Leo returned home at the beginning of July, crossing to England on a naval ship and arriving at Branford Abbey on a beautiful day of clear skies and fluffy white clouds. Branford stood on the West Downs of Sussex, and at the beginning of the seventeenth century it had been substantially remodeled from the stone abbey it once was into a house befitting an earl. Most of the house was still the Jacobean edifice built by the first earl, from the front hall—one of the grandest in all England—with its massive fireplace and spectacular screen, its awe-inspiring staircase, to the ornate and stately rooms on the second floor with their displays of portraiture and paintings and fine furniture.
Leo loved his home, but he had spent most of his life living away from it, first at school and then in the army. As he dined in state all by himself in the magnificent dining room, he thought how wonderful it would be to make this house a home again, to bring Gabrielle here, with her laughter and her greatheartedness. They would have children to fill up the nurseries, he thought, and Albert could have a studio and Mathieu a study to work on mathematical formulas.
“Do you know if my mother is in residence at Marley Manor?” he asked his butler as one dish was removed and another one served.
“I don’t know, my lord,” replied the venerable retainer, who had served his mother when she was Lady Branford. “I can have one of the grooms ride over there to ascertain if she is.”
“Do that,” Leo said. “Have him go tomorrow morning. I’ll give him a note to deliver in case she is there. If she isn’t, have him find out where she has gone.”
“Yes, my lord,” the butler replied.
He was very tired after dinner. That was one thing about being wounded; you got tired very easily. But the bandages had come off the wound and his ribs were healing and, all in all, he was in good shape, considering how serious things might have been.
He retired to his chambers, picturing how Gabrielle would look beside him in the high four-poster bed.
Leo’s butler sought him out following breakfast the next morning. “Lady Rivers is in residence, my lord, and she sent you this reply to your note.”
He offered the note, which reposed upon a silver salver, to Leo. Leo took it and unfolded it. Come when you wish, I will be home all day.
“Henderson, have the curricle brought to the front door,” he said.
“Yes, my lord.”
Half an hour later, Leo was on his way to visit Marley Manor, the home of his mother and her husband, Lord Rivers. Marley was eight miles away from Branford Abbey, and Leo had never once set foot in it during all the eleven years that his mother had been re-wed.
The home of Lord Rivers was a pleasant brick building, less than a quarter the size of Branford Abbey. There was a butler to answer the door, however, and Leo was shown into the house with great reverence.
His sister was just coming down the stairs as he came in.
“Leo!” she cried. “Is that really you?”
“It’s I,” he replied. “How are you, Dolly? You are looking very pretty this morning.”
She was wearing a chip straw hat over her blond curls and a sprig muslin dress was tied under her high young breasts. On her feet she wore serviceable boots.
“I’m going to cut flowers for Mama in the garden,” she said. “Whatever are you doing here? Are you all right? We heard that you were wounded again!”
“I am fine,” he replied. “I came to see Mama.”
Dolly looked flabbergasted. “You did?”
“Yes,” Leo replied serenely.
Lady Rivers appeared at the top of the staircase. “Mama!” Dolly cried. “Leo has come to see you!”
“Yes, I know,” Lady Rivers replied. “Come upstairs to the drawing room, Leo, where we can be private.”
Leo followed his mother as she led him toward a yellow-painted room off the hallway. Lady Rivers closed the door firmly behind him and looked up into his face. Her eyes filled with tears. “Thank God you are all right,” she said. “We were notified that you were wounded, but you seem well enough.”
“I am fine,” he replied. “A little stiff in the middle, perhaps, but that will wear off.”
She blinked back the tears so that they didn’t fall. “Please sit down,” she said. “When did you get to Branford?”
“Yesterday,” he replied.
She nodded and took a seat on a gold striped sofa. He sat on a gold velvet chair facing it.
“I was surprised to hear from you,” she said cautiously.
Now that he was here, it was hard finding a place to start. He nodded and said, “How did Dolly’s first season go?”
“Very well. She got two proposals of marriage from very eligible men, but she informed me that she didn’t love either of them, so we will try again next year.”
