As You Are (6 page)

“I would like to raise a horse,” Edmund said, sighing wistfully. “A whole herd.”

“I always wanted to as well.” The memory of his own longing at a tender age struck Corbin forcibly. Father had left specific instructions in his will regarding Corbin’s future. Philip and Father had discussed what could be done to make Corbin’s dream of a stud farm feasible. He was given the chance to buy one of the unentailed Lampton properties over time using the profits from his farm. He’d begun his efforts at Havenworth within months of finishing at Eton. That was eight years ago. Another successful year and he would own the property outright.

“Aunt Clara says I’m going to be a gentleman,” Edmund said unexpectedly. “Gentlemen can raise horses, can’t they?”

“They can,” Corbin replied. He had worried about the same thing when he was young. Horse breeding, his father assured him, was one of the occupations acceptable for a gentleman.

“She says I have to go to school first.” A hint of a pout tugged at his mouth.

“I went to school.”

“Truly?” For the first time since his attention had been captured by Devil’s Advocate, Edmund pulled his gaze away from the horse and looked up at Corbin. “Did you like school?”

“Yes,” Corbin replied. “And no.”

“Were you scared to go?” Edmund asked quietly.

“A little,” Corbin answered. The boy was easy to talk to. “But my brothers were there. That helped.”

“I don’t have brothers.” Edmund turned his gaze back to the paddock.

“But I didn’t have a sister,” Corbin answered. “You do.”

“Not really.” The boy shrugged. “She’s Aunt Clara’s baby. But I am like her brother. I take care of her and play with her. So that makes me almost a brother, doesn’t it?”

Aunt Clara’s baby?
Corbin was thoroughly confused. Alice looked far too much like Mrs. Bentford to be anyone else’s child.

“Where is your Aunt Clara?” Corbin’s curiosity grew by leaps and bounds.

He received a completely baffled look in response. “Probably at home.”

“Where is that?”

Still that look of confusion. Edmund silently pointed to the west, toward Ivy Cottage.

“Mrs. Bentford?” Corbin thought he already knew the answer. “She . . . she is your Aunt Clara?”

Edmund nodded with a look that indicated he thought Corbin ought to have known as much.

“And you live with her.”

“Because my parents are dead.” Edmund spoke without sadness or self-pity.

So that was the answer to the mystery that had so captured the imagination of the neighborhood. Edmund, who was by all accounts too old to be Mrs. Bentford’s son, was, in fact, her nephew.

“My father is dead as well.” Corbin could not say why he offered such a personal piece of information. He rarely talked about personal matters, even with his own family. The words had just come out.

“Do you miss him?” the boy asked.

Corbin nodded.

“I don’t miss my father,” Edmund said. “I don’t remember him much. Only Aunt Clara. And Mr. Bentford.” His countenance dropped at the mention of his uncle. “But Aunt Clara says I don’t have to remember him if I don’t want to.” Edmund dug his toe into the grass and dropped his gaze.

“Do you? Want to remember him?” The boy’s obvious discomfort when recalling Mrs. Bentford’s late husband worried Corbin. Had the man been cruel? Or simply indifferent?

Edmund shook his head. “He wasn’t very nice,” he whispered.

Corbin put an arm around the boy’s shoulders. They stood silently, watching Devil’s Advocate prancing around, snorting and snapping at Jim.

He wasn’t very nice.
Corbin squeezed Edmund’s shoulders. Would Mrs. Bentford—
Clara
, Corbin reminded himself—describe her late husband that way as well?

“Was your father nice?” Edmund quietly asked.

“Very nice.”

“Will you tell me about him someday?”

Corbin wavered. He never spoke to anyone about his father, not even to his own brothers. His memories of that man were far too personal to share. Yet he sensed in Edmund a need to know that there were men he could admire and hope to emulate.

Before Corbin could answer, Edmund pulled away from him. “Aunt Clara!” he shouted, running along the paddock fence in the direction of the house.

Corbin’s heart suddenly flew to his throat. He wasn’t even wearing a coat. A gentleman never appeared in company in only his shirtsleeves. Edmund pulled his aunt Clara by the hand toward the spot where Corbin stood.

