ever for? You did not strike me blind with your beauty,’ he said, taking her hand and raising it to his lips for a salute. ‘Nor do I begrudge you your vision.’
She relaxed a little as he put her hand back on his arm. ‘Sometimes, I am still unsure how to behave around you. You have been angry enough to destroy your life over this, you know. It does not bespeak a man content in his disability.’
‘Perhaps not. But today, things are different.’ He took a deep breath. ‘It is much harder to be bitter when the sun is shining and the roses are in bloom.’
‘You can smell them?’
‘You cannot?’
Emily paused and sniffed. Of course she could. But she had been far too focused on the delicate colour of them to notice the fragrance. She let him walk her closer to the bank of carefully tended flowers. ‘They are beautiful,’ she said.
‘There was a fine garden of them at my home in Derbyshire. York and Lancaster and white damask, with boxwood hedges. I wonder if it is still there.’
Yes. We will walk in it yet this summer, my love. ‘I would expect so,’ she said. ‘A country home is nothing without a rose garden.’
‘Describe these to me.’
‘Red, pink, yellow.’ It was quite inadequate to his needs, she was sure. ‘The red has a touch of purple in it. And shadows. Like velvet in candlelight.’
He reached out a hand, and she put it on a bloom. ‘The texture is velvet as well. Feel.’
She touched them, too, and found that he was right, then moved to the next bush. ‘And these,’ she said, ‘are apple roses. Big and pink, and the velvet is more in the leaves than the flowers. And here are your damasks.’
He gave a nod of approval. ‘As there should be.’ And then he cocked his head. ‘And there is a lark.’
She glanced around her. ‘Where? I do not see him.’
He pointed, unerringly, towards a tree on their left. When she looked closely, she thought she saw a flash of feathers in the leaves. ‘Poor confused fellow,’ he said. ‘It is past nesting season. Unusual to hear that particular song so late in the year.’
‘They have different songs?’
‘They speak to each other, just as we do.’ He smiled, listening again. ‘That is a male, looking for a mate.’
There was an answering warble, in a tree on the right. ‘And there she is.’ He sighed. ‘He has found her after all. Well done, sir.’ And, almost absently, he patted her arm.
She smiled up at him, happy to be in her rightful place, on the arm of the handsome Earl of Folbroke, even if it was just for an hour. She had never noticed the park to be so full of life before. But Adrian was quick to discover things that she had not noticed and to point them out to her as they passed. The few people that they met as they walked smiled and nodded, taking no more notice of her husband than they would have in any other passer-by.
She could feel him tense each time, as though fearing a response. And each time, when none came, he relaxed a bit more. ‘There are more people here than you promised,’ he said absently.
‘I might have lied a bit in calling it empty. But it is not crowded. And not as bad as you feared, I am sure,’ she said. ‘I see no one that I recognise. And the people that are out take no notice of us, walking together. There is nothing so unique in your behaviour as to incite comment from a casual observer. In truth, we are a most unexceptional pair.’
He chuckled. ‘My pride is well checked, madam. I have made an appearance in public and the sky did not fall. In fact, no one noticed. If they thought anything about me, I am sure they whisper at what a lucky fellow I am, to be taking the air with such a beauty.’
‘You are in excellent spirits today.’
Adrian looked up, and around him, as though he could still see his surroundings. ‘It is a beautiful day, is it not? You were right for forcing me into the sunlight, my dear. It has been far too long.’
‘It has,’ she said softly back to him. ‘And I have another gift for you, if you will accept it from me.’
‘It is not another piano, is it? Or perhaps some other musical instrument? Are you about to pull a trumpet from your reticule and force me to blow it and scare away the birds?’
‘Nothing so great as that, I assure you.’
He smiled down at his feet. ‘And it is not your own sweet person that you offer. Although if you were to suggest that we nip behind a rosebush for a kiss, I would not deny you.’
She gave him the mildest of rebukes, nudging his arm with her shoulder ‘Not that, either.’
‘Then I have no idea what you are about. But since we are in public when you offer it, I assume you are unsure of my reaction. Here you know I do not wish to call attention to myself, and will have little choice to accept, with grace, whatever you offer me.’ There was a sardonic twist to his lip. ‘Out with it. You are making me apprehensive.’
She reached into her reticule, digging for the card she had found. ‘Can you read French?’
He gave her a dubious grin. ‘Madam, I thought I made it plain enough the night we met that reading of any kind is quite beyond me.’
She responded with a sniff so that he might know of her annoyance, and said, ‘You are being difficult with me again. And I am not being clear enough with you. For that, I apologise. I should have more rightly said, before your difficulty overtook you, did you learn to read the French language?’
It was his turn to huff impatiently at her. ‘Of course I did. Despite what you might think, after finding me in such low estates, I was brought up properly and well educated. It might have been easier had I not been. One cannot miss what one has never known.’
‘But you were fluent?’
‘Better in Greek and Latin. But, yes, I managed tolerably well in French. I could understand and be understood. But I fail to see how that matters.’
Emily thrust the stiff sheet of paperboard into one of his hands, and placed the fingers of his other on the raised letters there. ‘See what you can make of this.’
He frowned as he dragged his fingers over the surface, moving too quickly to interpret the patterns. ‘What is it?’ he whispered.
‘A poem. The author was a Frenchman, and a scholar. And blind,’ she added. ‘From what I have been able to gather on the subject, the French people seem much more enlightened in the education of those with your problem. There are quite interesting experiments in place for the teaching of mathematics, geography and even reading and writing. But much of the work is all in French, and I have not …’
He held the card loosely, not even trying to examine it. ‘And if you have not noticed, my love, we are currently at war with France.’
‘But we will not be for ever. Once we have conquered Napoleon, there will be peace between our countries. I am sure of it. And then, perhaps, we might
