An Earnest Favour

XIII

"When a man loves a woman, he has to become worthy of her. The higher her virtue, the more noble her character, the more devoted she is to truth, justice, goodness, the more a man has to aspire to be worthy of her. The history of civilization could actually be written in terms of the level of its women." Fulton J. Sheen, Life Is Worth Living

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XIII.

"If you hate them so very much, they can just go back in the box, it is quite alright," Jack uttered soothingly.

How Claire wished she was not hysterically crying right at that moment. Everything had just suddenly overwhelmed her. Jack was being so very kind and honest with her. She had loved walking about the house with him, and she truly was interested in the stories that he had been sharing about his time spent in this house.

But she still very much felt as though she was playing a role, the role of wife. To be offered such an expensive and precious heirloom was one thing, but to hear Jack refer to her child as their daughter, to hear him so casually discuss the possibility of her inheriting things from him, was another experience altogether.

It was so normal. Something that a father would do if he possessed fabulous things to pass onto his children. It was right. It was what a father should do. Perhaps it had not occurred to Claire until that very moment that Jack was going to be the father of her child. Perhaps, until that moment, she still somehow pictured Arthur in that role.

But Arthur would not be her child's father. Arthur had abandoned her, abandoned them. Jack had not. He had stepped up into this role when he had absolutely no need to. He could have returned to his life in London after Perrie's birthday and lived the exact same life had been living. He did not need to burden himself with a wife and a child so young. And yet he had. And he did not seem at all resentful.

Even now, he was looking upon her ridiculous state with sincerity and concern. For how long had she been looking into Arthur's beautiful green eyes and believing she saw sincerity there? Now she knew what sincerity was, and she much preferred Jack's dark shade of hazel.

The betrayal was still there. The pain she had felt, she still suffered from keenly. As much as she did not want to, Claire did grieve for the happiness, the innocent happiness she had once felt.

But she knew that if she did not try, not only would she be making herself miserable, but she would be making Jack miserable as well, and he did not deserve that. Perhaps she would never experience love again, but happiness and contentment could surely be found.

"I love them," Claire stammered, finding her shaky voice. "I am terribly sorry for crying at you."

Jack hesitantly held out the jewellery box once more and this time, Claire accepted it. "Claire, are you alright?"

Claire nodded helplessly. "Yes," she said breathlessly. "I just want to tell you that I am sorry ... for flinching away, for curt words, bad moods, any ounce of ungratefulness that you have perceived from me. I promise my mother did not raise me to be rude."

Mrs Denham did not raise Claire to fall victim to a rake and become with child out of wedlock, either, but that was an entirely different issue.

Jack smiled, and Claire observed that he had a very sweet, a very genuine sort of smile. Of course, he could display devilish grins, but his normal smile was very nice indeed. Claire suddenly had a memory flash to the front of her mind of the first time she had made such an observation about Jack. It was while they were dancing at the winter assembly that first night they had met.

For a brief moment, Claire wondered what her life might have been like now had she accepted Jack's offer for a second dance, rather than leaving him to dance with Arthur.