Page 21 of The Wallflower Manifesto
“I can’t stay here. I … I can’t,” said the housekeeper—Mrs. Harrison, if Abe remembered correctly. She made a dash for the door before either man could stop her.
“Freddy,” Abe managed through his teeth.
“What! What do you want me to do?!” Freddy answered with a toss of his hands up in the air and a tinge of wildness in his tone. “Obviously I can’t manage a single thing without causing a disaster. In the future, I’ll just go hungry, I suppose! I might have to do anyway if the woman who keeps us fed has just abandoned us.”
“Freddy,” Abe repeated.
“When I bought the eggs, the lady at the market said it was as easy as just tossing some lard in a pan and throwing the egg on top. Why did shelieto me?!”
“Freddy!” Abe shouted, finally seeming to catch the other man’s attention. “You are going to go buy the nicest cast iron pan you can find. You are going to go to Covent Garden or Tottenham Court Road or somewhere respectable and beg them to give you their most expensive, most ornate cast iron pan, and you’re going to pay whatever they ask for it without complaint.”
“I don’t think that—”
Abe raised his voice. “Then you are going to take that pan to Cheapside and beg Mrs. Harrison to take us back. You are going to agree to whatever penance she demands from you. Do you understand me?”
There was a beat of silence, which felt oddly loud after all the shouting and commotion.
“Yes, all right,” said Freddy. “Anything else, master?”
“Yes, actually. You’re going to stop by Bow Street on your way home and pay Mr. Cresson back for yesterday’s breakfast.”
“The breakfast I didn’t eat?” Freddy shot back with a bit of shrillness in his voice.
“Yes.”
Another beat of silence. And then Freddy did the most sensible thing he’d done all morning, or perhaps in all his life.
He obeyed.
By the time Freddy returned,Abe had dressed and begun his work for the day. He was deep into his review of Cresson’s notes from Bow Street.
He looked up from the file and released a breath of pure relief that Mrs. Harrison’s distinctive voice seemed to be sounding from the hall alongside a much calmer version of Freddy's tenor than had been heard today in their little flat.
“Bentley!” he called from his office, leaning back in his chair. “A word?”
There was another exchange of voices and then Freddy appeared, slipping in and shutting the door to the office closed behind him. He was a little dirtier than usual from all the traipsing about the city he’d done, but he looked much better than he had this morning.
He wasted no time in crossing the room and throwing himself onto the chair opposite Abe’s desk. “Oh, it’s a pleasure to sit,” he groaned, stretching his neck back and forth.
“I see you reclaimed Mrs. Harrison,” Abe prompted with a raise of his brows. “Good work.”
“I went to her first, actually, and offered to take her down to the shops to replace her pan and buy a few new things besides,” Freddy said happily, as though he were the brightest boy in school. “She accepted but said she still wouldn’t come back to work for us.”
“Then why is she here?”
“Because I agreed to some other things too,” Freddy said with a shrug. “She wants an extra day off every week without losing anypay and she wants … uh.” He cleared his throat. “Well, you know, the shopping trip softened her a little, I think.”
“What else did you agree to?”
“She … uh.” Freddy looked supremely uncomfortable. “She asked me to do her work with her for a little while, until I understood everything. That way, I can’t muck it up when she isn’t here and … and I won’t take her for granted again.”
Abe had managed to hold it in all the way through that sentence, but now he laughed, loudly, then laughed again at Freddy’s obvious disapproval of his laughter. “You never did!” he snorted, dissolving into another fit of laughter. If nothing else, he appreciated amusement taking over any annoyance he might have still been feeling. “Oh, I cannot wait to see it.”
“You won’t be seeing it,” Freddy snapped with a frown. “You are going to be doing the job I hired you for if you know what’s good for you. Besides, how hard could it be? She picks up a discarded waistcoat here and there and boils water. It will not be very entertaining.”
This sent Abe into another fit of laughter, tears beginning to form in the corners of his eyes. He only stopped when Freddy made a disgusted sound and stood like he was about to leave.
“No, wait,” he managed, forcing himself to heave great big breaths in place of another fit of hilarity. “Sorry. Wait a tick. Please. I need to talk to you about that.”
