Hope - Lesley Pearse [255]
‘I wish I had now, but we didn’t want you upset or embarrassed. I almost told you when we heard that Hope was out in the Crimea,’ she said. ‘But I couldn’t find the words.’
‘Does Angus know any of this?’ Hope ventured. It was all too much for her. She knew it had to be true, for even a deranged old lady could hardly make up such a story. And clearly this was what lay behind Nell’s reluctance for her to see Lady Harvey.
‘No. He never knew.’ The older woman began to cry again. ‘Maybe Nell has told him since she went to work for him, but I doubt it as he would have come to see me and demanded to know why I kept it from him.’
Rufus looked as if he’d seen a ghost. His face was white and his eyes were wide and startled.
Much as Hope wished to give him comfort, his mother needed it more for she was shaking and distraught, so she went to her, drew her head to her chest and patted her back comfortingly. ‘I don’t know what to say to you,’ she said softly. ‘I need to think about it all and hear it from Nell too.’
‘Do you believe me?’ The older woman drew back from Hope’s arms and looked up at her.
‘Yes,’ Hope nodded. ‘But right now I can’t deal with it. I need to get Betsy home.’
‘I don’t want you getting anyone to come in here,’ Lady Harvey whimpered. ‘I couldn’t talk to anyone, I’d rather be alone.’
Hope didn’t speak as the buggy bowled along the road. The clip-clop of Flash’s hooves and the whizzing of the wheels seemed entirely at one with her thoughts as she pinpointed little incidents that gave credence to her real parentage.
Nell’s nervousness about Angus when he came to Briar-gate, the feelings she’d so often had of not entirely belonging in her family, even that old tale about her being ‘a fairy child’ had new meaning now. There was the bond between her and Rufus, and one with Angus too. She certainly couldn’t be ashamed or sorry she was related to either of them.
But it was the knowledge that Nell wasn’t her true sister that hurt. She’d been everything to her, often more of a mother than an older sister. It was devastating to know there was no blood tie between them and that Nell had kept this secret for all these years.
Where Lady Harvey was concerned she felt nothing, for there was little to admire the woman for. Meg Renton was a far more admirable person, for she’d brought Hope up and loved her as if she were her own.
She glanced at Rufus. It was dark now but she could see his profile well enough to see his mouth was tight, and that he was struggling to come to terms with the shattering events of the day.
‘What a day, eh!’ she said and slipped one hand over his on the horse’s reins.
‘At least I gained a sister,’ he sighed. ‘I always had a special regard for you, but I could never have suspected this. We are so completely different! There isn’t one similarity. Me blond, you dark, one with blue eyes, one with brown, how can it be?’
‘You had two blond-haired, blue-eyed parents,’ Hope said. ‘Clearly I inherited everything from Angus. Imagine if I had been like you. Questions would’ve been asked! In the village they talk about people being “as dark as a Renton”.’
‘I have to say that if one has to hear one’s mother had a secret love child, I’m glad it was you,’ he said, but his voice cracked with emotion as if he was struggling not to cry.
‘Try not to be angry with your mother,’ she said soothingly. ‘It must have been terrible for her. None of us know what we’d do in such circumstances.’
‘I always knew there was something lurking in the past,’ Rufus said thoughtfully. ‘But I thought it was to do with my father.’
‘She did love him,’ Hope ventured.
‘But he couldn’t love her, could he?’ Rufus said.
Hope’s heart skipped a beat, for that sounded very much as if Rufus knew about his father’s nature too. As she didn’t know howto reply she stayed silent.
‘He loved other men,’ Rufus blurted out. ‘That was the problem between them.’
The sound