Chapter Twenty-One
The moment the carriage turned onto the long drive leading to Montrose Manor, Henry relaxed. They were home.
Beside him, Sophia leaned forward, her face lighting up at the sight of the house emerging from the trees. “Oh, how pretty it looks.”
“Two weeks felt like two months,” Henry said. Though in truth, the time in London had been necessary. They’d faced his mother, won their battle, and emerged stronger. But now he wanted nothing more than the quiet peace of their own home.
The carriage had barely stopped before Amelia came flying out the front door, Mrs. Bromley hurrying after her.
“Mama! Papa!”
Amelia launched herself at Sophia the moment she descended from the carriage, wrapping her arms around her legs. Sophia knelt and pulled the child close, her eyes bright with tears.
“Hello, love. We missed you so much.”
“I missed you too. Mrs. Bromley said you were fighting dragons in London.” Amelia’s face was solemn. “Did you win?”
Henry caught Mrs. Bromley’s eye. She gave a slight shrug, as if to say what else was I to tell her?
“We won,” Henry said, kneeling beside them. “The dragons are gone now.”
“Good.” Amelia threw her arms around his neck. “Don’t go away again. Not for so long.”
“We won’t,” he promised, though he knew it wasn’t entirely true. There would be other trips to London, other obligations. But for now, they were home, and there was no other place he wished to be.
*
His plan for a village school had come to him in a dream in which Sophia’s father had asked him to build a school for the village children. After he woke, he’d lain there in bed, wide awake, imagining it, knowing it was a message from Sophia’s father.
He kept it a secret from Sophia until they had erected the sign.
On a warm spring morning, he asked his wife to walk with him to town. He led her out of the house, through the gardens, down the lane toward the village. They walked hand in hand, in no apparent hurry. Sophia was clearly curious but not pressing him with questions. So like his gentle wife to do so.
When they reached the village green, Henry stopped. On the far side, near the small parish church, stood a newly cleared plot of land. A cornerstone had already been laid, and several workmen were measuring and marking out foundations.
“What’s this?” Sophia asked.
“Come see.”
They crossed the green to the construction site. As they drew closer, Sophia could see the cornerstone more clearly. Engraved in elegant letters were the words:
THE DUKE OF ASHFORD MEMORIAL SCHOOL
Founded 1819
Sophia stopped walking. Her hand flew to her mouth.
“Henry, what is this?”
“A school for the village children. With a library. So they can learn to read and write. So they can have opportunities they might not otherwise have.” He turned to face her.
“Your father came to me in my dream. He told me to build a school that helps all children build a good life for themselves, so that he might not have died completely in vain.
Tears streamed down Sophia’s face. “Oh, Henry, it’s perfect.”
“This is a place where his values—truth, education, kindness—will live on. I wanted his memory be about life and hope instead of death and tragedy.”
“When…when will it be finished?”
“By autumn, the builders estimate. In time for the school year to begin.” He gestured to the foundation.
“There will be two large classrooms, a library, and quarters for a teacher. We’ll hire someone good.
Someone who cares about children the way you do.
They stood there for a long time, holding each other, watching the workmen begin their day’s labor.
Building something good from old grief. Creating hope from loss.
Finally, Sophia pulled back, wiping her eyes. They walked back to the house slowly, Sophia stopping every few steps to look back at the construction site, as if she couldn’t quite believe it was real.
“There’s one more thing,” Henry said as they reached the manor. “Though it’s much smaller than the school.”
“What is it?”
“I’ve commissioned a portrait of you. For the family gallery.
” He led her inside, down the corridor lined with paintings of previous Lords and Ladies of Montrose.
“I want your face here. Hanging with all the others. So that a hundred years from now, people will look at you and know: this was the woman who brought love back to this house. This was the woman who saved a little girl and her embittered uncle.”
Sophia stared at the generations of Montrose family looking down at them with varying degrees of severity.
“I shall smile for my portrait,” she said. “As if I’m gazing right at you. That way our love will live forever.”
*
That afternoon, Henry took Amelia for a walk. They wandered through the gardens, the child asking questions about where squirrels lived when they weren’t chasing one another up a tree, why frogs started as tadpoles, why there were so many different birds, all with different songs?
