AN: Found this lurking on my computer. Figured you might as well have it. Yes, it's been a long time. No, I don't know when I will get back to writing more often. But what will always be true is I love this community and the friends I have made here. And of course, I love Cobert. Cobert love, always.

He watches her walk up the stairs from where he stands with Matthew and Mary. The moment is such a juxtaposition of the moment earlier when he had watched her walk up those same stairs. He'd watched the swing of her hips, as he does now. But earlier he'd been thinking about the fact he needed to tell her Matthew was missing. Now. Well, now, Matthew was right here. Joy was surrounding them all once more. Well, perhaps not joy, but such a great deal of relief. He pats Matthew lightly on the arm a final time and then strides towards the stairs. It would soon be time to get ready for dinner anyway, nobody would notice. Maybe they was why Cora had made a quiet escape.

He takes the stairs slowly. Not wishing to draw attention to himself. He doesn't bother to knock as he lets himself into her room. She turns from where she stands at her dressing table with a little start at the sound of his intrusion. But she relaxes into a soft smile when she sees it's him. She holds a handkerchief between her fingers.

"I came up for a handkerchief." Her voice isn't quite sure, there's an edge of an emotional quiver at the end. As if the slightest word might offset her fine emotional balance. He hadn't been expecting that. He'd followed her simply to just express his joy and relief to her before he went to change for dinner. Now he felt like he'd walked in on a moment she had been trying to keep from his view. She's walking back towards him, towards the door, her eyes fixed on the floor. "I'm coming back down now." But he pushes the door shut behind him. It clicks against the frame and she stops, her face snapping up to meet his.

"Cora, are you alright?" She swallows. He takes a step towards her and puts a hand on her arm. Her head tilts first to the side, as if the weight of her hair is suddenly too much, and then her chin drops. He thinks maybe she is about to cry, but then she lifts her face again, and takes a shaky, but steadying breath.

"It was all just so overwhelming. I had to come up for a breather and a handkerchief." He watches as she tries to force her mouth into a smile.

"I think maybe you need another few minutes." He squeezes her hand.

"Maybe I do." She blinks a few times, rapidly, before dabbing her handkerchief at the corners of her eyes. "Oh dear. How pathetic I am." Her attempt at laughing at herself doesn't work and instead singular tears fall from her eyes to her cheeks. She walks back towards the chair - his chair - and takes a seat.

"Not pathetic Cora. It's just been a bit of an emotional few hours is all."

"I just can't seem to keep up. An hour ago we were stood in here and you were telling me Matthew was missing. That he might be dead. And now he's downstairs and it all should feel fine. I should be happy. But, oh, I just can't seem to get my brain to catch up. It's like I'm completely emotionally spent for about a week." He laughs softly at that. Mainly because the way she says it is funny, she's trying to laugh herself. But also he laughs because never had he thought Cora had an emotional limit. It was him, not her, that struggled with emotions.

"I think maybe it's the relief in seeing him. It came as such an unexpected shock. I know I felt like I could suddenly fly when Matthew entered the room."

"Me too. I think that is probably it. I'd resigned myself to the fact he was missing. I was listening to your mother make comments about the next heir being a chimney sweep." She pauses, a small catch in her voice, before she continues. "And then suddenly he was there. I thought I'd dreamt it for a moment."

"Exactly."

"But then the terror, and anxiety reappeared. He will have to go back." They mull on that for a second. Robert feels his heart accelerate just at the thought. He swallows the panic and looks back to Cora, they could worry about that later. After all, they had been doing well, coping with the daily worry that Matthew might be killed. "And then, on top of it all, watching Mary and Matthew singing together and…" There eyes meet, and she breaks off. They both know what the unspoken parts are. He knows she's thinking what he is. That they look so natural together. That they clearly still love each other. That Lavinia is a sweet girl.

"Do you think they might work it out?" His question surprises him. He hadn't realised he'd uttered it aloud. The look in her eyes tells him she's thinking the same.

"Mary is terribly stubborn."

"She is also terribly naive about love and marriage. Matthew too for that matter."

"I think most of us are at the start, Robert."

"True." He chews at his lip. Memories of their courtship and early marriage tumble in his thoughts. They truly had been naive. Him particularly. "I'm surprised Mary hasn't put up more of a fight for him though."

