“To Olympia’s?”
“Not yet. I need my house cleansed and I need to say that good-bye to Faith. I suspect she has been waiting for it for a long time.”
The graveyard beside the church was beautiful. The vicar’s son took excellent care of it. Brant was pleased and knew that, very soon, one of the sons would replace the father and the last of the ones who had wronged Faith would be gone. Perhaps, he mused as he walked up to Faith’s grave, Peter, who cared so well for the graveyard, would like to become his gardener.
He knelt on the grass and placed the bouquet of flowers he had brought up against the headstone. Poor Faith. She had been so young, so innocent. He could see her so easily at times, but those times grew less and less. She had been his first taste of love but he had realized on the ride here that she had not really been the love that touched his soul; not like Olympia did.
Brant had no doubt that he and Faith could have been happy together, raised a family and gone along quite smoothly, with him never realizing that something was missing. Simply being without Olympia for almost a month was as if someone had ripped out a piece of his heart. She would never be a sweet, obedient bride as Faith would have been, nor one who would always hide behind her man. Olympia was a woman a man had at his side, and his back if he needed it.
“Ah, Faith, you should have had many more years than were granted you. You did not deserve the betrayal your father dealt you, or the death you suffered. I also wronged you in the way I believed you would betray me with another man and for that I ask your forgiveness. It was like burr under my saddle for years but I have removed it. Yes, perhaps I should have asked a question or two. Yes, perhaps I should have tried to hunt you down and demand the reasons for why you left me as I would have soon seen that something was wrong. But your father was a vicar and I believed him as I now see most everyone else would have. So, I ask your forgiveness for my lapse in trust.
“I will also ask your forgiveness for not letting you go. I thought I had and Penelope said you had left, but I still clung to you. I fed my guilt with your memory. I do not know if that troubled your rest at all, but now I do set you free. Utterly. Completely. Find that rest you deserve, love.”
With his finger, he lightly traced her name etched in the headstone. “I will say that, if we had wed, we would have been happy. I know it. I did love you. I would have been a faithful husband and we would have had beautiful children. Yet, I have discovered that there are many depths to love. I have a new love now and her name is Olympia. She is in my heart so deeply that I feel as if a part is missing when she is not by my side. I think, although you and she are very different, that you would approve. I would like to think of you smiling down on us, pleased that we have found each other.”
“I suspect she is, m’lord.”
Brant stood up and brushed off his pants before shaking Peter’s hand. Faith’s brother had grown and fully become the man he had seen when he had brought Faith’s body home that day. The young man had kept a very watchful eye on his father to be certain the man did no more harm to his own children. It would not be long before the old man died for he had drunk himself nearly to death. It would not take many more drinks to finish the job. Brant would have removed him as vicar but he had not wanted Faith’s name tainted by anything that might have emerged during such a removal.
“Do you really?” he asked as they both looked down at the grave.
“Yes, that was our Faith. Kind and generous. This was a waste. It is something none of the rest of us have ever forgiven him for no matter how the good book speaks of forgiving. It is not possible.”
Brant patted the man on the shoulder. “I was recently told to cleanse my heart. I carried a lot of guilt.”
“For this? This was not your fault.”
“No, it was not. As were a lot of other things not my fault. It is also not yours. I think perhaps you may suffer a bit of what I did.”
“And just how did you clean your heart, m’lord?”
“I relived it all, all that caused me to feel guilty, and it was hell to do so, but it works. It is much akin to working a splinter out only you work it out of your heart and not your foot.”
“I shall give that a try then, m’lord, for it would be good to have a clean heart again. My father will die soon, within the week, I believe.”
“Do you want to take over his place as vicar?”
“No, but my brother does. He may be too young, being barely twenty, but if there was a way to hold the place open for him . . .”