Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
David tried to shut the door behind him slowly, carefully, but it seemed to snap shut with a bang, nonetheless.
Leaning against the wood, eyes unseeing the small bedchamber before him, he let out his breath in a slowly, jagged sigh.
Well, that could have gone worse.
Couldn’t it? He tried desperately to think of a worse scenario than the one he had encountered downstairs. Louisa could have…she could have refused to talk to him. She could have shied away from him, refused to be in the same room. She could have cried. Shouted. Something like that.
Try as he might, David could not entirely convince himself. Yes, she could have refused to speak with him – but in a way, wasn’t what she said worse?
“And I will come down for dinner, and perhaps, if I am fortunate, continue to make amends to you and your mother?”
“I think not.”
David’s head hung miserably. He had hurt her, truly hurt her; perhaps more deeply than he had expected. She was always so bright, so elegant, so cheerful. Always had been, as long as he had known her.
It was rather a shock to find that the agony he had endured at their separation had been felt equally, it appeared, by her.
Yes, she could have shied away from him, refused his presence…but was his heart not more greatly bruised by seeing her so discomforted by him? If he had merely been forced away from her, he would not have seen just how desperately sad she was by being near him.
She had not cried, but then Louisa was never the crying sort.
A wry smile crept across David’s face as he sighed again, and stepped into the bedchamber. Well, it certainly could have been worse – but it also could have been better.
David tried to push aside the hopes and dreams which had been growing with every mile he had travelled from Austria to get here.
Visions of Louisa launching herself into his arms, declaring that she had never forgotten him, and bore him no ill will.
Visions of kissing those sweet lips once again…
David threw himself onto the bed and stared up at the ceiling. Well, he had been a fool to get his hopes up at all, he supposed, and this was the right punishment for such laxity. If he had even attempted to be realistic, then surely he would have never had such heightened expectations.
As it was…
But it did not matter. He had the entirety of Advent to see if he could break down the walls put up by Lady Louisa and her mother – though he would admit, the mother would probably be more difficult to win over than the daughter.
Lady Jarrold was, rightly, rather protective of her daughter.
“Had I known it was you…Archduke Nelson, indeed. I would certainly have…if I had known – ”
David’s stomach twisted painfully. Well, he had to take the positives where he could find them, he supposed. They had not thrown him from the house, though he doubted there were sufficient servants in the place to separate him from Louisa if he really put his mind to it.
For a moment, the rather odd image of Lady Jarrold pitching him from the front door flashed through his mind, and his wry smile reappeared again.
But it was gone in an instant. He had not come back here to amuse himself, to treat this entire situation as a jest.
No, this Advent he had but one thing in mind, one aim, one goal, even if it was rather radical and unlikely to succeed. He would win back the heart of Lady Louisa Jarrold. Precisely how…well, he had assumed that the ideas would come to him once he was here.
What he had not accounted for, of course, was just how easily his mind was overwhelmed by Louisa. The look of her, the smell of her, the way he wanted to reach out and touched her.
“Are you in dire need of mistletoe, David?”
David’s stomach lurched most painfully, his heart skipping a beat. No, he could not think of that. He would not. First he had to win her heart. Then he would gain her kisses.
Kicking off his boots and sinking back onto the bed, David tried to think desperately about what he would do next.
“Decorations? No, my mother told Mrs. Lane to hold off until you – until the Archduke was here. I think she was under the impression he may like to join in with the celebration. In truth, I had…well. Expected an older gentleman.
Yes, that was it. The night had drawn in far swifter than he had imagined, but that would not matter. Tomorrow he would invite Louisa to accompany him to a market, gather some greenery – on his coin, of course.
Something akin to sadness tipped into his heart.
How had this happened? When he had last seen the Jarrolds, they had been the wealthiest landowners of the area.
The great house had been in their family for generations, everyone in the neighbouring villages had worked there or on their land for time immemorial.
No one could recall when there had not been Jarrolds there.
And now here they were, the two remaining Jarrolds; in this pokey old townhouse, barely big enough for them, let alone their Archduke guest.
David sighed. A truly sad state of affairs indeed. Why, he would need to ask –
The door to the guest bedchamber slammed open and David sat up hurriedly, gaze darting to the now open doorway.
Within it stood Mrs. Lane, the housekeeper. She was heaving his trunk into the room, cheeks red.
“My dear woman,” said David, hastily rising from the bed.
“I am not your dear woman,” snapped the housekeeper, pulling his trunk into its final position at the end of his bed and straightening up with a glare. “And neither is anyone else in this house, if you catch my meaning, sir.”
Heat seared David’s cheeks but he attempted to remain calm. “Thank you for bringing up my trunk, Mrs. Lane. That was kind of you.”
Mrs. Lane snorted. “I suppose it was. May I be so bold, sir, as to say that your arrival here appears to have upset my young lady?”
David’s stomach lurched. “I beg your pardon?”
“And I do not take kindly to either of my ladies being upset, if you get my drift, sir,” said Mrs. Lane doggedly, not breaking eye contact. “So if you are only here to bring grief to thems as has known plenty of grief this year, I beg you won’t.”
