Thomas left on a bright Thursday, his small valise strapped to the back of a hired gig, his violin case on the seat beside him.
“Write,” Mrs. Harrow commanded, standing on the steps with a shawl over her cap.
“I do,” he said. “You complain about my letters being too long.”
“Then write shorter,” she said. “More often.”
He leaned to kiss her cheek.
“Yes, Mama,” he said, unusually docile.
He turned to Martha.
“Do not let them exhaust you,” he said. “Any of them. Small or large.”
“I will try,” she said. “No promises.”
He smiled, eyes bright.
“And you,” he said to Richard, with a half-bow that teetered between respect and mischief, “try not to be insufferable. I would like to find my sister and the house improved when I next visit, not retreated into separate corners.”
Richard’s jaw worked.
“I will… attempt it,” he said stiffly.
Thomas grinned, flipped the reins, and was off, leaving a faint echo of humming and an oddly shaped absence.
“My son,” Mrs. Harrow said dryly, “has all the subtlety of a brass band.”
“He is… effective,” Richard murmured.
“Yes,” she said. “Like a storm. Things *do* look cleaner afterwards.”
She coughed, a small, tight sound, and Martha’s hand flew instinctively to her arm.
“Inside,” Mrs. Harrow amended. “Before I catch every wind in Hertfordshire.”
They went in.
Life—lesson-times, meals, Latin, carpenters—closed over Thomas’s departure, leaving only small eddies of his presence. A snatch of a tune hummed by Agnes. A remark from Mabel about violins sounding like cats. A parcel arriving from London containing a roll of new music and a scandalously amusing French play, which Martha confiscated at once and hid in her room to be read when she felt particularly reckless.
Three days later, an invitation arrived.
It came on heavy, cream-laid paper, bearing an expensive scent and a crest Richard had not seen in five years.
He found it in the post bag the steward brought in after breakfast, half-buried between tenant petitions and a pamphlet from a political acquaintance.
His hand stilled on the unfamiliar seal.
The crest. A lion couchant. A spray of something florid. The Latin motto: *Virtus sola nobilitat*.
Ashcombe.
His stomach turned.
He broke the seal with perhaps more force than was required.
> Corbyn, > > I hear you have been playing at hermit in Hertfordshire while the world turns without you. It cannot be healthy. > > I am to be in your part of the country next week, on some tedious business with my mother’s cousin. It occurred to me that I have not seen your famous oaks in far too long. > > I shall call on Tuesday. > > Yours, in old friendship, > Ashcombe
No *my lord*. No *dear*. No acknowledgement of the gaping wound he had helped carve.
The sheer, blithe assumption that he could stroll back into Richard’s life as if nothing had happened made Richard’s vision blur for a moment.
He breathed, carefully.
He should burn the letter.
He should send a curt note declining the visit.
He should, perhaps, invite Ashcombe and then after the most perfunctory of civilities, throw him bodily out and hope the hedgerows broke his fall.
Instead, he stood, letter crumpling slightly in his fist, and walked to the library.
Martha was there.
She had taken to using the room for some lessons when the weather was foul; the vastness of it allowed the girls to pace as they recited, and the books, she claimed, behaved better when occasionally read.
Now, Agnes and Mabel knelt on the rug, arranging geography cards into countries. Miriam sat at the central table, frowning at a translation. Martha stood at the tall window, pointing out something to Agnes—perhaps the line of the ha-ha, perhaps a rook in one of the ailing oaks.
She turned at his entrance.
“Latin or politics?” she asked. “You have that particular wrinkle between your brows.”
“Neither,” he said shortly. “A letter.”
She read his face, straightened.
“Children,” she said. “You will… occupy yourselves for five minutes in *quiet* industry. Do not knock over any globes. Do not climb the ladder. Do not, Mabel, attempt to discover whether the window ledge is suitable for flight.”
“Yes, Miss Harrow,” chorused three voices, with varying degrees of sincerity.
