Not like the duke. True, he had behaved somewhat bravely in trying to draw Mr. Young’s attention away from Lizzy and on to himself. But then he’d gone and had that awful attack of nerves afterward, needing to go with Fanny to the kitchen for a glass of water in order to steady himself. So: not handsome. Not brave.
So where did that leave Kate?
It occurred to Kate for the first time that maybe the stable boy was only so worried about Lizzy because Lizzy was the type of person who required worrying over while she, Kate, he regarded as fearless, invulnerable, and in need of no one’s concern?
Of course she’d told Agnes that there wasn’t anything to be scared of. And there wasn’t.
But if she were being honest with herself, she had to admit that while she might hope tomorrow would be a better day, it was quite possible that they wouldn’t be getting out of here then, maybe not even anytime soon, nor would there be any new visitors coming to them.
Or, not anyone they’d necessarily want to see.
Which meant no immediate opportunities for fresh suitors, which in turn meant…
Stupid bloody entail.
Chapter
Forty-Six
“You told Lady Katherine what?” Fanny asked Agnes, loading items onto the large tray Agnes was holding. Once she was done, Agnes would need to bring it up the back stairs so that Will Harvey and the farmers and villagers could have something to eat. Those people must be starving by now, Fanny thought, but this was the first chance she’d had to do anything about it. They’d need more than just the one tray, however large and full, to feed them all. But at least it was a start.
The items Fanny was loading it with, ignoring the cries from the three cats standing before the door as she hurried to finish before Mrs. Owen returned, were leftovers from Upstairs’s breakfast, now thankfully finished.
No matter what else was going on in the world, Upstairs would still have their nice breakfast.
And no matter what else was going on in the world, Fanny would still be expected to do her regular work. There was always the work.
Already this morning Fanny had risen before anyone else, lit some fires, did some dusting, read a little, helped Mrs. Owen prepare breakfast, did everything else that was normally required of her on a Monday, all the while ignoring the entreaties of the three cats whenever she came across them.
She knew what they wanted: to go out. But Fanny couldn’t, wouldn’t let them.
Before Agnes could answer Fanny’s question, and before Fanny could finish what she’d been doing, Mrs. Owen’s voice came at her from behind.
“Fanny, what are you doing with all that food?”
Fanny groaned inside. This was what she’d been hoping to avoid.
Usually, once breakfast service was finished, Mrs. Owen took a little break to do, well, what a person needed to do from time to time, the same thing the cats wanted to do right now, had wanted to do for hours. And whenever Mrs. Owen did it, she always took her time.
Fanny knew she couldn’t keep the presence of twenty extra people upstairs, all with mouths to feed, a secret forever. But she’d hoped to get a little further than just one meal. Twenty extra mouths to feed was normally no problem at all for a house such as this. Why, on any given weekend, Upstairs might have that many guests! There was always plenty of food. There had never been any lack here. But Fanny knew Mrs. Owen wouldn’t take kindly to it being these particular mouths.
Mrs. Owen didn’t know yet about them being up there. With the exception of Mr. Wright, none of the senior staff did. All the senior staff—Mr. Wright; Mrs. Murphy; Albert Cox, the earl’s valet; Myrtle Morgan, Lady Clarke’s maid; and Mrs. Owen—all had their bedrooms on this basement floor of the house, not on the attic floor with the rest of them. Fanny’d always supposed things were arranged thusly because they were all so old and it would mean fewer stairs for them. So none of them had reason yet to know about the extra twenty. But now Fanny saw, if she was ever going to pull this off at all, she’d need to enlist Mrs. Owen’s help.
So Fanny told her.
“Are you insane, Fanny?” Mrs. Owen said.
“I suppose it’s possible that I am,” Fanny replied. “But not because of this.”
“You’re taking food out of the family’s mouths!”
“But I’m not. These are things they were done with.”
“Then you’re taking things out of our mouths!”
