XII:

"Here now," Becky said gently, "let me help." Once Elsie was better situated, her sister sighed. "Your husband made it sound like you were positively done for."

"I think I was," Elsie murmured. "But you came? After all of the letters and all of the times you could have come… you came now?"

Becky hesitated. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I had to stay away. You know that. Mam and Da turned me out on my ear and… I hate that he's here now. But you're my sister. I should have been stronger for you, Elsie. I should have… I should have done so many things." She exhaled a sad sigh, then took Elsie's hand in her own. "I am glad – so glad – that you will be all right."

"It's been… ten years since I've seen you, and nearly three since you've written…"

Becky nodded and frowned. "I am sorry."

"Tell me why?" Elsie breathed. "Why did you just… leave?"

"I didn't leave," Becky said. "I was thrown out." She shook her head. "You don't need to know. All you need to know is that when Mam and Da disowned me, I made up a new name and went off with the money I took from your pocketbook and started a new life. I met my husband and have my lads, and we are as well as we can be."

"Five lads," Elsie said.

"Soon to be six," Becky admitted with a small smile. "But you… your daughter is a joy, Elsie. You never thought you'd leave service and now look at you – a mam, a wife…"

"Still a maid," Elsie mumbled. "A part of a fine household, but never really a part of it."

Becky flinched. "Like when we were little," she said darkly. "Held at arm's length because he was ashamed of us."

Elsie sighed and squeezed her sister's hand. "The past is the past," she whispered. "It's dead now."

"Tell me about your Charles – is he a good man?"

Elsie nodded. "The best man I could ever have hoped for," she said softly. "We are happy together."

"He's very tall," Becky commented.

"Yes," Elsie agreed. "Probably why our children have both been rather large."

Becky leaned over the bed in earnest and said, "Elsie, you almost died. You need to abstain from… that side of things. That man will never know a moment's happiness if you die; you know that as well as anyone, I daresay."

Elsie huffed. "Imagine you not being around for so long, having the temerity to lecture me on not having anymore bairns… And you're having a sixth!"

Becky snorted. "My last, god willing – if it's a girl, he says there'll never be need for another."

Elsie made a face. "Leave it to a man to want what it mightn't have."

Becky chuckled. "Most men would long for a son… he wants only for a daughter," she said simply. "You have both. That must please your husband."

Elsie felt her face fall. "He isn't very pleased with me at the moment," she said. "We argued about marital rights and… I'm afraid, Becky. I'm truly afraid for the first time in my life that I will lose what I love most because I am a stupid git full of pride and hubris –"

"No," Becky said firmly. "You are no such thing, Elsie. Even when we were girls, you weren't… you have always been the staid, practical one of us." She rubbed her sister's arm comfortingly. "He is worried for you. He will be cross for that reason alone: you scared him more than he will admit to anyone. He's shaken; it will pass."

There was a knock on the door and Elsie called, "Who's there?"

"Only me," Charles responded gruffly. "It's luncheon; the kitchens have sent up bread and broth, and I'm the only one fit to deliver it right now."

Becky got to her feet quickly and said, "I should go –"

"No," Elsie murmured. "Stay, please. Don't leave on my account. Father doesn't need to know that you're here and you've not properly met Charles –"

The door opened and Charles came in. He blinked in surprise, then said, "You might have cabled, saying that you were coming, Mrs. Smythe."

Becky's brow rose. "And how do you know –"

"There is no mistaking my wife's sister," he said, settling into the chair Becky had recently vacated. "Elsie, love, do you feel strong enough to feed yourself or should I hold the bowl for you?"

She paused, searching his face for any trace of the anger that had been there before she had collapsed into exhaustion. When she saw none, she exhaled a soft sigh, and murmured, "Will you help, please?"

Charles spooned broth into her mouth. "I trust your journey was good, Mrs. Smythe?" he inquired in a genteel, conversational way.

"It was," Becky said, watching them intently. "I met your mother and Meggie," she added. "That's how I came to be here – she brought me up to the big house and Lady Cora brought me to Elsie."

Elsie spluttered, nearly choking on the broth. "Lady Cora… helped you?" she croaked.

"Yes, Mrs. Carson told her that I didn't want it known I was in the house – or really, in Yorkshire at all – and Lady Cora brought me up the back stairs," Becky said. "She's quite nice, for an American."

Charles exhaled and covered a twitch in his jaw, but not before Elsie saw it. He was conflicted, and she gently touched his arm to steady him. "Love, Lord Allenby threw her out many years ago," she said softly. "She doesn't need to relive his censure. I'm certain we can find a way that our Becky can be here and not see him."

