Matthew's POV
'Mary is still in love with you'
'What', Mary, my Mary, the only, the one I dream about, it can't be true. It can't be her, can it? 'Lady Mary Crawley?'
'Oh good heavens, boy, what do they teach you at school. Yes, Mary Crawley, my granddaughter, your cousin, your former lover...
'Lover?' what Mary, my lover.
'You really are blind aren't you- Mary Crawley is in love with you- an you her, I think'
'Me, no, no, no I am engaged to Lavinia, not Mary.' I might be in love with her and think about her every minute of every day, but I am promised to Lavinia. Who is not Mary. Lavinia is pretty, Mary is a goddess. But I can't have her. I will be happy with Lavinia. I am happy with Lavinia.
'Well, I know you are engaged to her, everyone does. Even Mary. She was always in love with you, you know. You don't need to be a genius it see it. It's quite obvious.'
'I've never noticed' he had tried to forget her.
'Well of course you didn't. Really for and educated middle class man you are quite think'
'But Lavinia is kind, I love her', he did love her, didn't he?
'Like you do Mary?' No, but he couldn't admit it.
'But Lavinia cared for me, when I was wounded, she was, the most wonderful person', she was very good at caring she was a good person, oh how he felt for her, only having a fraction of his love, when she deserved more.
'And have you forgotten that Mary cared for you, when Lavinia was gone' Yes, he had forgotten she was there, she was always there, in his heart, always present.
'B...but how is this possible, she...she would of told me' now when I he thinks back to all those glances and smiles, at the time he thought they we to make up for the heart ache she had caused him. No, but now he can see that they were something more than that.
'Did she try to tell you?' no, she didn't or did she, was I so blind as not to notice, carrying on with my life trying to move on.
'I need to speak to her' was all I could manage.
'That you need to do, boy and sooner rather than later. I will leave you to your thoughts' she stood up and headed towards the door. I was lost in my own thoughts, and then she was gone.
Neither of then knew that there was someone hiding in the shadows, listening to everything. Not knowing what to do next
Back inside the room:
Matthew's POV
Matthew didn't know what to do, or what to think. He thought back to there parting in 1914, she was crying, he didn't know what to do, but he had to end it, she didn't love him, well not enough. But he had discover tonight that she did, she is still in love with me. It had been two years before they next saw each other, he had met Lavinia, poor sweet Lavinia, kind hearted, the opposite to Mary. But that was what I wanted, to get away from it all and he had with Lavinia, but then she came back into his life, and, well, he tried to hide his feeling. But cousin Violet noticed, oh God did Lavinia too? She gave him the toy, that blasted dog, his good luck charm, but it had protected him, was that given out of love? The way she cared for him, treated his wounds, talked to him, comforted him, love was to only way he could describe it.
Then there was tapping at the door.