She stepped into the corridor with him. He shut the door.
“What is it?” she asked at once.
He handed her the letter.
She unfolded, scanned, paled.
“Ashcombe,” she said.
“Yes,” he said.
“He is… coming here.”
“Yes,” he repeated.
“Richard,” she said slowly, “you cannot receive him.”
He laughed, short and harsh.
“I *must* receive him,” he said. “He is a peer. He is… connected. If I slam the door in his face, he will make certain my refusal is known in every club in London. And known not as an honorable man protecting his daughters from their mother’s seducer, but as a curmudgeon nursing an old grievance.”
“Let them think you curmudgeonly,” she snapped. “Better than—”
“Than what?” he cut in. “Better than my daughters hearing of their mother’s scandal from some loose-tongued lady in the village who remembers only half the story? Better than Ashcombe strolling into the churchyard and making some remark over Elizabeth’s absence that even the curate cannot ignore?”
She pressed her lips together.
“You could send a polite decline,” she said. “An influenza. A flooded lane. A leaking roof.”
“He would come anyway,” he said. “For the sport of it, if nothing else. He always did enjoy… pushing.”
Her jaw tightened.
“Then,” she said, “we must decide what weapons we have.”
He stared.
“Weapons?” he repeated.
“Yes,” she said. “You cannot bar him entirely. Very well. You can, however, control the terms of engagement.”
He almost smiled, despite the boiling in his veins.
“You speak,” he said, “as though this were a duel.”
“It is,” she said. “Of a sort. Only with words and glances instead of pistols. You are better armed than you think.”
He snorted. “He took my wife.”
“He took a woman who wanted to go,” she corrected. “He dangled London in front of her nose and she followed. That is… grotesque. But it is not wholly theft. It is seduction. And vanity. And stupidity. On both their parts. You are not… powerless in the narrative, Richard. Do not behave as if you are.”
He swallowed.
“What do you propose?” he asked.
She considered.
“You will receive him,” she said. “In daylight. In the drawing room. With witnesses. Myself. Mrs. Pritchard to appear occasionally in the doorway like a thundercloud. Perhaps the girls at a distance, if you judge it wise, so he cannot later claim that he saw them unawares. You will be… civil. Coldly courteous. You will not allow him to provoke you into shouting or sulking.”
He gave a sound between a laugh and a snarl.
“You have very high opinions of my self-control,” he said.
“You sat through an entire Sunday sermon without fleeing,” she said. “You can endure an hour of Ashcombe. You will not drink. You will not swear. You will not reveal more than you choose.”
“And what,” he asked, “if he speaks of Elizabeth? Of… her current situation.”
Her throat tightened.
“Then,” she said carefully, “you will have already spoken to your daughters. Before he comes. They will not hear of their mother’s choices for the first time from his lips.”
He shut his eyes briefly.
“Yes,” he said. “I promised. I… will.”
She reached out, then snatched her hand back before it could truly land on his sleeve.
“You are not alone,” she said. “In this.”
He opened his eyes.
“You will be there,” he said.
“Yes,” she said. “Unless you forbid me.”
“I would rather face him with Aristotle at my back,” he said. “And you are at least as sharp.”
She smiled, tight.
“A compliment,” she said. “In the midst of crisis. I am honoured.”
He took a breath.
“I will write,” he said. “A brief reply. Confirming Tuesday. That gives us…” He counted. “Four days.”
“In which,” she said, “you will talk to your daughters. And I will talk to my mother. And Pritchard will talk to the maids. And we will all, in our own ways, prepare the house for a man who likes to loosen foundations.”
He almost laughed.
“You make him sound like a carpenter,” he said.
“He is more wrecking-ball than craftsman,” she replied. “We will brace accordingly.”
He looked at her, something fierce and grateful and still afraid in his gaze.
“Thank you,” he said. “For not… suggesting I flee.”
