The next morning, Anthony, Edith, Elinor and Helen wandered around the gallery upstairs. Generations of Strallan portraits hung here and Anthony knew a great deal about all of them; walking up and down with Elinor, he could be heard to say things like, "Ah, this is my great uncle, Elinor. Captain Henry Strallan. He fought in the Peninsular Wars. And this lady is his wife, Valentina."

"That's a lovely name!" Elinor whispered, awe-struck, and Anthony chuckled.

"Indeed it is, my dear. She was Spanish - and your great-great-uncle Henry met her while he was fighting there. My father said his aunt Valentina was the best horsewoman he ever saw, and the cleverest lady in the whole of Yorkshire." He leaned closer to Elinor and murmured, conspiratorially, "Of course, the cleverest lady in Yorkshire still lives here, doesn't she?"

Elinor giggled. "Yes! Because Mummy's here!"

Edith rolled her eyes good-naturedly; her tastes ran more to the modern portraits. Behind her, she could hear Helen enthusing to Anthony about the light and brightness that some long-dead artist had infused into a portrait of some Strallan or other in Restoration costume at the other end of the gallery. Edith's own footsteps drew her towards the stairs.

Anthony's parents, painted shortly after their wedding, hung opposite the staircase, and she couldn't help but be fascinated by them. The painter must have been very skilful indeed: Anne Strallan's brown eyes, even in oil, glinted with fun and good humour. The couple had been painted in the library, of all places, and Anne was leaning back against her husband's shoulder most informally, his arm around her waist, her head turned back towards the viewer, as if to show off her prize. Phillip, however, with his sweeping head of blonde hair and broad brow (so like Anthony's own), had his attention fixed entirely on Anne. His piercing blue eyes, which stared down at his pretty young bride, were filled with such love and devotion that Edith had to swallow back sudden, inexplicable tears.

"All right?" Anthony asked quietly at her shoulder; Elinor and Helen were still admiring the Restoration gentleman, well out of earshot. Edith dabbed at her eyes and nodded.

"I was just admiring my mother and father-in-law. How old were they, here?"

Anthony glanced at the date in the painting's corner. "'68. Hmm, my mother would have been, oh, twenty-three, twenty-four. My father about forty-three, I think."

"The same age difference as us," Edith smiled, "or thereabouts." The lift of her eyebrow told him precisely what she was thinking. I kicked up such a fuss about my age, the first time around, and she thinks me a hypocrite. You deserve that one, at least.

He flushed. "It was a different age, then, though. An older man marrying a younger woman… well, no one batted an eyelid."

"Well, I didn't bat an eyelid about marrying you, either," Edith pointed out. She squeezed his hand, a gesture of peace. "They look… very happy."

"They were," Anthony acknowledged. "The more curmudgeonly he was, the more it seemed to amuse her. She thrived on flirting laughter out of him." Looking very far away, he added, "And he… he worshipped the very ground she walked on."

"How did they meet?" Edith was thoroughly fascinated now, by these people who had made her husband who he was, and whom she would never meet. "I don't think you've ever told me."

Anthony grinned. "She was from Cornwall - came up here on a sketching holiday with married friends and, er, ended up trespassing on Locksley land. She twisted her ankle, one of her friends ran up to the house for help and… my father carried her inside and looked after her."

"How romantic," Edith smiled, charmed.

"Not as romantic as all that," Anthony scoffed. "Apparently they spent the whole of that afternoon arguing."

Edith's eyes widened. "Really? Whatever about?"

Anthony dug his hands into his pockets and his grin widened evern futher. "Female emancipation, of all things. According to my mother, he made the mistake of wondering aloud why she didn't have a man with her to keep her out of trouble - "

"He didn't?!" Edith exclaimed, caught between outrage and amusement. "Oh, Anthony, I hope she boxed his ears for him!"

"Well, that was certainly the general gist of her reply, as I understand it." His mouth quirked dryly. "Family legend has it that Elizabeth Bennet to Mr Darcy after the first proposal wouldn't have held a candle to the verbal dicing she gave him. Well, anyway, she was carried back to her friend's house where she was staying, and that would have been that - if my father hadn't ridden over there the following morning with a bunch of Locksley white roses and a profuse apology." He shook his head in faint amusement. "Something about her… had caught his attention, clearly."

"And they stayed in touch?"

"Mmm. She went back to Cornwall at the end of her holiday, but they kept writing to each other, for some reason. Quarrelling by letter for the first six months and then…" He shrugged. "You can pinpoint it to one precise letter, when it all began to change for him. Dear Miss Treskillion becomes My dear Anne and then three months later we get My darling Nancy - and a proposal, in writing."

"'Nancy'?" Edith asked gently.