"I'd imagine she wants to be chosen by Matthew, rather than annihilate Lavinia."

"Doesn't sound much like Mary."

"No. But it is what women find captivating about love, we want to feel chosen. I'd wager, that even for Mary, that holds true." There's a pause. He isn't sure what to say. He can't tell if Cora is trying to tell him something? They might be talking of Mary and Matthew, but in some ways it felt like they were talking about themselves.

"Cora, are you sure you're alright?"

"Yes. Honestly, it's just a passing melancholy." He frowns. There's something she's not saying. The way her eyes drop from his, and she still fingers the handkerchief over and over between her hands, all telling signs that her thoughts are elsewhere. He moves her dressing table chair into the space right in front of her where she sits on his chair. His place at the end of the bed was too far away for what needed to be spoken now.

"Cora, I know you better than that, come on, what's upset you so? It can't be just about Mary and Matthew because that situation has not changed for some time." He leans forward, resting his forearms on his knees and then reaching forward to still her hands from their constant fiddling. She chews at her lip, and then her eyes come up to meet his.

"It was your mother's comment to you, about the next heir being a chimney sweep. I know it shouldn't hurt anymore. I know your mother shouldn't be able to upset me with those comments anymore. Heavens, I think she was just making a joke!" She half chuckles. "But it hurt, Robert, and it took me by surprise. Since Matthew has been the heir, and we've got so used to him, those thoughts had gone away, then suddenly, they were back. And of course, Matthew still…" She trails off, once again, they don't need to finish that conversation. They both know how that sentence ends. "It's silly Robert. Like you said, it's all been overwhelming, that's all. One too many things tipping me over the edge."

"Have you always been so conscious of it? Of the fact we never had a son?"

"How could I not be Robert? I'm fairly certain that it's almost my sole purpose in life!" There's hysteria there now. Catching at the edges of her voice and mixing together with the tears that threaten to choke her. He takes hold of both her hands. "Look how complicated it has all been because we didn't!"

"Look at me Cora." She lifts her eyes to his. "We don't know what it would have been like. It might not have been easier. Life is full of trials and tribulations, as we well know."

"But -"

"No Cora. You've taken too much upon yourself. Having a child, was not, last time I checked, a singular activity." Her lips twitch into a smile at that. "If you're to blame, then so am I. Our marriage, did not produce a son. Do I sometimes think about what it would have been like? Yes, of course. Do I have days like yours today, where I feel somewhere deep down having a son might have solved everything? Yes, I do. But you know what else I often think? I think about you, my dear, and I wonder what would have happened in my life if I hadn't been a fortune hunter. When I attended that season, our season, and I knew I needed a rich wife, I thought it was sure to end in disaster. I thought it was the worst thing that had ever happened to me. How very wrong I was! You are probably the best thing that happened to me. So, when I get melancholy about things, I think about that. I try to have faith in the fact that sometimes good comes from bad, and sometimes it does all work out right in the end."

"That all sounds rather romanticised for you. Once upon I time I might have believed it. But the thought of losing Matthew. I don't think I can do it all again Robert, I don't think I have the strength to hear who the new heir is again." He can't answer that, because the truth was, he didn't think he probably had the strength in him either.

"Nothing is too romanticised for me, when you are involved my dear. Besides, it's true. My life would have been very different if I hadn't been a fortune hunter."

"Not necessarily. We still might have found each other in the end." The silence that follows is proof enough of the realisation, that probably they wouldn't have. Which only proved that life was far more a lottery than anyone liked to admit. People talked of fate, they made themselves feel better by stating things were written in the stars. But the more Robert saw of the world, the more he was convinced that it all come down to luck and the choices yourself and others make. He knew enough about love to think that wasn't destined either, it was fought for and hard work. He couldn't imagine his life without Cora though. Whether it was luck, fate or something else entirely that had brought them together, he wasn't about to complain about it, or waste time philosophising about which it was. He was going to focus his attention on the present, enjoying their life together as much as he could.

Cora starts to try and stand, but he squeezes her hand, and leans forward to press a kiss to her forehead before she can. The look in her eyes as they gazes meet tells him that she agrees with his silent decision. They must make the most of what they had been given, each other.