“I considered it,” she admitted. “But I know you would not. Not now.”
“No,” he said slowly. “Not now.”
He went back to the library to write.
She went upstairs, letter burning in her hand, to the blue room.
***
Mrs. Harrow listened in silence as Martha read the invitation aloud, her fingers moving restlessly over her knitting.
“Ashcombe,” she said at last. “I recall the name. From the *Morning Post*.”
“Yes,” Martha said grimly. “He and Lady Corbyn were very… fashionable for a time.”
“Hmph,” her mother said. “Fashion. The devil’s favourite bait.”
“He is coming here,” Martha said. “Next week.”
Her mother’s needles clicked.
“And you are… anxious,” she observed.
“Yes,” Martha said. “For Richard. For the girls. For the house. For myself.”
“For yourself?” her mother asked, brows lifting.
“He is a man who likes… pressing,” Martha said. “In all senses. I have encountered his type enough to know the pattern. He will test boundaries. He will say things meant to unsettle. He will look for cracks.”
“And you,” her mother said, “are not easily cracked.”
“Everyone has a weak point,” Martha murmured.
Her mother’s gaze sharpened.
“And yours?” she asked.
Martha hesitated.
“My… temper,” she said. “And my pride. And—” Her voice faltered. “And the girls. And… Richard.”
Her mother’s needles paused.
“You speak his name more easily now,” she observed.
Martha flushed. “He *insists*,” she said. “When we argue. In private.”
“I see,” her mother said.
“You will not—” Martha began.
“Matchmake?” her mother said dryly. “At my age? I have more sense. And more pressing concerns. Like my lungs.”
Martha subsided, half-relieved, half-strangely disappointed.
“Will you withstand Ashcombe?” her mother asked after a moment.
“Yes,” Martha said. “I must. I will.”
“And if he attempts to… touch,” her mother said bluntly. “You will do as you did with Lennox’s son.”
“Yes,” Martha said, jaw setting. “And more. I am older now. Less inclined to polite retreat.”
“Good,” her mother said. “Then I shall not worry on that account.” She set her knitting aside. “As for your marquess—”
“He is not mine,” Martha muttered.
“—he will require… bolstering,” her mother went on, as if she had not spoken. “Men whose pride has been cut rarely hold their heads straight when the knife returns.”
“I will do what I can,” Martha said softly.
Her mother smiled, a little sadly.
“You already do,” she said. “More than is… comfortable for you, I suspect.”
Martha did not deny it.
***
That evening, when the younger girls were abed and Miriam pretended to sleep with a book hidden under her pillow, Richard called his eldest into the small study off the drawing room.
It was a room seldom used, containing a desk, two chairs, and a wall of rather gloomy portraits. It felt, tonight, like an interrogation chamber.
Miriam sat stiffly on the edge of the chair, hands clenched together.
“You are not in trouble,” Richard said at once.
She blinked. “You only say that when I am.”
He huffed. “Fair. On this occasion, however, it is… true. I wish to speak to you. As… plainly as I can.”
Miriam’s brows drew together. “Is it about the curtain?”
“No,” he said. “That matter is concluded.”
“Is it about Mabel’s plan to train the mice to carry notes between rooms?” she asked warily.
He stared. “She what?”
Miriam clamped her lips shut. “Nothing.”
He rubbed his temple.
“We will… address the rodents another day,” he said. “This is… about your mother.”
Miriam went very still.
“Our… mother,” she corrected. “She is not only mine.”
“Yes,” he said. “Your mother.”
Silence pressed in.
“You know… some of the story,” he began. “That she left. That she is… gone.”
“Yes,” Miriam said. “Gone. Not dead.”
He shut his eyes briefly. “No,” he said. “Not… dead.”
“Where is she?” Miriam whispered.
“In London,” he said. “As far as I know. She lives in a house in St. John’s Wood, with… people of her acquaintance.”
“Lord Ashcombe,” Miriam said flatly.
He inhaled.