“What was wrong with the two eligible men?”
“Nothing, as far as I could see—except the fact that Dolly didn’t love them.”
He frowned a little, and she added, as if she expected him to object, “After all, she is only eighteen, Leo. There is no rush.”
“Of course not,” he said firmly. “It’s important to love the person one marries. I have come to understand that very well.”
There was a little silence, then Lady Rivers said carefully, “Are you by any chance in love yourself?”
He looked at her. She was still a very lovely woman. When he had been a child he had thought her the most beautiful woman in all the world. “Yes, I am.”
“Tell me about her,” she said.
He took a long breath. “Her name is Gabrielle Robichon and she is the proprietor of a French circus. She smuggled gold for the army from Belgium to the south of France, and I rode with the circus the whole time to keep an eye on the money.”
He paused for breath, and to try to ascertain his mother’s reaction. She looked astounded. “She owns a circus?” she murmured.
“An equestrian circus. She is the best rider I have ever seen. To watch her ride is magical.”
She said, “She does not sound like an…appropriate…person for you to fall in love with, Leo.”
He leaned a little in her direction. “If you look at it with worldly eyes, she isn’t. But she is the most beautiful, the most brave, the most gallant woman I have ever met. She’s a much better person than I am, Mama. In the eyes of God, she stands miles ahead of me.”
She looked down at her hands, which were clasped in her lap, then back up to him. “Why have you come to me?” she asked finally.
He leaned slightly more forward. “I want you to help her to be accepted by society. I don’t want to marry Gabrielle and have her ostracized by my own people. She doesn’t deserve that.”
Lady Rivers changed the way her hands were clasped; otherwise she was motionless. “Leo,” she said. “Tell me how you came to fall in love with this girl.”
He told her how he had looked down on the “circus girl” when first they met; he told her how gallant Gabrielle was, shouldering the burden of her young brothers and of all the people in the circus who were depending upon her. He told of her kindness, of her tolerance, of her charity. “My mind was so prejudiced by the social gap between us, that I never thought of marrying her until after I had left her,” he concluded. “I knew I was miserable without her, but it took a bullet in my back to make me realize that the only way my life could be important was for me to be with her. I thought and I thought about how I could marry her and make my world accept her, and finally I thought of you.” He fixed her with a pleading look. “Do you think you can help me, Mama?”
She searched his face. “Leo…how does this girl feel about you?”
“She loves me. I know she loves me.”
“What about this circus that you say is so important to her?”
“I’ll pay them all double what they would have got for the rest of the season. That way she won’t have to worry about leaving them in the lurch. And her beloved horses can come to Branford—and her brothers as well. You’ll like Mathieu and Albert, Mama. They are wonderful youngsters.”
She smiled faintly. “You seem to have figured this all out.”
“I’ve figured out everything except a way to make sure that Gabrielle is accepted into the ton. I don’t want her ever to feel inferior, Mama. That would be a terrible thing to do to her.”
Lady Rivers got practical. “What is Gabrielle’s background? Who were her father and her mother?”
“Her father was Master of the Horse under Louis XVI. I don’t know anything about her mother. Oh! I remember she once said that her grandfather was a minor noble. I had forgot about that.”
“That is encouraging,” Lady Rivers said. She nodded slowly. “Her father was a member of the court of Louis XVI. Her grandfather was a noble. These are things I can work with.”
Leo brightened. “Do you think so?”
Lady Rivers said thoughtfully, “What I might do is hold a ball in order to introduce your new wife to society. I’m sure I can get Sally Jersey to attend—she is a particular friend of mine—and if Sally Jersey comes, the world will follow.”
“That sounds wonderful, Mama,” Leo said fervently.
Lady Rivers went on, “I can tell people that her family lost their estate in the Revolution and that she has bravely been raising her little brothers by herself.”
“That’s not a lie, either,” Leo interjected.
She raised an eyebrow. “I assume that she is presentable, Leo?”
“She’s the most beautiful girl I have ever seen.”
“Her manners are good?”
“Her manners are perfect.”
