30. Chapter 30- Lily
Understandably, Lily slept fitfully. Though she and her sisters had stayed at the ball well past midnight, Lily was up and dressed before the sun’s rays crept over the horizon.
She sat on her velvet sofa, her knee bouncing up and down, and checked the window every few moments to see whether it was light enough for Mabel to relent.
Finally, Mabel sighed and offered Lily her wrap. By the time they reached the park the sun had risen, though mist still clung to the pond in a haze. Bradford was already there, his strong back turned to her as she approached.
He must have heard her footsteps, for he turned and gave her a cautious smile. “Good morning, Lily.”
“What is it?” she said. “What do you have to tell me?”
Mabel gave her a look loaded with meaning and put additional distance between herself and the couple.
Lily didn’t care that she sounded overwrought—she was overwrought.
She’d tossed and turned for hours wondering what the issue might be.
She’d imagined several terrible scenarios and practiced her side in a dozen different arguments.
Bradford nodded, then swallowed deeply. He stared out over the water for several moments and finally said, “It’s about my late wife. How she died.”
If Lily hadn’t known Bradford so well, she might have been fearful of what he would confess. But he was a good man. She’d seen firsthand how gently he treated the women in his life, down to the lowliest scullery maid.
“I thought she died in childbirth,” Lily said.
He nodded slowly. “That’s what we tell people. There are very few who know the truth of the matter—only me and a few of my servants, who’ve been sworn to secrecy.”
Lily tensed. Though she couldn’t say precisely what was coming, she knew it was going to be something dreadful, if he’d hidden it from her for the entire length of their relationship.
“When I married my wife, I was very young. Perhaps not in years, but in experience. She was very beautiful, and I now can see I was blinded by that beauty.” His mouth twisted with a wry, self-deprecating smile. “I suppose this is as much my confession of the foolishness of my youth as anything.”
Lily waited.
“I didn’t know it until after we were married, but she was also…delicate.”
“Physically delicate?” Her brow furrowed.
Did Bradford blame himself for his wife’s death in childbirth? It was a tragedy, to be sure, but unfortunately, such things weren’t altogether rare. Every woman looked at childbirth as the labyrinth they had to navigate alone in order to attain the lauded title of Mother.
“I suppose she was a bit of that, too, but it isn’t her frame I’m speaking of. Her mind was delicate.”
“How so?” Lily frowned, thinking of her own dislike for enclosed spaces.
“At the start, I noticed she was fastidiously clean, for one,” he said. “If dirt smudged her person, she couldn’t settle until she changed or washed her hands. If her spoon had a water spot, the entire table needed to be reset. Things of that nature.”
Lily frowned. That was odd, but then, every person had a cherished quirk that any other might call strange.
He continued, “You must understand—I truly believed that I loved her. It’s difficult for me to admit how blind and foolish my emotions—my desires—made me.”
“It wasn’t your fault that she was that way, surely.”
It was difficult for her to navigate this conversation. It felt much like being led blindfolded—the other person can see where they’re headed, but the blindfolded person is trying to orient themselves in the dark.
Bradford shook his head. “It’s kind of you to say so, Lily, but I’m trying to explain—not only the truth that I need to tell you, but also how my past has influenced some of my unfair behavior toward you.”
“Very well. I am ready to hear whatever you have to tell me.” Lily nodded and resolved to stay silent going forward. It was clear her interjections weren’t helpful; Bradford seemed to be struggling enough without her interruption.
He smiled at her, but it was a sad kind of smile—one that spoke of past loss and his fear that he might lose her affection, too. Lily was determined that it not be so—not unless he confessed something she found morally objectionable.
People came to marriage with a past, didn’t they? Every single person who’d stood before the matrimonial altar had a number of mistakes trailing after them. Why, there might as well be a string of twine and rocks trailing down the aisle, right along with the lace veil.
“As I’ve said, she was very pretty.” He cleared his throat and yanked at his cravat.
“Her family noted my interest when I asked her to dance at a ball. I brought her a glass of punch and spoke with her afterward. I was perhaps too young to be thinking of matrimony—I’d just come into my inheritance and my title.
