“That may be,” Fanny retorted, “but if the world’s coming to an end, I’m damn well not going to greet it in a maid’s uniform.”
Mr. Wright narrowed his eyes at her. “Where did you get that dress?”
“Lady Lizzy—”
“You stole from Lady Lizzy?” This from Mrs. Owen.
“You take that dress off this instant!” Mr. Wright commanded.
“This instant?” Fanny countered. “And what? Do you want to see me in my knickers?”
“No, of course not!”
“But you said—”
“What I meant was that you should leave this kitchen, go to your own room, and then take off the dress.”
“But it wasn’t like that—I didn’t steal anything. You know, there are always things they have put aside, things they’ve outgrown or are tired of; things they set aside that they might give to Agnes or Becky as a present come Christmas.”
“You’re not Agnes or Becky,” Mr. Wright said, “and this is not Christmas.”
“I do know that. But it wasn’t anything she was going to be using anymore. As a matter of fact, when Lady Lizzy caught me—”
“Lady Lizzy caught you?” Mr. Wright said.
“Yes,” Fanny replied, defiant. “And if you’d just let me finish, you’d know that when she did, she said it was fine for me to take it, that she was glad for me to have it, but did I by any chance have a spare pair of the black lace-up boots I always wear in the kitchen. She said Agnes and Becky’s side-button shoes were pretty enough, but that mine were ever so much more practical and would I be willing to give her a spare pair of mine if I had one. Lady Lizzy said she thought they’d be more practical than anything she has for what might lie ahead.”
“Lady Lizzy asked…” Mr. Wright shook his head, like a dog coming in from a downpour, like he’d had too much wine to drink and could no longer trust his own ears although, sadly, he’d had no wine.
“We traded, Mr. Wright,” Fanny said. “Lady Lizzy and I traded. So everything is even-steven and there’s no reason for you to—”
“Hullo!” a cheerful voice called out from the foot of the staircase that led to the Upstairs part of the house.
It was the duke.
“What a lovely dress you have on tonight, Fanny,” he said.
“Thank you,” she said, stunned.
“But I do think you’ll want to lose the apron,” the duke said thoughtfully.
“Lose the apron?” Mr. Wright said.
“Yes,” the duke said. “I was thinking… While it’s important for everyone upstairs to be armed, and to know how to properly use those arms, the servants need to be trained, too. We must ensure everyone’s safety.”
“You mean even me?” Mrs. Owen said, pointing at herself. “I’ve only ever strangled a chicken and then hacked its head off with a knife, but I’ve never fired a gun before.”
“Which is why you must learn!” the duke said brightly, encouragingly.
“What is our world coming to?” Mr. Wright muttered uselessly, empty decanter in hand.
“Yes, well,” the duke said, still brightly, “be that as it may.” Then he turned to Fanny in her red dress. “I thought we’d start with you, Fanny.”
…
The duke knew he shouldn’t be thinking this, not with everything that had gone on and might yet go on. All right. Fine. Would go on. For there was little to no doubt that there would be some very dark days ahead. Days so dark, none of them might survive it all.
And yet…
And yet…
“This is so much fun!” he cried. “I can’t remember a time I’ve ever had so much fun in an evening, not in my entire life!”
It was true.
His entire life, relatively short as it might have been when taken in comparison with someone like the earl or Mr. Wright, had been positively Hobbesian if one were to only take out the poor part, meaning it had been solitary, nasty, brutish, and short.
Father dead very early. Mother as cold as a stone castle in winter. A nanny who was only a touch warmer than that. A series of governesses and tutors, coming to their home to teach him all the things there was no father there to teach him, none of them staying for very long—Mother was a hard woman to work for. Then, starting in adolescence, being trotted out to meet girls, potential mates, or having them trotted in to meet him. None of those girls had ever shown the slightest bit of interest, no matter how grand his home, no matter how grand his title. Finally, coming here three days ago—just three days ago! the mind reeled—with the last-ditch hope of Lady Katherine.
Well, that hadn’t exactly worked out.
So, to now, after all his solitary and brutish misery, not to mention all the nasty sport other boys had made of him when he was younger—what with his jug ears—and sometimes when he was older, too; after all that, to find himself in this room on the south side of the abbey, engaging in target practice with Fanny; Fanny, whom, despite the seriousness of their circumstances, seemed to be delighting in this as much as he was—
“It’s no laughing matter,” a voice said; a voice that was, clearly, not laughing.
Ah yes. Will Harvey was there as well. Too bad, that.
“Yes, I know it’s not,” the duke said. “I only meant—”
“This is serious business,” Will said.
“Yes, I do know that, too,” the duke said.
And the duke did know that.
No matter what Mother, others, and now Will thought of him, the duke wasn’t some silly simpleton.
He’d seen what had happened to Dr. Webb. Even if he hadn’t really known Dr. Webb, it had still been awful. And he’d seen what had happened to poor Mr. Young, more awful still because he had gotten to know him a bit. Really, the whole thing was dreadful, almost too dreadful to contemplate. But you had to. You couldn’t just put your head in the sand. There was too much at stake, and the duke knew exactly what was at stake: their entire way of life, the world as they had ever known it to be.
