No matter what he tried, he could not seem to calm down after Tom's announcement at breakfast. The audacity of that man was simply beyond him. Did he truly think he could decide things like the girl's religion just like that, without ever talking to any of them? And the insolent tone he took, knowing full well it would goad him and lead to someone losing their temper, most likely him — and Robert would have lost it had it not been for Matthew and Edith present. It was a good thing he had decided to leave then and there and instead start going about his day, or else his anger would certainly not have stayed buried inside him. He wouldn't have managed to get another bite down, anyway. Only then, hours later, the anger was still there and it clouded his judgment of matters so much that he had not managed to get any correspondence done that day until lunch, and even now as it was nearing teatime, he was still seething inside.
It had been apparent that both, Edith and Matthew, had been on Tom's side that morning, presumably trying to appease the Irishman, but Robert still held out hope that at least Mary would see how wrong all of this was. She was most like his mother, who had insisted she be raised with the proper values to one day be Countess, not that Edith or Sybil had been brought up without manners. Surely Mary would see everything that was inappropriate about Tom's plans. She had to.
Briefly, as he made his way outside to the bench she had been sitting on underneath the giant tree, his mind went onto something else — or rather someone else.
Cora.
Cora, who was still hiding away upstairs in her bedroom, refusing to come out for most of the day. Usually, he would have had his Cora to talk this over with, but she was making it abundantly clear she did not want anything to do with him still. Even after more than two weeks. No matter what he did, she would not let him in or even allow him near.
However, his hopes of finding an ally in his eldest daughter were soon crushed as well when even Mary quite nonchalantly told him that she supported Tom's decision regarding the little girl's name and religion, both things that would either make or break her start in life in this society. At least that was what he thought about the religious aspect. On top of all that, naming that poor little girl after her dead mother was simply in bad taste to him. And frankly, he did not think he would ever be able to call her by her given name if things went ahead like this. It would, as Tom had rightfully agreed, be very painful at first. Robert doubted that this pain would ever lessen for him. And a catholic Crawley? That was simply unheard of. No matter what they all said — that little girl was a Crawley just as much as she was a Branson. Their family was all she would ever know of her mother.
Seething once more after having to admit defeat yet again out there by the bench, he had all but stormed back inside. Rather unkindly he had asked Carson to fetch his cane and hat, and he was sorry for that. He'd have to apologise later.
On the way back to the house he had decided to walk down to the village and call upon his mother for tea. Nobody else would be joining him here at the abbey either way, so he might as well go out in search of some company. He simply could not bear being alone with his thoughts yet again. That had been happening far too much recently.
Spratt had just come to take the remnants of their tea away and gone back outside immediately to grant his mistress and her son the privacy Violet always demanded. Robert almost felt bad for leaving the scone he had taken from the platter and prepared with cream and jam untouched on his plate. It did look delicious, but when it came to actually eating it, something inside him violently resisted the notion and so he had set it back down again, earning him a concerned look from his Mama.
At first, their conversation was strained. Robert had not managed to find a suitable way to break Tom's news to his mother on the way down to the village and so they started with polite conversation, both of them avoiding the elephant in the room. Eventually, however, he just outright told her. Although the energetic response in protest he had expected never came. All she did was purse her lips upon hearing the news he brought, seeming deep in thought. Not even a single snide remark about the Irishman's audacity left her lips.
His mother's complete silence prompted him to leave his armchair opposite her and walk over to the window at the far back of the room. His mind was reeling. Was he seriously the only one minding? That couldn't be, could it? It could not be that even his mother seemed to be against him on this. He could not be that far off in assessing every single member of his family, there was simply no way. If there was anything in this world that he could count on, then it was his mother and her traditional views. Views so deeply rooted in an upbringing in days long gone, sometimes too much so.
Robert had his back to her, looking out over the garden that was always kept up to snuff by her gardener. He let his gaze wander over the many blossoming flowers that were always meticulously groomed. They were all in full bloom, looking like colourful explosions dotted around the greenery. It was strange to look upon such dainty, colourful things when the rest of his life seemed to play out in rough shades of black and white.
