Angels in the Gloom_ A Novel - Anne Perry [75]
“I knew he was having an affair with Penny Lucas,” she said quietly. “I’m not sure how. I’m not even sure if it was partly my fault.”
His mind wheeled around thoughts of Hannah, and Judith, and then other people he had known; love, envy, loneliness, the need to know beyond question that you mattered to someone. Relationships were complicated, full of hungers so intense they overrode all wisdom and understanding of morality and loss.
He should have been gentler with Hannah. What had crippled his imagination so badly that he had allowed himself to be angry with her? “How could it be your fault?” he asked.
Lizzie kept her eyes on the road. “I don’t know. Sometimes I wish life could be as it used to, but part of me is excited by the changes, the new possibilities opening up. I’ve always just waited on Theo.” Her face was motionless in the evening sunlight. “He was truly brilliant, you know, perhaps one of the best scientists we’ve ever had. It’s not just me who’s lost him, it’s Britain, maybe the whole world. But in a way now I can be me.” A wobbly smile touched her lips. “I’ve got to. I no longer have him to look after anymore.” She blinked back sudden tears. “What I mean is, perhaps I wasn’t doing it so well anyway.”
He believed her. She was filled with regret, and her determination was a balance between fear and hope, and a mask for the pain too deep to face.
Had she loved Theo enough to be passionately jealous? He did not want to consider even the possibility. But he had been wrong before. Other people he had cared about, loved, and known far better than he knew her, had had the courage, the violence, and the moment’s unreasoning fire inside them to be blinded to the values of eternity and see only the need of the moment—and kill.
There was death and bereavement all around them. Casualty lists were posted every day. How easy was it to think of France, only twenty miles across the Channel, and keep sanity untainted here?
“Wait until Perth has solved it and you’ve had a little time to get your strength and make a firm decision,” he said to her.
She smiled and took a deep breath, reaching for a handkerchief in her pocket. She was too busy trying to master herself to repeat her thanks.
They were almost at the Corcorans’ house and they did not speak again until arranging what time she should return to take him home.
The visit was just what Joseph needed: the warmth of welcome, the familiar rooms with their memories of the past, old pictures, old books, chairs that were long worn into the shape that held his body. The French doors were open to birdsong in the garden, even though the air was growing cooler. There was a comfort about it all that put mistakes in perspective.
Corcoran was delighted with the goblet. He held it up to let the light play on its satin surface. The beauty of the gift captivated him, but far more than that was the fact that Joseph had chosen it and given it to him. He set it in the middle of the dinner table and his eyes kept going toward it.
Over dinner with Corcoran’s wife, Orla, they talked of matters other than war and tragedy: timeless ideas and the beauty of poetry, music, and fine art that outlasted the storms of history.
Afterward, Orla excused herself, and Joseph and Corcoran sat alone in the twilight. At last they turned to the matters of the present.
“You must have known Theo Blaine quite well,” Joseph said almost casually. “Did you like him?”
Corcoran looked surprised. “Actually I did. He had a very pure enthusiasm it was impossible not to like.”
“Was he really one of the best scientists in England?”
A slight shadow passed over Corcoran’s face, hardly more than a change in his eyes. “Yes, I have no doubt he was, or at least he could have been. He had some distance yet to mature and realize his full potential. Certainly he was remarkable. But don’t worry, Joseph. We will