There was only one more thing to be decided, after the letter. Not decided, perhaps, but discovered. Neil confessed it two weeks later, when they were working in the library after putting Annie to bed.

"I want some help – remembering something."

Verity looked up from the cap she was embroidering for Annie. "From our past? What do you want to know?"

"I don't want you to tell me – I want to remember." He set down his pen, and closed the accounts book. "I have remembered a little, all along, about the first time we met. But only a little. I want to know all of it."

Verity's face fell. "Oh. Neil, it was... not a good beginning."

"I remembered as much." He came over and sat down on the couch with her. "I tried to – in a word – buy you."

"Neil..."

"Didn't I?" he pressed.

"In a word, yes – but it needs more than a word to describe it." She continued to weave her needle in and out of the blue ribbon, sewing it round the brim of the cap. "My father was more to blame than you, I fear."

"But I was to blame."

"Not so much I did not forgive you." She gave him a half-smile, and dropped the cap in her lap, so she could reach across and touch his hand. "Don't give me that look. What do you remember?"

He forced his frown to relax. "Everything, I think, until I open the door and see you standing there. Verity – will you go and ring the doorbell? I want to see if I can remember what happened next. Sometimes, when the now echoes what came before, memories come to me."

She looked very thoughtful for a moment. "I'll go. But if you don't remember, I'm going to tell you – it can't be as bad as you imagined. Your imagination is always too dark and vivid."

When she had left, he leaned back against the sofa and breathed in and out slowly to calm the nerves growing in his belly. A few moments later, the bell came ringing furiously through the hall. She kept ringing, as he ran for the door, and he felt a faint echo of irritation – how he had hated her for it last time. He was almost laughing as he pulled the door open.

The effect was different this time, because it was well past sunset, but seeing her there, he had the eerie, unreal feeling that they existed both in present and past simultaneously, as though time had melted into itself, and they stood independently of it.

"And then..." Her eyes had been bright with anger. Her cheeks flushed. It was incongruous to see the reality before him, when the memory was suddenly so concrete in his mind. "...You looked so proud. You don't look proud now."

She looked faintly sad. "I was proud." She stepped through, and he closed the door after her. Memory came to him like grains of sand through an hourglass.

"I sent you upstairs – to be dressed. The dress is in my cupboard. Will you go and put it on now?"

"Must I?"

"It's coming back to me – please."

Her lips were pressed tightly together. "Very well. You were waiting in the-"

"Library. I know."

It was not a long wait, but long enough for the nerves to rise like acid in his belly. When she appeared again at the door, he rose to meet her on feet that hardly felt the ground beneath him. The dress brought out the colour in her eyes, but it was almost indecently low in the bust and high in the ankles. Giulia had been shorter and more generously proportioned. She had been wearing it, last, at a dance the autumn before they had been ill, laughing, spinning, smiling.

It was an unexpected memory. He stared into the distance, trying to burn the image into his mind. Verity's voice brought him back to the present, or at the very least, the closer past.

"Neil?"

"We go to the dining room."

"Yes."

She took his arm, though he remembered that she had not taken it that first night. But he didn't stop her. Her touch was like an anchor, as though if she weren't there he might drift away into the past, and lose himself there.

In the dining room, she let go, and stood before him. "You're not going to make us eat dinner again, are you? The servants will be put out."

"No." He considered her. "You slapped me."

Her cheeks went pink. "Yes. I thought-"

"Do it again."

Her hand came up, and instead softly touched his cheek. "No."

"Verity, please."

"I slapped you." Her fingers traced the line of his cheek bone down to his mouth. "I'm not doing it again."

But he didn't need it, to remember. His cheek tingled from her touch, and from the memory of the sting.

"And then we sat down for dinner."

"Then you explained, and I decided I would tolerate you," she corrected. "And then we sat down for dinner."

"Tolerate." His lips twitched, despite his unease.

"I found you very charming – when you weren't making me nervous." She smiled back at him. "We explored the house afterwards."

"Yes." He could remember phrases of their conversation, trailing back to him. He had conversed; she had listened. He had wanted to impress her, he recalled vaguely, and more vaguely, he had the impression that he had, somehow, succeeded. "Something happened. Didn't it?"

"Yes. Come with me."

When they were half-way up the stairs, he realized they were going to the roof. The attic room had become a store place for extra, miscellaneous furniture, and he had to shove to get the window unstuck. When they were out on the roof under the night sky, she shivered, and he held her close to warm her, and because he was afraid that either one of them might fall.

"We stood here, and looked over the valley," she murmured into the breast of his jacket. "And then you kissed me. It wasn't a very nice kiss. You were very – lonely."

"I remember. I remember." He looked into her eyes, which seemed to be begging for a kiss again, and denied them. "I thought... lust, a little honest lust, might... help me. It didn't."

"You cried," she said bluntly. "You began to cry straight after. I felt sorry for you then."

"Sorry for me? You had the grace to feel pity."

"You were quite pitiful, then." She stepped back a little, and raised a hand to the collar of her dress. He knew what she was going to do.

"Don't!" His cheeks burned in the chill night. "You don't need to. I was stupid - stupid."