"What is your plan for the child?", Violet inquired a little while later from her position next to the fireplace.
She caught him fully off-guard, that much was apparent. His mind had been miles and miles away from the sitting room at the dower house, she recognised that when he briefly turned around with raised eyebrows before turning back again.
"What d'you mean?"
"Well, if Branson takes her away, to live with him in Liverpool or wherever he comes to rest. Presumably it will be his influence that governs her upbringing."
"I haven't thought about that."
It was true, he hadn't. All day, he had been so on edge about all these decisions Tom was making on his own, decisions that completely disregarded everything in Sybil's upbringing. All day, Robert could not help but want his son-in-law to go away as soon as possible in hopes that it would keep him from losing his temper and subsequently likely his family, even if that already seemed to be happening. He had been so preoccupied with this that he never once thought about that aspect. At breakfast that morning, he had all but politely kicked the chauffeur out of the house without ever being clear himself about the consequences that would have not only for him, but for all of them.
"Then I suggest you do. And soon," Violet said pointedly. As realisation finally dawned on him, his mother watched him closely. With everything he had just complained about to her, she had expected that he would have thought of this well, but she had been wrong. His baffled and quite thoughtful expression was more than enough proof of that. Had Cora not thought of this? She usually was the one to think a bit further ahead than her son, after all. "What does Cora say?"
That simple question uttered by his mother hit a sore spot and he inadvertently had to look away that same instant when the words registered with him. Talking to his mother about the troubles their marriage was facing was certainly not something he had wanted to do when he decided to walk down to the village on a whim.
It would not do to prove her right after all these years, she would only go after Cora. And that was the absolute last thing he wanted. After all, his mother could be ruthless occasionally if she wanted to be. However, she would also instinctively know if he lied to her. So he decided to play it as safe as possible.
"Not much. Not much to me anyway," Robert said, looking everywhere in the room but at his mother, avoiding her inquiring eyes as best he could. She should not see the hurt in his eyes as he said this, he knew he was not hiding it well.
What Robert had not taken into consideration, though, was that his mother knew him even better than he thought she did, and she saw that the admission cost him greatly. And it surprised her. She never would have expected this. She never would have expected the rift between her son and his wife to be this immense.
Sitting upright as ever, she sounded as flummoxed as she looked when she asked: "She still holds you responsible?"
There was no use trying to hide by looking elsewhere, she would see straight through him either way. Even though his reluctant silence was more than enough to answer her simple question, he turned at last to face her again and retorted almost defensively: "She's wretchedly unhappy, if that's what you mean."
"I will not criticise a mother who grieves for her daughter."
Normally, this would have surprised Robert, and normally he might have commented on it. The fact that his Mama chose not to criticise Cora, which had been all she had been doing for 30 years now, was remarkable. The circumstances, however, were such that he would rather forget about all of this. After all, his wife — his darling wife who had not even so much as batted an eyelid at any other of his misgivings in the past — wanted nothing to do with him. Even just being in the same room filled her with so much pain and anger as resentment seemed to radiate off her; so much so that even he noticed. He simply could not see a way this could change in the near future. "I think she's grieving for her marriage as well as for Sybil."
It was a thought that had occurred to him countless times by now, and how could it not when this hardship coming between them exceeded any of the ones before? How could he not when it seemed so much more insurmountable than anything they had to face in the past? At night, when he lay awake in his narrow bed, entirely unable to fall asleep with the weight of the world pressing down on his chest as if to suffocate him, he tried to think of how he could possibly turn things around, how he could win her back. But nothing he thought of would ever be enough with the way things currently were between them, he knew that much.
If his nonchalant tone surprised her as he talked about his marriage, then she did not let it show. Her appalled expression at his words and what he was insinuating, though, was quite enough already. "Robert, people like us are never unhappily married."
At that, Robert could not help but scoff. He knew only too well about everything that was expected of a marriage for people in the aristocracy, and he knew the lengths some of his peers went to in order to keep up pretences and stay afloat through a crumbling, loveless marriage that had ultimately run its course a long time ago.