He must have looked every bit as ridiculous as he had on Sunday. So much for better impressions.

“I hope Edmund was a good worker,” Clara said as she reached his side.

Afraid he would actually call her Clara, for he could no longer think of her as Mrs. Bentford, Corbin only nodded.

“Can I come tomorrow?” Edmund asked him.

Corbin shook his head. “Tomorrow is Sunday,” he explained, then began walking back to the stables.
Only in my shirtsleeves. Must I always make a complete fool of myself? It’s no wonder she hasn’t given me a second glance.

“Monday, then?” Clara asked.

Corbin nodded without looking back at her.

“Good-bye, Mr. Jonquil,” Edmund called out to him.

Corbin glanced over his shoulder and offered a slight smile. “Good-bye, Edmund,” he replied, then fled for the obscurity of the stables.

Why hadn’t Clara sent the young serving girl to fetch Edmund? The girl had brought him earlier. If Corbin had realized Clara herself would be coming, he would have seen to it that he looked presentable. He would have practiced a greeting, decided on a topic of conversation.

He dropped onto a stool near the door of the stable, where he could watch Clara and Edmund walk away from the paddock. He probably should have walked with them or offered a carriage to take them back to Ivy Cottage.

He doubted any of his brothers would have bungled things so quickly, so thoroughly. Corbin rubbed his face with his hands. He was failing miserably.

Obviously Mr. Jonquil didn’t feel she was worth his time or notice. He didn’t say a single word to her. Clara couldn’t, for the life of her, understand why he so wholly disapproved of her. They were not well acquainted. He’d noticeably stiffened when he’d seen her arrive. He’d left with only the briefest backward glance and parting word for Edmund.

Edmund, on the other hand, hadn’t stopped talking since leaving Havenworth. He wasn’t tensely quiet the way he always had been after an encounter with Mr. Bentford. That boded well for his afternoon at Havenworth. It seemed, at the very least, he hadn’t been mistreated. Clara felt immense and immediate relief at that.

“Did you know a pony isn’t just a baby horse?” Edmund said. “It is different from a horse. It’s smaller and has shorter legs and doesn’t get bigger when it grows up.”

“Is that so?” She’d never heard Edmund talk so much at once.

He slipped his hand inside hers. “And you can brush harder than you think, Aunt Clara. It doesn’t hurt them.”

“You seem to have learned a great deal.”

“I didn’t get to ride yet. Mr. Jonquil says I need to be comfortable with horses first. He knows everything about horses.”

“Did you spend very much time with Mr. Jonquil?” Clara asked, surprised to hear that Havenworth’s owner had been involved in Edmund’s chores. If he disapproved of a nonentity of a widow, he would certainly not lower himself to spend time with her ward.

“The whole afternoon. He showed me the stables. They’re big as our whole house. There are more than twenty horses. More than thirty, maybe. He knows all of their names. And there are boys in the stable who are only a little older than me. Mr. Jonquil says he started working in the stables when he was too young to even remember. And he says a gentleman can raise horses.”

“He is correct about that.” Clara loved Edmund’s sudden chattiness. She couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so cheerful.

“I am to go back on Monday,” Edmund continued. “But he said I cannot come to the stables unless I have finished all my lessons and only if you say I have finished my chores at home.”

“Did he?” That was thoughtful, at least.

“And he said if I sneak there without permission or don’t finish everything at home, I won’t be allowed to come for a few days until I learn that a gentleman never neglects his home or his family.”

Clara actually stopped in the middle of the lane and stared at Edmund in astonishment. “He said that?” It had always been her experience that the only thing a man never neglected was his own comfort and pleasure.

But Edmund nodded, confirming his tale. The warning didn’t seem to have frightened him. Mr. Jonquil must not have taken a threatening or overpowering approach to laying down the rules. Odd, that.

“Is he correct?” Edmund asked, apparently noticing the confusion on her face. “About a gentleman taking care of his family?”

She fumbled for only a moment. “Yes. He is.” Whether or not true gentlemen actually did take that approach was irrelevant. She fully meant to raise Edmund so that when he was grown,
he
would treat his family that way.

“I thought so,” Edmund said.

