Chapter 34

“Family meeting,” Comfort called through the door. “Get down to the drawing room now!”

I trudged down to the sitting room. Cynthia was sitting huddled in an armchair, her face red and splotchy from crying. As they had done so often lately, my memories flashed back to after Father had died, and it seemed like Mother and I had done nothing but cry for weeks. But for Cynthia, the pain must be even worse, since she now had no family at all. She had lost the only parent she had ever known. She had no one left. No one but us.

My heart ached for her. While Comfort went to rouse Mother, I slipped into the kitchen and brought back a cup of hot tea for Cynthia, which I placed on the table beside her. She ignored it, or else was so overcome by her grief that she didn’t notice. I understood only too well.

Comfort marched Mother into the room, then stood by the fireplace, arms folded, looking at us with narrowed eyes.

“We are out of money,” Comfort announced.

This information visibly concerned Mother but didn’t register at all to Cynthia.

“Is everything gone?” I asked.

“Almost everything, yes,” Comfort stated firmly. “With Algernon’s funeral expenses, settling all of his business debts, and no income, our savings have been drained very quickly, especially with paying our hired help. I dismissed the housekeeper today, and we need to find a way to earn some money.”

“Us? Find work?” Mother asked, as if she was testing out the sound of the words.

“Yes,” Comfort said the word harshly. I was forcibly reminded of the family meeting she had called after Father’s funeral, when she had insisted we leave the castle and forge a new life for ourselves. This felt very similar. Again, our lives had been upended.

Comfort turned her attention to me. “Truly, you are the only one of us that has brought in a steady income. Would you be able to expand your translating business?”

“I suppose,” I contemplated. “Small town merchants don’t pay much, but I could try.”

“Something is better than nothing. Mother? What are your ideas?”

Mother shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Comfort fell silent, pondering. I thought too. What was it that Mother was good at? Dancing, singing, decorating, organizing parties. None of those things would be profitable, unless…The answer suddenly seemed obvious, as if my mind had been working over the problem for the last several weeks. “Mother! You and Comfort can open a finishing school!”

Comfort nodded vigorously. “That is an excellent suggestion!”

“Teach?” Mother mused. “An interesting thought, but is there a market for it here?”

“Haven’t you seen these village girls?” Comfort scoffed. “They have no fashion sense, no knowledge of etiquette, and yet all of the families want them to have advantageous marriages. This is a perfect plan for us!” I recalled the garish gowns that had been worn during Mother and Algernon’s engagement party, and the ugly dresses featured in the tailor shop window. No fashion sense at all was right.

“You could help the girls sew nice dresses, teach them calligraphy and to dance and sing and style their hair, teach about proper protocol, and you could host parties to show what they have learned!”

“A stroke of brilliance!” Comfort cried. “We can plan units on all the different topics that need covered, and girls can pay by unit or by month.”

She then turned to Cynthia. “And what are your plans?”

Cynthia finally looked up, her tear-streaked face in anguish. “My plans?” she repeated feebly.

“Yes, your plans,” said Comfort. I felt like this was overly demanding, the poor girl had recently lost her only remaining family member. “We have to band together to figure this out. We have to rely on ourselves, and that will require all of us pitching in the best we know how.”

Cynthia sniffed and pulled her blanket closer to her chin. “I don’t know. I don’t have any skills.”

“Comfort, dear, Cynthia doesn’t have to do anything. Give her some time,” Mother said kindly.

“Mother, do you want to know how close we are to starving?” Comfort snapped. “This is a time for action. We barely have enough to feed ourselves through the end of the month. Then we won’t have a single coin left.”

“Cynthia doesn’t have to find outside,” I piped up, doing my best to defend the stepsister I barely knew. When Comfort was in her no-nonsense mode, there was little I could do to dissuade her. I searched around for an answer. If only there was a way for Cynthia to not be required to leave the house, so she could grieve for her Father away from prying eyes. I knew how painful that was.

Then it hit me. “She could…do the housekeeping.”

To my relief, Comfort seemed to consider. “It is a possibility…”

“It would be a great option,” I said, anxious to keep Comfort thinking positively about the idea. “We will need a lot of help with keeping the house clean if we are going to open a finishing school, right?”

“Right.”

“We will still need to eat, and none of us know how to cook and keep house, right?”

“Right again.”

“But Cynthia does. She has done it for years for her father, and she is a fantastic cook. We would be able to focus on our work without the added stress of keeping house and cooking and without needing to hire out the work.”

“Hmmmm….” Comfort pondered the idea.

I held my breath, praying she would agree. When I translated, it was like I was holding on to a bit of Father, a piece of the happy life we had had together. I hoped it would be similar for Cynthia. That she could find joy in continuing the hobby she had developed with her father when he was alive.

“Cynthia, dear? What do you think?” Mother probed gently. Cynthia shrugged. She was too depressed to care about anything.

“I will take that as an agreement,” Comfort said crisply, clapping her hands together. “Very well. There is not a moment to lose!” She and Mother left the sitting room, already deep in conversation, brainstorming ideas for the finishing school.

I looked over at Cynthia. She was so miserable and thin, chin quivering, eyes brimming with tears.

“I’m so sorry, Cynthia,” I said sincerely. “I was trying to think of the easiest thing for you. I remember what it was like after my Father died.”

She didn’t respond, only drew a shaky breath.

“If you teach me to cook, I can try to help you when I have time,” I offered. “I don’t want you to do any more than you absolutely have to, okay?”

Cynthia glared at me, her eyes overly-bright. “I don’t need your pity.”

I ignored the jibe. People always say things that they don’t mean when they are upset. Hadn’t I done the same thing when I had first met her? She was merely returning the favor.

“Just let me know how I can help.”

“I don’t need your help either!” she snapped. “I can manage fine on my own.”

I ignored that as well. I recalled the time when our family visited the seaside when I was a young girl. Comfort and I found a small dog that was injured and in pain. It had fallen into a briar patch and had thorns stuck all over its tiny body. But when we had tried to assist it by pulling out the thorns, it growled and nipped at us. That was what Cynthia made me think of. She was just a lost, injured puppy who wasn’t ready to accept any help.

Everyone grieved in their own way and in their own time. I arose and departed, pretending not to hear the sobs coming from the chair that held Cynthia.