He knew what they could all lose if mistakes were made, like Dr. Webb had when he’d failed to take the initial death of Ezra Harvey seriously; like poor Mr. Young had when he’d stepped forward, misguidedly, to help Dr. Webb without any thought to his own risk. So of course you had to take it all very seriously. And yet he was finding that you couldn’t let it overwhelm every second, consume your thoughts through every breath you took so that all became darkness and fear. Why, if one couldn’t still take delight in the things that made life worth living, then what was the point in waging the battle at all?
No, he was not a simpleton. He’d been smart enough to choose Daniel to lead them, hadn’t he?
Oh, how he wished Daniel could have come along to tutor him and Fanny instead. He knew Daniel would have taken it seriously, of course he would have, but he wouldn’t have been quite so grim about it. Will Harvey, on the other hand…
But there’d been little choice in the matter. After all, they did need to permit Daniel to take a short break for some sustenance sometimes.
Still…
“You know,” Will said to him, “you already have plenty of experience with guns, what with the hunting you lot do and all. Perhaps you should let Fanny give it a go?”
“Oh! Of course!”
The duke stepped away, stood off to one side as Fanny lifted the weapon, took aim.
“You know,” the duke said, thoughtfully tapping his lower lip, “if left to my own devices, I’d have picked out something for you in a pastel: perhaps a soft pink or a pale yellow. But now that I’ve seen you in it, I find that bold red suits you right down to the ground.”
Fanny didn’t take her eye off the target, although the duke did note a blush coloring her cheeks. It was a pretty blush, but he wasn’t so taken with it that he didn’t feel the uncomfortable presence of other eyes.
“What?” he said, looking over to find Will staring back at him with disapproving eyes. “Nothing’s so serious that a man can’t pay a maiden a compl
iment, is it?”
“It is and you shouldn’t.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t follow.”
“It is that serious and you can’t, not when you’re a duke and the maiden in question is an actual maid.”
What? The impertinence!
But was Will Harvey right? Should he not have said that? But it was true…
Now, though, it was Fanny’s turn to cast disapproving eyes on someone. Much to the duke’s surprise, the person she chose to cast them on was Will Harvey.
“Who died and put you in charge?” Fanny demanded.
“Daniel said—”
“That you were to train us. He didn’t say anything about you having the right to tell other people what they can or can’t say.”
“Yes, but—”
“And if you didn’t want him paying me a compliment, then you should have thought to pay me one first yourself. I do look nice in this dress!”
Good show, Fanny!
Then Fanny hefted the rifle to her shoulder once more and blasted a hole in the tapestry, right where Will had told her to.
“Good show, Fanny!” the duke said, laughing as he clapped wildly. “Good show!”
…
What an extraordinary day it had been.
Daniel lay in his bed, reliving it.
It had really begun when he’d been summoned to the drawing room and been informed that he was to be some sort of leader. It had been a lot to take in—simply being invited to sit among them had been a lot to take in—and the wonders had only increased from there.
Sitting with Lady Katherine in the library, being invited by her—no, she’d insisted that he take the main place at the writing desk, while she pulled up a smaller chair beside his, watching as he drew up those plans, his ideas for the perimeter defense.
He hoped to set up that perimeter defense in the morning. It would take a while to dig all the trenches he wanted dug, but at least they could institute some sort of patrol system along the edges of the estate, using armed farmers and villagers. He’d have liked to get it done today, but there had been so many people to train in weaponry first.
There’d been Grace in the afternoon, of course. More a pleasure than a job, that, particularly when he’d put his arms around her from behind, felt her soft hands beneath his. Had she felt what he did? Then later, after Will had worked with Lady Lizzy and the duke, and after his own dinner, he and Will had worked with some of the other servants.
Agnes and Becky had mostly giggled their way through it. This had clearly irked Will, who’d reminded them of how seriously they needed to take things. Daniel, on the one hand, agreed. Well, of course they should take the threat seriously. But what did Will want? That they take it so seriously that they move through the rest of their lives in a state of constant fear? Who would that help? Besides, it was nice to hear people just giggling, to hear Agnes and Becky just being girls.
Then it had been Jonathan’s turn.
In the years they’d worked together, Jonathan had had no quarrel with Daniel, not even all those times Daniel had beaten him at cards. And yet he’d sounded a bit bitter when he said, “You were missed at dinner service this evening.”
Well, of course Daniel hadn’t been there. He wondered who had been there in his place. Had one of the maids, although maids never attended in the dining room, been pressed into service?
“Looks like you’ve misplaced your jacket,” Jonathan said.
Daniel hadn’t misplaced it, but he had removed it when he’d been drawing up plans for Lady Katherine—the buttons on his jacket kept banging against the side of the desk as he tried to write and it had been annoying. And later on, it felt only natural to remove his bow tie and collar, to roll up his sleeves when he began working with the weapons.
“Next thing you know,” Jonathan said, “they’ll have you eating dinner with them.”
But they hadn’t called him in to do that, nor had he eaten meals with the other servants as had always been his custom.
He ate alone.