“Only a little bit. And we have so much in the house.”
“Well, we won’t have for long, if you keep up at this rate.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“We have a lot, for the time being, but it won’t last forever. What if we’re trapped here? What if none of us ever get out of here again for more supplies?”
Fanny hadn’t thought about that.
Was it possible? Would they never get out of here again?
It was scary to think of, but after a moment, Fanny pushed the thought away as she tightened her resolve.
“That doesn’t matter,” Fanny said.
“Doesn’t matter?” Mrs. Owen’s pudgy hands went to her ample hips. “How can you say it doesn’t matter?”
“Because it doesn’t. Those farmers up there, they’ve worked this land all their lives. Don’t they have a right to the fruits of it? Don’t they have as much right as anyone else in this house does, to eat, to survive?”
“What about Mr. Powell, then? You said he’s here, too. Well, he’s not a farmer. What’s Mr. Powell ever done for anybody?”
“I don’t know. He’s the publican.” Fanny thought about this. “He serves beer to people when they go into the village, which some of the farmers and villagers find essential: that he serves them beer.” She thought about it some more. “And he’s a human being.”
“A hu—” Mrs. Owen stopped herself. “Does anyone else know about this insane scheme of yours?”
“Actually—”
“Fanny, what are you doing!” Was there no end to people asking her that question? This time, it came from Mr. Wright.
“Why haven’t you let those cats out?” Mr. Wright said, not giving her a chance to answer. “They’re making an infernal racket!”
“But they need to be kept safe,” Fanny said, worried now, panicked even. “It’s not safe out there, you know it isn’t.”
Henry Clay had been so brave last night, coming up behind Mr. Young like that, causing him to topple over the marble railing. How could Henry Clay’ve known that a fall from such a height wouldn’t kill him? Or destroy him? Or whatever you called putting an ending to something that had already died once? After doing that, Henry Clay didn’t deserve to be put at risk. And Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. While they might not hold quite the same place in her heart that Henry Clay did, she was fond enough of those two privileged fluff balls. She certainly didn’t want to see them dead.
She tried to explain as much to Mr. Wright.
“And what do you propose?” Mr. Wright said when she’d finished. “That they do their business inside? That they be allowed to piss all over the abbey? No matter what else is happening, standards must be maintained. Anything less is chaos.”
Before she could say anything further, Mr. Wright strode to the back door and turned the knob with his white-gloved hand.
“Well, go on,” he told the cats, who scooted out, but for once, they didn’t go far.
“There,” Mr. Wright said, observing the cats as he stood in the doorway, arms folded. “You see? That’s how you do it. You just let them out and then you stand guard and wait. It’s a lovely day, clear, you can see anything that might come at you.”
The cats finished with their business and, disinclined to scamper about as they would normally, trotted back in.
Mr. Wright shut the door and bolted it. “You see?” he said again. “Now, where is tea? His Lordship and the others are gathered in the drawing room, and they are ready for it now.”
Tea? But they’d just finished breakfa
st!
“Ah!” Mr. Wright said, spying the tray in Agnes’s outstretched arms. “There it is!” Then: “But those are just leftovers from breakfast. That will never do. Mrs. Owen, please see to getting the tea organized and do be quick about it—His Lordship is waiting. I’ll be back in a trice for it.”
“But Mr.—” Mrs. Owen started to say.
“Whatever you want right now must wait,” Mr. Wright said. “Honestly, I don’t know what’s going on in this house anymore. Did you not hear me? His Lordship is waiting!”
Then the butler was gone.
“He doesn’t know what’s going on in this house anymore?” Mrs. Owen muttered. “Well, that makes two of us. And I don’t want to know any more than what I know already. I’ll just put my head down and do the work, that’s me settled.”
At last, Fanny turned back to Agnes, loading the last few items she’d set aside onto Agnes’s tray. Oh, those poor people up in the attic. So hungry they’d be by now.
