A Modest Independence

by Mimi Matthews

  Jenny

  “Well?” Justin’s deep voice startled Tom from his reverie. “What did Miss Holloway write that has you looking so miserable?”

  Tom scowled up at him. “Aren’t you needed inside?”

  “Not immediately. Helena will want some time alone with her brother, and he with her.” Justin descended the steps. “Come down to the stables with me. With any luck, we can roust out Neville.”

  Tom folded the letter and slipped it into an inner pocket of his coat as he walked alongside Justin down the drive. It curved in a gradually winding slope, leading down past the cliffs.

  “Do you wish to talk about it?” Justin asked.

  “Not particularly.”

  “No? You’ve spent three months traveling with Miss Holloway. Three months alone. Have you nothing to say for yourself on that score?”

  “The servants were with us.”

  “The Indian servants you described in that first letter you wrote to me? I recognize a fig leaf of decorum when I see it.”

  “I’m in love with her.”

  “Obviously.” Justin cast him a glance. “What are you going to do about it?”

  “Nothing.”

  “That doesn’t sound like the Tom Finchley I know.”

  Tom sighed. “She needs time on her own. A lifetime, possibly. There’s nothing I can do about it.”

  “So…you’re just going to give up.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Perhaps I might if you explained it.”

  “What difference does it make? There’s nothing to gain by talking about it. It will only make it worse. I’d as soon forget it than review it again.”

  “I don’t suppose this means you’re abandoning that other matter as well? If so, you should know that I’ve already sent Mr. Treadway to Dorset.”

  “Your inquiry agent?” Tom had almost forgotten about the man.

  “Your inquiry agent now,” Justin said. “I wish you better luck of him.”

  Tom thrust his hands into his pockets. “I’m not concerned with Treadway at the moment.” The cold sea air nipped at his face, whipping at his frock coat and rumpling his hair. He took a deep breath. “There is, however, something else I’d like to discuss with you. Something to do with our time in the orphanage.”

  Justin gave him an alert look. “What about it?”

  “Perhaps we should find Neville? He’ll want to hear it, too.”

  “That bad, is it?” Justin’s lips compressed. “Very well.”

  The stone stable block stood ahead. Tom followed Justin inside. It was snug and sweet-smelling, the fragrance of fresh hay, oiled leather, and well-groomed horses permeating the air.

  Justin called out to Neville.

  “Here, Justin!” Neville’s blond head popped up over the side of one of the loose boxes.

  During their time in the orphanage, he’d always been considered a good-looking boy, and he’d grown into an equally well-favored man. He was lean and fit—and as muscular as a bull. But though he outstripped Justin by at least an inch in height and a stone in weight, Neville was no brute. He was a gentle man in every sense of the word. Gentler still after his childhood fall from the cliffs. Now he preferred the company of animals to that of people, often spending time in the stables or down at the beach with Thornhill’s two mastiffs, Paul and Jonesy.

  His face lit up at the sight of Tom. “Tom! Have you come to stay?”

  “No. I’m only here for a short visit. Will you come out a moment? There’s something I’d like to tell the both of you. Something I should have confessed long ago.”

  Neville opened the door of the loose box. Paul and Jonesy ran out ahead of him, first barking at Tom and then galloping to their master.

  Justin crouched briefly to pet the two hulking black beasts. “You’re making me uneasy, Tom.”

  “That’s not my intention.” Though it might as well have been. Revelations from the past were never easy to deal with. But Jenny had been right. Tom had borne the burden alone for too long. It was past time he shared it.

  Neville dusted off his linen shirt and coarse woolen trousers. “What is it, Tom?”

  “It’s about Alex Archer.”

  Justin’s expression froze. So did Neville’s. They both stared at him, waiting for him to explain himself.

  Tom didn’t hesitate. As clearly and succinctly as possible, he told them about the day he and Alex had found the treasure. About how Alex had beaten him and broken his nose. And about how Alex had absconded with the treasure some days later, disappearing from Devon, and from all of their lives, forever.

