Chapter 8
314 Words
Stephen leaned up against a pillar looking out to the road. He wondered if his aunt truly intended on staying for dinner after that embarrassing encounter. As the moments passed he was sure she was staying. He grumbled under his breath and began to think about borrowing a horse. After everything that just happened no one could blame him and he would get a footman to return when he got to his aunt’s house. The woody smell of pipe smoke told him he was not alone anymore. He turned and saw Mr. Douglas leaning on the opposite pillar smoking his pipe.
Mr. Douglas nodded to the young man and took a puff from his pipe. He looked up at the stars and smiled a secret smile, “You know I had to ask Sarah’s mother three times to marry me before she accepted?” He smiled at the memory, “Imagine my surprise, this little country girl. I was the son of a gentleman.”
Stephen lips curved into a smile. “Why did you keep asking?”
“Hmm. . .,” he puffed from his pipe again, “because I could not imagine my life without her.” He took one more puff from the pipe, “You know, I always believed the things you work the hardest for were always worth the most.” He knocked the tobacco out of his pipe. “Am going into dinner, the ladies will not wait for long.” He turned and walked back into the front doors, leaving them open.
It was a rough six month engagement, but Stephen finally properly wooed Sarah into marriage. As she sat by the fire of their quiet estate watching the fire burn and her husband work on the books, she smiled to herself. Three children and two countries later, there was no place she would rather be.
- Writer
