She found a prayer book on a shelf in the sitting room and sat to read the burial service through quietly.
* * *
By the time luncheon had been cleared away Kate decided that she was going to have to do something. She had cracked the jib door into Grant’s bedchamber open a fraction so that she would know if he had come up to rest, and by four o’clock he had not. She handed a fed, gurgling Anna to Jeannie, cast a despairing glance in the mirror at her appearance and set off downstairs.
‘Have the guests left?’ she asked the first footman she encountered. He was wearing a black armband, she noticed with an inward wince for her own lack of mourning.
‘Yes, my lady.’
‘And where is my husband?’
‘In his study, my lady.’
‘Will you show me the way, please?’
He paused at the end of the hallway outside a dark oak door. ‘Shall I knock, my lady?’
It looked very much closed. Forbiddingly so. ‘No, I will. Thank you...’
‘Giles, my lady.’
She tapped and entered without waiting for a response. The room was warm, the fire flickering in the grate, the curtains closed against the winter chill. There were two pools of light, one over a battered old leather armchair where Charlie slept, curled into a ball like a tired puppy, the other illuminating the papers spread on the desk.
It lit the hands of the man behind the desk, but left his face in shadow. ‘Grant, will you not come to bed?’ she asked, keeping her voice low.
There was a chuckle, a trifle rusty. ‘My dear, that is a most direct suggestion.’
Kate felt her cheeks flame. ‘I was not trying to flirt, my lord.’ I would not know how and certainly not with you. ‘Surely you need to rest, spend a few hours lying down. You must be exhausted.’ She moved closer, narrowing her eyes against the light of the green-shaded reading lamp. The quill pen was lying on its side on top of the standish, the ink dry and matte on the nib. Grant had run out of energy, she realised, and was simply sitting there, too tired to move.
‘Perhaps I am.’ Grant sounded surprised, as though he had not realised why his body had given up. He made no attempt to stand.
‘Why did you marry me, if you will not allow me to help you?’ Kate sat down opposite him, her eyes on the long-fingered, bruised hands lying lax on the litter of papers. They flexed, then were still. Beautiful hands, capable and clever. She had put those discoloured patches on the left one. She had a sudden vision of them on her skin, gently caressing. Not a doctor’s hands any longer, but a lover’s, a husband’s. Could he see her blush? She hated the way she coloured up so easily, was always consumed with envy for those porcelain-fair damsels who could hide their emotions with ease.
‘You felt sorry for me, I can see that. It was a very generous act of mercy, for me and my child,’ she went on, thinking aloud when he did not answer. ‘And, for some reason, your grandfather was anxious to see you married again and you would do anything to make him happy.’ Still silence. Perhaps he had fallen asleep. ‘But I cannot sit upstairs in my suite for the rest of my days.’
‘Not for ever, no. But for now you are still a new mother. You also require rest. Is there anything you need?’ he asked.
At least he was not sleeping where he sat. Kate did not wish to bother him with trivial matters, but he was talking to her, maybe she could distract him enough to consider sleep... ‘I have no clothes.’ His expressive fingers moved, curled across a virgin sheet of paper. ‘Other than two gowns in a sad state and a few changes of linen,’ she added repressively. ‘I need mourning.’
‘It can wait.’ The words dropped like small stones into the silence, not expecting an answer.
At least he was not sleeping where he sat. If she could rouse him enough, she might persuade him to get up and go to his bed. ‘Not for much longer. I cannot appear like this, even if it is only in front of the servants.’
He focused on her problem with a visible effort. ‘The turnpike is clear. Tomorrow, if the snow holds off, Wilson can go into Hexham and purchase enough to tide you over until you are strong enough for a trip into Newcastle.’
‘Thank you.’ Kate folded her own hands in her lap and settled back in the chair. If he thought he could send her back to her room with that, he was mistaken. The silence dragged on, filled with the child’s breathing, the soft collapse of a log into ash, her own pulse.
‘Are you going to sit there for the rest of the afternoon and evening?’ Grant enquired evenly when another log fell into the heart of the fire.