  As Tom spoke, Justin paced to the loose box and back again, his large frame taut as a coiled spring. “I’ve thought him dead these many years,” he said at last. “Why the hell didn’t you say something?”

  “Would it have made any difference?”

  “Probably not. But I’d rather have known about it all the same.” He raked his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Damnation, Tom. I thought it was Cheevers who broke your nose.”

  “Does this mean Alex is alive?” Neville asked.

  “I haven’t any idea. There were times I thought to look for him, but if he prefers to cut off contact with us, who am I to—”

  “You assume it’s his choice,” Justin said.

  Tom gave him a dry look. “What else am I to think? It was always in his nature to be selfish. You know it as well as I do. I’ll wager he took that money and ran as far from Abbot’s Holcombe as it would take him.”

  Justin gave a sudden bark of laughter. “Good for him. At least one of us got away unscathed.”

  Neville’s hands tightened on the door of the loose box. His knuckles went white. “Someone was hurting him.”

  Tom’s gaze jerked to his. “What?”

  “A man at the apothecary’s shop. A friend of Mr. Crenshaw.”

  Justin crossed the stable floor to Neville. “He told you this?”

  Neville nodded.

  A wave of nausea rose up in Tom’s stomach. In the months preceding his disappearance, Alex had been apprenticed to old Mr. Crenshaw, the Abbot’s Holcombe apothecarist. It had been a poor fit from the beginning. But Tom had never thought—had never considered… “Who?” he demanded. “Do you have a name?”

  “He didn’t say. It was…afterward. He came to my bed and said goodbye. He said he was sorry.”

  Justin uttered a vicious curse. It was enough to make Neville wince. “Neither of you thought to tell me any of this? I might have done something. Looked for him or—”

  “It was afterward,” Neville said again, a sharp note of insistence in his voice. “I thought it was a dream.”

  “Afterward,” Tom repeated. “You mean after your accident.” He gave Neville a fleeting smile of understanding. “Of course you thought it was a dream. Perfectly logical. You were out of your head for a while.”

  Justin’s shoulders sagged. “What a bloody mess.”

  Neville’s face was pale, his hands still clenched on the loose box door. “Are you angry, Justin?”

  “Not at you. At myself. I should have realized—”

  “How could you?” Tom wondered. “You’re not omniscient, Justin. Besides, when it came down to it, you were a boy, no different from any other Parish orphan. We none of us were equipped to handle what happened at that place. It’s not a matter of being strong or smart or knowing everything about everything. We had no power. No real power, anyway.”

  “We have it now,” Justin said quietly.

  Tom met his eyes. An unspoken understanding passed between them. It was true: Justin Thornhill had been an orphan boy just like the rest of them. He had also been their fearless leader. “What would you like me to do?”

  “Find him,” Justin said.

  Neville nodded. “Find him
, Tom.”

  Tom exhaled. “Well. Having just unearthed a missing earl, how difficult can it be to locate one larcenous former orphan?”

  Very difficult, he suspected.

  And probably impossible.

  Tom arrived back in London the following day. There hadn’t been any point in lingering at Greyfriar’s Abbey. He was in no mood for festivities, and after speaking with Justin and Neville, it was plain that Tom would be of more use to them at his offices than if he remained in Devon halfheartedly celebrating the Earl of Castleton’s return to the bosom of his family.

  After depositing his luggage at his rooms, he hailed a hansom to take him to Fleet Street. As he climbed the steps to the front door of his office, he saw a light flickering in the second-floor window.

  What the devil?

  It was Sunday. Keane would be at church with his family, as was his habit. Keane’s clerk was, presumably, occupied in a similar manner. No one else had a key—not even the elderly charwoman who cleaned for them.

  Tom unlocked the door and entered, bounding up the stairs to his office to find…

  Josiah Fothergill hunched over his desk.

