19. Sensible Advice

19

Sensible Advice

Ballenger Estate, August 14, 1813

Dear Lord Warrick,

Lady Ballenger is aware of our correspondence. So—dare I admit, regretfully , for I have enjoyed our brief conversance—this must be the last letter we exchange. Please honor that. Allow me to retain the job I have. And want.

Which does not mean I do not want to help you. I do. But I think it best from afar. And in the form of advice, if I may be so bold.

Of a certainty, this will not suffice for long, but at least through the end of the year, perhaps…might you consider governing them yourself? Not attempting to hire another to do the job for you?

I cannot believe I suggest such a thing. But I remember myself when, just a year beyond Sophia’s age, I lost both my parents. I remember well. I found myself upon the doorstep of one distant family after another, all relatives of some sort yet none of them interested in another mouth to feed.

It was a fraught time, filled with excessive tears as I grappled with grief and the unknown, until Fortune shone its light upon me and I ended with the best possible parent imaginable, little did I know it at the time.

From the roundabout succession of governesses you describe, as well as the recent parental deaths in these dear children’s lives, let no more excessive change burden their present. (Nor your own. Please pardon my neglect in not mentioning it sooner. I am incredibly sorrowed to hear of the early death of your mother. You mentioned her to me during our first conversation, do you recall? You indicated my “optimism” reminded you of hers. Though I do not believe it was ever intended as a compliment, I chose to take it as such and have felt an affinity toward the strong woman who would rear such an entertaining rake as yourself. I know how hard the loss of those closest to us can cut. I pray you find solace in time, and in the proximity of your siblings.)

Concerning your siblings… I believe you mention the boys continue at school, though with some questionable behaviors, outbursts, most likely. That is to be expected, I believe we can both agree.

Continue to engage each of them, both together and separately, whenever they are on holiday with you and their sisters, and I daresay they will heal and their angry antics mitigate in time.

As to your sisters? Young girls far too soon without a mother…

Something in my heart tells me forcing a governess upon them, when the right one is yet to be found, is not the proper direction to take, not quite yet.

For you , sir , my lord, you are the one constant in these girls’ lives. The only consistency. The only recognizable paternal, authoritative “parent” they will know from here ? —

It dug at his craw, how she “my lorded” him. How she amended herself to do so. It mattered not that it was the appropriate address for a servant to one of his rank. It rankled, is what it did. Rankled quite uncomfortably.

I have allowed my sentiments to become far too maudlin, I know. As I try to explain why I believe there is no one better to care for them than yourself. At least until the worst of their grief has waned.

In truth, no matter that part of me is called, fiercely so, to assist you, Sophia, your precious Julia… I could never come live in your household and be governess to your girls without…

Without…

Without betraying who I am. As a person. One with morals and ideals and thoughts about wrong and right, and my place. I know my place.

And—

Lord Warrick, whatever you may think of me after reading this, it must be said—whether a flirt or something else entirely, something unnamed, it exists between us. And I cannot deny it no matter that I might wish to.

Selfishly, I cannot live with you as governess and watch you wed, which I know full well you must and will one day. Unselfishly, I cannot imagine extensive time would pass, if you remained a bachelor, and we lived under the same roof, when I would not give in to your prompting— and my own— and sit upon your lap.

We both know you take my meaning.

I could not make it any more plain nor blunt.

I cannot knowingly place myself in that situation—of being tempted because I suspect I would fall prey to it. To you. And that is not who I am (however a small—very small—shred of my being wishes I were exactly just so)…

His fingers turned lax, followed the fluttering page downward until it landed upon his desk, his eyes staring unseeingly toward the overgrown lawn through the study window.

“Not who you are, my Miss Primrose?” He sighed, flattened his fingers over the words she had written with such forthright honesty he was near floored with it. “Not who you are, indeed. And that is exactly why, despite every sound argument you present, you are the one I so desperately need to mother my children.”

A tiny squeak, barely heard, of skin shifting against leather drew his gaze toward the thumb-suckling six-year-old staring at him with blue eyes, wide with wonder and curiosity.

His mind echoed the words he had just said— mother my children.

Begad!

“Ahem. Govern my sisters,” he told the child with a wink he could not suppress. “Govern my sisters. That is you, dear heart. But alas, there are other things that prevent that wish.”

Aphrodite Primrose, of the prim morals and distinctly fetching manner, thought he should abandon his governess efforts for the nonce, not shuffle the girls off on someone else. Not yet, not with grief still so fresh.

He sat back, buttocks and spine firm against his ambulatory chair. Then did something he had not yet attempted there in the confines of his study, something only previously attempted in the room housing Arbuckle’s devices and set aside for what Warrick had come to think of his Torture Time, the daily rounds he and Shieldings put his body through after the children were abed and long before either of them sought their own.