He should not talk like this, not to his mother, but he could not help it any longer. Keeping up this facade he had put up for more than two weeks already was draining, and right now he was past caring about it. "What do we do if we are," he all but sighed as he walked back to the empty seat opposite her and unceremoniously sat back down. He had not meant for it to come out like this, and he certainly did not expect his mother to respond to it, and so quickly as well.
"Well, in those moments, a couple is unable to see as much of each other as they would like."
The words Violet carefully uttered needed a little while to sink in as his eyes were fixed on the embers in the hearth to his left, and he did not particularly care for the meaning barely veiled by her concerned tone. "You think I should go away?"
"Or Cora could go to New York to see that woman."
At that, Robert could only barely contain yet another scoff. His mother's disdain for anything American and especially his wife's mother was quite something. So much so that even in moments like these, she could not keep from letting it show.
Upon seeing her son lounging quite forlornly in the armchair, she added truthfully: "It can help to gain a little distance."
He heard what she said, and he'd like to think he understood what she meant. And yet, none of the possibilities presenting itself after this proposition seemed right to him. Things could not go on as they were, that much was crystal clear, even to him. But he could not send her across the pond; away from here, from her little girl. Away from her grave that he knew she visited regularly. Away from her and her daughter. He couldn't even in good conscience pose the possibility.
His mother was waiting for a reply — a decision, most likely. One stating he would talk to Cora about going to New York, he assumed. And yet, Robert found he simply didn't have one, no matter how hard he thought about it all.
It frustrated him. Everything about this wretched situation did, including this conversation.
"Ah, I can't seem to think straight about any of this," he then admitted after trying to give it some more thought. And it was true. No matter how hard he tried, his head just would not stop spinning. If admitting this to his mama meant defeat, then so be it. He could not fight his mother as well, there was enough on his plate already.
Robert did not look at her, he did not see the way she eyed him. Her face was so defeated, so unbearably sad, filled with so much commiseration and grief. He took no notice of any of it, his eyes entirely too focused on a loose thread clinging to the edge of his mother's carpet.
When she saw how he tried to avoid her gaze, she leaned forward slightly. "My dearest boy, there is no test on earth greater than the one you have been put to." Her voice was now frail and vulnerable; both qualities he rarely associated with her.
At this, his head turned up to her again, Robert finally facing her at last when he heard the not-so-subtle change in her tone.
Looking into his red-rimmed eyes, she saw the storm raging inside. She saw how dark the clouds over his mind were and how impermeable they lay, darkening his every waking thought. She saw through his carefully constructed facade and how he barely kept it all together inside. She saw the waves of the storm crashing against the prow of the ship alone at sea with only him at the helm of it, saw how the waves came rolling in, one after the other. Relentlessly. Threatening to pull him under, over and over and over again.
"I do not speak much of the heart," she went on, unintentionally toying with the ring on her finger, turning it this way and that in trepidation. "Since it's seldom helpful to do so, but I know well enough the pain when it is broken."
It took everything in him not to break down again. Everything. When he had walked down to the village that afternoon, his anger still very much present at the forefront of his thoughts, he had not thought about the possibility that this afternoon, his mother would have the most honest and heartfelt conversation with him he thought they had ever had. It was true, she never spoke of any matter involving these deep emotions, let alone love. Sometimes in the past, he had questioned whether she was even familiar with the notion of love and everything it entailed. As it turned out, she was. His mama was just very, very adept at burying it so very deep inside her that it never came to the surface.
Never, apart from today. She always hid behind her quick wit and stubborn, seemingly cold nature. As he looked at her, though, and let her words sink in, he realised that her facade had not slipped; she had not lost control when she said these words. She had simply lowered the walls surrounding her to allow him in just the tiniest bit, to let him see that she knew what he was feeling. He appreciated that more than he could ever say.
And yet, he could not look at her and say as much. Swallowing down the lump that had been forming and steadily growing in his throat, he avoided her eyes once more and only said: "Thank you, Mama."
Right before she entered the library, Violet paused just for a second. Was she right in doing this? Was she right in trying to interfere with their marriage, their lives?
