she just enjoyed writing the silly story.
She wrote it to entertain herself, and she wanted her readers to enjoy it as well.
That was all. Truly. “The maiden was very much afraid of the monk,” she concluded lamely.
The ladies nodded.
After an hour of such talk, Viola was thoroughly exhausted. When it was finally over, she rose gladly, ready to leave, ready to never ever attend one of those sessions again.
But Lady Penworthy held her back by taking her hand. “I so enjoyed having you here. I feel you brought another level of insight to our circle, and I would very much like it if you could repeat it with us.”
Viola’s smile was strained, and she did not know what to reply. She enjoyed Lady Penworthy’s friendship, but not necessarily these book clubs that left her feeling awkward and put on the spot.
“I should like to chat more with you, for there is so much to say! But, alas, I must go to Parliament now. There is an important debate happening, and I have promised Sir William that I would listen in so I can advise him on it later.” She leaned in with a wink.
“He only votes for what I tell him to, you know.”
Viola’s head snapped up. “Parliament? But I thought women were not allowed in there.”
“Indeed,” she smiled mischievously. “But we have found a way where we can listen in on their debates without being seen. Would you like to come along?”