Hope - Lesley Pearse [52]
Every sound seemed magnified, the scrape of his chair on the stone floor as he pulled it out to sit down, his first sip of tea and the crackle of the wood in the stove. Albert was mostly silent, and she usually chattered just to break the deadly quiet. But this time she said nothing, just served him up a large portion of the pie.
It was when he picked up a knife to spread butter on his bread that she noticed him wince.
‘What’s wrong with your hand?’ she asked.
‘A cut,’ he said curtly.
‘Let me see,’ she said, leaning closer and reaching out for his hand.
‘Leave me be, woman,’ he spat at her. ‘I’m not a child.’
Nell had intended to wait until after he’d eaten, but the way he spoke to her riled her so much she could not contain herself any longer.
‘No, you aren’t a child. You’re a big and very strong man. Yet you’d half-strangle a young girl and try to dash her brains out.’
He flushed and began to rise from his chair as if to strike her.
She snatched up the bread knife. ‘Sit down,’ she ordered him, pointing the knife at him. ‘For once you are going to listen to me.’
‘Now look here, woman,’ he began to bluster, ‘I expected that the impudent madam would go snivelling to you, but I doubt she told you the truth. She insulted me, so I chastised her. She deserved it.’
‘She didn’t snivel to anyone. She wouldn’t even admit to Baines or me that she were attacked. But we knew! FingerMarks on her neck, the gash on her head. She couldn’t get those from falling on the drive.’
He gave a snort of derision and went to get up, but Nell lunged out warningly with the knife and he sat down again. ‘I could get you thrown off this estate,’ she hissed. ‘Thrown out without a character. Where would you be then?’
‘They couldn’t do that without throwing you out too,’ he said with a smirk. ‘I’m your husband.’
‘Husband!’ she sneered. ‘How can you be when I’m still a virgin after three long years of marriage?’
He was clearly astounded that she would dare voice such a thing. Suddenly he looked a little unsure of himself.
‘That’s my trump card,’ she said determinedly. ‘I haven’t played it yet, but I’m prepared to.’ She lowered the knife just a fraction, and leaned forward to nudge his plate nearer to him. ‘Eat up, dear Albert, you have to keep your strength up. Ruth made that for you, though if she guessed the truth about Hope’s injuries she might well have slipped some arsenic in.’
He looked down at his plate, then back at Nell. He was hesitant, wanting to eat it because he was starving, but afraid to.
‘Come on, Albert, eat,’ she said. ‘There are so many of us Rentons.’ She laughed lightly as if she were joking. ‘James in the stables with a pitchfork! Matt lying in wait somewhere with a scythe! How about Joe and Henry destroying your rosebeds?’
‘Now look here, woman!’ he said, his face darkening. ‘You can’t threaten me!’
‘Threaten you?’ Nell gasped, as if that was the last thing on her mind. ‘Surely you don’t think I was threatening you? I was only pointing out the things you might think could happen. But none of those things are necessary, not with my trump card.’
She paused, feeling a little more confident now. ‘It would be easy enough to go to Lady Harvey and tell her that you aren’t a real man and you take it out on Hope and me because it shames you. Do you think she’d want you as her gardener knowing that? I believe a marriage can be annulled if it hasn’t been consummated.’ She smirked at him, proud that she’d remembered the right word. ‘I could speak to Reverend Gosling about that!’
‘I never meant to hit Hope,’ Albert exclaimed, his face suddenly paler. ‘Damn it, woman, I’m sorry I did.’
‘I’m sorry you did too,’ Nell said fiercely. ‘Because it’s made me face things about you that I didn’t want to examine.’
He looked at her blankly.
‘You really don’t like women at all, do you?’ Nell asked. ‘When we got married I thought you loved me and that we’d have children. But you cheated me. You knew that you could never give me that.’
‘I take care of you,’ he said indignantly.
‘Care! You call ordering me around, pulling