Her daughter-in-law would certainly be in there, Carson had just informed her that she was down already — alone. The butler had also told her that she had chosen to wait in the library instead of the drawing room. That alone told the ageing matriarch that everything her son had told her the day before was true, although she wished he had been wildly exaggerating.
Oh, how she hated this sort of thing. Taking a deep breath, she then stood up straight again and gripped her cane firmly as she set foot inside the familiar room.
She saw her sitting there on one of the red settees, her back turned to the door. It almost looked like a doll had been put up there and not a real person, with how little movement she showed, even when Violet entered and almost reached her.
"I do hope you do not mind me coming here early, my dear," she said carefully. It would not do to startle her and she was obviously very deep in thought.
Only when her mother-in-law was right next to her and had spoken softly did Cora move to even just acknowledge her. Surprised, she turned her face to where the voice was coming from. Her red-rimmed eyes found those of Violet, who was looking at her with both compassion and sadness in equal measures.
A forced smile appeared on Cora's face, one that barely reached her lips, let alone her eyes. "Oh no, not at all, Mama," she breathed.
In truth, she did mind. She had hoped to be alone in here for a bit before she would have to socialise with all of them again. Even if it was just her family, it still cost her greatly. Though the greatest test for her was having to sit opposite him for the duration of dinner, having to look at him when her feelings were still so conflicted and confusing. Violet was also clearly not there for no reason, she never came earlier than socially acceptable, and that moment was still more than half an hour away.
When Cora made to stand, her mother-in-law only hastily waved her cane, denoting that she should just stay seated while the elderly woman took a seat opposite her on the plush couch.
The two women just sat there in silence for a little while. That was until Cora decided she could not bear this any longer. Forcing another smile, she faced Violet and asked, her voice nothing more than a hoarse whisper: "Now, what brings you here so early today?"
Her mother-in-law looked at her, taking in her pale complexion and her lifeless eyes. It almost seemed as if Cora was not looking at her, but straight through her. As if she was not really there, at least not mentally. The younger woman was so clearly suffering through these unimaginably trying times, Violet couldn't even imagine how she was feeling. "I only wanted to see you," she said softly. "To ask how you were faring?"
"Quite how one would expect, I imagine, after the loss of their youngest child."
"That is precisely what I thought. Only Robert said-"
Abruptly, Cora looked away and all but bolted up out of her seat. It looked almost as if she had burned herself as soon as Violet had so much as mentioned her husband's name.
A part of her wanted to hear all about it, wanted to hear how he was doing. What he was saying to his mother. That was the part of her still madly in love with her husband, the part she was trying so hard to suppress at the moment. The other part wanted to bolt out of the room and run back up into the sanctuary of her own bedroom. It recoiled at only hearing his name spoken. It made her think back to that night and his behaviour, something that fuelled the fire of resentment deep within her.
"You spoke to him, then?" She knew it was not ladylike, but she crossed her arms across her chest as she stood there towering over Violet, who did not react to this quite disrespectful move at all.
"I did. He came to me for tea yesterday. And when he left, I was quite concerned. You see, he said that you were not doing well," Violet started, glancing up at her daughter-in-law as if she was testing the waters.
"What did he expect? That I just keep on pretending that nothing happened and everything is fine like he does every single day?" Cora bit out. Her eyes were stinging again, and she felt her cheeks heat up, partly in embarrassment, partly in anger.
Calmly, Violet tried to assuage her by saying: "Cora, that is not what he is doing."
"Isn't it? How curious."
Her face seemed made of stone at that, her jaw was clenched and Violet knew she would have to admit defeat on her quest to help her son and his wife for that day. It would take a lot more than she thought it would, even after her son's honest words the day before.
Silence settled over the two of them once more, and slowly her stony expression mellowed and gave way to one of such intense melancholy that it startled Violet.
It did not take long for the first tears to roll down Cora's pallid cheeks. She did not even bother with trying to wipe at them, she was past caring about who saw her cry and who did not.
Violet opened her mouth, trying to think of something to say that would help her, ease her pain at least a little, but she could not seem to think of something appropriate when they heard footsteps approach from the other end of the room.
"Forgive me for barging in but I have a little plan."
