The Egyptologist - Arthur Phillips [56]
You are adorable, Margaret. You have always downplayed your bad days, as if I would not notice the difference between you healthy and ill. When you finally admitted your condition to me, the day after the party, I should have looked more surprised for you. My love, I am sorry if I was unconvincing, but one day last summer, your father had already told me everything. You must not be angry with him. CCF is father to us both now. When I asked him for your hand, he felt himself honour-bound to tell your would-be husband the entire tale. He wanted to tell me the worst and see that my love for you was unshaken. CCF spoke openly, and well before your timid little report, I had heard all about the nerve specialists, the exhaustion caused by the medication, the rarity of your illness. I also heard your excellent prognosis, your imminent and certain cure. And, Margaret, upon my word, I have never had a moment’s concern since. I know you are every day stronger, and Inge is but a temporary nurse to administer the last of your medications and nothing more. Whether she joins us for the early days of marriage, or whether you will already be fully restored to health—time will tell. In the meantime, you must not worry, and certainly never about the strength of my love for you, my angel.
Your father is a man of many parts. He presents such a rough exterior to the world, and of course his business milieu allows for no other, but I have seen him speak of you. I have seen him drop his guard and reveal his deep concern and tenderness. I saw his eyes mist when he spoke of the worry your illness had caused him, and his determination when he told me, “Ralph, she’s beating this thing. You’ve got nothing to worry about in her as your hale and healthy, intact wife.” He is a father, bless his heart.
I mourn the loss of my own father every day, and you should think of CCF with fondness, as I do, for a father’s love is one of the most precious gifts.
I remember the anticipation I would feel, as a boy in Trilipush Hall, when I knew Father was due to return from an expedition soon. He would have been gone for weeks or even months, and I longed for nothing more than to be taken up in his strong arms and popped on his knee in front of the great fire to hear of his adventures. Would today be the day he arrived? How I would pace the vast, echoing chambers of the Hall.
Ah, Trilipush Hall! There were marvels to be found there. The walls cluttered with portraits of wigged and grinning ancestors. The endless suits of armour and forests of halberds, lances, pikes, the walls of unstrung crossbows. The hanging tapestries with scenes of mediaeval hunts and balls. The drawer where Father haphazardly tossed his military honours and medals, and those of our ancestors. The relics Father had brought back from Africa, Malacca, China. The blazing fire in the hearth ten feet tall—a hasp of log the shape of a ham hock, but zebra-striped grey and black and fluttering its long, orange tresses of flame—in front of which I would lie on my stomach in solitude and practise hieroglyphs. On some days, out the east window of the main room, you could see streaming rain and at the same instant, through the west window, sunshine breaking through the clouds, and I would run back and forth from window to window, imagining myself in different countries at Father’s side, fighting bandits while he pulled astounding artefacts from the earth. I would look out the window (streaked with rain or sparkling with new sun), and I would watch the birds on the emerald grounds—the omnipresent pheasant and the uncomplaining grouse had grown more plentiful and arrogant in Father’s absence, as no hunts took place without him. And I would long for the sound of carriage wheels out front: would today be the day of his return? The great room grew darker and darker until only the fire’s orange embers lit my face and the dark wood furnishings