Widow in White

Chapter Thirteen: Secrets Between

When the first letter from Neil came, Richard read it with many snorts and then tossed it straight into the fireplace. It contained a great deal of neatly worded phrases, such as "the rashness of my conduct notwithstanding" and "not to dwell on past mistakes when present concerns demand forgiveness". The second letter was more to the point and contained several carefully blotted out expletives. Richard ignored that too. The third letter, coming at the start of July, as Richard and Laura were about to leave London for the year, was not from Neil but from his wife. Richard read this one more slowly. It ended on the lines,

This is a personal request, from me to you, Richard. Will you please come and visit us this summer with your wife while she can still travel? Neil knows he did wrong and regrets it deeply. And I miss you, my children miss you, and I want to get to know Lady Laura before the baby comes and changes everything. Let's be family again.

With love, Verity

It was impossible for him to throw that on the fire. He looked across the breakfast table to where Laura was eating her way steadily through two boiled eggs, three pieces of toast with jam, and a pile of ham; her appetite had come back with a vengeance now her sickness was fading.

"How do you feel about travelling?" he asked.

She looked up, licking jam from her bottom lip. "Where are we going?"

"Only if you're well enough."

"I think I am. I'm not often sick anymore, and only in the mornings before I've eaten." She looked curiously at the letter. "Neil?"

"Verity." Richard tapped the letter thoughtfully on the table. "She wants us to come up and visit them."

Laura chewed on her toast then swallowed. "So Neil asked her to extend the olive branch. I never thought him a coward."

Richard hesitated. "No... Neil sent two letters already. I didn't reply to them."

Laura raised her eyebrows.

"I'm still angry," Richard admitted.

"I know." Laura began to shell an egg. "It's very charming, really, how long you can hold a grudge on my behalf."

She did not sound charmed. Richard sighed inwardly.

"Do you want to go then?" he asked.

"I think so. I'm curious about Neil's wife." Laura sliced the egg and spread it across one of her jammy pieces of toast.

Richard winced. "Laura, that's a vile combination."

She took a big bite and chewed curiously. "It is, rather."

That didn't stop her eating it. Richard sipped his coffee and thought about the invitation. He'd rather hoped Laura wouldn't want to accept it. If Verity was asking, he couldn't say no. The compulsion to agree, to make her happy, was too strong for him. Whatever piece of his heart or soul she had caught so long ago, she still had it.

He looked across at Laura and felt guilty for thinking it. He never had any trouble telling Laura no.

"Are you sure you'll be able to travel?" he asked. "It's three or four days by road — not very good road, the last two days — and the weather will probably be hot."

"We'll take it in easy stages," Laura replied sanguinely. "As long as we're back before the end of September there'll be no risk at all."

Richard put the letter down with a sigh. "Right then."

"It's settled. Good." Laura finished her toast and egg and got up. In the full skirts of her morning dress, she looked more plump than pregnant yet, but it had been a few weeks now since her belly had started to round. That had shaken the last, silent doubts from Richard's mind that perhaps Laura might be mistaken after all. It still bewildered him, however, to think about the fact that, not many months from now, he was going to be a father.