Chapter 2 – Do you Love me Enough to Spend your Life with me.

They sit together on their bench. Matthew is holding Mary's hand waiting patiently for her to begin, to tell him what she has not told him, why she did not give him an immediate yes to his proposal. Mary pulls her hands back. She takes a deep shuddering breath and looks up at Matthew, who is no longer angry and is sitting patiently waiting for her to speak. Mary tries to decide how much of the story she will tell him. She decides to just be direct and get to the point and looks down at her lap before she starts to speak.

"Matthew, before you asked me to marry you, before we started courting properly, way before, but not before I knew you, I took a lover for one night. I am not virtuous, as you would expect a woman of my class to be."

There she said it, she got it out. She raises her eyes to look at him, bracing herself for what she will find. Because he says nothing. Mary thinks she has never seen this expression on Matthew's face, perhaps on anyone's face. He is staring at her wide eyed and his face is contorted in a painful way, maybe a shocked way, Mary is not sure.

Matthew takes a deep breath and tries to say something. But he finds that nothing will come out of his mouth. He thinks he might be in shock, because he cannot speak, and he can barely think. Mary could not have just said what he thought he heard out of her mouth. She had taken a lover? Why on earth would she have done that? It had to have been a hidden love, otherwise it made no sense.

Again, he tried to speak, he met Mary's eyes. Her face was carefully masked with her game face, her stoic face that showed little emotion. "Can you repeat that? I'm not sure I heard you correctly." But he does not give her time to say anything when she starts to speak and says, "No, I see from your expression I heard you correctly."

Matthew gets up and starts to pace and rapidly fires off questions in a very lawyerly manner, as if he is interrogating a witness, "When was this? Who was he? Was he a hidden love, someone your parents would not want you to marry? Was a it a Romeo and Juliet situation? Did you love him?"

Mary looks at him, she is not prepared for this barrage of questions, but she should have been. Matthew is a lawyer and he wants all the facts before he decides if he can live with it.

"Matthew, what difference does it make? I did it, its done. He died and he is not…"

"He what? When was this? Was he sick? Is that why you did it?"

"No, he wasn't sick and that is not why I did it. But if you must know, he died right after and I needed help to get him out of my room and back to his."

"Mary, what? You did it in your home, whoever was this person?"

Mary realizes that Matthew has not yet put the pieces together, so she remains quiet.

"Mary when did this happen?"

Mary responds, "March of last year."

Matthew continues pacing and stops and Mary sees that a realization is dawning on him.

"No, you are not saying, did this person die? Never mind you already said he died in your home. And I remember very well who died in your home in March 1913. Are you saying what I think you are saying?"

Mary squirms, "Yes I am. I took Kemal Pamuk as a lover and he died in my bed and I had to get help to move him back to his room."

Matthew looks at her in disbelief, "You know I remember that night very well. I saw you flirting with him all through dinner and afterward, but you know Mary I never thought you were that kind of girl. And with a Turk, did you love him that fast?"

"Of course, I did not love him. He was exciting yes and attractive, but no I did not love him. Matthew, I made a mistake and I paid for it in the most horrible way. Clearly, I am now Tess of the d'Urbervilles to your Angel Clare, I have fallen."

Matthew looks and responds, "Tess was forced, raped, from what you are telling me you are hardly Tess. And I'm insulted if you think I would act like Angel in that situation."

Mary looks at him uncomfortably, she re-thinks what happened with Pamuk. She had not wanted to be with him, but once she saw that he was not leaving and she was ruined either way, she had given into him and enjoyed it. No Matthew was right, she was not raped, she was not Tess, she was just a fallen woman. She stares at Matthew who has gone silent. "I guess this is it then. I had told you that you should not be so certain that you would still want to marry me, and I guess I was right."

Mary rose from the bench and starts to walk away as tears threaten to come coursing out of her eyes. She turns back to look at Matthew one more time, a final goodbye, a what could have been. She should have known better than to tell him the truth. She had been right, he was a self-righteous middle-class prig, he could never have accepted what she did. She had been right not to accept him right away, and now certainly with his inheritance in doubt, he did not need her. Now that he knew the truth about her, whatever love he told her he had for her, had quickly been covered by disgust.