I think, for her family, I was perfect. A gift from heaven. ”
Here he exhaled forcefully and shook his head again. “They certainly weren’t going to find another naive young lord whose estate was in the far-flung countryside, that’s for certain.”
Bradford met Lily’s eyes. “Not that they forced the attachment, mind you. However, every place I went after that, Francine was in attendance. It only occurred to me after she was gone that they must have paid someone in my household to tip them off whenever I left the house.”
Lily frowned. That sounded like forcing an attachment to her ears, but she kept her promise and remained silent.
“To me it seemed that it was Providence. Or at the very least, a happy chance. In my mind, Francine and I grew close naturally.” He looked across the pond, lost to memories for several moments.
“Of course, now I know better. Our relationship hadn’t come about naturally, and we were never close.
We would only speak but a few sentences to each other before she was whisked away by her mother. ”
He huffed a humorless laugh. “It’s funny, while I was in the throes of it, I thought her parents were properly protective. Francine had only been presented the month prior, after all. Now, I think they were clever to limit our conversational exposure.”
Lily shook her head, her own hands twisted together with the sheer effort it took her to remain silent. A sense of impending doom tightened her shoulders until they edged closer to her ears.
Though Lily knew Bradford had already survived whatever was coming, she couldn’t help the fear she felt in hearing his words. She felt as if she were standing on a shoreline, watching a loved one’s ship sail straight toward a storm they couldn’t see, and she was too far away to warn them.
He smiled, but it was sad. “Keeping us mostly apart served two purposes, you see. My inexperience was proven—the small slivers of time I had with Francine only served to increase my suspense and therefore, my fascination. It also served to hide what her family already knew.”
“Which was what?” Lily couldn’t help but ask.
“As I’ve already said, Francine’s mind was delicate. Her temperament was fragile. The first time I truly became aware of it was on the carriage ride from our wedding luncheon to my townhome in London.”
Bradford exhaled again—something close to a laugh, but not related to true merriment in any way.
“Even at the wedding luncheon, her parents had managed to keep us mostly separated. Francine needed to greet her guests, and they invented some issue with her gown—a broken lacing, I think—that needed several repairs. Her parents had told me over and over that they’d depart to their home in Falmouth from the very luncheon.
I didn’t think it odd at the time—I was too excited for the privacy that Francine and I would share for the first time. ”
He cleared his throat. “So by the time she and I actually did have a real conversation, we were already married. It was clear that Francine was different. Nervous. Of course, with the eyes of a new husband, I viewed her through an unclear lens. I thought that the pressure of the day had gotten to her, that it was natural for any young lady to be overwrought. Especially because at that time, I believed Francine was exceedingly shy.”
Bradford paused and frowned at the ground. Lily desperately wanted to reach over and thread her fingers with his, to offer comfort, but she didn’t dare. He seemed to be saying the words by sheer effort now, and she didn’t want to distract him from what looked to be a monumental task.
“I beg your forgiveness for what I’m about to tell you, but I want you to have the entire picture before you agree to any sort of future with me.
You deserve that.” Here, he cleared his throat several times and yanked at his cravat before continuing.
“I’m still uncertain whether it was by chance or by her mother’s instruction, but Francine was expecting before I realized the true scope of her issues.
I won’t excuse myself for it, though I genuinely couldn’t have known at the time that it was wrong of me to… ”
Here he seemed at a loss for words, gesturing haltingly at the air.
Lily took compassion on him. Among her and her sisters’ chaperones in Paris had been their dowager aunts.
They were ladies of impeccable breeding but possessed a no-nonsense approach.
Their aunts had taken it upon themselves to impart the wisdom regarding marriage that the Preston ladies would have received from their mother, were she still alive.
They’d even gone so far as to answer questions.
After the initial shock receded, Lily had been exceptionally grateful.
It was far better, she reasoned, for her and her sisters to know what would follow if their Seasons were successful.
Lily was dismayed to learn that both her aunts had gone into marriage completely unaware, for the simple fact that their own mother had been too embarrassed to broach the subject beforehand.
“I understand,” Lily said quickly. “You needn’t explain. You were married, and as long as she was willing…”