I
"I think a part of me will be always waiting for you." – Anonimous
Robert could not say how long he had been there, sitting at his desk in the library, in silence, totally absorbed in his thoughts. Rosamund's letter, that Carson had given him shortly after lunch, was still in his hands.
"Robert?" Cora's voice startled him and he turned to see her standing there with a little smile at the corners of her lips. "Excuse me, dear, I did not want to scare you." She walked over to him, placing her hand softly on his shoulder with a worried expression on her face. "Is everything okay?"
"Yes, yes. I... Was just distracted." He looked at her realizing the hat and the handbag she carried. "Are you going out?"
"Yes. I managed to convince Mary to go out a bit. We will go to the village to visit your mother."
"Good." He turned his chair so he could see her better. It was good news that Mary had finally decided to leave home.
"Is everything okay with Rosamund?"
"What?" He blinked without understanding her.
"The letter you received, is from Rosamund, isn't it?" She asked, raising her eyebrows with a puzzled look. "Oh, yes. It is from Rosamund." He said, folding the letter in his hands." Rosamund is alright. She said she will spend a few days with us when she will come to Lord and Lady Stratford's ball."
"Good," she said, with a smile, adjusting her dress' sleeves. "So we have one more person to convince Mary to attend the ball."
She leaned over and placed a chaste kiss on his cheek and turned around, walking towards the door. Robert watched her walk away until she disappeared through the library's door. He took a deep breath and slowly let the air come out of his lungs, feeling suddenly tired.
Lately he felt that there was little room in her life for him. She was constantly involved with Mary, who appeared to refuse to leave the mourning for Matthew's death, even after almost eight months. In addition, she was always worried about Sibbie and George, trying to be the mother they needed. Cora was so devoted to ensuring that their grandchildren would not feel the impact the losses they had suffered, that she seemed to have forgotten him. Robert felt that even Tom was getting more attention from her than himself.
They had suffered Sybil's loss too much and had barely begun to rise again when they were struck by Matthew's death. All that had left deep scars on all of them. It had been a hard year that Robert would like to be able to erase from his memory. But he knew it would never be possible. Time would just let the pain more bearable, but would never make it completely disappear.
And then, there was Mary, Tom and the babies. They needed him whole and strong. They needed him more than ever. So he forced himself to overcome everything. Just as Cora. He understood what she was doing and had admired her even more for that. What he had never expected was that all that effort to rebuild their family could stand between them, and he could not help but feel deeply lonely.
He shook his head slightly, as if that could withdraw those dark thoughts, and stood up, stretching his legs. Then looked again at Rosamund's letter over the table. The words written by his sister seemed to echo in his mind.
"You may have already heard about the Italian family who bought Haxby. But there is one more thing, my dear brother, you need to know, since you will certainly find them at Lord Stratford's ball, or even before, in the village. The young Earl of San Bertazzo is the grandson of the Haxby's former owner, Lord Dunnington. He is also the eldest son of our old childhood friend, whom we knew by Lady Elizabeth Dunnington, now the Dowager Countess of San Bertazzo."
Lady Elizabeth Dunnington. Lizzie... Robert could not say exactly how he felt about that.
He walked slowly to the window and looked at the garden, at that time completely lit by the afternoon sun. How long had he not thought about her? How long had he not heard that name? More than thirty years. Thirty-two, if his memory had not failed him. And yet, if he closed his eyes, he could easily see the image of those dark eyes that already had fascinated him so much.
Robert had thought he would never see her again. And even so, she was back. She had returned to the house that had once belonged to her family, the house where she was born and raised. Elizabeth had finally come back to Haxby. He could not help but feel happy for her, since he, more than anyone, knew what it should mean to her. Despite that, he felt strangely anxious to know that she was back, and he would see her again after so long.
Elizabeth's father, the late Lord Dunnington, had to dispose of everything when he lost much of the family's fortune in a disastrous investment, many years before. A story that was very familiar to Robert. He himself had been about to lose Downton Abbey twice, and twice was saved, first by Cora, and later by Matthew.