"Oh, he always called her that. It was his pet-name for her."

Edith tilted her head on one side. Who would have thought that that severe man up there would give his wife white roses and nicknames? But then, she had to remind herself, this was also the man who had cared so deeply about the fate of one of his housemaids, and who had raised a son as thoughtful and loving as her husband. Perhaps she ought not to be too surprised.

"You still have all of their letters? I'd like to see them."

"Yes, they're locked away in the library somewhere. When they married, my mother gathered them all together in a box for posterity."

Impishly, Edith asked the burning question. "And did she ever convert your father to the cause of women's empowerment?"

Anthony smiled down at her. "Oh, she toned him down a little, but he was still very much a man of his time. In a good way, I think." Glancing up at his Papa, he murmured, "He'd be thought of as a bit of a dinosaur these days, but… he'd never have dreamt of being cruel or dictatorial to her - to any of us." He smirked. "For one thing, she wouldn't have stood for it. He just took his responsibilities towards my mother - and Diana, when she arrived - very seriously. But… he learnt very quickly that marriage, for her, didn't mean that she'd abandoned any of her beliefs. I think he… admired her for them, in the end, even if he didn't quite understand."

Edith looked back at Sir Phillip's face, frowning a little. "The Lord only knows what he would have thought of me!"

Anthony squeezed her waist. "He'd have adored you. They both would have." He shook his head thoughtfully and there was silence for a moment as his frown deepened.

"What are you thinking of?" Edith asked at last.

Anthony glanced down at her, his facd relaxing a little as he did so. "Oh, it's just… I always wonder… well, it wasn't much to base a marriage on, was it, really? An afternoon of quarrelling, nine months of letters, and then a proposal. Whatever could my mother have been thinking of?"

Edith leant her head against his arm. "Sometimes, I think… you just know. You know the person you are meant to spend your life with." She looked up at the painting again. "I think your mother knew exactly what she was doing." Her hand scouted out his, and took hold of it lightly, her thumb brushing over the top of his fingers. "Anthony," she began, "I think - "

"Who are those people?" asked Elinor, suddenly, at Edith's knee.


Afternoon tea was a quiet affair. Helen had taken Elinor and her Brownie off for a photography lesson in the surrounding countryside, leaving Anthony and Edith alone.

Edith was rather sorry for this. For one thing, she was still recovering from the shock of having very nearly confessed her love to Anthony. And of course, that was the very last thing she could do.

You have a happy home together. He adores Elinor. He's your best friend. Why risk spoiling all of that? She swallowed a sip of tea with difficulty.

Anthony watched his wife narrowly over the rim of his tea cup. He felt that they had been on the brink of something earlier; there had been a spark of electricity between them and he had been so sure that she was about to -

About to what? that little voice in his head asked, cynically. Confess her undying love for you? How ridiculous! Haven't you got enough? She relies on your support, she lets you take care of her and love her, and be a father to Elinor. What more do you need? Best to leave it all alone.

Of course, there was another explanation, one that was far more painful to contemplate. They had been speaking of husbands and wives, of love matches, of marriages that were meant to be. It might be that she has realised that you aren't enough for her. Or perhaps that you are too much, especially after… recent events. Perhaps she was trying to… let you down gently. Explain to you. Inwardly, he shook his head. As if she would ever need to say more to you than 'I am unhappy' for you to tear the whole earth apart for her.

"Edith?" he asked, aloud, and she looked up startled from where she had been staring fixedly at the plate of scones which lay between them.

"Y-yes?"

"What was it that you wanted to say to me, earlier?" He smiled teasingly, trying to keep his voice light. "Before our little rascal interrupted?"

"Oh, it doesn't matter." She smiled, but he knew her too well now for it to work; it was obviously forced and false. "I - I can't even remember, now, darling."

"I see." Oh, that was the first time she's lied to me. How many other things will she begin to feel she must tell untruths about? "Well, you know, don't you, that you can tell me anything? At any time?"

She nodded, her eyes starting to glisten with something like tears. "Of course."

Gently, Anthony kissed her fingers, but she half-flinched at the press of his lips, and he withdrew. "You know I only ever want your happiness, my darling."

Edith swallowed and refilled their tea cups. "I know. And - and I am happy. Truly. You - you couldn't do anything to make me happier."

Anthony accepted his teacup, and gave a sad, secret smile to himself. The lady doth protest too much, methinks.


AN: A quick note on dates and Strallan family history... I'm setting Anthony's birth year as 1870 for the purposes of this fic, with his father being forty-five when he was born. Phillip was therefore born in 1825, to a father who could have been a brother to someone who fought during the Peninsular Wars. I think my maths (and genealogy!) just about works, but if anyone with a better head for figures or family lineage disagrees, please get in touch! :)