“How?” he asked, puzzled.
“I didn't hide. I told him… I didn't want to see him. I told him to go away.”
“But that's good, love,” he assured her, stroking her hair. “It means you're finally getting strong.”
“It made him so angry.”
“And I wasn't there to protect you.” Now Christopher looked ashamed.
“Yes, you were. You stopped him. You're my hero again.” She touched his
cheek with one delicate hand.
“I'm no hero,” he protested. “Just a husband who adores his wife. You're the
brave one.”
“But I'm not brave. Not without you.” She stroked her thumb over the scruff
on his cheeks.
He covered her hand with his. “Then be with me.”
“Oh yes. I'm here now. I'm sorry I went away.”
He smoothed an errant lock from the tangled mass of her hair and looked tenderly into her eyes. “You came back. That's what matters.”
“There's no place I would rather be than here.”
“I'm so very glad.” He brushed his lips against hers in a kiss of such aching
tenderness that she was finally able to release the terror in a flood of wracking
sobs that shook her slender frame, but she was not alone. She was part of something bigger than herself. She was part of Christopher, and he was part of
her, and both of them were part of the child she carried.
Now, at last, Katerina could finally finish healing and make herself into the
woman she had always wanted to be, and Christopher would be with her.
And she was finally safe.
HISTORICAL NOTE
The Victorian era was a time of dawning awareness of the rights of the poor and
disenfranchised, as evidenced by Robert Browning's poems, as well as by the passage of several laws intended to improve the lives of the working poor, particularly children. The cotton mills of the period were well known to be horrible places: hot, dangerous and prone to employing small children, who often died or were maimed. No precautions were taken to protect these small and
vulnerable workers, let alone the adults who also risked their lives each day.
There was no health or life insurance. Of course, a progressive family like the Bennetts would not allow such things. This wasn't unheard of at the time, but it
was rare.
Robert Browning, who is one of my all-time favorite poets, is famous for his marriage to the poetess Elizabeth Barrett, who during her lifetime was far more
famous than her husband. Her father, like Giovanni Valentino, did not want his
daughters to marry. However, it is not generally believed he was abusive. Just possessive. When Robert and Elizabeth married in secret, they returned to their
separate homes after the wedding and later ran away to Florence, where they lived happily together for several years and had a son. While living in Italy, Robert encountered many works of art and wrote about the artists: Fra Lippo Lippi and Andrea del Sarto, for instance. And Browning's poetry was hated at first. It was only later that people began to appreciate his vision.
Bullying is quite a buzzword these days and thus might seem like a modern term. However, the concept is not new. People have been bullied forever, and the
term first appeared in print in the 1500s.
Child abuse has been a scourge of society for a very long time, but in the early
Victorian period, people were becoming increasingly aware that such things
happened and were debating how to deal with it. I wish I could say the problem
has been effectively dealt with, but that would be too great a piece of fiction.
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