The Last Letter from Juliet - Melanie Hudson Page 0,28
and accepted it.
This, I said to myself, was love.
Love was two people who got along and, after an appropriate amount of time, kissed, and after a further appropriate amount of time, married and perhaps had children. It was a steadier romance than Lottie and I had imagined during our nights reading novels at school, but I didn’t mind. My passion was reserved for flying and unlike Lottie, I had never actively looked for romance or expected anything other than that one day, I would perhaps marry the kind of man my mother had instructed me to marry – the non-predatory kind, the kind who would adore me to eternity.
Charles, very definitely, fit the bill.
Lottie, by comparison, was desperate to find the opposite kind of love, one that burned with the raging heat of a thousand furnaces and was determined not to settle for anything less until she found it. In late September 1938, while I took myself off on a flying tour around France with an old flying club friend, Lottie disappeared north to spend two months in Scotland on an estate belonging to friends of her parents – the son was deemed to be a suitable match. Bored by the son, Lottie found passion elsewhere, with another house guest, an eminent one, who was not only a married man and a charlatan, but also a high-profile politician, close to the Prime Minister himself. By November she knew she was pregnant and with her tail between her legs and her heart well and truly broken, Lottie dashed home alone.
There were no histrionics. A plan was hatched. A promise made. I would marry Charles earlier than planned and we would leave immediately for Oxford. The child would, after Lottie’s confinement with an aunt in Yorkshire, be passed off as mine. My only proviso was that I would continue to fly. The child would be kept in the family at Lanyon. Lottie would be the doting aunt and everyone would be happy. And I had, until the moment I met Edward Nancarrow, in a breezy Cornish field just before Christmas, been, if not happy, then resigned to this arrangement. I owed it to them.
Determined to do the right thing for everyone concerned, I took the final few steps up the lane towards Edward’s cottage and knocked on the door.
***
Edward sat in a chair across from me next to the fire and listened as I told him – not Lottie’s story, I could never tell him that – but how I loved the Lanyons and how, no matter what, I intended to marry Charles. I explained that I was marrying not just the man, but the family – my family. I explained how well they had treated me and how much they relied on my substantial fortune to save the house and estate from ruin – relied on me to save the hard-working tenant farmers like Jessops from ruin, too. When my story reached its natural end, he reached across the fire and took my hand.
‘Are you in love with him?’
‘I love him,’ I answered without hesitation, and it wasn’t a lie. ‘He’s a good man. And until recently, I believed myself to be in love.’
Edward released my hand and stepped over to the window.
‘Your silence says everything there is to say, Edward.’
He turned to face me. ‘I’d rather say nothing at all than say the wrong thing. With people like the Lanyons, I have found that it’s generally best to keep one’s own counsel.’
‘The Lanyons? That’s so dismissive. They’re good people, Edward. Truly they are.’
Edward took a deep breath.
‘All I know is they will stop at nothing to keep their house – their name – in order.’ He sat down again. His voice was kind. ‘Why are you here, Juliet, in my cottage, right now?’
Because I’ve fallen in love with you. Because you’re my every waking thought …
‘I wanted to explain.’
He stared out to sea before suddenly sitting forwards in his chair. He took my hands.
‘What are you doing for the rest of the day?’
‘Nothing much. I’m supposed to be working on the Moth. Charles is in Penzance making some last …’ I stopped, not wanting to speak about wedding preparations. ‘At any rate, I shan’t see him until dinner, I suppose.’
‘In that case, spend the day with me. Let’s take one last day just for us – one wonderful day together – a day to last a lifetime. Let’s coddiwomple together, one last time. What do you say?’