Matthew looked up and met her eyes, eyes that were clearly losing the battle to contain tears.

"Mary, wait!"
"Why? Its clear you have made your decision. And I cannot blame you."

"I have not made any decision. I'm in shock and I think I need time to think. You took two months to think and to decide to tell me this. I think I'm entitled to some time as well."

Mary knows she should feel comforted that he is not outright rejecting her, but she also knows that Matthew is perhaps too kind to do that. This is clearly just a way for him to let her down easy.

"Matthew, take as much time as you need. I understand and if you decide that you can't, which is what I expect, you need not worry what we will tell the family, everyone will assume that we have broken because you are not surely the heir anymore, and I would rather they think that then what the real reason is."

She does not give Matthew time to respond and she quickly turns and hurries toward the house, where she can go escape to her room and let the tears that have threatened to fall down her cheeks.

Matthew is left to stare after her. When he had been waiting by the tree for her, he had been nervous she would not want him because he was not surely the heir anymore, he could not ever imagine what this afternoon would bring. Mary had slept with the Turk. He now thinks back to the detail of that day and night. He had been infatuated with Mary then, but she was not interested in him in the least. He thought that Evelyn Napier was coming to court Mary, but he too did not have much luck with her. She had been enthralled by Kemal Pamuk. Matthew had always thought him a bit shifty. But then he had died in his sleep and Matthew had just felt bad that perhaps he had judged him and had sent him ill will.

He remembers the next morning, how he had gone over to the house to see how Mary was doing, he now saw how unnerved she was, but now on a totally different level. What did she say that he had died right after the act, that she had to get him back to his room? How horrible that must have been for her, whether she deserved it or not for what she had done. And that too did not make sense, Mary was a lady, for all he knew about her it did not make sense that she would have a clandestine rendezvous with a Turkish diplomat, no matter how exciting and handsome he was.

Matthew's head was spinning. He needed to go home and clear his head, have a quiet dinner and sleep on all this.

Mary does not hear from Matthew for several days and she is not surprised. Her father keeps looking at her as if she has put Matthew in exile and she allows him and the rest of the family to think that. She does not tell her mother that she has finally told Matthew about Pamuk and that it is clear he is now done with her. Her mother and granny had been right, she should have never told him. But she knew that it would not have been honest, and they would not have had the marriage she would have wanted like that. If she was going to marry for love and not position, she needed to have any open honest and accepting marriage. Well Matthew had clearly decided he could not be with her, so the decision was no longer hers and she would have to find a suitable husband for position and live a life without love. It was what she expected anyway, was it not? But Matthew had changed her, she now knew what it was like to love and be loved. This only further depressed her, but she kept a steady face and tried to get on with things.

After several days of mulling it over but not coming to an understanding, Matthew remembered that Mrs. Bird was now the temporary cook at Downton while Mrs. Patmore was having eye surgery in London. He and his mother were expected at the house tonight for dinner. That was the last thing he needed; it was going to be a difficult night.

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Dinner had been a very uncomfortable affair. There was a simmering, palatable tension around the table. Cora and Robert were glowing with hope at the expectation of a new baby and a possible heir. Isobel and Violet were snarkier with each other than usual. And the bitterness between Edith and Mary was a step above what it usually was. Mary and Matthew were not seated near each other and they barely acknowledged the other's presence at the table.

Alone with Robert for after dinner drinks and cigars, Matthew does not know what to say. Robert keeps telling him how happy he would be for Matthew to be his son in law regardless of his position. Robert really has grown to look at him as a son. Matthew feels similarly for him. But this is between Mary and him and he wonders if Robert knows what happened with the Turk. It would be no wonder he would want Mary to get married to anyone of relative decency if he knew she was not what was expected of a Lady. He thought back to what Mary had said about preferring the family think she had rejected him over the inheritance, so he goes along with what she had said and merely tells Robert that things have obviously changed since London, when things seemed certain between them.

Later in the drawing room, Matthew observes Mary from a distance while discussing the telephone with Robert. She seems really upset with Edith; he wonders again if something else is going on there.

