Thank you all for the wonderfully supportive reviews. All are much appreciated! I'm hoping to have some writing time over the next few days and with luck will be able to post again sooner rather than later. In the meantime...
Our Edith has become quite mischievous it would seem. Will she get Anthony in trouble?


That night, Edith once again stole through the corridors to Anthony's room. This time however, she had dressed in her least attractive night wear, mindful of his reaction the night before and his desire to not step over certain boundaries. As much as she enjoyed teasing him in various ways, she did not want to push him beyond where he was ready to go, and Dr. Clarkson had said to go slowly.

Again she knocked softly at his door and once again she peeked around to see him engrossed in a book. Only this time, he was sitting in a chair by the window, a lamp lit on the table beside him. He looked up and smiled that sheepish grin of his. "Lady Edith, what a pleasure," he said lightly. But if his expression was any indication, he had been expecting her.

Closing the door behind her as she stepped into his room, Edith grinned back. "You don't seem at all surprised to see me."

"My dear, you are full of surprises and I've merely armed myself to be ready for them. But visiting me in my bed chamber at night really must stop. What if you were discovered?"

"The wedding would be moved forward."

"Or your father would be so angry, it might never be allowed to happen," Anthony said darkly.

"Papa would be angered. But no matter what he says or does, I will marry you, my darling man. Now kiss me before I go mad with the want of it."

Anthony stood and crossed to her. "Can't have that, now can we?" he teased. His kiss was firm and sure and from his perspective, her lips were even more delicious than usual. "This really could become a habit," he murmured as he released her.

"A habit? Kissing?"

"Yes, my sweet one, a habit. I should think at least once a day."

"Only once a day?"

"Perhaps once every four hours, like some of my medicines."

"Only every four hours?" Edith was teasing in earnest.

"Very well then, would once an hour be sufficient?" Anthony asked with twinkling eyes.

Running her hand up his chest and neck into his hair, she leaned up. "More than that, much more than that" she whispered as she kissed him.

"My dear, you are temptation personified. We really must take a break," Anthony said after her rather lengthy and intense perusal of his lips.

"If we must," Edith sighed. She nudged past him, making certain that she brushed against him, and sat on his bed.

Anthony groaned. "Oh my darling girl, you really are testing me, aren't you?"

"How can you say that? I wore my ugliest nighties for you."

Settling next to her on the bed, Anthony chuckled. "You could wear a burlap sack and I would still find you most alluring."

"Oh, that deserves another kiss," she said as she moved to act on it. But Anthony pulled back slightly. "I think not. Given our current location, that might lead to something unintended."

"Do you spoil every party?"

"No, at least I don't think so, and I shall be most happy to party with you once we are married. But for now, let's content ourselves with merely sitting together and holding hands perhaps?"

Another sigh from his darling told Anthony that she was resigned to the less ambitious suggestion.

"I had another reason to come to you tonight," she finally said.

"Oh? And here I was thinking you'd lain awake thinking of ways to molest me."

"Oh, that too. But Patrick or Peter or whatever his name is…" Anthony felt her shudder beside him. "What my sweet?"

"He stopped me as I was going up to change for dinner. He really is insisting that he is Patrick Crawley and I want to believe him, but he just doesn't act like Patrick. Our Patrick would have never treated me the way he did."

"What? He treated you badly? Anthony could feel anger rising from his gut.

"Well, certainly not in a manner I would expect from Patrick. He… he told me that he knew all along that I was in love with him, that he hadn't wanted to marry Mary. But then he grabbed my arm and held it tightly and he said he…. He said he'd seen me with you and that he couldn't believe I would choose you over him. Then he kissed me and… well, it was just awful. I tried to push him away and he just pressed me more. When he finally stopped, he glared at me and said that I am as cold as a fish in the ocean and you could have me."

"What! The scoundrel!" Anthony sprung up from his seat on the bed. "I shall go and have a word with this young popinjay. He has no right to speak to you like that."

"No Anthony, please…. I didn't tell you this to make you angry. I just…. I needed to tell someone and there is no one I trust more than you. Whoever that man is, he isn't Patrick, at least not the Patrick that I cared about."