But she had already undone the buttons at the breast, and was pulling it over her head. She shoved it towards him, standing in nothing but her chemise and stays and drawers. It was a chemise of very fine linen, and her form was clearly outlined beneath it. He remembered, the last time, she had been wearing only drawers. And she was different now. She was not so thin. Her hips were broader from the baby, and she was softer all over. The differences seemed very endearing and very important to him. All the Neils, of past and present, and particularly future, were interested in precisely defining those differences. He met her eyes with difficulty. She was smiling the sort of smile which was hardly less than a laugh. She shoved the dress towards him.

"Take it. Go on. Though last time I wasn't wearing a chemise or stays. Do we demand such realism today?"

Goosebumps were pricking up along her bare arms and shoulders. He found himself unable to speak. It was as though she had read his mind. No, he realized, only his eyes – and she had enjoyed the reading of them.

"We do?" she teased.

"We don't! I remember enough – you must have been mad – we must both have been mad!" It was awful of her to joke about it like that. Suddenly, he was ashamed, both of his feelings now and of his feelings then. "No, don't, please."

"It's alright." Her smile faded. "Don't get upset, Neil. We went indoors, after that. You said you would find clothing for me."

They crawled back into the attic and he forced the dress into her hands. "I've remembered so far. It's enough. Let's stop this." His heart was beating fast. He did not know what happened next, but if what he had felt tonight was any indication of what he had felt then, he could guess.

"Neil." She pushed the dress against his chest. "You haven't put me through this farce to make me give up now. We went to your room. I still was not dressed, and you held this."

They went back down the halls, Neil following Verity's footsteps. When they were in Neil's room, she pointed to the bureau.

"Your old black dressing gown. Get it."

He dumped the green dress on the bed, and went numbly to the bureau. It took him time to find the dressing gown in the drawers, because it was folded away behind some outdated waistcoats and neckties. When he turned to face her, with it in his arms, the last few grains of the hourglass of his memories came slipping through, in a rush, the way hourglasses end. He stopped still under its force.

The terms of your agreement were not so specific as to that.

She had scorned him. She had very thoroughly put him in his place. A strange buzzing mixture of shame and overwhelming relief came over him.

"Neil?"

"Yes. Yes – I know."

He stumbled closer, and held out the dressing gown for her, still mechanically playing out the act. She slipped her arms through, but before she could tie it, he pulled her into his arms and held her tight. Her arms were pressed uncomfortably between them, but he couldn't let her go. He waited until his heart stopped pounding before speaking,

"You cheeky little woman. I could have died of shame, when you said you would not kiss me."

She struggled a little, wrested her arms from between their bodies, and wrapped them around his back. He could feel her own heartbeat, pounding in her chest, pressed against his. His hands, on her back, pulled closer. Another memory came to him.

"You were at the window, after, too... I was even more ashamed then. You looked so beautiful."

"The next morning," she said. "I wanted to make sure you wouldn't ask for the money. We didn't have it."

He released her, at last, and led her to the couch, where he sat down, holding her hand. She was leaning towards him, cheeks flushed, lips parted expectantly. He was tempted to kiss her, but it was at odds with what he knew had to happen next. He contented himself by holding her hand.

"Thank you for helping me remember," he said softly. "There's something else – something I can't remember, because I wasn't there."

Her eyes widened curiously. "What?"

"Your grandmother told me there was a man who tried to... rape you."

He felt her pulse quicken. Her face went white.

"It was the one thing I was glad you had forgotten about. That's over, Neil – it's long ago. Dead history."

"But I know. And I need you to know that I know." He stroked the back of her hand with his thumb. "Is it the worst thing that has happened to you? Or was that your father? Or was it when I – was dead, and you were pregnant? Whatever it is – you're my wife and it's my tragedy too. All of your tragedies are mine to share. I need you to know that you can share them with me."

Her face was still very white. Slowly, she leaned forward, toppled, like a tower on sinking foundations, and rested her forehead on his shoulder. He pressed his hand to the back of her head.

"And I share yours?"

"You've already taken most of mine on your shoulders yourself, I think," he said softly. "Let me return the favour."

She shifted again, and huddled against him. He patted her gently.

"They were all terrible," she said quietly. "It's my happiness I want to share with you. And share yours. That's what a wife does."

"That too."

"We were happy. There was a brief time. We were incredibly happy. Shortly after we were married. Before your father started the annulment. We were happy then."

"I know."

"You remember?"

"No." He had almost been caught out. There was no need to tell her about the letter yet. "I mean, of course we must have been."

He felt her warmth against him and breathed out slowly. Now that he knew the truth about that night, he could see how little it had mattered. It was what had come before that had been important: the awful dark impulse that had led him to propose the deal. The weight of the crime was on his soul. It wasn't her innocence he had needed to confirm, but his own.

Her weight on his shoulder was comforting. She was staring into space, remembering what he could not.

"We'll make new happy memories," he promised her. "We haven't lost it."

The smile she gave him was sad and unbelieving. He didn't attempt to persuade her. He knew he could be proved right only with time.

~~

A/N: Had to rewrite this chapter entirely. Have not done final proof read for typos! Or more than a cursory edit! Typos will abound. Probably. If they're that many I'll do one tomorrow. I can't do it tonight because I just had a spider crawl out of my bed, while I was in it, and I need to go burn the house down now.