‘Off the shoulder, do you think?’ the dressmaker asked.
For a moment Oliver didn’t realise all eyes were turned to him. Carefully he put down his papers and rose, walking over to the three women.
The dressmaker was holding up two sample dresses, one with a tight bodice and low-cut front, the puffy sleeves sitting well off the shoulders. It was a design to draw attention, a dress that exposed a fair amount of skin.
‘I’m not sure...’ Lucy said and Oliver could see the hesitation in her eyes. Although the dress was lovely, and would no doubt make Lucy look beautiful, it wasn’t her style. It was too ostentatious, too scandalous for a woman who was used to wearing a brown woollen sack.
‘The other one,’ he said.
The second design was still tight in the bodice area, but not so low cut, leaving more to the imagination.
‘Good choice, sir.’
As the dressmaker and her assistant stepped away to find their tape measures, Oliver stayed positioned just in front of Lucy. He wanted to reach out, to run a finger over her cheek, feel the softness of her skin, the moistness of her lips. They had barely touched since their reunion, just gloved hand on jacket as he offered her his arm, and already Oliver was yearning for more.
‘Time to take your measurements,’ the dressmaker said, bustling in between him and his wife.
Reluctantly Oliver moved away. He knew this was his cue to depart and leave the women alone to do the more personal aspect of the fitting, but for a moment he lingered, watching his wife hold out her arms obediently as the tape measure was looped around her back. All the time he’d searched for her he’d told himself it was to find out what had happened to their son and to get his wife back for social occasions and the running of his household. Never had he allowed himself to believe there might be a deeper reason for desiring their reunion.
* * *
‘Parker,’ Oliver called, waiting as his young butler promptly turned and faced him. Despite it being four years since Oliver had been his superior officer in the army, the young man still almost saluted. Oliver saw his arm twitch at his side as he struggled to suppress the movement.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Meet me in the dining room.’
The butler grinned, nodding swiftly and hurrying off to prepare the room.
Oliver followed behind. With Lucy still being pushed and prodded by the dressmaker, he was feeling restless and the only solution was to use up some energy.
As Oliver reached the dining room, he saw Parker had recruited two footmen and between them they were moving the dining table and chairs to one side. A couple of the more expensive pieces of furniture had been moved out of the way and an antique vase placed on a high shelf.
Within minutes the centre of the room was clear of any obstacles, a long, wide space big enough for the coming physical workout.
Oliver stretched, pulling each arm to one side, and then opened the large display cabinet at one end of the room. He removed two fencing foils, long and sleek, giving them both an experimental swish.
Parker, the butler, shrugged off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves, revealing a few more scars on his forearms to match the vertical slash down one cheek.
‘I hope you’ve been practising, Parker,’ Oliver said as he handed the foil to the butler.
‘Never fear, sir, one of these days you’ll beat me.’
The younger man was always respectful and deferential in his work as butler, but there was a subtle shift when the jackets came off and foils came out. It was as though they were back in the training camp, still superior officer and soldier, but a comradeship flourished that was peculiar to the army.
‘I’ll go easy on you, Parker,’ Oliver said, getting into position.
They fought, foil clashing against foil with satisfying clinks, moving backwards and forward with lunges and parries. As they clashed Oliver felt some of the tension that had been building inside him the last few days dissipate as it always did with physical combat.
They were fairly evenly matched, with points being traded backwards and forwards as the minutes ticked by. Oliver didn’t really care who won. For him it was more about the thrill of the fight, the wonderful way he felt liberated as his body lunged and defended.
‘What on earth...?’ a small voice said from the doorway as the foils clashed.
Oliver spun around to see Lucy’s shocked face in the doorway.
‘Forgive us,’ he said with a bow. ‘Just a little light exercise.’
‘Shall I put the room right, sir?’ Parker asked, wiping a film of sweat from his forehead.
‘Don’t let me stop you,’ Lucy murmured, backing away, but Oliver had already tossed his foil to the butler and was following Lucy from the room.
He caught up with her on the stairs.
‘That’s a very peculiar use of the dining room,’ she said. He could tell she was itching to ask for an explanation, but held back from fear of getting overly involved or invested in his life.
‘Sometimes I find I need to work out a little energy,’ Oliver said, offering her his arm.
‘And your butler can fence?’
‘He can fight,’ Oliver corrected. ‘He was my sergeant for a while on the Peninsula.’
‘And now he’s your butler.’
‘And now he’s my butler.’
Lucy looked at him with curiosity and he wondered if she might ask more. He knew she was interested in people, but so far she had kept her enquiries into his life to a minimum, as if asking about it risked pulling her deeper into it.
‘That’s very kind of you,’ she said. ‘Giving him a job. I know many soldiers struggle to find employment after returning from the war.’
It was an awful thing to see when walking the streets of London. Former soldiers who had once fought bravely for their country, abandoned by the very people they’d served. Many of the returning soldiers found their families had moved on and their jobs filled, leaving them without a true place in the world. It was a hundred times worse for those who had been injured, losing an arm or a leg or an eye, unable to find even the most menial of jobs to provide them with food and shelter, and having to resort to begging on the street.
‘He’s a good man—loyal. I never have to worry about my silverware disappearing with Parker running the household.’
Parker was a good man, one of the best, but with his facial scars he would have been turned away by any of the grand households who wanted their footmen and butlers to be aesthetically pleasing, sometimes even more than they wanted them to be efficient at their jobs.
When it became clear she wasn’t going to ask any more he turned the subject back to her dress fitting.
‘Will the dress be ready in time for the ball in two days?’
‘Mrs Farrar assures me it will be ready even if she has to stay up all night.’
‘Good. I don’t want anything to upset our plans.’ He saw her stiffen at the idea of the ball but couldn’t stop himself from adding, ‘It is very important we reintroduce you to society as my wife.’
‘We wouldn’t want the gossips speculating about whom you might have holed up in here,’ Lucy murmured.
‘This isn’t a joke, Lucy.’
‘I know. It’s my life.’
‘Our life. As husband and wife.’
‘But my freedom.’
‘Freedom?’