“Yes,” he said. “With Lord Ashcombe.”
Miriam’s jaw clenched.
“Do you… see her?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “I have not seen her since she left this house. We have exchanged only letters. Through solicitors.”
“Does she write to *us*?” she demanded.
A knife twist.
“She… has not,” he said. “She asked after you, once. Briefly. In a note about money.”
Miriam’s face went taut.
“She does not love us,” she said.
“She…” He swallowed. “She… is not… capable of loving in the way you deserve. Not… us. Not me. Not anyone, perhaps, beyond herself.”
“That is a very complicated way of saying no,” Miriam said.
“Yes,” he said. “Because it is… complicated. Feelings often are.”
She stared at her clenched hands.
“Was it our fault?” she whispered. “Did we… vex her? Were we too noisy? Too much? Not enough?”
His heart broke.
“No,” he said fiercely. “No. Listen to me.” He leaned forward, reaching across the small space to lay his hand gently over hers. “It was not your fault. Not in any way. She did not leave because of you. She left because of herself. Because of what she wanted. Because she… could not bear… this life. This house. Me.”
“You,” Miriam said, looking up, eyes bright. “She left… you.”
“Yes,” he said. “She left me. She left us *all*. But you must not… ever… believe it was because you were lacking. You three are… more than enough. For any parent worthy of the name.”
She swallowed, hard.
“Why,” she asked slowly, “are you telling me this now?”
“Because,” he said, “Lord Ashcombe—her… current companion—is coming. Here. Next week.”
She jerked as if struck.
“What?” she hissed.
“He has… invited himself,” Richard said. “I cannot easily refuse. I wished you to know. To be prepared. So you do not hear his name for the first time in our hall and… wonder.”
Her eyes blazed.
“He took her,” she spat.
“He… lured her,” he said. “She chose to go. Do not absolve her entirely.”
“I do not,” Miriam said coldly. “I hate them both.”
He winced.
“Hate is… heavy,” he said.
“So is grief,” she said. “Which would you have me carry?”
“Neither,” he said quietly. “If I could. But I cannot. I can only… tell you what I know. And promise… that I will not lie to you about them. Or about myself. Not any longer.”
She looked at him for a long, measuring moment.
“You should have told us sooner,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “I should.”
She nodded once, as if checking off a ledger.
“Will we… see him?” she asked.
“Only,” he said carefully, “if you wish. He will be received in the drawing room. You may choose to be present. Or not. I will not force you to… greet him.”
She considered.
“I wish to see him,” she said. “I wish to know what he looks like. The man who thought he could take *our* mother and leave us with… gone.”
He swallowed.
“Very well,” he said. “We will arrange… a vantage point.”
Her mouth twisted.
“Miss Harrow will have ideas,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “She already does.”
She studied his face.
“She knows everything,” she said, half-accusation, half-awe.
“Not everything,” he said. “But… much.”
“She cares,” Miriam said. “Too much. For us. For you. It is… dangerous.”
He stiffened.
“Dangerous?” he echoed.
“Yes,” she said. “Because you care. A little. For her. And people we care for… leave.”
He drew in a breath, sharp.
“I…” he began.
“Do not lie,” she said. “Not now. Not after all that.”
He shut his eyes.
“I will not leave,” he said. “Not… willingly.”
She made a small, skeptical sound, but some faint easing in her shoulders suggested she took a fragment of comfort from the declaration.
“You may go,” he said gently. “Think. Or shout into your pillow. Or both.”
She stood.
At the door, she paused.
“Father,” she said, not turning.
“Yes?” he asked.
“I am… glad,” she said haltingly, “that you told me. Even if it hurts. It hurts less than… not knowing.”
He swallowed.
“So am I,” he said.
When she was gone, he sat very still in the small, gloomy study, the weight of what he had done—and not done—pressing down.
He had spoken.
He could not unsay it now.
Nor, perhaps, did he wish to.
***