Cora was still standing tall when they heard Isobel begin to talk, and slowly she turned to face the new arrival.
"Oh, goodness. You've changed. It's much later than I realised."
Maybe she should have wiped away these salty, treacherous tears by now, given that there was another guest, but she seemed in a stupor concerning that. All she managed was to swallow the lump in her throat and reply tersely: "We're rather prompt. Robert's invited Mr Travis to dine with us. So what was your plan?"
Violet had to hand it to her, she made a good show of pretending she was not at odds with her husband when others were around, or so it seemed at least when she replied with a benign smile, forced as it might have been.
"Well, I was wondering if you and the girls might come to me for luncheon on Thursday."
"Do I count as one of the girls?"
Slowly, Violet half-craned her head around to look at Isobel, who was visibly shaken by the revelation that Cora had not been alone in the library.
"Of course," Isobel stammered, visibly flustered by her presence.
It earned her a benevolent nod from Violet before she turned back around to look at Cora.
That smile was back on her face, Violet noticed. That forced smile that did not reach her eyes. "You're very kind, but I'm not really going out at the moment."
Violet herself would have dropped the topic by then, it was most apparent that Cora did not want to go out. She looked more than just uncomfortable standing there. The elderly woman couldn't help but smile sadly at her. Cora truly was suffering, just like Robert had said. And then being ambushed like this? Although she had to admit, it was awfully kind of Isobel to think of her now and invite them. Maybe going out and just seeing different surroundings might actually help her, even if just for an hour.
It seemed that Isobel shared those thoughts, for she replied: "There'll be no one else there. Only me. And a walk to the village might blow some cobwebs away."
It was awfully, awfully kind of Cousin Isobel to offer, but Cora found she simply could not agree to go. It cost her more than greatly to even just hold back the tears at that moment. What was she supposed to do out and about? It couldn't end well, it simply could not.
"I'm afraid I would only bring my troubles with me."
It seemed that Isobel had now accepted her refusal, judging by the look of slight disappointment on her face. But then, the door to the library opened again, and people entered, only Cora did not turn around to see who it was. Maybe Carson had told them all where she had chosen to wait that evening. She should have told him not to tell a soul, this was not the kind of peace and quiet ahead of dinner she had had in mind when she came down early.
"Hello Mother, what brings you here?"
"She's just invited Cora and Edith and Mary to come to luncheon on Thursday," Violet replied before Isobel could, a smile on her face that neither Matthew nor Mary could quite place.
That did not matter though, the invitation previously declined quite vehemently by Cora was an awfully nice gesture, and Mary was desperate to find a reason to leave the house. It all felt quite suffocating at the moment, like the walls were constantly closing in on them. "Oh, how kind. Thank you," she then breathed.
It put a smile on Isobel's face to know that her efforts were not fully in vain, she would host a luncheon after all. She only hoped that Cora would come along, the Countess truly needed a change of scenery by the looks of it.
More footsteps approached, and Cora did not even have to turn around to see who had joined them now. She could never mistake these heavy footsteps on the wooden floors for someone else's. Steeling herself to keep the tears at bay, she took a deep, steadying breath.
"Isobel," Robert greeted as he passed his eldest and her husband and walked on. He chanced a quick glance over at them. He had expected his wife to look away, and so he was not too terribly disappointed to find she was. It still hurt him, but he was not as disappointed as he used to be. Not wanting to let his hurt show, though, he said to Isobel: "Have you come for dinner?"
"Oh no, I'm dressed quite wrongly, and I know you have a guest."
A mischievous twinkle in her eye, Violet interfered: "I doubt Mr Travis has much of an eye for fashion."
Maybe it would help to have someone who is not a direct member of this family at the table. Violet had the funny feeling it could end up quite the night to remember given how emotionally charged their lives were at the moment.
"Oh do stay, we need cheering up," Mary sighed. It was true, only a glance over at her parents reassured the young woman. She did not have to ask her father to sleep in his dressing room any longer, but she knew he still stayed away. Whenever her parents were around each other, the entire atmosphere seemed so charged, so burdened by everything they were not saying to the other.