He exhaled, shaking his head. "I don't like all this sneaking around," he said gruffly. "It isn't becoming a lady –"

"Good thing I'm not a lady," Becky quipped wryly. She let out a tiny, near hysterical laugh, and Elsie had to bite back both a retort and an echoing giggle. "I can't lose Elsie," she said simply, her mirth vanished.

"No one is trying to take her away from you," Charles said softly. "I just don't… I don't care for subterfuge."

"It's not skulking around," Elsie sighed. "She just doesn't want to see him. I don't blame her: I don't bloody well want to see him and I know you'll insist. You called him here, after all…"

"Because we weren't certain you'd last an hour, let alone a night," Charles muttered irritably; there was the simmering anger again, and she almost flinched at it radiating in her direction. "You cannot fault me cabling him to come."

"No, of course not," she murmured, chastened again.

"He wants to see you when you've finished eating," Charles said firmly.

Becky said, "I should go, then –"

"No," Elsie said. She ate a bite of bread and leaned back against her pillows, exhausted from the effort. "No, please stay. Both of you. I'm not strong enough on my own: he will try to coerce me into giving up my son again –"

"No one is taking our son," Charles said firmly. "You can trust me to guarantee that."

"He can take any one of mine," Becky huffed. "That would be punishment enough for his sins, eh? How about the twins? Two eight year old boys who like to dole out fisticuffs and mud pies."

Elsie's eyes welled up with tears. "I don't want anything to do with… with our old lives," she whispered. "Not now. Not since I've got Charlie and our wee'uns and everything I've ever wanted."

"I never wanted it," Becky said sharply. "You… you're my sister," she said. "I'm so sorry I left you. It's them I can't stand. Him and her; she's dead, and he's a pompous prig."

"To be fair, that's basically his job description," Charles supplied.

"He pinned everything on Ida and lost the game," Becky countered. "And now what? He wants to just play happy families after everything he's done and pretend that his eldest children weren't treated like shite on his shoes?"

Elsie inhaled sharply. "Becky… please stay," she implored. "If for no other reason than to support me."

Becky hesitated, swaying a little on her feet. "I'm not promising I will behave in a manner befitting a lady of my status," she said grudgingly.

"No one is asking you to," Charles said.

Elsie was a bit surprised by his forthright declaration; he was normally such a stickler for propriety. "Charlie, love, are you –"

"I'm all right," he conceded. "Whatever he has done to your sister to create such utter vitriol and hatred leads me to believe it was deserved. And I will not be the one to tell her that she cannot express herself." Charles cleared his throat. "At least… quietly and within boundaries."

Becky bit back a laugh. "You have quite a man, Elsie," she said darkly.

Elsie exhaled and murmured, "I do." She looked up at Charles and added, "I suppose we should get this over with."

Five minutes passed where Becky worked diligently to make her sister presentable – at least to a point. Then there was a knock and Charles and Bruce Hughes were both there, in the room. Bruce's face registered shock – true, earnest surprise – when he saw his younger daughter, and he said, "You came?"

"She is my sister," Becky said simply.

"But you didn't come to your mother's –"

"You're here for Elsie, not me," Becky snapped, cutting him off. "She's the one what almost died. So say your piece and bugger off to Scotland."

"I never thought to see the day when one of my children could be so unbearably rude –"

"Pot meet kettle," Becky muttered, crossing her arms defensively over her chest.

"Enough sniping," Elsie exhaled wearily. "Enough, enough, enough! Lord Allenby, please say what you've come so far to say and then… go. Please. I've not got the constitution for any of this and lord knows I hate an atmosphere."

Charles bit back a chuckle, though Elsie saw it from the corner of her eye. He was doing a good job of remaining stoic and on the sidelines; his interest was in her, and not the rest of it.

Bruce sighed and looked down at his hands. "I cannot begin to apologize for my many sins," he muttered. "Beginning with seducing your mother and ending with… well, to be honest, without properly making her my wife before she died."

"You might make an effort," Becky hissed.

"I did not want to believe that my son in law was that kind of a man," Bruce said, meeting Becky's eyes. "He seduced my daughter, yes, but they were a good match and –"

"And she died and he took pleasure in a rotating supply of maids," Becky shot back.

"I wanted to believe you were lying to me, so I didn't have to face the truth, and for that… I cannot be forgiven."

Elsie blinked and inhaled sharply as the picture came into focus. "Why didn't you tell me?" she asked her sister in alarm.

"Because it was my fault," Becky said, her voice distant and cold. "I was the soft touch; you were no-nonsense and all business and you'd knee a man before you'd let him try anything funny. But I was younger and stupid. I'm sorry I took your money, Elsie, but I had to get out of there somehow and get home –"

"The money never mattered," Elsie whispered. "You've no idea how scared I was when I didn't hear from you – when I found out you weren't at home. I cried for hours when I got your first letter, I was so relieved that you were alive." She reached for Becky, beckoning her sister closer until she could take her hand tightly. "I never want to feel like that again. Don't shut me out."

