Only Beloved Read Free Page B

with her fork and trowel, waging war upon the ever-encroaching weeds. Actually she was fond of weeds, but not
—
please, please—in her garden. Let them bloom and thrive in all the surrounding hedgerows and meadows and she would admire them all day long.
    Oh, she thought with a sudden pang, how she
still
missed Agnes. Her sister had lived with her here for a year after losing her husband. She had spent much of her time outdoors, painting the wildflowers. Agnes was wondrously skilled with watercolors. That had been such a happy year, for Agnes was like the daughter she had never had and never would. But Dora had known the interlude would not last. She had not allowed herself even to hope that it would. It had not, because Agnes had found love.
    Dora was fond of Flavian, Viscount Ponsonby, Agnes’s second husband. Very fond, actually, though initially she had had doubts about him, for he was handsome and charming and witty but had a mocking eyebrow she had distrusted. Upon closer acquaintance,however, she had been forced to admit that he was the ideal partner for her quiet, demure sister. When they married here in the village last year, it had been evident to Dora that it was, or soon would be, a love match. And indeed it had turned out to be just that. They were happy together, and there was to be a child in the autumn.
    Dora turned away from the window when she realized that she was no longer really seeing the garden. They lived in faraway Sussex, Agnes and Flavian. But it was not the end of the world, was it? Already she had been to visit them a couple of times, at Christmas and again at Easter. She had stayed for two weeks each time, though Flavian had urged her to stay longer and Agnes had told her with obvious sincerity that she might live with them forever if she chose.
    â€œForever
and
a day,” Flavian had added.
    Dora did not so choose. Living alone by its very definition was a solitary business, but solitude was infinitely preferable to any alternative she had ever discovered. She was thirty-nine years old and a spinster. The alternatives for her were to be someone’s governess or companion on the one hand or a dependent relative on the other, moving endlessly from her sister’s home to her father’s to her brother’s. She was very, very thankful for her modest, pretty cottage and her independent employment and lonely existence. No, not lonely—solitary.
    She could hear the clatter of china downstairs and knew that Mrs. Henry was deliberately hinting to her, without actually calling upstairs, that the tea had been brewed and carried into the sitting room, and that it would go cold if she did not come down soon.
    She went down.
    â€œI suppose you heard all about the big wedding in London when you went up to Middlebury, did you?” Mrs. Henry asked, hovering hopefully in the doorway while Dora poured herself a cup of tea and buttered a scone.
    â€œFrom Lady Darleigh?” She smiled. “Yes, she told me it was a very grand and a very joyous occasion. They married at St. George’s on Hanover Square, and the Duke of Stanbrook hosted a lavish wedding breakfast. I am very happy for Lady Barclay, though I suppose I must refer to her now as the Countess of Hardford. I thought her very charming when I met her last year, but very reserved too. Lady Darleigh says her new husband adores her. That is very romantic, is it not?”
    How lovely it must be . . .
    She took a bite of her scone. Sophia, Lady Darleigh, who had arrived back at Middlebury Park from London with her husband the day before yesterday, had said more about the wedding they had gone there to attend, but Dora was too tired to elaborate further now. She had squeezed an extra pianoforte lesson for the viscountess into what was already a full day of work and had had scarcely a moment to herself since breakfast.
    â€œI will no doubt have a long letter from Agnes about it in the next day or two,” she