“I will have to get her a wardrobe. Does she speak English?”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
“Well enough. And she’s very smart. She will pick it up in no time.”
“Well then…” Lady Rivers straightened her shoulders. “I think we can do it, Leo. She does sound like a brave girl. Her story—if it is presented properly—should garner a great deal of sympathy.”
He gave her the smile he had not been able to give her in more than a decade. “This is wonderful, Mama.”
Lady Rivers smiled back. “I think you should be married in the chapel at Branford. All of the family will come. That way Gabrielle will face society as your wife, and the wife of the Earl of Branford is one of the highest positions in English society. There have been Earls of Branford at Branford Abbey since the sixteenth century. Not too many people will want to snub your wife, especially if she is introduced by your family.
“How does that sound, Leo?” she asked.
“It sounds wonderful.” His voice was a little subdued and he couldn’t look at her. “I have been thinking…it is very kind of you to support me like this—especially since I have scarcely been kind to you these past twelve years.”
She said, with an ache in her voice, “I always understood how you felt, Leo. I have never blamed you for rejecting me.”
“No. It was wrong of me.” He managed a crooked smile. “Gabrielle tells me that everything can be forgiven, but I didn’t want to forgive. I wanted to remember—and to hurt you, like you had hurt me. It was childish of me. Can you ever forgive me, Mama?”
“Oh, darling, of course I can forgive you.” Tears started to stream down her face. “Jasper and I were wrong to do what we did, and your finding us the way you did was the worst punishment that could ever have happened to me. I would have given anything to take back that moment—anything!”
He said in a low voice, “I couldn’t understand it, you see.” His voice took on a painful note. “I still can’t understand it.”
She looked at him, her eyes full of tears. “Leo…let me try to explain. Your papa and I…our marriage was arranged by our families, and we simply did not love each other the way you love your Gabrielle. When you were still a small boy, I fell in love with Jasper. He loved me back, but for many years we kept our love in check. I tried my best to be a good wife to your father and a good mother to you children. Then your father became ill and it was clear that he would not live.”
The tears fell faster. “I didn’t wish it on him, Leo. Believe me that I never did that. Your papa was a good man—he was always kind to me. I took the best care of him that I possibly could….”
Her voice tapered off.
Leo said flatly, “But Papa’s death meant that you could marry Rivers.”
“Yes. And for one moment—the only time, Leo!—we allowed ourselves to act out the love that had always been in our hearts.”
“And I walked in on you.”
“Yes. Because of my weakness, I lost my son.”
Silence fell in the room. Then Leo said, “I’m through with judging you, Mama. I know a little myself now about the exigencies of love. It does not always come where it is appropriate or convenient. I can only say that I hope you have found happiness in your years spent with Rivers.”
“Oh, Leo.” Tears clogged her voice as well as her eyes. “The only flaw in my happiness has been my estrangement from you.”
“Don’t cry, Mama, please don’t cry.” He moved to sit next to her on the sofa. He took her hand into his. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I was such a boor for all those years.”
“I never blamed you,” she said.
He took a square of white linen out of his pocket and put it into her hand. She wiped her cheeks and her streaming eyes.
“I’m so happy,” she said.
He smiled. “You don’t look it.”
“These are tears of joy.”
“I missed you all these years,” he said. “I missed my family. I was a fool to turn my back on everything I loved the most.”
“You had reason—good reason. But I hated to see you so alone. And I worried so much the whole time you were in the army.”
“I’m selling out,” he said. “The biggest battle is over. Now all Wellington has to do is sweep into France from the south while the Allies—which now include Austria—invade from the east. Napoléon’s hours are numbered. I think I’ve done my part. The others can finish it up.”
“Thank God,” she said. “You were wounded twice. God knows what might have happened the next time.”
“I have been thinking about that—and once you start thinking that way, you had better get out. I want a long life in front of me to spend with Gabrielle. I don’t want to be buried on some French battlefield.”
“God bless Gabrielle,” Lady Rivers said. She gave her son a radiant smile. “She has given you back to me.”
“Yes,” Leo said. He bent his head and kissed his mother’s soft cheek. “She has.”