‘Three out of four is a fine record, darling,’ he murmured as he stared unseeingly at the soft, serene blue of the October sky.
And a full house trumps it every time, came the reply so certainly he looked for Virginia’s shade again, then called himself a fool for expecting it to show up for him. There was a little more in her missive from some time last year, when she had put her affairs in order while she had the strength and certainty to do so. How he admired and loved the one woman he could safely adore until his dying day. Come to think of it; if she was ordering him to give his heart, wasn’t she already too late?
Cheating, my boy, the gruff almost-sound of her voice reproached him and what he wouldn’t give to actually see and speak to her one last time? That’s a different sort of love. Virgil and I simply tried to give you and your brother and Tom a firm foundation of love to build your lives on. Love between a man and a woman, full and true and without boundaries, is very different to the deep affection of true family. That love is an undeserved gift that can light up a whole lifetime with the joy and surprise of it, for however long or short a time you are together. I want you to love like that, James, I need you to love truly if I am ever to have peace and join my far-more-saintly Virgil in heaven one day.
‘Now that’s blackmail,’ James muttered with a frown at the circling buzzard that had taken off from the perch where it had been dreaming in the sun at the top of the tallest oak in Lord Laughraine’s beloved woods. ‘I’ve made love to some of the loveliest women in this land and quite a few further afield and not fallen in love with a single one of them. If I couldn’t love any of them, I’m beyond heavenly intervention.’
No, just looking in the wrong place, the not-quite sound of Virginia’s distinctive voice in his head insisted stubbornly.
James felt that restriction where his heart ought to be again and did his best to ignore it. Did she expect him to find a saint? The very idea made him snort with derision. Even the slightest hint of the saintly martyr in a woman would make him play the devil more than ever. No, he didn’t have it in him to give himself wholeheartedly to any deep human emotion, let alone loving a woman who’d preach at him and pry into his sooty soul. Shaking his head at the very idea, he forced himself to read the final farewell of the most matchless woman he’d ever met.
Whatever you do, live well and never close your heart to loving those around you if you can’t let go of your pride or your tender conscience long enough to truly love a partner for life. I was lucky to adore your great-uncle from the moment I met him and perhaps that’s not a miracle given to many of us sinners. You must believe that if I could have had a son I wanted him to be just like you, James. Know that now and please shrug off the self-loathing you struggle with for some reason you never would confide in me.
I find it hardest of all to stop writing to you, but now my pen is in need of mending and I am weary of this wide and wonderful earth of ours at last. Don’t grieve for me any more, love. I’m more than ready for a new adventure the other side of this little earthly life, if God will allow a sinner like me into heaven where I know Virgil already abides.
Farewell, my love; be happy and true to yourself. I pray one day you will be truly loved by the right woman, despite your conviction you do not deserve her,
Virginia
James blinked several times and watched the buzzard lazily circle its way up to the heavens on a warm thermal of autumn air and call for its mate to join it. Soon two birds were mewing in that circle, gliding and calling in the still air as if all that mattered was the miracle of flight and one another. For wild creatures with only their next meal and the urges of nature to answer perhaps it was. For James Winterley there was good earth under his feet and a mass of mixed emotions in his heart. He must go back to Raigne soon and show his sister-in-law and his hostess he wasn’t bowed down with the task Virginia had laid on his shoulders. Truth was he didn’t know how he felt about it. How could an unlovable man end up like the other three? Impossible, so he shook his head and decided he’d been right all along, he was destined to be Virginia’s only failure.
Perhaps he should give back the small fortune Gideon had passed to him as Virginia’s lawyer? James had plans for it, so, no, he’d accept the sacrifices Virginia’s nearest and dearest had made to get him off their hands. It would be an insult even he couldn’t steel himself to make if he was to throw the money back in their faces and tell them he didn’t want it.
‘Are you a hermit, mister?’
James jumped and looked for the source of that voice, so attuned to ghostly intervention he wondered for a moment if it came from a cherub instead of a child. He looked harder and spotted a grubby urchin peering down at him from halfway up a vast and curiously branched tree.
‘No, are you a leech?’ he asked as casually as he could and watched the girl squirm a little higher. Was there some way to get close and catch her when she fell without alarming her into falling in the first place?
‘Of course not, do I look like such a nasty, slimy bloodsucking thing?’
‘Only by hanging on to an unwilling host and defying the laws of gravity.’
‘You’re a very odd gentleman. I watched you for ages until I got bored and decided to see if I could get to the top of this tree instead.’
‘So that’s my fault, is it? I suppose you will tell your unfortunate parents so if you survive the experience?’
‘No,’ the pragmatic cherub said after a pause to think about it. ‘They will know it’s a lie,’ she finally admitted as she carefully worked her way up a little further and James’s heart thumped with fear as he let himself see how far from the ground she truly was.
‘How perceptive,’ he managed calmly as he strolled over so casually he hoped she had no idea he had his doubts about her survival if she took a wrong step.
‘Yes, it’s a trial,’ she admitted with a sigh that would normally have made him laugh out loud, but he was holding his breath too carefully to do any such thing as a branch writhed and threatened to snap when she tried it too hard.
‘I can see how it must be,’ he somehow managed to say calmly. ‘Sometimes knowing what you know and keeping quiet about it has to be enough, don’t you think?’
‘What?’ the adventurer asked rather breathlessly, as if not quite willing to admit her lucky escape had scared her so much she hadn’t been listening.
‘You know you can climb that tree, so perhaps that’s enough.’ He did his best to reason with her as if every inch of him wasn’t intent on persuading her to come down before she fell and he must try to catch her.
‘There’s no point me knowing I could do it if nobody else does.’
‘Yes, there is. You have the satisfaction of achievement and I’ll know.’
‘No, you won’t. I’m only halfway up.’
‘Which is about ten times as far as anyone else I ever came across can get. Being further up than anyone else can be has to be enough at times, don’t you think? I believe that’s the sign of a truly great person—knowing when it’s time to stop and be content.’
His latest critic seemed to think about that for endless moments before she took another step either way and he felt slightly better when the whippy branches above her head stopped swaying from the intrusion of a small human into its stately crown.
‘Do you really think it’s a big achievement to get this far?’
‘Of course it is; Joan of Arc couldn’t have done better.’
‘She