And finally, “Can we go to the beach, Papa? I want to find shells for Mama.”
“If you wish.”
They made their way down to the shore, Amelia’s small hand tucked securely in his. The day was beautiful, the sea calm and blue, the cliffs rising majestic and solid.
This place had once represented death to him.
Eleanor’s death. His own contemplated death.
The edge of the world where everything ended.
But now, with Amelia tugging him toward the water’s edge, it felt different.
Peaceful. Just rocks and water and sky. And a little girl who wanted to collect shells.
They spent the next hour combing the beach, Amelia running ahead to examine promising shells, then racing back to show Henry her finds. He helped her choose the ones with the prettiest colors, the most interesting shapes until they filled her small pockets.
“I need to rest now,” Amelia announced.
“Good, let’s sit for a while and just watch the waves.”
She followed him to a fallen log and the two of them sat side by side, watching the ebb and flow of the sea.
“Papa, do you love me?”
“More than you will ever know.”
“Mama said you did.”
“She was right.” Henry pulled her onto his lap, amazed as always by how small she still was. How light. How trusting. “You are my little girl.”
“And you are my Papa…” She looked up at him with those bright eyes—Rebecca’s eyes, though he could look at them now without pain.
She wriggled off his lap to look at a tide pool, and Henry sat there watching her.
Two years ago, he’d been convinced he had nothing to offer this child.
That he was too broken, too damaged by grief, too inadequate.
But he had been wrong. He had been capable of change, of growing into the man Sophia and Amelia needed him to be.
Amelia had changed him. Sophia had changed him. They’d both cracked open his bruised and bloody heart and healed it. They’d brought joy back into his life.
“Papa, come look! I found a starfish!”
Henry stood and walked to where Amelia was crouched by the tide pool, peering at a tiny orange starfish clinging to a rock.
“That’s wonderful. Should we leave it here so it can go home to its family?” Henry asked.
“Yes. Everything should get to go home to its family.” She patted the starfish gently. “Goodbye, starfish. Have a nice swim.”
They made their way back up to the house with the spring sun on their backs, Amelia’s pockets full of shells and her hair windblown and tangled.
She chirped away about which shells Mama would like best and whether starfish had mamas and papas like regular families and why owls hooted only at night because she wanted to hear one.
Henry loved her sweet, high-pitched voice and the way her hand felt in his. How could he have been afraid to love this child? But he was not afraid now. He was ready, finally, to live.
*
That evening, before he went to change for dinner, Henry found his wife in her bedchambers. Although it was still early, she’d changed into her nightgown and wrapper, her hair loose around her shoulders, and was standing by the window looking out at the moonlit gardens.
“Are you ill, my love?” Henry asked.
She turned from the window. “No, not ill. Just in need of a quiet night. I’ve asked for our dinner to be sent up. I have something to tell you.”
Henry wrapped his arms around her waist. “Is anything amiss?”
“No, quite the opposite. I think I might be with child.”
His arms tightened around her. “What?”
“I’m not certain yet. But I’m late. And I’ve been feeling odd in the mornings. I think we might be having a baby.”
Joy flooded through him, so intense it was almost painful. “A baby. Our baby.”
“Are you happy?”
“Happy? Sophia, I’m—” He couldn’t find words big enough. “I’m overjoyed.”
“I keep thinking about how adorable Amelia will be with a baby brother or sister,” Sophia said.
“It will be good for her to have a sibling.” A hint of sadness drifted into his voice, thinking of Rebecca. “I loved my sister very much. And now, Edward and I are becoming close again. Nothing is quite as wonderful and complicated as the love between siblings.”
“Yes, and think about where I would be without my brothers.”
“We’ll be a family of four.”
“Unless it’s twins,” she said laughing.
“I’ll take as many as you will give me.” He lifted her into his arms and crossed the room to lay her gently on the bed. But before he could do all the things he wanted to do to her, a maid arrived with their dinner.
First things first. Sustenance for his pregnant wife. And then, he would show her once again just how much he loved her.