Page 19 of Indecently Employed
“Well, pardon my intrusiveness, but her father has passed, correct?”
“Years ago,” he chuckled. “Thank heavens.”
Oh dear. She wondered if she’d ever get used to this sort of dry, macabre humor the sophisticates seemed to enjoy. She didn’t even want toimagineher father’s face were she to jest about a family member’s death. Let alone the fury her mother’s tongue would unleash.
Mr. Sedley must have read the uneasiness on her face, for he added, “My nephew and I were never on what you’d call good terms.” He turned to stare at the fire before them, holding his chin as if deep in thought. “Bound to end up that way, really, when he came back from Harrogate to an infant ‘uncle’ in leading strings. We didn’t have much in common, you see.”
“I see,” she began, then pressed her lips together, thinking. “Still, if I am not mistaken, she has no brothers? No close male relative?”
“There’s my elder brother, Tiberius. Her grandfather. Bedridden, for the most part.” He held out a hand, counting off the sparse remains of his family. “My nephew, Marcus Hartley. Well, cousin, really, but we regard one another as uncle and nephew. A good lad, if a bit sanctimonious. Always busy; he’s an MP, you see. Knockton. Odd little borough. Don’t know what they were thinking, voting him in.”
“Perhaps, then, it would be a welcome gesture if you were to speak with her,” Susanna said, using her governess voice, which only caused her further embarrassment. She looked down again, smoothing out a wrinkle in the tablecloth before her.
“How do you reckon?”
“People aren’t meant to live alone, sir. We are social creatures. And if something about her seems amiss, and she has no father, I merely wonder if she might appreciate someone offering her guidance.”
She looked up. He was again focused intently on her, this time with an expression of curiosity, as if he were attempting to figure her out. She didn’t know why. There was no mystery to her. She was a simple governess in a plain frock; the answers were all out in the open for anyone to see.
“This is what you’d want, then, on the eve of your marriage? Your father?”
Suppressing a laugh at the notion of her, Susanna Abbotts, as a bride, her mind conjured the image of her father, David Abbotts. He would no doubt be resting in front of the parsonage’s fireplace now, snoring away, with florid complexion and his feet up on the footrest, hands folded across his ample belly. She wondered what, if anything, he had said to Maddy when she’d accepted Mr. Felstead’s hand. Probably a bland recitation of Ecclesiastes 4:9–12, or some other tedious scripture.
“Well…” Susanna placed her hands back in her lap, folding them primly as she thought about her answer. “Yes. I believe so. Not so much for what he might say, as I’m well aware of the Church’s instructions on marriage. But his presence, sir, I would…” She swallowed, thinking of the scant few letters her parents had sent her over the past year. “I would be despairing without it.”
“I see.” Mr. Sedley continued staring into the fire, as if the flames might further explain her position.
A tension fell gently upon them, like a mist. Dining alone with her employer was improper enough. And taking a meal in a drawing room like this, with no one else to guide her, Susanna found herself at a loss for what the correct behavior was. The meal was finished; should she excuse herself? Or stand and select another, more comfortable seat away from the table?
Mr. Sedley’s deep sigh cut through her thoughts.
“Tomorrow I’ve business to attend; I’ll likely visit Oswine House far too early to expect you to come along. Take the morning for yourself and Gilman will call for a carriage when you’re ready to see Charlotte. I’ll inform them as well, so they’ll know to expect you.”
“Of course,” she said, feeling that this must be her dismissal for the evening. The moment had passed; no longer would they communicate as equals. But this was what she’d wanted, wasn’t it? A normal position? So why did she feel so hollow just now?
“Seek out Mrs. Prew if you have any questions.” He turned his lazy gaze to her and offered a wan smile. “I apologize for imposing my dull company on you this evening. But I rather enjoyed yours.”
Susanna stood, unsure of what to say, his mood seemed so mercurial. She smiled politely and dropped a small curtsy. “Goodnight, sir.”
“Goodnight, Miss Abbotts,” he said, then turned back to the fire.
It took several knocks, but Charlotte finally opened her door, the slight arch of one eyebrow the only clue that he’d surprised her.
Good. Ajax had lurked in the breakfast room all morning, like a spider, waiting for either his niece or his daughter to come downstairs. When neither appeared and he’d tired of reading, he finally took matters into his own hands, forcing the staff to dragHarmonia down to speak with him. When that was done, he set to attending his own line, hoping to carry the high of playing the concerned paternal figure for one relation over to the other.
Hell, who knew, perhaps he didn’t have to merely play the part. Perhaps he could do the damned thing for real, and be an actual father. The thought brought about a strange new ambivalence in him.
“Yes?” Charlotte finally said, clutching the door. “Papa?”
“You don’t open the door yourself,” he sighed, gently pushing it open wide and stepping around her with ease. “Just speak to allow admittance; you’re not some serving girl cleaning out the hearth.”
She watched him stalk into her room, looking like she might say something in response but holding her tongue.
It was one of the smaller bedrooms, covered in dreary Jacobian portraits of people Ajax didn’t recognize. Perhaps distant relations of his long-deceased nephew’s long-deceased wife? That chit had been of a higher quality than them—impoverished gentility. Two hundred years ago the Sedleys had been mucking about in pig shit, not sitting for portraits. He couldn’t say how the portraits had ended up here, but their subjects looked as positively miserable as the rest of the family.
He crossed over to the window seat, collapsing with more than a little dramatic emphasis. The movement fluttered some papers tucked behind the drapes. He crossed his legs, picked one up, and began perusing it. A letter. Not just any letter, but one in his father’s hand. He froze, the shock of recognition coursing through him. He scanned the page, relieved to find it a dry recounting of the wretched man’s various ailments. Flipping it back over, he glanced at the direction. Titus. Dated April of 1839.
“What in God’s name are you doing with your uncle’s old correspondence?” He looked back at the pile of aging letters on the seat, baffled.