  “Ah, Finchley. You’ve returned at last. Have a look at the wording I’ve used here and tell me what you think of it.” Fothergill extended a paper to Tom, the ink on it still glistening wet.

  Tom took it carefully between his gloved fingers. “What are you doing here?”

  “Your job. Precisely what it is you should be doing—and would be doing had you not followed some auburn-haired female all the way to India. You haven’t married the girl, have you? But of course you haven’t. If you had, you wouldn’t be here of a Sunday morning.”

  “There’s no need for you to be here, either. I have no open cases at the moment.”

  “No?” Fothergill motioned to the paper. “Read the third paragraph, if you please.”

  Tom skimmed it. When he’d finished, his gaze jolted back to Fothergill’s face. “What is this?”

  “Viscount Atwater called on me in Belgrave Square last week. It seems there’s some difficulty with the terms he agreed to with the Earl of Warren.”

  Tom sank down into a chair. Probably the very same chair Jenny had sat in when she called on him in February. It felt like a lifetime ago. “He wants to renegotiate a contract they’ve both already signed?”

  “He wants you to have a talk with Warren. To see if you can convince him to come to more favorable terms. If anyone can do it, you can, my boy. It’s past time you resumed your work. I didn’t invest all of my knowledge in you so you could shirk your duties whenever a handsome woman chances to flit by.”

  Tom ignored the barb. “This case is settled. If it hadn’t been, I’d never have left London.”

  “I believed it so as well. But you know Atwater. He’s a gentleman of many moods.”

  “His moods have no bearing on the legal force of that contract.”

  “The contract notwithstanding, there remain several actions you might take to reshape the outcome of the case to his satisfaction.”

  Tom was familiar with the sort of actions Fothergill was referencing. He wanted him to apply pressure on Warren, just as Tom had done before. To make every other aspect of Warren’s life a legal nightmare until such time as he capitulated to Atwater’s demands. “Undoubtedly, but I have no desire to re-litigate the matter.”

  “Your desire is of little concern. It’s your client who—”

  “Atwater will never be satisfied. I’ve long begun to think it isn’t the land he wants, but Warren’s complete destruction.”

  Fothergill regarded Tom with an enigmatic stare. His face had grown more cadaver-like in the past three months. He must have lost two stone at least. A reasonable man in his position would have taken to his bed. But Fothergill had never been reasonable—not when it came to his practice.

  “It won’t be at my hand,” Tom said. “Not the destruction of Warren. Not the destruction of anyone who doesn’t deserve it.”

  “You presume to know who deserves what and when?”

  “No. But I have a mind to direct my talents to worthier clients—and to setting right injustices more grievous than the bad blood between two aging noblemen intent on getting the better of each other.”

  “Few in the legal profession have the luxury of representing worthy clients and those who do are invariably underpaid—or not paid at all. Is this really the course you’d choose for yourself, Finchley? I can’t think it advisable. Especially not if you intend to marry and start a family.”

  An image of Jenny Holloway smiling up at him in the clearing on Senchal Ridge sprang fully formed into Tom’s mind. His chest tightened on a rush of bitter anguish. “I have no plans to marry, as I’m sure you’re well aware.”

  “Hmm. And what about your natural mother? The shrill female who makes so many demands on your purse.”

  “What about her?”

  “She’s called here twice in your absence. Once inflicting herself on poor Keane. And the second time…inflicting herself on me.”

  Tom’s eyes narrowed. “What did you say to her?”

  “I sent her off, naturally, in terms she could understand.” Fothergill paused before adding, “You’re too softhearted with women, my boy.”

  “She’s not just any woman.”

  “No, indeed.” Fothergill set down his quill pen and leaned back in his chair. “She’s the low creature who abandoned you as an infant. Who left you in the custody of individuals even lower than herself. As I understand it, she won’t stoop to acknowledge you, though she certainly has no qualms about accepting your money. Is this the sort of woman to whom you owe filial loyalty?”

