Page 62 of Indecently Employed
Eventually the rain let up, fading to a gentle sprinkle. The parsonage would soon come into view. An aching melancholy came over her when she passed the church, the old tower still standing tall, looking almost as if it didn’t belong with the small, bowed building behind it. She wanted to go inside, to see if all the pews were still there, and the odd little rectangular Portesham stone font her father christened babies in. But she pressed on. The hour was late, she’d been traveling all morning, and she’d now been walking in the rain for what felt like an eternity.
An overpowering longing for Ajax’s massive bed and the roaring fire in the Gallox Castle solar came over her. She wondered, without much hope, if she’d ever return to it.
Finally, when it seemed her wet, raw feet couldn’t take another step, she was greeted by the familiar stout stone wall and blackthorn hedges. And not far behind them, the parsonage—squat and sturdy, topped with two symmetrical chimneys. Her father had taken out a loan against his income to repair the north one several years back.
Susanna tried to swallow the lump in her throat. She passed through the gate and closed it carefully behind her, not wanting to prematurely announce her arrival with its earsplitting wail, only to find that someone had finally oiled the hinges. Frowning, she opened it again, then closed it just as gently, finding it silent the second time as well.
Taking a breath, she walked up the path and knocked on the door. Her heart thudded as she wondered what awaited her on the other side.
The door swung open.
Maddy stood there, frowning and wiping her hand on her apron, her face more lined than Susanna remembered. Orville stood behind her, his features wan, his pale hair combed all the way to one side to compensate for its extreme thinning.
“Susanna?” Maddy exclaimed. “You look like a drowned cat!”
Susanna pressed her lips together. She didn’t know why she’d expected anything different.
Orville pushed past his wife and reached for Susanna’s carpet bag. “Dear, let her in, out of the rain.” His face was apologetic, but she barely glanced at it as she allowed him to take the bag. She instead stared straight ahead as she crossed the threshold, feeling uneasy about what was to become of her. But she recalled Mr. Rickard’s parting words. Whatever it might be, she could handle it. On her own.
Ajax didn’t sleep much that night, instead setting pen to paper with the madness of a man who, having had his supple young beauty wrenched away from him just as he’d decided to ask for her hand, was now facing a looming deadline.
Even though he couldn’t have her in his bed tonight, whispering his entreaties against the perfect skin of her neck, Susanna’s suggestion for the setting of his tale had taken hold. His own longing and desire spilled forth from the lips of his main character: a man seeking the titular ghost, a mysterious lady who roamed the coast at night. A woman from another time and a place lost to the rising sea. He wrote with such urgency that he’d be able to post it to Rokeby with a week to spare.
The story came easily, so Ajax allowed himself to think it good, though he would never be able to avoid having at least a part of himself convinced the opposite was true. Susanna would tell him, he assured himself. Susanna would not hold back with herpraise or censure, whichever was deserved. He only wished she were here in his bed, her hair loose on the pillow as she read, waiting for him to provide her with the fresh pages.
By the time he awoke the next day, it was so late he doubted there would be anything, let alone anyone, remaining for breakfast. That was just fine with him. He’d been furious with Harmonia and Marcus at first; their interference had been a pointed slight at him and a condemnation of his reputation. But after he’d caught Susanna in the hallway, his temper had abated. For they weren’t entirely wrong; he had, after all, forgotten that Susanna had said she would want to be with her family on the eve of her marriage, and though she didn’t know it, he had been ready to get down on one knee and pledge his troth—tacky hallways of Elverton Bridge be damned—were it not for the inopportune appearance of the housemaid.
He’d nearly done it, nearly said it explicitly. Next time, he wouldn’t let anything stop him. He’d make her his wife, and damn whoever would dare intrude. He could wait no longer.
The thought sent him into high spirits, and he forgave his great-niece and nephew for their meddling. Ajax Sedley was to take a wife. Would wonders never cease?
It was this self-congratulatory tune that he whistled as he made his way to the breakfast room, expecting an empty stage for his happy musings on his and Susanna’s future together: all the jewels and gowns he was going to pile upon her, what dry, expressionless thing Charlotte might say once she learned of it, and where he might find an appropriate coastal home as a morning gift. He’d always been fond of that tradition; perhaps Faine could begin to make inquiries if he wrote him…
He stepped into the breakfast room to find Harmonia sitting at the head of the long table, narrowing her eyes at him over her cup as she set it back in its saucer. She’d eschewed her past tendency toward rich, opulent clothing for a simplemorning dress made of light blue silk moire with mother-of-pearl buttons, giving her an air of mature confidence that he found slightly unnerving.
“Uncle,” she said, with a syrupy smile he immediately recognized as one of his own, the most patronizing in his arsenal. “How did you sleep last night?”
It felt like a trap. Ajax adjusted his coat, determined to evade it. It was time for something new, something different. He couldn’t allow himself to be led into whatever this tired scheme was, volleying thinly veiled accusations back and forth as if that, rather than shoe polish, were the family business.
“Wonderfully. And you?” He cast a glance at the sideboard, then sat down and signaled the footman over to request something else to eat, but more importantly, to send him out of the room.
“Hmm,” was all Harmonia allowed. It was almost as if he could see her mind working, her tactics shifting.
When the strapping lad had departed for the kitchens, leaving Ajax alone with his great-niece, he dropped the act.
“Now see here.” He leaned forward, genuine to his core. It felt odd, but strangely powerful in a way that impertinence never had. “You never answered my letter. Do I need to speak with Mr. Rickard, or have things smoothed out with you two?”
Harmonia’s brown eyes widened. She certainly hadn’t been expecting that, to which Ajax felt a twinge of sadness. He was still learning to be good, and it was obviously happening at a knave’s pace, but he meant to do right. When would they begin to recognize his sincerity?
“He said all was well. Now, I don’t relish calling a man out, and certainly not your husband, but I will if warranted.”
Harmonia came back to life, waving her hands about. “No, no. You were quite right when we spoke before the wedding. I…” She paused as a pink tinge settled on her cheeks. “I had madea misstep, but he had as well, and you were correct. Love did prevail.” Her eyes downcast, she nearly choked out the last part, so unaccustomed were the two of them to speaking earnestly with one another. After a pause, she looked back to him, a wry grin lifting one corner of her mouth. “At least, it did after we both apologized for being such dunderheaded fools.”
Ajax watched her. He fiddled with the signet ring he wore on his little finger, twisting it about, considering just how to put what he wanted to say. Finally he took a breath, and decided once again to speak frankly.
“Your father and I never got on, you know.”
Harmonia laughed, a hollow, mirthless sound, but he pressed on. “No, I loathed him. I absolutely hated him. He never gave me a chance, always had it in for me. After all,” he added with his own humorless chuckle, “who wants an infant uncle? Who wants to divide their inheritance yet again?”