Robert can not understand his daughter, Matthew is perfect for her, regardless of title, he feels he must do something to bridge the gap between them. So instead of offering to show Matthew the telephone himself, he calls Mary over and asks her to show Matthew so that he can tend to Cora. It's a poor excuse, but Mary acquiesces and escorts Matthew to the place where the telephone has been newly installed.

"I'm sorry papa has forced my company on you."
"You need not be sorry, I could have feigned an excuse, but I did not want to. So, show me this new telephone."

Mary shows him where it is installed and how Carson is to have one in the butler's pantry as well. They joke easily about Carson learning to live with change. It is easy when they don't have to think about the elephant in the room. Mary also regales Matthew with how they used the telephone in London and how her sisters loved it even more than she did.

As she talks, Matthew begins to see the Mary he has always been enamored with. He had been holding hurt in his heart, and he is still shocked and hurt but he also knows he will not be able to stay here in Downton and not be with her. When he makes his decision, it will be all or nothing.

While he has been musing, he has not heard what she was saying, but is pulled into reality when he hears her say. "Perhaps if I had one of these in my room that night, things would have been different. I could have called for help."

She is joking, but he suddenly realizes that perhaps what she is saying is more than a joke.

"Mary, do you want to talk about it? I think there is more to what happened that what you are telling me."

"Oh, Matthew there is a lot more that you don't know. But I'm not sure I want to tell it or that you would want to hear it. Like that my sister Edith found out what I did and wrote the Turkish ambassador, and all of London has been talking behind my back, spreading rumors of my behavior. The story they tell of course is exaggerated. Now I'm a wanton woman and a killer and I single handedly dragged his corpse across the length of this house."

Matthew looks at her askance, he does not think he has ever heard Mary talk so openly about something so shocking. For all his own hurt and shock, he is beginning to see just how much she has gone through with this.

"Mary, why don't we go for a walk in the cool night air and we could talk some more. I'm growing more shocked by the minute, but not at you, rather for you. My darling, you have been through so much."

Mary winced; she had said much more than she should have. "I don't think so Matthew. There is no reason to burden you with my troubles. I clearly deserve the consequences. Like you said you did not think I was that kind of girl, and clearly, I am, and I am getting what I deserve."

"Mary, I never meant that."

"No, it's alright. You did and probably have thought more since I told you. Our life is not a novel, our story is not a fairy tale. Love does not conquer all."

And with that, Mary turns from him and runs up the stairs, leaving Matthew with his mouth open and perhaps more confused than ever.

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Mary closed the door to her mother's room. How had this happened? Her mother's pregnancy had set her whole world off kilter. But she was happy for her parents, they loved each other, and they should have had another healthy child. And that child had been a boy, she was supposed to have a brother. But Mama had fallen and now the baby was gone. Really, she should be happy that this left Matthew's position certain. But that also did not matter now, after hearing her indiscretion, Matthew did not want her. He had not said that, but he had not given her an indication that he did still want her.

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Matthew entered the garden and surveyed the crowd of people. Men and Women in their best whites on. He himself was wearing a white hat and suit. The events of the past few days, (really the last few weeks), had left him shaken and thoughtful. One day he was the heir, then he possibly was not, and then now he was again. He did not need to be the heir; he had only wanted it so that Mary would be happy with him. Matthew felt so sorry for Cora and Robert, they were holding their heads up high, but there was a sadness permeating the air around them.

Events like this, the miscarriage, made him think about what was important and what was not important. And Mary was important. He needed to find Mary, he needed to find out what she meant when she joked that she could have used the telephone to call for help. But most importantly he really just needed to talk to her.

Matthew saw her across the garden, speaking with Sir Anthony of all people. Sir Anthony then rushed off and Edith tried to follow him, but he seemed to be determined to go. Matthew now saw Mary standing with Sybil. He crossed the garden and approached.

Mary saw him coming, she had just gotten her revenge on Edith and she was happy. Or a little happy, Edith deserved it after what she did to her, and really Sir Anthony was an old boob and Edith could do better.

"Mary, might we take a walk and talk?"

"If you wish"

Mary and Matthew walked beyond the party and to their bench under the tree. Matthew settled himself down and asked Mary to sit beside him. After a bit of hesitation, she acquiesced.

Mary held her breath, she guessed this is where he would put the final nail in the coffin of their relationship. But instead he began to speak in soft tones.