He shoved aside the papers and pages, letters, notes, bills, reports… Moved everything to the edges, to give his fingers and then palms, strong purchase on the surface. The desk was massive, one of the few original pieces of furniture still within these walls, passed down for at least three generations, now. Kept because of its use and also the memories of Warrick’s father associated with it. Good memories. Pleasant thoughts.

Facing the desk, he spread his fingers wide, shuffled his hands out just beyond the width of his torso and hips. Then realized he had forgotten to put his feet on the floor. Imbecile. He quickly righted that, lifted each thigh and swung his foot, nudging the calf as needed, until each booted foot met the ground just beneath the edge of the desk. His arms and fingers went right back to their prior position.

His forehead had already started to sweat. So inane. As though even the thought of the effort to come took a toll. A price he had to pay. One he would pay willingly. Would this work? Or was he about to end up, arsey-varsey, heels overhead, dignity abandoned?

The muscles in his arms and hands had already tensed. ’Twas but a moment to firm them and push upward. Took a bit more to maneuver the rest of him in the direction he hoped he would go, slightly up and slightly forward.

But a silenced grunt later, he was standing. Standing, by damn. Leaning forward more than he might wish, the pressure and reliance upon his arms keeping him slightly bowed, not standing upright, but no longer seated.

He wavered in place a moment, shifted his upper body, just a minim, testing his balance. There was complete silence from the other occupant in the room. Not a sound, nor a suckle.

His breath exited on a whoosh.

Warrick lifted his eyes from his taut fingers until he caught the staring gaze of Julia. Her thumb had slipped from her mouth. She stared at him, wide-eyed. Didn’t quite give him a smile, but the slowly darkening blonde hair tilted when she did grant him a small nod.

“One.”

He thought about slowly sitting back down, using his arms to maintain control, then had the lovely image of plunking down in his chair, the wheels skidding backward and him landing upon his arse after all.

He scanned the study. Not hard, with so few things still in residence. “That chair, Julia, the wooden one”—he paused to haul in air, more nerves than exhaustion, he knew, then indicated the small wooden chair he spoke of with a jerk of his chin—“over there behind the door. Are you able to bring that to me, lass? Is it too heavy? Or can you move?—”

But she had already jumped down from the comfort of the burgundy leather, blanket abandoned for once, and raced across the room, skittering the simple chair across the wooden floor. It was of sturdy design, decades old, a basic wood frame with cushioned seat that some ancestor had replaced with a needle-pointed duck at some point, and some ornate carving work along the back.

She dragged it across the hard floor where one rug had been dispatched, over stains and neglect no amount of cleaning could take care of, and then bumped more silently over the rug that remained, closer to his desk. Without turning to watch, he listened as she abandoned that chair for the one he used on wheels, rolling it out of the way and placing the other right behind him.

“Like this?” The soft, feminine voice almost felled him. Nearly pitched him floorward in shock.

“Right up against my legs,” he told her, shaking now not from exertion but sheer amazement. “Directly behind me. Can you stand there, hands on the chair, make sure it doesn’t move??”

He yearned to hear the yes. Waited for it. But only received silence. He dared to angle his jaw over one shoulder, to watch her watching him, took a bit of solace from the confident nod, her small fingers gripped tight around the top horizontal brace of the chair.

Biting down on a small smile, because two words were more than none, he returned to face forward. Used his arms—and his legs, he thought—hoped—and gained his seat. Lifted his hands off the desk, stretched them out to the sides, felt the pull on his chest, the pinch in his upper back as he stretched them as far out as he could. Then he brought them overhead, mimicking one of the stretches Arbuckle had him do each time they finished. He stretched the muscles and skin down his sides.

“Let’s do a few more, hmm?”

Silence. But a comfortable one, he thought.

And before that morning was over, he had stood upon his feet and gained a count of thirty before deciding that was probably enough without checking in—reporting, though the thought made his gaze roll skyward—with The Tyrant. If he was going to begin a session more than once a day, best not to overtax his muscles without seeking “permission” first.

He had taken to heart Arbuckle’s experience, tales of sparse but miraculous success with certain people and injuries, and knew, given the state of everything within his household, he wouldn’t risk falling on his arse and bungling any potential healing.

A decision he regretted not one whit, especially when, after a flurry of letters between him and The Mayhap-Not-So-Tyrannical man proved fruitful, as far as a “plan of attack” between now and the year’s end.

Especially when both girls took to Mrs. Shieldings like the grandmother they hadn’t had before, and Julia whispered something in his ear, one day a few weeks later. Only a handful of audible syllables, but ones cherished more than diamonds: “If you take steps, brother Richard, I will make more words.”

With a promise such as that, he could deny the little sprite nothing.

So even when progress seemed at a crawl, or even nonexistent, he found unentailed properties to sell. Entailed ones to lease, and did everything he could to postpone the marital noose that wanted to slip around his neck and solve all his financial problems—while creating so many others.