A Fall from Grace - Maggie Ford (have you read this book TXT) 📗

the throes, albeit hidden, of shell-shock? If they ever made love again, would those hands have the same feverishness or would they be far gentler? In her innocence she had loved that sense of urgency. Would that now be lost – that was if he ever made love to her again? She couldn’t tell.

From that first exchange of glances, he hadn’t looked her way again, almost as if trying to avoid eye contact. She felt isolated as the conversation passed back and forth despite him seeming little interested in joining in other than answering questions as to his present health and hopes that he’d be able to pick up on his life again. Once as his aunt expressed her deep sadness over the loss of her sister, killing the conversation for a moment, Madeleine saw him wince, his lips tighten, until James tactfully turned to the present troubles in Ireland, Anthony for a while forgotten.

Madeleine too felt disinclined to talk, finding herself virtually ignored, and in a way glad to be so.

Finally, the butler came to enquire if they would be staying for tea. James immediately took the hint, catching an anxious message in the look on Anthony’s face and saying he thought his nephew was looking tired and perhaps it would be best to leave and allow him to settle into his home to rest after his long journey from Scotland.

Each visitor went over to Anthony to say farewell, the men shaking his hand, his Aunt Lydia kissing him on the cheek a little tearfully, no doubt thinking, if only his mother were here. Madeleine in turn approached him.

‘It’s good to see you home, darling,’ she whispered.

But he merely nodded, saying, ‘Thank you, it’s good to be home,’ for a moment making her doubt the contents of his letter to her.

His head lowered, not looking at her, nothing there to support the words he’d written, she felt her heart drop within her. Then without raising his head, he lifted his eyes to her and they were filled with a silent message of love, before he looked away to the departing guests, his Aunt Lydia giving him a final wave, and leaned back in his chair. Compelled to follow the well-wishers, Madeleine dared not look back at him.

James was waiting for her at the main door. Was it her imagination or was there a strange look on his face? Had he seen what had passed between her and Anthony? If so, had he correctly interpreted it? There was no way to know but she knew they’d come dangerously close to betraying themselves. Yet, strangely, she didn’t care. Her heart was sailing with joy in her breast. One day James would find out or be told, and what he would or could do about it, at this moment she couldn’t have cared a jot.

Eighteen

Nigh on eighteen months of silence, of loneliness, with no word from him, then hurt and anger at his unexplained silence other than the odd letter to James, she mentioned almost as an afterthought. That was now all in the past. Now she lay in his arms, her heart going out to him when she thought of all he’d gone through in his struggle to force himself back to sanity. Realizing that in the grip of a mental breakdown, he’d virtually isolated himself from everyone, even her, almost broke her heart each time she’d thought of it.

She wanted to creep inside him, comfort him with her warmth, feed him with her love, but all she could do was to take him into her body and afterwards to just lie in his arms.

Apart from that one letter to her three weeks ago now, he had not spoken of those months at all, and she felt it better not to pry. Although he’d bared his heart in his letter, he seemed unable to give voice to them. Maybe she would never know. Maybe best she didn’t. Better just to have his arms about her; be grateful just to have him back.

They no longer met in that seedy hotel but at his home, his mother gone. It was wonderful not having to sense people looking at her, guessing what she was up to, especially the hotel porters who would have seen her arrive there regularly once a week. What Anthony’s staff thought, they kept to themselves. If James found out, she would know it could only have come from them and they would soon be dismissed, and in this climate of huge unemployment, who would want that? Thus she felt safe, those miserable eighteen months well behind her, merely hoping James wouldn’t perceive the change in her from pensive to buoyant, practically overnight.

She had never dared hope for the kind of happiness that now possessed her, and the year seemed to speed by. Christmas was almost upon them and she was planning the biggest party ever as well as another to see in the New Year, a celebration to outdo all celebrations. She would be the talk of the town.

James as ever was not of the same mind. ‘The house will be disrupted as usual, it would be rather nice to have one quiet Christmas to ourselves, don’t you think?’

She felt cross with him. ‘You hardly ever show yourself anyway,’ she ranted. ‘It’s a wonder you don’t escape altogether, to your club maybe.’

‘There’d be no one there,’ he said quietly, ‘My friends and colleagues will no doubt be at home enjoying the festive season, quietly, and it would be nice if we did the same.’

She ignored that hint. ‘In that case, I wouldn’t be surprised if you wandered off to some common pub to drink there all on your own, as you were doing when I first met you, of all places to expect a wealthy, respectable businessman to be!’

‘I’m sorry you think so little of me, my dear,’ he said, and adding that it was time he retired to bed, got up slowly from his armchair by the sitting-room