"Mary I've been thinking about everything that has happened to us and our families in the past few weeks and it feels like a horse race. My mind has raced and slowed down. I have spent many days and nights pondering what you told me, and I have come to the conclusion that life is short and we don't know what will happen next. But if you will still have me, I want you beside me as life rolls out its challenges."

Mary blinked. Then she gasped, how could it be, did Matthew still want to be with her, knowing her shame?

"Matthew are you certain? Won't the late Mr. Pamuk resurrect himself every time we argue?"

"No"

"Matthew, I can't undo the past, it's something that will always be a part of me and if you are with me, you'll probably have to put up with some unkind gossip as well."

"Mary, you were honest with me. That is the most important thing. Its taken me some time to think it through and I'm sorry I had to make you wait and perhaps you felt uncertain of my love, but I needed to make sure that I was certain that it did not matter. And it doesn't. I love you and that is all that matters, the rest will work itself out."

"Oh, Matthew, thank you, I love you too. I think I love you even more now, knowing that you can accept what I did and not hold it against me."

"Mary, that is something else I need to know. What did you mean when you said you wish you had a telephone that night so you could call for help?"

Mary looked down, "Did I say that? I couldn't anyway, I would have been ruined either way. He came to my room without permission, he pushed his way in, I asked him to leave, I threatened to scream, he told me I would be ruined either way, so I let just let him do what he wanted and then he died."

She said it so fast, Matthew was not sure he had heard everything. This is what her version of taking a lover was. She did not take a lover, he forced himself on her. Matthew audibly gasped.

"Mary, why did you tell me you took a lover, you did not take him, he forced himself on you. I'm so sorry, come here." Matthew took Mary in his arms and just held her. Now he felt like such a heel, he had judged her and made her wait and really not only did she do nothing wrong, but she had been dreadfully wronged, forced by that horrible Pamuk, if he was not dead already, Matthew would have hunted him down and killed him himself. And then what did she tell him the other night by the telephone, that Edith had written the ambassador and the tale was being told him all of London's busiest ballrooms. Oh, his Mary, how ever could he make it up to her?

At that moment, he felt the box in his pocket that he had taken with him today, that he had carried with him the day Mary had returned from London. Mary was looking quietly at him and breathing softly.

"Matthew, I don't know that I agree with you, I let him do it. You must know that, if you are to be with me."

"Mary, we are going to need to discuss this more, because clearly you don't even see the truth of what happened. But right now, I have something very important to ask you and I must have my answer right away."

Matthew pulled Mary up from the bench and got down on one knee. Still holding onto her hand, he slipped the box out of his pocket and held it open before her. Mary's eyes widened and a hand flew to her mouth.

"Lady Mary Crawley, Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?"

Mary broke into a big smile, "Yes!"

Matthew pulled himself up and took the beautiful diamond ring he had purchased in London after Sybil's ball and placed it on Mary's ring finger. He then pulled her toward him and pressed his lips against hers. She hungrily returned the kiss. It had been so long since they had kissed at Sybil's ball. She had missed him so terribly, but now several weeks later, so much having happened, her mother's pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage, her telling her tale to Matthew. It had all worked out; she was engaged to Matthew just as she thought she would be several weeks ago. It had just taken much more drama and angst than she thought it would.

Mary pulled away first. "I love the ring, its beautiful. And I love you and I am so excited to be your wife."

Matthew smiled back, "I'm glad, and I love you and I can't wait for our lives to begin together. When do you think we could get married?"

"I don't know, soon I hope, Mama will have to decide. Let's go tell my parents, do you want to announce our engagement at the garden party?"

"Well let's tell Robert and Cora and see what they say."

Matthew and Mary walked back toward the garden party arm in arm, a diamond sparking on Mary's finger, the happiest of couples.

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A/N – Well there you have it, my version of what would have happened if Mary had not hedged when Matthew asked her, "Do you love me enough to spend your life with me?"

I always felt that had Mary told him about Pamuk he would have gotten upset at first, especially if she told it as consensual and her idea, but that he would come around. So in my version it was important that Matthew come around even without knowing the truth of what happened.

I hope you enjoyed. Please review and let me know what you thought!