Christmas Child: an absolutely heartbreaking and emotional Victorian romance by Carol Rivers

Author:Carol Rivers [Rivers, Carol]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Carol Rivers Publications
Published: 2019-09-23T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 38

She woke as daylight broke through the curtains and lit the room.

Throwing off her cover, she hurried to her employer who was struggling to ease himself from the chair.

‘Mr Benjamin, let me help you.’

‘Am I home, Ettie?’

‘You are home, Sir, though I can see you are weary from your long travels.’

‘I am, I am,’ he confirmed. ‘Give me my staff and I shall visit the washroom. After which, I shall answer all your enquiries.’

She placed the staff in his hand as he stumbled away, his figure that of an aged man. She felt the impulse to go after him, but instead put two hens’ eggs on to boil and sliced a loaf, adding a little salt and pepper to the breakfast tray. By the time he returned she had set the dining room table and their meal was ready.

He made no murmur as he sank to his seat and ate without enthusiasm. A sad fondness crept over her as she recalled the younger, happier Lucas Benjamin who always enjoyed his meals with such gusto.

‘Thank you,’ he said at last. ‘I haven’t eaten so well in many days.’

‘Sir, that is distressing to hear.’ She waited for a further explanation but once more he drifted into his own thoughts and sat mute.

Ettie cleared the dirty crockery and busied herself in the kitchen, repressing the urge to beg him to tell her what had happened. When she returned, she found him in the salon, staring up at the portrait.

‘I hope you don’t mind that I removed it and hung it there,’ she apologized once again.

‘Secrets,’ he rasped. ‘We all have secrets.’

Ettie thought this was rather a peculiar answer, but she nodded and replied, ‘I never knew your mother. But I imagine she was very beautiful.’

‘Love must be blind,’ he whispered. ‘For that is the only explanation.’

Ettie moved a little closer. ‘I am sorry, Sir, I don’t understand.’

‘Lies, Ettie, all lies. A nest of them.’

‘Sir, you are confused from your journey,’ she insisted, ‘come and rest. I shall call the physician.’

‘A physician cannot cure what ails me.’ His lips quivered and she thought he might collapse. ‘I shall tell you from the beginning,’ he choked on a rattled breath as he sank to the stool. ‘You see, I have been travelling for nearly a month. A coach here. A carriage there. But in the end, all were beyond my means. Instead I ventured on foot, until at last I reached the French coast. Enough, saved, yes, enough to cross the Channel by boat. But after that … I have returned here destitute!’

‘But Sir,’ Ettie replied in bewilderment, ‘after your letter, I did as you asked. With a friend’s help I took the chest to the Bank of England.’

He gave a low groan. ‘Don’t ask me about them!’

‘But why, Sir?’

‘Don’t ask! Don’t ask!’

Ettie could make no sense of what he was saying. ‘Your wife, Sir, and the baby, what of them?’ she burst out. ‘Please tell me.’

Desperate eyes looked up at her. ‘Clara and my darling child, my family, they are gone, Ettie.

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