Филиппа Карр: Will You Love Me in September

"You were there?”

"I followed him. I could not let him go. I was nearby, waiting. I wanted to join him when the battle was over. He was wounded badly, but some of his men brought him in from the battlefield. Thank God, at least he died with me beside him.”

"Sabrina, my dear child, how you must have suffered!”

"Yes, I have suffered. I never really found complete happiness. You didn't entirely deceive me, Clarissa. You loved him, didn't you?”

"It's over," I said. "Dickon is lost to us both now.”

"He spoke of you when he was dying. I think his mind had gone back to that time when you were young. He kept saying your name over and over again.”

I could scarcely bear it. Nor could she; but as she told me of his last hours we wept, mingling our tears.

But she is back with me now. We are together, as something tells me we were always meant to be.

And yesterday she called in the doctor. She did not let me know that she had done so, and when I was told by one of the maids that the doctor had been there, I was filled with a terrible apprehension.

I ran to her bedroom. She greeted me with a smile. I looked at her intently. There was no mistaking the radiance in her face.

"I was hoping it was true," she said. "I did not want to tell you until I was sure.

But now I know. Oh, Clarissa, I am going to have a child... . Dickon's child.”

I was trembling with a joy I had not known since the day Dickon came back, for now I knew he was going to live on ... for both of us.