Chapter Nine
“Your Grace, the books you requested have arrived from Westmere Park.”
Helena looked up from her correspondence. The footman, James, who was the second footman had been with the household for seven years. He stood in the doorway of the morning room with an expression of careful neutrality that somehow conveyed he knew more than he was saying.
“The books I requested?”
“Yes, Your Grace. His Grace mentioned you had particular favourites you might wish to have with you during your stay in London.” James gestured toward the hallway. “Shall I have them brought to your chambers, or would you prefer them in the library?”
Helena set down her quill. She had not requested any books, nor had she mentioned any favourites.
She had not, in fact, discussed her reading preferences with Edmund at all, beyond their conversation in the library at Westmere Park, the conversation that had ended with his unexpected laughter and her unexpected realisation that she was in considerably more peril than she had anticipated.
“The library, please,” she said. “And James, which books, exactly?”
“I couldn’t say for certain, Your Grace. There are two crates, I believe, and His Grace gave instructions before we departed Westmere.”
Two entire crates. Not a mere scattering of volumes, but two whole crates of books, selected by some unknown hand and conveyed to London, all without her knowledge.
Helena rose from her desk and made her way to the library.
The crates had been opened by the time she arrived, their contents spread across the central table like offerings at an altar. She moved among them slowly, touching spines, reading titles, her heart doing something complicated in her chest with each volume she recognised.
Every one of them were her favourites.
The gothic novel she had mentioned during their library conversation, the one with the insufferable brooding hero.
The volume of Wordsworth poetry they had debated over.
A collection of essays she had pulled from the shelf to illustrate a point and then replaced, not realising he had noticed.
A natural history text she had lingered over one evening, fascinated by the illustrations of botanical specimens.
He had been watching. He had been paying attention. He had noted which books she reached for, which shelves showed the most wear from her fingers, which volumes she returned to again and again during their brief time at Westmere.
And then he had arranged for all of them to follow her to London.
Helena picked up the gothic novel and held it against her chest, her throat suddenly tight.
It was such a small thing. Such a thoughtful, careful, devastating thing.
The kind of gesture that could not be explained by duty or strategy or the practical requirements of maintaining a convincing matrimony.
Or could it?
The doubt crept in like cold water through a crack in a dam.
She knew about Reginald’s challenge. She knew that every aspect of their matrimony was being scrutinised, every interaction evaluated for evidence that their union was genuine.
A husband who anticipated his wife’s needs, who paid attention to her preferences, who arranged for her comfort without being asked, that was exactly the kind of evidence they needed.
Was it possible that Edmund’s kindness was calculated? That every thoughtful gesture was designed not from affection but from strategy?
Helena set down the book. The warmth in her chest had cooled, replaced by something more complicated. Something that felt uncomfortably like self-protection.
You cannot afford to assume the best, she told herself. You cannot afford to be naive. He wedded you for practical reasons. You wedded him for practical reasons. Everything else is a performance.
But she did not put the books away. She arranged them on the shelf nearest her favourite chair, where she could reach them easily during the evening hours she would come to spend in this room.
Just in case the performance was real.
***
The London routine had established itself with surprising ease.
They took breakfast together, at the same end of the dining table, this had become a norm, unquestioned, as natural as breathing.
They discussed the day ahead: Edmund’s business at Parliament, Helena’s social calls, the endless small negotiations of managing a household in two locations simultaneously.
These conversations were practical, efficient, and somehow comforting in their predictability.
Edmund had his responsibilities, the estate business that followed him even to London, the political obligations that came with his title, the endless demands on his time and attention.
Helena had her own work: establishing herself in society, building relationships that might prove useful, studying the ton’s invisible hierarchies with the same methodical attention she had applied to the household accounts.
The evenings had become a business of quite another character.
They had fallen into a pattern without discussing it, without acknowledging it, without ever agreeing that it was what they both wanted.
After dinner, they would drift toward the library, separately, as though by coincidence, as though neither was seeking the other’s company.
Edmund would be reading in his chair by the fire.
Helena would settle into the window seat with her own book.
Sometimes they read in silence for hours, the only sound being the turning of pages and the crackle of flames.
Sometimes conversation would spark between them, a passage shared, an opinion offered, a debate that stretched past midnight before either noticed the time.
Helena had begun to look forward to these evenings with an intensity that frightened her.
She told herself it was simply the pleasure of intellectual companionship.
She had spent years in a household where her mother was too ill for sustained conversation and Rosalind, though cherished, did not share her taste for serious literature.
Edmund was the first person in years who could match her thought for thought, who challenged her assumptions and forced her to defend her positions.
He made her mind feel alive in ways she had almost forgotten were possible.
That was all it was. Intellectual companionship. Nothing more.
She knew all too very well that she was tormenting herself trying to ignore the falsehood.
***
The letter from Mrs Blackwood arrived on a Thursday.
Mrs Blackwood was the nurse Edmund had hired to care for Helena’s mother, the one Marcus had mentioned, the one Edmund had interviewed personally before selecting.
Helena had corresponded with her twice since the arrangement had been finalised, receiving polite reports on her mother’s health and spirits.
This letter was different.
Your Grace, Mrs Blackwood wrote in her careful, precise hand, I wished to inform you that the garden has been completed.
His Grace’s instructions were most particular, he specified that the roses should be placed where Mrs Whitmore might see them from her bedroom window, and that the herb garden should be near the kitchen door so she might tend it herself on days when her health permits.
The gardener His Grace engaged has done beautiful work.
Your mother was beside herself with joy when she saw it and wept.
Helena read the letter three times.
She knew that Edmund had been extremely thoughtful and generous with the arrangements for her mother’s well-being.
She had not known, however, anything about the garden.
She had not known that he had given specific instructions.
That he had thought about where the roses should be placed so her mother could see them from her bed.
That he had arranged for a herb garden because Helena had mentioned, once, in passing, that her mother used to grow herbs before she became too ill to tend them.
When did I mention that? Helena tried to remember.
It must have been early in their acquaintance, perhaps during their negotiation by the river, or during one of their first dinners together.
A small detail, easily forgotten, not the sort of thing anyone would remember unless they were paying very close attention.
Edmund had been paying very close attention.
She folded the letter and pressed it against her chest, the paper crackling softly.
Her eyes were stinging, which was ridiculous, she was not the sort of woman who cried over gardens.
She was practical. Sensible. She had learned long ago that tears accomplished nothing and sentiment was a luxury she could not afford.
But her mother had wept. Her mother, who had lost so much, her husband, her health, her home, had looked at a garden arranged by her son in law, and wept because someone had thought of her comfort.
He did not have to do this, Helena thought. He did not have to care about roses and herb gardens and where my mother might see them from her window. He could have hired a competent nurse and a serviceable cottage and fulfilled his obligations without any of this.
Why did he do this?
The doubt returned, colder this time. More insidious.
Because he is building a case. Because every kindness, every thoughtful gesture, every evidence of genuine care makes it harder for Reginald to argue that this matrimony is a sham. He is not being kind because he holds you in his highest esteem. He is being kind because it serves his purpose.
But even as she thought it, something in her rebelled against the interpretation.