“I told her we were scared,” Agnes said.
“What?” Fanny said vaguely, looking it over just one more time to make sure that everything she wanted was there.
“You asked, before, ‘You told Lady Katherine what?’ And now I’m telling you again. I told her we were scared.”
“Why would you do such a thing? She doesn’t need to know that. Especially since it’s not true. I’m not scared.”
“Even if you’re not, Fanny, I am, and the others are, too.”
Fanny did know that. Of course she did. Even though the others were going about their normal business, performing all their daily duties, Fanny knew that fear had taken over most of them. She could see it in Becky’s eyes. She could hear it in Jonathan’s voice, laughing too hard at something that wasn’t all that funny to begin with. And now Agnes, coming right out and saying it.
“But it’s going to be all right,” Agnes said.
“How do you know that?”
“Lady Katherine said. She promised. She said she’d take care of us.”
“And you believed that?”
Agnes nodded.
“Oh no,” Fanny said softly. “We need to take care of ourselves.”
Chapter
Forty-Seven
The duke stood near the fire with his elbow on the mantelpiece, observing the others in the drawing room: Lady Grace, still looking sad; Lady Elizabeth, determined; Lady Kate, restless, as though one too many days without riding had put her on edge; and all the rest. To a person they looked shocked at what the butler was now telling them.
Fanny wasn’t there, of course, more’s the pity. How he wished she were! He hadn’t seen her yet today, although he wanted to. Last night, after Daniel had left him, he’d had the damnedest time falling asleep. Of course there’d been the events of the day to relive: the awfulness with Dr. Webb. The even greater awfulness with poor Mr. Young. But more than that, there were the words Fanny had spoken to him. No one had ever paid him such a fine compliment before.
“Fanny did what?” the earl said.
The duke noted that Mr. Wright had mentioned Fanny and no one else when he’d given his report. Why had he said nothing of the duke’s involvement? Was he made of glass? Of course not. The duke knew he’d seen him there, spoken with him, too. What then? Did his actions not matter? Then it occurred to him. Mr. Wright might be quick to tell on Fanny, figuring it to be his duty, but he’d be less quick to say anything about him. He was, after all, the duke. Huh, he thought. Well, that’s a good privilege.
Privilege or not, it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that Fanny should hang alone when they had acted together.
Even if it had been all her idea.
He was about to say as much—not the part about it all being her idea, which would not be very gallant of him, but rather that they’d enacted the idea together—but then he thought: Am I really brave enough to speak out?
He thought he was. Maybe. But maybe not. May—
But it didn’t matter any longer what he thought, for now the butler was speaking again.
“I know, my lord. And I would have told you about it earlier, but you see, you were having your breakfast. I know how you hate to have any meal spoiled with unpleasantness, most particularly the first meal of the day. I simply thought it could wait a bit. Shall I throw them all out now?”
Throw them—
“Of course we can’t do that,” someone said, a female voice, and the duke was surprised to see it belonged to Lady Kate.
“We can’t?” the earl said.
“No, Father. It’s our duty. It’s your duty as head of not only the abbey but all of Porthampton itself. We must do whatever we can.”
This struck the duke as surprising, coming from Lady Kate. She hadn’t exactly impressed him as one who cared overmuch about other people. But maybe something in all this had caused her to change a bit, to think more generously about others? Or maybe, he thought, it was exactly the word she used: “duty.” As a member of the British Empire, one could never escape it. Duty. To what’s right. To what’s the done thing. To being, simply, British. Well, the duke supposed, he had that sense, too.
The earl looked as though he were still stuck on the outrage he’d felt earlier, unwilling to give it up, and the duke thought for sure he would overrule her, however much she was his obvious favorite.
But then: “Kate’s right, Wright.”
The butler could ill disclose his shock. “She is?”
“Of course,” the earl said. “It is our duty, now that they’re under our roof. Although I do wish someone had thought to ask me about this first. It is, after all, still my house.”