Lord Dunnington, however, had not had the same luck. Struck not only by financial failure, but also by the early loss of his eldest son, the Dunnington family had moved to Italy, to live next to one Lady Dunnington's sister. Move away from everything was the easy way old Richard Dunnington had found to overcome the pain of loss and shame for his ruin.
Richard Dunnington and Robert's father, the late Lord Grantham, had been childhood friends, the same way Robert and Rosamund had become friends with his children. James, Lord Dunnington's eldest son, was only two months older than Robert, and one year older than Rosamund. They had grown up together, shared childhood adventures in Downton and Haxby's large gardens. The two boys had become inseparable friends, they had been classmates at Eton and then studied together for three more years in Christ Church.
They always knew that was in their parents' plans a wedding between the Crawleys and the Dunningtons, to seal the centennial friendship between the two families. However, if a marriage between them was something that really appealed to their parents, the children were never able to see their future in that. James and Rosamund liked each other very much, but they felt more as siblings than anything else. As for Robert, he always saw Elizabeth, Charlotte and Anne, James's younger sisters, as three little girls, as they are younger than him. Perhaps at that time, among them all, only Elizabeth thought a little differently about that.
Then, on a fall morning, the unthinkable had happened. A stupid hunting accident had taken James's life, at twenty-one years old. And coincidentally, from that awful fact, their lives had taken a completely different course from what they had ever thought.
All that seemed to have happened so long ago that Robert felt like it was almost in another life. In a different life, at least, in a time when they were all young and naïve enough to remain oblivious to what the future would need from them.
He thought of going out for a walk. He desperately needed to slow down and forget it entirely, but he finally gave up the idea. Certainly walking alone by gardens full of memories was not the best way to erase from his mind the thoughts of his past.
And if he did not know exactly how he felt about the Elizabeth's return, at least he was sure about one thing: he did not need anything else to disturb his life, especially now that things were so difficult. Somehow, in the coming days, he would have to learn how to deal with the fact that Elizabeth had returned and would have to understand what it truly meant to him. It was something he needed to solve, alone.
He decided to go to the nursery. If he was lucky they were awake and he could spend some time with them, and perhaps distracted enough to forget everything that was tormenting him.
He went up the stairs quickly, followed closely by Isis fanning its tail happily, completely oblivious to the confused thoughts passing by its master's mind.
Sybbie had just fallen asleep, according to her nanny, but George was wide awake and grinned when saw him through his crib's bars. Robert could not help but smile too, infected by the boy's innocence. He took him in his arms and walked across the room, cradling him slowly, under the nannies' watchful eyes.
"How are you today, my sweet boy?" He told him in a low voice, fearing waking up Sybbie. George smiled again, and Robert thought there was nothing that could make him happier than seeing a smile those children's faces.
"Can I take him for a walk in the gardens?" Robert asked nanny Smith.
"Yes, my Lord. He is rested and fed", she replied.
"Good," he smiled looking at his grandson. "So let's take a ride, you and me."
"Would you like one of us to come with you, my Lord?"
"It will not be necessary, Mrs. Smith. Thank you", he looked at the boy who seemed very happy in his arms. "I think Master George and I will be perfectly fine in each other's company", he added with a grin.
Robert went down stairs slowly while talking to George, explaining about the walk they would take. Isis passed them running and was already waiting for them at the door. The little boy shook his arms happily when they approached it, and the big yellow Labrador also seemed happy to be in the young master's company.
He crossed the front door and walked into the garden, his shoes making noise on the gravel path, as he spoke softly to the boy, showing him everything they were seeing along the way. He sat on a bench in a shade of a tree. Putting him in his lap he stood there for a while, talking and playing with him, imagining how it would be in a few years when George and Sybbie would walk everywhere, running and playing. Downton would be again a place filled with joy and child's laughter, and he expected to be there to be part of it all.
After a while, he decided to go back inside. He did not know much about babies, but he knew enough to think that the outside's temperature might not be so suitable for little George now. In addition, the boy seemed not to be enjoying getting outside anymore, and then he took him back to the library. Robert rang the bell and a few minutes later Carson came through the library doorway, his face softening at the moment he saw the baby sitting on the couch next to his grandfather, playing with a small box that Robert had given him.