Becky nodded and squeezed Elsie's hand.

"I wanted to marry your mother in a church, to show the world that I loved that woman from the moment I clapped eyes on her," Bruce said. "But she was stubborn and insisted that our handfasting was enough – that it was enough in the eyes of the law and she didn't need the Church's blessing." He looked like a caged animal, wary and ready to pounce. "There was a witness to our handfasting," he added very quietly. "I never told my parents: they thought I was making it up and it could be undone by making me marry a good English girl. And so began my life as a bigamist."

"Oh my god," Elsie croaked, looking at him in horror. "She said there was a handfasting – not a witness to it. It was legal… it was a true marriage that whole time and you – how could you? How could you do that to her? How could you hate her so much that –"

"I love her," Bruce said, cutting her off. "That's why I never let her go, Elsie."

"You sick, sadistic man," Elsie spat in anger. "You treated her like –"

"I know how I treated her, and I am shamed by my actions, lass. And I know how I treated my children. You do not need to remind me."

Charles cleared his throat. "If the handfasting was legal," he said, "that would make Elsie and Becky legitimate, would it not?"

"They are my surviving legitimate children, yes," Bruce said. "Elsie being the eldest, I have made provision for her to inherit my estates and title, as they aren't entailed. Becky and her family will inherit a considerable sum of money and houses in Dorset, Manchester, and Aberdeen that were inherited from my mother's family and are not part of the main estate." He looked at Elsie, then, his gaze boring into her like a fury. "I cannot begin to atone for my sins, and throwing money and property at you is vulgar in the extreme."

Elsie's mind was racing. "You mustn't tell anyone," she said. "That knowledge mustn't leave this room. Your solicitor mustn't ever say anything to anyone until your death. Do you understand?"

"Elsie, the scandal is mine – of my own making…"

"Yes," she agreed, "it is. I cannot… Father, I cannae be your heiress and be Mrs. Carson. I want to be a wife and a mother on my terms, as my Charlie's lass – the money and the prestige and scandal and… it will be too much. Please understand – I am not… I'm not turning you away. I'm just saying –"

"To carry my guilt to the grave," Bruce sighed.

Becky was very quiet, holding Elsie's hand tightly. Elsie rubbed reassuring circles on the back of her sister's hand with her thumb. "Yes, I suppose… that is what I am asking," Elsie murmured.

"I will do it… but only because you've asked me to," he said with a heavy sigh. "I regret choices I have made, paths I've taken… but the one thing I can never regret is how it felt to hold you in my arms after you were born. Any of you. My children." He ran a hand through his hair and frowned. "I was going to tell you after Ida married and was well-settled and it couldn't be undone."

"You would have hurt her very deeply," Elsie said. "She always thought very highly of you."

Becky finally found her voice. "So I am 'forgiven' then?" she asked bitterly. "After so many years, I'm just meant to come back into the fold and play happy families?"

"No," Bruce said. "I wouldn't dream that you would ever want to forgive me. But you deserve something when I die – you are my daughter, as well as Elsie is."

"I've never told my husband anything but that I have a sister," Becky said. "And that I was disowned. What is he going to think when suddenly I'm being given houses and money – and he cannot have any of it because it will be mine and our children's? He will be furious."

Elsie shifted in her bed and murmured, "Tell him the truth, love. Tell him everything. Everything."

"I can't," Becky said. "I'm not strong like you, Elsie. I'm a soft touch."

"You can," Elsie promised her. "And you will. You must." She looked up at Charles, whose brow was furrowed with worry. "Charlie?"

"You will be a Countess," Charles said, "and our children will be the Honourable Lady and Lord Carsons; but I will be nothing."

"You will be my husband," Elsie said firmly.

"There is a provision for that, as well," Bruce spoke up softly. "Notarized by the Queen, granting you the title of Lord Carson." He frowned, his expression matching Charles's. "I had to go through proper channels – back channels, but channels nonetheless. I was owed a favor by Prince Albert: I merely called it due."

"She knows?" Elsie asked, dread in her heart.

Bruce nodded tersely. "But she willna say anything," he said. "It is a matter of righting wrongs, Elsie, and she is upset that I've not taken the chance to do it before now. I am upset with myself for the very same thing."

"That's why you're here?" Elsie asked. "To make amends?"

"To tell you that I am glad you are still alive," Bruce said. "And to right the wrongs I've done you."

"None of us are perfect," Charles said.

"No," Elsie whispered, reaching for her father's hand, "no one is perfect."