“And if they had asked you,” Lady Kate said teasingly, “you’d probably have said no.”
“You’re probably right, my dear,” the earl confessed with a rueful grin. “But now that they are here, Wright, do see that they’re comfortable and have everything they need, but not too comfortable. We don’t want them to think they’ll be staying on forever once the danger has passed and everything has been returned to normal.”
Did the earl genuinely believe, the duke wondered, that the danger might pass with any sort of speed or that anything would ever be normal again?
“Very good, my lord.” The butler all but clicked his shiny heels. “As you wish.”
“Now, then.” The earl clapped his hands together. “I think what we need here is a plan of action.”
“A plan of action?” Her Ladyship said.
“My, that does sound overly ambitious,” the dowager countess added. “And all before I’ve had my tea.”
“Be that as it may,” the earl said. “We’ve been putting this off, no doubt because none of us wanted to face the truth of what is happening. But after the events of last night, we can put it off no longer. We must organize! We must prepare a line of defense! Toward that end…” Here, the earl turned to Benedict Clarke. “Benedict, might we enlist your help?”
“My help?” Benedict said.
“Of course! You’re the only one here who’s been to war. I thought perhaps that, with your training and skills…”
“Yes, well, I-I don’t…” came the stammered reply.
“No, no, no, no, no! You’re doing this all wrong!”
It was only when all heads turned in his direction that the duke realized he hadn’t merely thought those words, but rather, they’d actually flown out of his mouth.
“You had something to add to the discussion, did you?” the earl asked him.
Did he? Have something to add?
Once upon a time, the duke thought he had been born into greatness. He was a duke, after all! How much greater could one get? Well, king. There was that. But then, as he’d started to grow up, he’d realized that greatness hadn’t come along to accompany the title. And those times the possibility of having it thrust upon him had occurred? He’d pretty much run the other way. But now, in this moment, could he reach for it? Could he do and say the things that needed to be done?
&
nbsp; He thought of Fanny’s ears, and he found that he could.
To the earl, he said, “I don’t mean to offend you, but you’re making a hash of things.” Then he turned to Benedict. “Look,” he said, “I don’t mean to be rude, and you’re a fine enough chap, or at least you seem to be, but you’re simply not the right man for the job.”
“And who is?” the earl said.
“You can’t possibly be suggesting yourself,” the dowager countess chortled, peering at him, “can you?”
“No, of course not. The person I’m suggesting is Daniel.”
“Daniel?” the dowager countess said. “Who, pray tell, is this Daniel?”
“Your footman,” the duke said, feeling some impatience.
“Yes, but which one?”
“The one who tore off his shirt to bandage Mr. Young yesterday,” Lady Kate provided, smiling when she mentioned the part about him tearing off his shirt. “It was quite thrilling, actually.”
“Oh,” the dowager countess said thoughtfully.
What was she thinking, the duke wondered, that like her granddaughter, she too found it pleasing and thrilling when the footman ripped off his shirt?
“Look,” the duke tried again. “I’m sure that Benedict is well-meaning and I hate to be rude, I wouldn’t want to give offense—”
Benedict Clarke waved a hand. “None taken, I assure you.”
Well, that was a relief, at least.
“But I do think Daniel knows more about what may be required here. He saw more, did more in the war. He has real military training, and I think his instincts are exemplary. I just,” the duke finished, “think he’s the best person for the job.”
“Well,” the earl said, “I thank you for sharing your opinion on this matter with us, and I will take it under advisement. Now then. Where was I? Benedict—”
“I don’t think you’re hearing me right,” the duke said.
“Of course I am,” the earl said peevishly, “but this is still, as I have already been forced to point out once today, my house.”
“And I am still the duke.”
“Pardon?”
“It pains me to say this, but I outrank you. You are an earl. I am the duke. So unless you want to bring the king in here to overrule me, I suggest we do this my way.”
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