"Carson, please tell Mrs. Smith Master George will be here with me."
"Certainly, my Lord. Should I ask her to come to pick him up?"
"It will not be necessary", Robert shook the little box to call the boy's attention to him. "I think we're safe for now." Both men smiled when George shook his hands, looking bemused by the box's sound in his grandfather's hands. "Unless it is necessary to feed him or... Do anything else that babies need to be done. If it is not the case, we can still spend some time together."
"Perfectly, my Lord." Carson nodded slightly and left them alone, intimately satisfied with the scene he had witnessed. He went upstairs to take the message to Mrs. Smith, hoping that she would not have to take the baby back yet. He knew how important those moments were for Lord Grantham, after all they had gone by.
Robert kept playing with the boy, and realizing that he seemed sleepy, laid him in his lap so he could take a nap. He spoke to him softly, as he used to do with Sybil when she was a baby, and he knew that George would soon fall asleep. Later, he would take him back to his nanny. But now, all he wanted was to enjoy the peace of mind that the mere presence of his grandson brought to him.
As soon as she had returned home, Cora was informed by Carson that Robert was in the library. Mary went straight to her room, and so she decided to go to the library to join her husband. She knocked and entered, stopping instantly to enjoy the lovely scene before her eyes.
Robert was leaning against the huge red sofa with George perfectly accommodated in his arms. Both were asleep, and Isis seemed to take care of them, lying at its master's feet. The dog raised its sweet and large dark eyes to look at Cora, but made no other movement, as if afraid to wake them.
Cora smiled, touched. Robert had always loved children, and even that was not very typical of an English gentleman to show his feelings openly, he always had melted by their daughters when they were little. And she suspected that he would be even worse with their grandchildren.
She was moving away slowly when Robert had opened his eyes, still sleepy, to look at her.
"It seems that George fell asleep," he told her in a low voice, afraid to wake him.
"It seems that someone else fell asleep too", she approached, sitting carefully beside him. The two of them exchanged a smile and he can not help thinking of how much he had missed those smiles of her, so rare lately.
"It appears so," he said, giggling softly. George moved slightly in his lap, but she made a hand gesture indicating him that the boy was still sleeping.
"You're back early. Is everything okay? Where is Mary?"
"Upstairs, in her room." She replied softly, stroking George's blond hair. "She's fine. I guess she liked our little tour." He shook his head slowly.
"You want to hold him?" He asked her.
"No. He looks so perfectly happy in his grandfather's lap", she smiled. "You have not lost your touch."
"I guess not", he let out a stifled laugh looking at the little boy and then again to his wife, whose blue eyes were staring at him in a loving way. So they stood there in silence exchanging a long look, until she lowered her eyes to see George.
"He has your chin", she said finally.
"What?"
"Georgie has exactly the same chin of yours, with the very same dimple."
"Oh, please, do not do it with the boy!" Robert struggled not to laugh. "Do not make him feel bad because he has something like his silly and old grandfather," he told her with a chuckle.
Cora smiled and reached her hand to touch Robert's face, her fingers gently sliding down his face. "I like your chin." She tilted her head slightly. "It gives you an air of strength and dignity. And I'm sure George will love to have some resemblance to his old and silly grandfather." She said with confidence. Then she stood up and looked at him with an amused expression on her face. "Even though he is not so old..." she said with a small smile, teasing him.
"Oh, I see... Just silly?" He said, raising an eyebrow with an ironic smirk in response to her teasing, then realizing it had been a long time since she had teased him it that way. Cora smiled and held out her arms to him. "Now let me take George to sleep upstairs or he will spoil your jacket with all this drool."
Robert gave her the boy and watched Cora crossed the room and vanished through the doorway. Then he looked at his coat, there was a humid and dark spot in the place where George's head had been. He smiled getting up from the couch, feeling light for the first time in the last few days. There was nothing that could not be solved with soap and water, he thought, as he climbed the stairs going to his dressing room. After all, he would soon have to change clothes for dinner anyway.