Paragon Walk - Anne Perry [62]
She lay in her chair, stretching her back, feeling the stiffness in it. Could the child within her make so much difference already? There was a dragging, an awkwardness. Perhaps Aunt Vespasia was right and she would have to loosen her stays. That would make her look thick. She was not tall enough to carry the extra weight gracefully. Funny, Charlotte had looked all right when she was carrying Jemima. But then Charlotte had not had fashionable clothes anyway.
Across the room George was sitting fiddling with the newspaper. He had congratulated her on the party, but now he was avoiding looking at her. He was not reading it; she knew that from the angle of his head, the curiously fixed stare he held. When he was really reading, he moved, his expression altered, and every so often he would rattle the sheets as if he were having a conversation with them. This time he was using the paper as a shield, to avoid the necessity of speaking. He could at once be both absent and present.
Why? There was nothing she wanted so much as to talk, even if it was about nothing, simply to feel that he wished to be with her. He could not possibly know that the solution would be all right, that it would not go on hurting, and yet she wanted him to say so, to tell her all the comforting words. Then she could repeat them all to herself over and over, till they drove out reason and doubt.
He was her husband. It was his child that made her feel so tired and lumpy and strangely excited. How could he sit there a few feet away and be totally unaware that she wanted him to speak, to say something foolish and optimistic to silence all the clamor inside her.
“George!”
He affected not to have heard.
“George!” Her voice was growing higher and there was a thread of hysteria in it.
He looked up. At first his brown eyes were innocent, as if his thoughts were still on the paper. Then slowly they clouded, and understanding could not be denied. He knew she was demanding something.
“Yes?”
Now she did not know what to say. Reassurance you have to ask for is no reassurance at all. It would have been better if she had said nothing. Her brain told her that, but her tongue would not keep still.
“They haven’t found Fulbert yet.” It was not what she was thinking, but it was something to say. She could not ask him why he was afraid, what it was that Pitt might find out. Would it destroy her marriage? Not anything like divorce, no one divorced, at least, no one decent. But she had seen any number of empty marriages, polite arrangements to share a house and a name. When she had first determined to marry George, she had thought that friendship and acceptance would be enough—but they were not. She had grown used to affection, to shared laughter, little understanding secrets, long, comfortable silences, even habits that became part of the security and rhythm of life.
Now all this was sliding away, like the tide going out, leaving stretches of empty shingle.
“I know,” he replied, with a little frown of puzzlement. She knew he did not realize why she had made such an obvious and silly remark. She had to say something more to justify herself.
“Do you think he’s run away completely?” she asked. “Like to France, or something?”
“Why ever should he?”
“If he killed Fanny!”
His face fell a little. Obviously he had not really considered that.
“He wouldn’t kill Fanny,” he said firmly. “I should think he’s probably dead himself. Maybe he went into town to gamble or something, and had an accident. People do sometimes.”
“Oh, don’t be so stupid!” At last she lost her temper completely. It surprised and alarmed her that she should so suddenly snap. She had never dared speak to him like that before.
He looked startled and the paper slid to the floor.