She gave herself a mental slap. That was no way to get over him. Planning ways to gain his favour! She ought instead to use this time in London to get used to living without him. It was why she’d come, after all. Without him around, prodding at her bruised heart every five minutes with shows of indifference, it would soon start to heal.
Wouldn’t it?
Yes. The longer she stayed away from her husband, the easier it would become to be his wife. Hadn’t she always suspected that was the only sort of marriage that could work? She certainly hadn’t wanted the kind of clinging, cloying relationship she’d seen destroy her parents. That was what had made her tell him, at the outset, that the only man she might consider marrying would be a sailor, because she’d thought that when a man wasn’t around, he couldn’t hurt his wife.
Well, she knew now that was a load of rubbish. She still hurt, even though she’d created a distance between them. Perhaps even because she’d created a distance between them.
And now she couldn’t help recalling that those sailors’ wives she’d envied so much in her youth for having charge of a man’s income without having to put up with his beastly nature, never had looked as happy as she’d thought they should.
Because they were lonely. Lonely and miserable without the men they loved.
* * *
When Susan came to take away her breakfast tray, she also brought the news that Mary had visitors.
‘Mrs Pargetter. And her daughters. Say they are some sort of relations of yours,’ said Susan as if she wasn’t totally convinced. ‘Mrs Romsey has shown them to the white drawing room.’
‘Oh!’ When she’d sent an invitation to call whenever they liked, she’d never imagined they would come at once.
As if they couldn’t wait to see her again.
Forgetting all her resolutions to behave like a lady and impress the servants, Mary hitched up her skirts and ran along the corridor to the room Mrs Romsey described as white, but which was in reality a patchwork of twenty years’ accumulation of stains.
Her cousins, Dotty and Lotty, were poking rather gingerly at the worn coverings on some spindly-legged chairs that looked as though they’d collapse if anyone sat on them. Her aunt was running her gloved finger along the mantelpiece, with an expression of disgust.
Mary had never been so glad to see anyone in her life.
‘Mary, my dear!’ Aunt Pargetter smiled with genuine pleasure. And then executed a clumsy curtsy. ‘I suppose I should address you as my lady now. Old habits die hard.’
‘Oh, no. No, you must never call me anything but Mary,’ she insisted. ‘I don’t feel a bit like a my lady.’
She felt her face crumple.
‘My dear girl, whatever is the matter?’
And Mary, who’d vowed that nobody, but nobody, would ever know what a mess she’d made of what should have been the perfect marriage, let out a wail.
‘I’ve left him!’
Then she flew across the room, flung herself into her aunt’s outstretched arms and burst into tears.
‘Whatever has gone wrong? Has he been cruel to you?’
Mary shook her head. ‘No. He has been very k-kind.’ How could she have forgotten the way he’d gone to fetch coal during the night, shirtless, just so she wouldn’t get cold? Or the way he’d praised her cooking? And told her she was an angel for putting up with his failings?
‘And g-generous,’ she wailed, suddenly remembering he’d promised her free rein to decorate this house, to buy as many clothes as she liked and not worry about the bills because he’d pay them all.
‘Th-that’s why I f-fell in love with him,’ she sobbed into her aunt’s shoulder.
‘But...so...why have you left him then, if he is so wonderful? And you’ve fallen in love with him?’
‘Because he doesn’t love me,’ she wailed.
‘Of course he does. Why, I’ve never seen a man so smitten. He couldn’t wait to get you to the altar....’
‘It wasn’t because he fell in love with me. It was because he was so sure he wouldn’t! He only wanted to marry me so quickly because of...because of...’
‘What do you mean, sure he wouldn’t?’
‘He wanted a certain sort of wife. A woman who wouldn’t give him a m-moment’s bother. He warned me not to expect affection from marriage. I’m the one who changed my mind about what marriage means to me. I’m the only one who wants more.’
‘Well, if that is true, running away isn’t going to endear him to you,’ said her aunt tartly, though she was still patting Mary’s shoulder in a comforting sort of way. ‘If you don’t believe he can ever love you, you must surely want him to respect you, don’t you? It would have been far better to stay with him and show him what a wonderful wife you can be. That your love needn’t make him uncomfortable.’
‘I know!’ Mary sat up and scrubbed angrily at the tears she couldn’t check. ‘I know that now. Only for a while I completely lost my head. Said things and did things he will never, ever, forgive. I’ve ruined everything!’
While her aunt had been soaking up Mary’s tears, Lotty had poured her a cup of tea and now pressed it into her hands.
‘Here. Drink this. And we’ll help you come up with a plan to win him round.’
Well, if anyone could, Dotty and Lotty could. They were such adept flirts they could probably make a living giving lessons in it.
‘I’m so sorry,’ said Mary, wiping her eyes with the handkerchief Dotty gave her. ‘I can’t think why I’ve become such a watering pot. I’m not usually prone to tears.’
Aunt Pargetter sat bolt upright.
‘Is it possible you are increasing?’
‘What?’
‘Well, every time I have been in the family way, I became a touch unstable. And this sort of behaviour is most unlike you. I always took you for a very sensible, down-to-earth sort of girl.’
‘Increasing...’ Mary laid her hand flat on her stomach, and did a few sums. ‘It...it might be the case. I haven’t...’
Aunt Pargetter nodded sagely. ‘Well, then. That is a sure way to win him round. Every time I got in the family way Leonard was so pleased with me he couldn’t do enough for me. You have only to write and tell your own husband and I’m sure he will come post-haste to your side.’
‘No.’ A cold, sick feeling knotted Mary’s stomach. ‘No, that really would be the end. We agreed, you see, that once I was expecting, he would no longer need to...need to—’ She broke off, blushing fierily. ‘He said that as soon as I gave him an heir, we could go our separate ways.’ She buried her face in her hands. ‘If I am increasing, he won’t think there’s any need to see me again. I’ll never get him back.’
‘Well, then, don’t tell him.’
Mary’s head flew up. ‘But I promised him an heir. Wouldn’t it be dishonest to keep him in the dark about something he finds so important?’
‘Pish,’ said her aunt, making a dismissive gesture with her hand. ‘The man clearly needs to be brought to his senses. And you’re not going to be able to do it unless you can get him here. Unless you would rather go crawling back to him and beg him to love you?’
Since she’d already vowed never to do such a craven, spineless thing, Mary shook her head vehemently.