For a moment she was silent again, then she glanced at him and away again swiftly. “Did you ever love her? I mean, really love her?”
“No.” It was the truth.
“That at least is consolation.”
He saw a lifeline in such words, and clutched at it. “You can trust me again, Juliet, for I swear that I am now the man I ought to have been then.” He rose and went to a window to look out over the snowy island. “I can only say that the past six years have been my punishment, and that every day I have awakened yearning to find it was a nightmare, and that you will be beside me again, just stirring from sleep, puzzled to know why I am so overjoyed. Juliet, if I could turn back the clock and make things as they were before I let you down . . .”
“But we’re different people now, Charles,” she interrupted quietly.
He went back to the table, his eyes imploring. “I am different now, Juliet, but you are the same sweet, gentle, kind, adorable woman you always were.”
“The same gull I always was too?”
“That is not what I said, or indeed what I meant.” Now his was the gaze filled with reproach. “You see before you a new husband, a better husband, a true husband, who believes to the depths of his soul that we can start again. All you have to do is wear my ring again, and let me prove that I am worthy of you.”
The light in his eyes, the fervor in his voice, and the urgency in his manner, all combined to quicken her heart. More and more glimpses of past happiness jostled at the edge of her consciousness, reminding her just how much love and joy she had shared with him.
“Please, my darling,” he whispered. “See, I have worn the ring all this time . . .” He reached inside his shirt for the purple ribbon, but of course it was not there.
Juliet was puzzled. “My wedding ring? But that’s impossible, for Jack lost it.”
“No, he didn’t, he brought it to me at White’s.” Charles delved everywhere in the shirt in case the ribbon had somehow come undone. Then he remembered taking it off in the drawing room the night before, and without further ado he strode from the kitchen to get it.
Juliet hurried after him. “This is nonsense, Charles. Jack can’t possibly have taken the ring to you, White’s is miles away from here!”
“Nevertheless he did, and I have kept it around my neck for six years,” Charles shouted over his shoulder as he entered the drawing room. But when he went to the sofa, he found neither ribbon nor ring. He moved the cushions, shoved a hand in every corner, and even looked underneath, but there was no telltale sheen of purple satin or rich glint of gold. Dismayed, he cast around the rest of the room, but no matter where he searched, he found nothing.
Juliet, meanwhile, watched patiently from the doorway. She could see a great deal of the room, far more than Charles could, and what she saw made her smile. Charles had always been comical when he’d lost something, especially when so often he failed to see what was right under his nose. Or right above it. Fondness warmed her eyes; no, much more than fondness . . . “Do you remember when you lost that letter opener your great-aunt gave you for your birthday?”
“That was not funny, for she was coming within the hour and was bound to want to see I’d received it safely.” Charles ran a hand through his hair, and glanced around in bewilderment. Where on God’s own earth was the ring? It had been here last night, but now it had disappeared.
“I remember you found the letter opener in the nick of time, only for her not to mention it anyway,” Juliet went on.
“Which, as I recall, afforded you much hilarity at my expense.”
“Of course.” She paused, knowing she loved him still, and that ring or not, she would be his wife again. How could she not? She had not been able to forget him, and if she’d wavered at all these past six years it was pride’s doing. But the future was a long time to spend alone, and now that she was with him again she knew she wished to spend it with him. Sally Monckton should not be accorded the importance of keeping Sir Charles and Lady Neville apart a moment longer, especially when the ring he sought so desperately was only a few feet from where he stood. “Charles, you must forgive my mirth, but if you will keep giving me cause . . .”
“Cause? What do you mean?” He was cross with her. “Juliet, I have been waiting six years to put that ring back on your finger, it has been my greatest wish, and now that I am with you again the damned ring has disappeared and you appear to think it amusing!”
“Perhaps because it is. Think now, sir. How did the ring disappear six years ago?”