Page 14 of Pining for Lord Lockhart
At the top of the list, he had written about the children.
She ran her finger along the words. “Might I see this?”
“But if you hold it, then you aren’t leaning over me like this. I quite like it.”
She swatted him. “Oh stop. You will begin to sound like Lord Wessex.”
He stiffened. “What do you know of Lord Wessex?”
“Not a thing except he is always on about …” To his great consternation, Charity blushed. “He’s just the biggest flirt I’ve ever known.”
“Not all flirting is rakish, of course.”
She stopped and looked up into his face. “You are right. Some is quite welcome.”
Before he could answer, she turned back to his paper. “Food, education.” She nodded. “This is the problem.”
“True.” They approached his carriage and surprised a dozing coachman. When Lockhart told him their destination, the man looked as though he were about to complain, but instead he just nodded. “Yes, my lord.”
“How will we be safe?”
“I’m not quite certain, but I think perhaps the street is safer in the day?”
She pressed her lips together. “How many footmen do you have?”
“Two on the back.”
She rested a hand on her parcel and hugged her rucksack closer. “I hope to comfort, if even for a short time.”
“I think you are most excellent for doing such a thing.” He kept to himself his dismay that she was about to attempt such a delivery alone. Foolhardy would not even begin to cover how unwise it would have been. Even now, he questioned his own personal sanity.
“Education.” She tapped her chin and then stared out the window.
“What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that things are pretty hopeless for everyone in that neighborhood unless they can somehow rise above their stations.”
“And then what is available for them? And how does one do such a thing?”
“We saw it in Mr. Sullivan, didn’t we?”
“But his situation is hardly the same, not with his own expertise and the attention from the crown…”
“How do you think he has become renowned with expertise?”
He considered her and then nodded. “By education. And then of course from noble attention.”
“Right. I think there is perhaps a way we can help here.”
“With education?”
“And food. What if we opened a school?”
He should have known that involving Charity would be a full commitment and an involved one. But that was what he wanted, wasn’t it? “Could we do such a thing? What know we of schools?”
“We are educated. We know how to read. That alone might lift these beggarly children out of the gutter.”
The truth of her words hit home. “I hear you, and I think this is a great idea. I have no idea how to accomplish such a thing, particularly in the neighborhood where the most need exists.”
