“You made quite a display of yourself today,” said Tony.
Venetia hung on to the carriage strap. The brougham plodded through London’s congested streets; there really was no need to use the strap at all. But she could not seem to unclench her fingers from the strip of leather.
“One of the Harrow players couldn’t stop staring at you,” continued Tony. “If someone had handed him a fork he’d have devoured you in one sitting.”
She didn’t respond. When Tony fell into one of his moods, there was never a point in saying anything. Clouds gathered overhead. Beneath the spreading shadows, the summer leaves turned gray—nothing escaped London’s reign of soot.
“Were I less discreet I’d tell him you can’t breed. You are God’s elaborate ruse, Venetia. All that prettiness on the surface, quite useless where it counts.”
His words were drops of acid upon her heart, burning, corroding. On the sidewalk the pedestrians opened their umbrellas, held ever at the ready. Two fat plops of rain hit the carriage window. They slid down the glass pane in long, blurred streaks.
“It is not certain I can’t have children,” she said. She shouldn’t. She knew he was goading her. But somehow, on this subject, she rose to the bait every time.
“How many physicians does it take to convince you? Besides, my friends marry and within a year they already have heirs. It’s been two years for us and you show not the least sign of increasing.”
She bit the inside of her lip. The blame for their failure to procreate could just as well lie with him, but he refused to even contemplate that possibility.
“But you will be glad to know that your looks aren’t entirely useless. Howard agreed to join my rail venture—and I daresay he did so to have more opportunities to seduce you,” said Tony.
At last she looked at him. The harshness of his voice was reflected in his countenance, his once winsome features now hard and brittle. During their courtship she’d thought him impossibly appealing—funny, smart, and lit from within by a thirst for life. Had he truly changed so much or had she been blinded by love?
And if he despised Howard for wanting her, then why bring Howard deeper into their lives? They didn’t need the rail venture. Nor another source of displeasure for him.
“Are you going to betray me?” he demanded suddenly.
“No,” she said, weary almost beyond what she could bear. His contempt and dismissal of her had become a near-permanent condition of their marriage. The only thing he cared about—or so it seemed sometimes—was the matter of her fidelity.
“Good. After what you’ve made me become, being faithful is the least you can do for me.”
“And what have I made you become?” She might not be a paragon but she had been a decent wife. She saw to his every comfort, never overspent her allowance, and gave no encouragement to men like Howard.
His voice was bitter. “Don’t ask useless questions.”
She turned her face back to the window. The pavement had disappeared under a horde of black umbrellas.
Even inside the carriage she felt the incipient chill. Summer would end early this year.
A short time later Christian finished his last term at Harrow and went on to read the Natural Science Tripos at Cambridge. The summer after his second year at Trinity College, he took part in a dig in Germany. On his way back to Algernon House, he stopped in London to inspect a new shipment of marine fossils at the British Museum’s natural history division, fossils that would not be available for public viewing for some months.
The discussion engendered by the new fossils was most stimulating, so much so that instead of continuing on with his journey home, Christian accepted an invitation to dine with the curator and several of his colleagues. Afterward, rather than retiring immediately to his town residence, where a small staff kept the house ready for his use should he require it, he decided to while away an hour at his club. Society had departed London at the end of the Season; he could expect to be largely undisturbed.
The club was indeed quite empty. With a glass of brandy by his side, he settled in and tried to read the Times.
The days were easier. Between his course work, his estate, and his friends, Christian’s hours were fully occupied. But at night, when the world quieted and he was alone with his thoughts, his mind turned all too often to the woman who’d pickpocketed his heart without so much as a glance.
He dreamed of her. Sometimes the dreams were lurid, her naked, lithe body under his, her lips whispering lecherous words of encouragement into his ears. Other times she remained resolutely out of reach, walking away while he was rooted to the ground, or coming to stand next to him just after he’d been turned into a stone statue. He would struggle and shout inside his marble confines, but she took no notice at all, as uncaring as she was lovely.