“But did she resent her brother for it? Was she not angry with him?”
“Lord, no.” Mrs Evans shook her head. “That just wasn’t her way. She was a gentle creature with a romantic heart and the softest of ways, just like her little girls. She could no more resent him than she could resent her own children.”
“Did she not talk of the break between them?”
“Not very often. I suppose it was just a fact that couldn’t be ignored and didn’t need to be said. When she talked to me, or to Mr Thomas’ parents, it was only of all the good that had existed between them. There was never any bitterness, only sadness.”
“It is a great relief to me to hear you say that, Mrs Evans. If only I could find some way to prove it to her brother. If only I could give him something of the relief I feel myself.”
“Then you might be better off to look through the little box of letters she wrote him,” Mrs Evans said with a shrug.
“The letters she wrote him?”
“Yes, Mrs Thomas used to write to her brother regularly. But she never sent them; she just kept them in the box. I never asked her why; I just thought that she might decide to tell me one day. But, of course, she never did.”
“Mrs Evans, do you know where the letters are?” Georgette said, feeling suddenly as if she were truly getting somewhere.
“Yes, they are under her bed, Miss Darrington. You may help yourself to anything; Lady Lyndon said that you might.”
“How very kind you are, Mrs Evans,” Georgette said sincerely.
“Not at all. If I can do anything to help my dear little angels, I shall do it.”
Leaving Mrs Evans to prepare the two of them an evening meal, Georgette hurried upstairs to the master bedroom. The house had been a complete revelation to her and very much larger than she had ever imagined before.
Built in a beautiful pale gray stone, the house sat on the banks of a wide river with the most breathtaking countryside apparent from each elevation. The view was just as Eleri and Ffion had described it and, as she looked out of Josephine Thomas’ bedroom window, Georgette found that she was suddenly crying. The full force of the tragedy hit her terribly at that moment as she imagined the laughter and happiness of a young woman, so in love with her handsome and poetic husband, with two small children and all of life ahead of her. And how that life had been brutally cut short before she and the brother she had loved so dearly had ever had a chance to see each other again. And that Eleri and Ffion had been taken from the only home they had ever known must have been a truly frightening experience for them. Georgette, at that moment, could only see tragedy everywhere she looked.
Of course, she knew it would not do. Life had to go on for the living, and for her to dwell in the past, a past that was not her own was by no means helpful.
Hurriedly swiping at her tears with the back of her hand, Georgette made her way over to the large wooden-framed bed. The room was a beautiful one, and she would have been extraordinarily glad for it herself. It was certainly very much larger than the bedroom she had enjoyed back home in London, and the windows were enormous. She rather thought that one could lie in bed and simply stare out at the beauty all around without even having to move.
And the fabrics and furniture in the room were absolutely delightful. There were little tables and tiny fabric-covered stools; there was a beautifully woven wicker chair with a most striking, hand sewn patchwork quilt folded neatly upon it.
Georgette could not help imagining that Josephine herself had sewn much of the fabric work which adorned her home, and she wondered at the beautiful simplicity of a woman who had grown up in the very heart of one of the largest mansions in England.
Stooping to a crouch, Georgette peered under the bed, instantly spying the box of letters. She drew the box towards her, feeling a little like the eavesdropper she had been when she had overheard the Duke arguing so dreadfully with his aunt. But surely Josephine herself would not have minded; after all, Georgette’s only wish in all of it was to find a way for Josephine’s brother and children to beat a path back towards each other. No mother could surely object?
Georgette carried the box over to the wicker chair and sat down, placing the box upon her knee. She could see that the letters were dated and that none of them had been sealed. Presumably, there had been little point since the sender had never truly determined to send them. Perhaps, just as the Duke had feared, his aunt had told Josephine that he had burned the first of her letters, and so she saw little sense in sending any more.
However, she still clearly saw the sense in writing them, even if she never sent them.