Now Jonathan was making him feel bad about things that were not his fault, things beyond his control, and Jonathan was even bristling a bit as Daniel showed him how he wanted him to do things.
“I have shot one of these before,” Jonathan said.
Will laughed from the side—at Daniel, Daniel felt.
“Of course you have,” Daniel said, in a tone he hoped was polite, respectful. It was obvious Jonathan was feeling some jealousy; Daniel couldn’t really blame him for it, and Daniel further didn’t want to do anything to exacerbate the situation.
“Well, it’s been a number of years,” Jonathan added sheepishly, having discharged his weapon but hit far wide of his mark.
Now Will was laughing again, only this time it was at Jonathan’s expense.
“You’ve worked so hard today,” Daniel said to Will, still keeping the same polite tone he’d used with Jonathan. God, I’m a great actor, he told himself. Used to be, I had to feign polite subservience for Upstairs. Now I have to feign polite solicitousness so as not to ruffle the feathers of Downstairs. “Why don’t you go on up? I can finish down here.”
“And why don’t you stop telling me what to do?” Will said.
Daniel felt as though he’d been slapped. “You don’t like me very much, do you, Will?”
“I don’t really know you to like you or not.”
“Still.”
“I suppose I just always thought, particularly after Lizzy invited me to come here, that when it finally came to it, I would have a more central role in things; a leading role, even.”
“They did ask you to help, too, you know.”
“Yes, to help you.”
“You know, I didn’t ask for this.”
“Still.” Will paused, his expression shifting from its usual state of proud stubbornness to one that was almost wistful. “I suppose, too, that I also thought, in a perfect world…”
“Yes?”
“I don’t know. I suppose I thought things might be different in that perfect world.” He gave a rueful laugh, falling just short of bitter. “Well, you know what they say.”
“And that is?”
“If wishes were horses…”
“…beggars would ride.”
Another rueful laugh, then: “Exactly.”
“Well, perhaps in this new vastly imperfect world, we may yet get that chance.”
Daniel smiled and was half shocked to see Will smile back at him.
“Why don’t you go on up?” Daniel suggested again, more gently this time.
This time, Will went.
Despite that exchanged smile, that last good moment at the end, once Will was gone, the air almost immediately felt clearer. Daniel had never had much to do with Will in the past, before all this happened, but he’d always seemed to be a serious sort. Now, though, it appeared as though something more was going on, something deeper and beyond the petty jealousy both Will and Jonathan seemed to be experiencing, the kind that naturally follows when one of your own is suddenly raised a bit over you.
Daniel wondered how he’d feel if Jonathan—or, God forbid, Will—were suddenly granted leave to give him orders. He had to admit, he wouldn’t like it.
Still, as the air cleared with Will’s departure and, left alone, Jonathan and Daniel fell into their old ways together, Daniel decided that was something he’d need to make note of and watch out for.
Who could be depended on? And who might be…trouble?
Surprisingly, Lady Katherine had fallen into the former group. If at first she’d had a problem accepting that he might have more knowledge of a subject than someone high-born like Benedict Clarke did, once he’d demonstrated for her that he did have that knowledge, she’d been all ears. Indeed, it had been she who had warned him about one who surprisingly fell into the latter group.
Late in the afternoon, she’d pulled him aside and said, “I could be wrong, although I should point out that that never happens, but I do bel
ieve Father might not be entirely on board with the rearrangement of power in the house. You’ll be careful, won’t you? I know he doesn’t mean any harm, but he can be disruptive.”
He’d thanked her for telling him and left it at that. What else could he do? He couldn’t argue with her. If he did, she’d no doubt get mad at him. And he couldn’t outright agree with her, either, because then, even though she’d brought it up, she’d probably get offended on her father’s behalf.
But he could see then that she was onto something.
And later, he could see that Will was someone he needed to look out for, too, because he was bothered by something on his mind and he was moody and he was Will. Jonathan also needed to be looked out for, because he was understandably jealous. And old Wright had to be looked out for, because some things never change.
If only they could all be as easy as the females had been: Lady Katherine, who’d been surprising in her agreeableness; Lady Lizzy, who it was impossible not to like; and Grace, whom he found it hard to stop thinking about, and so he had to force himself to do it.
Like when, as Jonathan was leaving the room, the dowager countess entered.
Even she was easier to deal with than some of the men.
“Hello?” she said. “Is this the place I am to report to for my military training?”
“I don’t think it’s necessary… That is to say, I don’t think anyone means for you to…”
“Do not be ridiculous. Daniel, is it? Now, hand me a weapon. I will show you how it’s done.”
And she had.
Turned out, she was the best shot he’d had all day.
“Oh!” she said, placing one silk-gloved hand against her chest as she closed her eyes in what could only be described as a state of bliss. “That is the most fun I have had in years.” She opened her eyes, looked into his. “Do you know how I do it?”
He shook his head.
“I simply picture the faces of my enemies, those people who annoy me most. Bull’s-eye every time. The list is long, you know, and the opportunities to do something about it like this are far too few. I shall sleep with this pistol under my pillow tonight.”
“I’m not sure that would be the safest place for it.”
“My nightstand, then. Once armed, we should keep those arms close by at all times. Now then.”
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