They continued their walk, Edmund’s tongue never slowing. Clara only half listened. What was Mr. Jonquil about? He obviously didn’t think highly of her. She, he had made clear enough through his actions and pointed silences, was beneath his notice. But he’d given Edmund some very sound advice and had shown him around the stables, watching out for the boy.

What was his motive? She’d known enough men in her life to know there was always an ulterior motive.

She sent Edmund up to his bedchamber to wash up and settled herself at her small writing desk in the sitting room. Suzie had returned from Grompton with a letter in the moments before Clara had been obligated to go fetch Edmund. The letter had come from London, and she hadn’t opened it before she left. She had but one correspondent in Town, the man of business she’d secured in the days before fleeing Sussex.

Clara held the unopened letter between her hands now. A heaviness settled in her stomach at the memory of that desperate flight. She’d tried so hard to appear calm and unconcerned for the children’s sake. But she couldn’t remember ever being so afraid in all her life. Her welfare had depended on escaping Bentford Manor. More importantly, however, the children were no longer safe there. If she’d had to decide between sending them away and escaping herself, she would have sent them anywhere she possibly could.

She pushed aside the painful reminders of her past and broke the wax seal on the letter. It was, indeed, from her man of business, Mr. Clark.

Mrs. Bentford,

I fear I have less than satisfactory news regarding your quarterly payment. I was able to transfer the payment from the Bentford Estate to an account I have created in your name, including the address misdirection you requested.

Her circumstances required Mr. Clark to conduct her business as unobtrusively as possible. If Clara drew attention to herself and her location, she’d be found. After all the difficulty she’d gone to escaping her life in Sussex, she couldn’t bear the thought of being discovered, of being dragged back to the misery she’d run from.

However, this could not be accomplished without the Bentford man of business being aware of the change. I do not believe he knows of your current location, but he has managed to delay the funds transfer. I fear you will not be receiving your usual quarterly payment anytime in the near future.

If you wish, I can have more funds withdrawn from young Mr. Clifton’s accounts that you can repay once this latest difficulty has been worked through.

Please advise as to your preferences.

Yours, etc.

Joseph Clark

Clara slumped in her chair. The last thing she wanted was to draw more money out of Edmund’s inheritance. It would simply be unfair for Edmund to have to be required to sacrifice yet again for her.

Now what do I do? We must have money to live on.

Clara refused to crumble under the weight of difficulties. She was no longer the frightened girl she’d been when her father had married her off to a horrid and frightening man. She had found strength and courage in herself that she’d never realized was there. Life was hard, but she was strong.

She pulled a fresh sheet of parchment from her desk and dipped her quill in the inkwell.

Mr. Clark,

Thank you for your efforts on our behalf. I dislike severely the idea of pulling more money from Edmund’s account. But neither can I live without money to feed myself and my children.

I am not certain which course of action I ought to take, so I will instead explain my wishes and give you leave to take whichever approach is most likely to achieve that end. I have but two goals, Mr. Clark. The first, that my children have food to eat and a roof over their heads. The second, equally as imperative, perhaps even more so, that Mr. Bentford not find us here.

Please proceed according to your best judgment.

Yours, etc.

Clara Bentford

She sanded the letter and leaned back in her chair. Though she was courageous and determined, she was also painfully aware of the perilous nature of her current situation. The peace and freedom she and the children enjoyed was precarious at best. Everything she had worked for would disappear if Mr. Bentford found them.

“Mr. Jonquil talked to Johnny real quiet,” Edmund said nearly two weeks after he’d first begun his daily trips to Havenworth. “I didn’t hear what he said. But Johnny looked real ashamed, like he’d done something he wasn’t supposed to. Then Johnny started walking up to the house, and Mr. Jonquil told him that he would ask Fanny—I don’t know who that is—if Johnny had apologized to her, so he had better make sure he did.”

“Why was Johnny apologizing?” Clara asked. Johnny was the stable hand who brought Edmund home each afternoon. Fanny must have been one of the Havenworth maids.

“Jim said Johnny was playing with Fanny’s heart.” A look of profound confusion crossed Edmund’s face. “I have been trying to figure out what that means.”