  “She’s my mother.”

  “And so you’re content to let her get the better of you?”

  “Myra Culpepper has never gotten the better of me.” Tom’s voice was cold. “I know her for exactly who and what she is. What I feel for isn’t filial loyalty. It’s pity.”

  “Pity?”

  “Tempered by compassion.”

  “Because you’re her son.”

  “No.” Tom was rather amazed Fothergill didn’t understand. “I’ve never been her son. I’ve been yours. But no longer. Not if it means I must constantly prove myself to you by destroying anyone who stands at odds to one of our clients.”

  Fothergill’s lips thinned. He shuffled the stack of papers on the desk and screwed the cap back on the inkwell. “You have nothing more to prove to me. If you wish to marry your Miss Holloway—”

  “It’s not about her. It’s about my conscience.”

  “A costly thing, a conscience.”

  “Perhaps it is,” Tom said. “But I’ve lately found that I can no longer do without one.”

  Cairo, Egypt

  July, 1860

  Jenny stood, as still as a statue, atop the low footstool in her parlor as Ahmad knelt at her feet, pinning the hem of her new riding habit. It was one of his latest creations. An elegantly tailored costume of deep green with an exceedingly tight bodice, close-fitting sleeves, and skirts that spilled down in a sweeping fall of brilliantly cut fabric.

  “I thought your skill only ran to fashionable dresses,” she said. “But it’s the riding habits on which you truly excel. I don’t know how you manage to make them look so flattering.”

  Ahmad glanced up at her. “When I was a boy in Delhi, I was apprenticed to a tailor.”

  “Making men’s clothing?”

  “Cutting and sewing the patterns for coats, vests, and trousers. A lady’s habit isn’t so different.”

  She admired the velvet cuffs at her wrists. They were complemented by a matching velvet collar. “Lady Helena claims that the best women’s riding costumes in London are made by gentlemen tailors. Though I can’t say I’ve ever noticed the difference. Until today, one habit looked very much like anoth
er to me.”

  “If I made riding habits for the ladies of London, everyone would notice them.”

  Jenny laughed. “No one could accuse you of having false modesty, could they?” She smoothed a hand over her fitted bodice. “Nor why should you? You’ve a rare talent, Ahmad. Between you and Mira, I suspect I may be well on my way to becoming one of the best-dressed ladies in Cairo.”

  Ahmad only smiled as he continued his work. When it came to dressmaking, he was incredibly single-minded.

  She gazed out the window into her courtyard. The limestone house she’d taken on lease was located near Esbekiya Gardens, in the modern part of the city, where most Europeans tended to dwell. Staffed with a cook, housekeeper, and groundskeeper, it had been one of the houses Tom recommended to her on his last night in Egypt.

  Jenny liked to imagine him walking through the rooms, his blue eyes drifting over the carpets and furnishings as he scribbled particulars in his notebook.

  She imagined Tom rather too much, truth be told.

  After he’d gone, she’d spent nearly two days in bed at Shepheard’s Hotel, burying her face in her pillow to hide the sounds of her weeping from Mira. It had taken a herculean effort to haul herself out of bed, to bathe and dress and begin her life.

  And it wasn’t a bad life. Far from it. She’d made friends in Cairo, both of the Cairene women and the Europeans. She volunteered at the local native hospital and school. She was even learning to drive a donkey cart.

  It was independence of a kind she’d never had before.

  After a month in residence, she felt more herself—more certain of what she was capable of.

  It was only during moments alone that her mind settled on Tom. Memories of him and the time they’d spent together punctuated her days. She missed him dreadfully. It was an ache that never fully went away. She often longed to ask his advice. And many a regretful moment passed when she wished she could turn to him and share the joy she felt, whether at seeing an antiquity in the museum or even at finding some particularly interesting trinket in the bazaar.

  Sometimes at night, she lay awake in her room, wondering where he was and what he was doing. Wondering if he’d forgotten her.