Looking down at Edith, Anthony let loose a long breath. "Yes, well… I can see you are disappointed. You thought you might be getting your cousin back and instead this… this imposter has insulted you." He settled back beside her and took her hand. "I'm very sorry, Edith."

"But you did nothing wrong."

No, I don't think I have. But still, it is because of me that this Peter person thought he could speak to you in such a manner. It's outrageous, really."

"Oh, I knew you would understand. I am disappointed by it all. I did hope that he might prove to be Patrick. But now…"

"Now you are caught because as much as you hope he isn't your cousin Patrick, it means that your beloved Patrick is at the bottom of the ocean."

"Yes, that's it exactly." She paused and tilted her head in thought. "Except Patrick isn't, never was, my beloved. I cared for him, deeply, but not half of how much I care for you."

"I really don't deserve you. But I can't tell you how happy it makes me to hear you say things like that," Anthony answered.

As much as he wanted to kiss her in that moment, he refrained. Oh my sweet one, I daren't say how very much I want to be with you, just like this… always. And so he simply contented himself with gazing at her adoringly.

They sat a few minutes more, Anthony finally relenting and kissing Edith just once before she left to return to her room.

Late the next morning, Anthony found Edith sitting on a bench under one of the large trees that dotted the estate. "Good morning," he said, glancing around before he dared continue, "my dearest darling."

Edith looked up him and smiled, but it was a sad smile, he noted. Sitting next to her, he studied her expression. "What's the matter?"

"Patrick or Peter or whoever he was is gone," she said unhappily. "He didn't even say good-bye, just… disappeared."

"Oh my," Anthony said consolingly. Inwardly he was relieved. "Not a word to anybody?"

"He left a note…." Edith sighed.

"Did it explain why he left so abruptly?"

"No, well… he said it was too difficult. And he signed it P. Gordon. P for Patrick or P for Peter? That's what I want to know."

Anthony mulled that one a minute before replying. "Well, I should think that since he used Gordon and not Crawley, that it was P for Peter."

"Yes, you're probably right, which means Patrick really did drown all those years ago. And I was a fool for ever believing this man."

"Oh my dear, you were not a fool. You simply wanted to believe that a loved one, a member of your family, had somehow survived. There is nothing foolish in that, in wanting to believe in the best of people and not always seeing the worst."

"Really? Because I certainly feel foolish right now."

"Well, you shouldn't and you can't."

"I can't?" She looked at him curiously.

"No my dear, because you see, I'm already foolish enough for the both of us."

"I don't see how."

"Well if, as you have said, I was to propose to you the day that the war broke out, I'd say I was patently foolish for not doing so. And now, as young and lovely as you are and as old and broken as I am, I'm a bit foolish in believing that I could ever make you happy for the long term. So I've quite got the foolish side of things in hand, you see."

Edith chuckled. "Oh Anthony, you do make me happy, so very, very happy. I wish you could see that. First you say I'm lovely and then you make me laugh and I'm feeling better already about my own foolishness." She looked at him, studied his face for a moment. "You know, I never knew Humpty Dumpty was so handsome. If I had, perhaps I would have payed closer attention to the tale as a child. But then, you aren't Humpty, are you? Because he, poor thing, couldn't be put back together again. And you, my darling man, are coming together quite nicely, I believe. "

"No, I'm not," Anthony answered uncertainly. "My arm will always be broken and the rest of me, well… you must realize that I'll never be the same, never quite whole again."

"Dr. Clarkson has told me the same thing. Well, not that exactly. He said you would never be quite the same man as you were before the war, that it has changed you. And I understand that. I also understand that under all the hurt and uncertainty, that kind, gentle man is still there. And more and more I see him when we are together. Beyond that, you Anthony, make me better. When I am with you, I am happier, kinder, and a much better person. And I know that will always be the way it is for me."

"I can't imagine you as anything but kind and I want always for you to be happy," he replied.

"Then you really must stop doubting your ability to make me happy."

"I'll try," he answered with a crooked smile and worry nibbling in his gut.