The woman was staring at her with Colin’s eyes, which felt unsettling instead of familiar, because they held a contempt that was new. Elizabeth could see that the Duchess Dowager had been a great beauty once, but now she looked… spent. It didn’t resemble normal ageing, for Elizabeth knew and had known many lined, well-used, well-loved faces that looked wonderful. This woman’s face looked like something had sucked the life and youth force out of her.
“Mother, this is my wife,” Colin started introducing her, and at the same time, his mother said, “There she is, the harlot’s daughter.”
“Your Grace,” Elizabeth curtsied to her husband’s mother, having already decided upstairs that whatever happened tonight was about Colin and not about her.
The woman threw herself into one of the chairs, and Elizabeth took her own seat next to her husband. Her heart swelled with sympathy for him. He looked so scared and ashamed.
“Careful, mother,” he said through his teeth. “I called out a man for a similar insult, don’t think I cannot think of a creative punishment for my own mother.”
“Ah, yes, I heard of your vulgar behaviour on that count as well,” his mother said as she filled her glass. “I did not suffer and sacrifice my entire life, only for you to think you can just do whatever you please! That’s not how the world works!”
No one said anything, and Colin nodded at Hannah, the already painfully timid maid, who had witnessed the entire exchange, to start serving them. As Colin and Lizzie half-heartedly pretended to eat, Charlotte Talbot kept drinking. No one said anything for over fifteen minutes. At some point, Elizabeth noticed that Colin shook his head at Hannah, who promptly took the wine carafe from the table and disappeared.
“Look at how they obey him, his little servants,” the Dowager said bitterly after she, too, had observed the interaction. “He’s always been close to them, closer than to his own parents. He’d even started talking like them. His father was mortified when we came back from Europe, and the boy was talking like a villager. I’m afraid he’s never grown out of his affections towards the unworthy,” she concluded with a pointed look at Elizabeth, who merely pressed her thigh against her husband’s in silent support.
He was clearly aggravated at the words, which worried her. What was this insane, very inebriated woman talking about?
“He must have made it easy to trap him,” Charlotte slurred as she leaned back in her chair. “He’s always… Father. I said, to the Duke, I told him…”
She was becoming less and less coherent, and Elizabeth whispered to Colin, “Should we send for a doctor?”
He looked at his mother with pity in his eyes. “No, this is rather common for her. I shall call for her maid and we’ll help her to her room, and then I think I shall also retire for the evening.”
“Colin, I…” she started saying, but he closed his eyes and shook his head. “All right,” she conceded.
Elizabeth sat alone in the parlour for a long time, going over everything that she had just witnessed. How could that bitter old drunk be the mother of the man she had met all those months ago, the one whose presence had commanded every room he’d entered? She had imagined a refined, intimidating, sophisticated duchess, but the way that woman had spoken to Colin, the way she had insulted both of them…
Suddenly, Lizzie understood why Colin had liked being at Eton, why he’d found comfort and control in the order and hierarchy of theTon.How helpless he had to have felt as a child in such a violent household!
Dear God, please heal that part of him. Make his heart whole.
She stood up and rang for tea. When the housekeeper brought it in some time later, she lingered, as if waiting for the inevitable questions she knew would come.
“Is she always like this?”
“And worse, Your Grace,” Mrs. Hughes said with a sigh that sounded like a dam inside her was breaking. “My poor master had such a hard time growing up with the two of them. His late father was a kind man, but deeply unhappy. It was a mercy that the two of them were absent so much of his childhood, and then they sent him away to school. He used to be such a warm, affectionate boy, but they never returned his love.”
The older woman had tears in her eyes and looked away hastily, as if regretting that she’d said too much.
“Thank you, Mrs. Hughes,” she said warmly, and the housekeeper scurried out of the room.
After almost an hour, Elizabeth decided she would be unable to sleep alone tonight. So she confidently made her way upstairs, dressed for bed, went over to her husband’s door, and somewhat less confidently knocked. He opened it immediately, like he’d been standing behind it and hoping she’d knock this whole time.
“Can we not speak tonight?” He asked in an uncertain voice, and Lizzie nodded.
She led him to the bed and they both got in very slowly and very quietly. He turned to her and watched her with tired, sorrowful eyes from his pillow. She moved over to him so she could kiss his brow, and then hugged his neck, putting her chin on top of his head. He helped her back onto her pillow and lay his head on her shoulder as he hugged her waist.
Elizabeth stroked and caressed his shoulders, hair, forehead, bestowed tiny, soothing kisses on his brow, his eyelids, his temples, and lightly scratched his scalp with her nails until she felt his head become heavier on her bosom and his breathing deepen.
It was exhilarating to watch his relaxed, open face as he slept, and to know that she was able to give enough safety and love for someone to find comfort and rest in. The action of providing those things for another person fortifiedherand healed something inside her, for it showed her the value that her presence could have for someone who cared about her. She’dnever felt stronger or more important.Like a port to dock in, where the weary traveller can rest,she thought.
The imagery reminded her of what Mrs Cooper had said about ports and lighthouses, and she thought about Colin’s mother again until she succumbed to sleep.
“Good morning,” her husband’s hoarse voice accompanied a kiss on her shoulder.
“Morning,” she replied sleepily.
They were both quiet for a while. Lizzie stared at the ceiling and tried clearing her head enough to get up. Colin stroked her hand with the back of his fingers.
