A/N: So turns out I was underestimating how much this fic was inspiring me when I said there would be a delay between chapters. Could be a good thing though, I can't seem to stick with BaD while this is floating around in my head and I *really* want to concentrate on that soon.
(Although work will keep me insanely busy tomorrow so there might actually be a gap in posting *gasp*).
Thank you to everyone who has read, reviewed and enjoyed the last part (I like to think Lady Jane Elizabeth will find more reasons to stick around at Downton, seduce Mr Carson with her brogue and her general Hughes-ness. His principles wouldn't stand for too long against an assault like that). In the meantime, I present something that I think you'll all like. A little break in the wistfullness.
Three: Beth
She prepares them a late supper. Ever since the war broke out he has been staying at the house later than before. She understands, there are so few men around now, so many of the young staff have been conscripted if they hadn't already volunteered.
She has always wished she had given Charles a son, a little boy he would have bounced on his knee and taught to fish. She has never in all their life together, been more pleased to have daughters instead.
Oh, they have doted on the girls, never felt the lack for not having a son, but she thinks once he would have liked to know his name would go on after them.
Now she knows they are so very lucky. They only have Katie's Jamie to worry about and that's hard enough.
She steps out for a minute - the food will keep, the soup bubbling along, the bread cooling on the table - and takes a deep breath of Spring air. Looks for him up the path, listens out for his familiar tread.
He isn't there and she is not surprised, for him it's still early yet, the sun not set.
She takes a moment as she turns back, to look up at their cottage, at the spray of ivy that curls around the side to arch over the doorway, the little nameplate beside the front window - the carsons - with the backwards 'e' that Maisie made when she was just seven. {It was the first thing she made for them that was more than the drawings they would pin to the walls. Charles had been so pleased with it, so proud of the little carving that he varnished it the next day, nailed it on the wall a few days later. Their little girl had been excited to see it there for weeks.}
The light wind flutters the hair at her neck and she can hear a dog bark in the distance. Isis, she thinks, out for a last run before retiring with her master.
They're so close to the house here that from the gate, if she rises to her toes and squints she can just make out a shadow moving about in the lit window of Lady Mary's room. Anna.
She heads back towards the door again, brushes her fingers along the roses just starting to bud. She has taken great care of them this year, has high hopes for the show. She will never win, of course, but she does enjoy the annoyed look in the Dowager Countess's eyes when she presents them.
They all know the contest is fixed.
Their home is small, but comfortably so. They have lived here with two young lasses filling the place with fights and laughter and not felt they were tripping over each other.
She has been to the Abbey. Once, when Charles returned to take his place there again, when he had presented her to the young Lord as his new wife - started to be Charles instead of Charlie - and countless times since when she has visited Beryl for tea or dropped in to return the young Ladies' dresses, mended or adjusted as needed, to Anna.
She cannot imagine living there, with all those draughty corridors and empty rooms. Cannot understand anyone who needs more bedrooms than they have people to fill them.
She has always been happy with their modest rooms and garden. What would Charles need with his own dressing room, with a bed in it no less? The settee in the sitting room has sufficed for the nights they've argued, though she knows it is hardly a comfortable rest for him, his long body tightly folded into it. Perhaps that is why they often reach a compromise before bed.
The spicy scent of the soup surrounds her as she pushes through the door, closes and locks it behind her because Charles worries about things like that.
He worries about a good many things these days, far more than he did in their youth. Katie is like that, always fussing over the state of their roof, the chill that persists in the Winter 'are you sure we can't help, mama? Jamie knows a roofer, he could fix it for nothing if we asked, papa. Are you eating enough, sleeping enough, papa you look a little red are you sick?'
Charles can't see it, only resists his girl's attempts to help, but she can. They are so alike.
Maisie worries inside, is more of a thinker; a plotter Charles calls her. She assesses, analyses and doesn't mention a thing until the wheels are already set in motion and before they know it they have electricity installed and a telephone in the back room.
{'what if mama gets sick, papa and you're up at the house? Isn't it better that she can call a doctor instead of waiting until you get home?'}
She maintains that she hasn't a clue where their youngest gets those traits from.
The orange light of the setting sun catches the floating dust and fluff in the sitting room, makes them sparkle. Caught in amongst them in a moment of fancy, she twirls on her toes, round and around, keeps her head spotting on the window so she won't get dizzy.
She has not danced properly in years, decades. Not since she married her man and they left London for Yorkshire.
{He had been in love with someone else for much of their early friendship, huddled together in the back rooms of the theaters. She had waited patiently for him to notice her while he told her of his darling Alice, his plans to marry her and raise children while he performed, touring the country as a little family of theatre-folk. She had never, not once, told him to stop dreaming even when she was sure those dreams would not bring him much joy. She hadn't been sure then how to say that for all his eagerness to be in love, he did not seem happy in his life. That she thought there was some other profession he was better suited to, one with the flair and theatricality but without the cold nights with no food and the daily humiliation of performing for men who hardly looked up from their glasses to see you.
She had been disenchanted herself by then, tired of the chorus line; couldn't be sure she wasn't just seeing her thoughts in him and not his own.}
She senses him in the room before his arms slip around her waist, fingers splayed out against her stomach.
"There's no one here to see your show, Beth." He says, nuzzles in behind her ear, kisses her neck.
"Except you, Charlie." For a long time before they left, she had only been performing for him anyway.
His arms tighten around her, pull her back into his chest.
"You're early tonight." She says, raising her chin towards the window where light is still visible.
"The family retired early." He mumbles into her neck, she tilts her head to give him more access. "I gave Bates the keys, he can lock up tonight. I've missed you." He adds, one hand rising to her chest, cupping her in his palm.
{If she has ever thought of herself as a second choice, his consolation prize, it can only have been for a half-second, forgotten the moment he touched her, looked at her. She cannot imagine that any man could love her more completely than Charles has all these years.}
"Soup first." She says, slaps playfully at his arm until he releases her breast, wraps her more loosely in his embrace. She turns in his arms, rises onto her toes to drop a butterfly kiss on his lips. She loses herself in it for a moment, as he deepens the kiss, brushes his tongue against her bottom lip - the one she worries with her teeth when she thinks.
She forces herself to think of the food, their meal not yet ready now that he's early.
"No Mr Carson." She says when she can finally pull away, takes several steps back and puts some distance between them.
"You're a terrible tease Mrs Carson." He pouts, magnificent eyebrows scowling at her.
She turns from him with a wink, heads for the kitchen.
"Go wash up, love. I'll have supper on the table when you're done."
She pops her head back into the room a moment later. "Don't look under the pillows Charles, I picked something up in Ripon today and I want it to be a surprise later."
He lunges towards her and she jumps backwards, hurries to the kitchen and leans back against the closed door.
"Evil woman." He growls and she can hear him making his way up the stairs to their bedroom.
She smiles, goes to raise the heat under the soup.
Katie will be arriving in a few days, staying with them until Jamie comes back (she prays that it will be soon, as she does for all the men out there). {She hasn't said anything, but she suspects the young man left his wife with a little something before he got on that train. She has been carefully hiding her latest knitting project from Charles, doesn't want him fretting needlessly. They would both love a grandchild crawling about the place.}
So they only have a short time alone before they must share each other again, before they'll have to take care to be quiet, to not cry out or whisper too loud.
She stirs the pot, sprinkles a little more seasoning in.
"Beth Carson!" She jumps at his shocked bellow, laughs. He never has been able to resist peeking.
Think of all the teas and sherry they've shared! Although I see Beth and Charlie as wine drinkers more than anything, with the odd beer.