David swallowed. Resistance from Lady Jarrold he had expected; he had hoped not to find it in Louisa, but had accepted that he may.
But from the staff too?
“I see you understands me,” said Mrs. Lane darkly. “You just mind my words, sir. Just mind my words.”
She had slammed the door behind her before David could even think about replying – though what he would have said, he was not entirely sure.
Despite himself, a smile crept across his face. Well, it was good to see that Louisa had at least two women in the place who were determined to keep suitors away. Did that mean Louisa had received no overtures of affection from others?
Or, a nasty voice at the back of his mind suggested maliciously, is it just you they are opposed to? A woman as beautiful as Louisa, it is unfathomable that she would have no other suitors.
A flicker of irritation seared David’s heart, but he tried to push it aside. He could not think that way. All he could do was focus on her, Louisa. On how he felt for her.
Opening up the trunk, David started to pull out a slightly more formal shirt and cravat to wear for dinner. His travelling clothes were serviceable, of course, but nothing to what he wished to impress Louisa with.
As he pulled out a waistcoat with more gold thread than sense, he sighed slightly. Czar Alexei Dmitry Immanuil Maximilian Konstantinvich did have a rather Russian approach to style, a little more gilt than his normal taste.
But then, he was an Archduke. It was probably only right that he looked the part.
The waistcoat was laid carefully on the bed as David hunted in the far reaches of his trunk for the matching cravat, but his searching fingers found not the soft damask material that he sought, but instead something different.
Paper.
David’s stomach lurched. No. He thought he had burned all of those; had made a point of it before he left Austria.
But his questing fingers pulled out precisely what he thought he had destroyed, and he sat heavily on the bed as he stared at the paper in his hands.
Covered in ink splotches, scratchings out, and a few splatters that probably came from tears, David looked down at the letter that he had written Louisa the day he had arrived at the court of Czar Alexei Dmitry Immanuil Maximilian Konstantinvich.
He swallowed. He had been sure he would send it; desperately wished to. He wanted Louisa to know, to have tangible proof of what regret he was filled with.
But he had abided by her parents’ wishes in the end, for better or worse. They had instructed him never to speak to her again, and he had done so.
Until now.
Shaking hands smoothed back the paper as David looked down at a letter written in the depths of his grief.
Louisa.
I know I should not be writing to you. Trust me, I have written this several times. With each attempt, I wrack my heart to find the depths of my emotion for you, but I am yet to find its limits. I care for you more than I have ever cared for –
It is impossible to write. If only I could show you my affection, if you could see how greatly I am afflicted by your absence in my life. That kiss
I must not write of it – I promised your parents I – but then it is impossible not to write the memory which overtakes my mind so entirely every night when I close my eyes to sleep, and all day as I attempt to survive another one without you.
Kissing you…feeling the soar of your heart as I clutched you in my arms…
Louisa. Do you miss me? Do you think about me as often as I think of you, for if you do you will know it is entirely impossible to do anything. One’s concentration is not one’s own, yet I do not wish to stop thinking of you. The moment I cease thinking of you will be the moment of my death.
I should not be so morbid. It is strange here, in the Czar’s court. The world is looked at differently, life and death so much closer in this freezing winter, yet I am warmed by mere memories of that searing look you gave me, chastising me for not seeing the romance blossoming between us until…
Until it was too late.
No, say not that it was too late. I do not know when, my dearest Louisa – I hope you do not mind me writing that – but one day I shall return, your parents be damned.
A love like ours, it should not be forbidden, pushed out, pushed aside.
It should be embraced.
One day I will return to England, and I will prove myself worthy of you, your love, your hand, and your parents will embrace me as a son.
I will never cease planning and hoping for this day, and I know that when I do return, you will clasp me to yourself as eagerly as you did the last time I saw you.
Until then, I remain your affectionate and loyal –
David
David folded the letter, putting away the words that were written so raw, and still evoked such emotion within him now.
I will never cease planning and hoping for this day, and I know that when I do return, you will clasp me to yourself as eagerly as you did the last time I saw you.
Well, that was what he had hoped. Only now was it proven to be a false hope.
Louisa had looked startled, upset by his presence. She had fled from him, retreated to another room in the house and given that ridiculous lie about why she had left him.
“You must excuse me, Archduke Nelson. I was a little overcome by the heat of the room. I came here to recover.”
David sighed heavily and dropped the letter back into his trunk. If only that excuse had been true; if only he had warmed her, made her flush at the sight of him because she wished to see him – not because she was so upset to see him.
Could he do it? Could he, after all this time, win over the women he had not stopped thinking about for so many months?
He could have done thinks so differently. He could have refused to go in the first place, yet he had been obedient.
Now it was time to do things his way, the way of an Archduke – whatever that was, David thought with a wry smile.
He would attempt to show Louisa just how much he cared for her, how he had never forgotten her, that being his wife would mean everything to him – and if he was fortunate, to her.
A loud gong echoed around the house and David rose hastily. He had not dressed for dinner – and this was a dinner at which he wanted to make the best impression.