Anger

Robert lay awake in his dressing room at Grantham House, staring at the ceiling. He was straining his ears to hear. The foremost sound was the lamp beside the bed, an electric buzzing noise that seemed amplified the longer he listened. But then there it was, beyond the buzzing. Crying. Cora crying in their room beyond the door. He hadn't heard her cry in such a long time, years even, and his stomach turned when he thought of why. It lurched to think of what he had said.

He had questioned Mr. Bricker's intentions, but in not so many words. He had questioned them silently, really, not even bringing the subject up to Cora. He only watched as she demurely lowered her lashes and laughed with the man to her right at dinner. He only watched as the man studied her features, her mouth, as she spoke. Her lovely, lovely mouth.

Surely, Robert was imagining things. Bricker, however oily he seemed to be, understood that Cora, Lady Grantham, was Robert's wife. And so he had put his suspicions aside, and he swallowed down the childish jealousy he was embarrassed to feel.

That was until two nights before now, until Cora had returned to Rosamund's rather late and rumpled from Bricker's company. When she flew in the sitting room, flustered and visibly upset. When Rosamund had asked if she was alright, she had shook her head dismissively. Of course she was. Only tired. Very tired.

Seeing her that way, and knowing, knowing, that something had transpired, had done something inside of him. The whispered words his mother had uttered a week before echoed in his head. The small comment, obviously aimed at a blushing Cora and attentive Bricker across from them at dinner, had been little more than just words. He didn't put much thought to them then, but now they were suddenly unsettling. "The line can too often be blurred between dutiful delight and consequential desire." He remembered with a clinched fist how the man stared at her as she took a sip from her glass.

So this morning, when he heard her soft, polite, greeting from below and Bricker's resonating voice, he froze. He stood completely still for a moment and listened hard at the tap of her shoes against the floor, the way she beckoned the man into the drawing room. It wasn't the usual, practiced version of her voice. It was the private version. The version that Robert was used to hearing when they were alone. It was the version he heard next to him in the dark when she'd startle in the middle of the night and ask if he were awake.

"They're this way."

Robert had tiptoed to the edge of the balcony and looked down. He watched inconspicuously as Cora led Mr. Bricker into the drawing room behind her. He felt his heart stop when Bricker looked behind him before entering the room. Something wasn't proper about the man. Something wasn't proper about the way he had peered behind him. So, Robert hurried down. He hurried down and had swung open the door and saw them. Saw her with that man's lips against hers.

After that had been an angry blur. He had left the room, and she had followed, calling his name, and he had spun around and shook his finger at the man and yelled at her. And he had yelled at her again only moments before. Called her deceitful. Called her ungrateful. And then he had come in here, but now, now anger had subsided and sadness crept in. The vision of his wife, stiff in that man's arms, predominated all other thoughts. Her hands in tight balls by her sides. Her face as red as the walls around her, countless beautiful paintings all around her feet.

Robert rose from the bed and walked to the dividing door, listening again. The crying had softened. He took in a breath and knocked twice. When there was no response, and so he entered.

She sat up in their bed, a book in her lap, but closed, her hair in the familiar braid resting on her shoulder.

"What else would you like to add? Hmm?" She clutched at the book, her eyes now trained on its cover. Her voice wavered. "Any other choice names you'd like to call me?"

"You were kissing him. You were in there kissing him and you think you have a right to be indignant?" The anger that subsided earlier now resurfaced.

She shook her head and sniffed.

"Did you sleep with him?"

The words almost surprised himself, but he had asked them, the wrinkles of her dress two nights ago in his imagined periphery. Her eyes flew to his, tears brimming them again.

"What?"

"Did you sleep with him?" He repeated it slowly, his throat tightening.

Her expression grew hard and she took deep breaths. "34 years, Robert. We've been married for 34 years and you ask me if I slept with him?"

He opened his mouth, but she wasn't finished.

"Don't you know me at all?" She began to cry again. She moved the covers to the side and rose from the bed.

"I thought I did. I thought we knew one another, but after this morning, after seeing you in his arms, after seeing you kiss him, I'm not sure anymore."

She stood before him, clutching her dressing gown in her hand. "I didn't kiss him!"

"I saw you!"

She leaned forward and yelled. "You saw him kissing me!"

Robert took several breaths. "What?" It came out quietly.

She didn't respond, only pulled her dressing gown around her, pulling the tie tightly. He moved to her, grasping her arm. "What?"

She looked up at him, her blue eyes shimmering, searching his own. "Robert," she shook her head. "You're the only man I've-" she swallowed and looked down, color tinting her cheeks. "-I've ever…" She pushed out a sigh. "You know that."

He said nothing and she met his eyes again. "I love you, Robert." New tears came to her eyes and he felt his own begin to burn. "I love you."

And just like that, a new anger burned in his chest, but it was different from before. The way Cora had been standing there, as that man held her. The way her eyes shimmered now. He pulled her closely to him and felt her melt beneath his chin.

Simon Bricker had not seen the last of Lord Grantham.