He nodded. “I have accepted that I have permanently tainted our business dealings. Any final motions you need from my end to sever things cleanly, I am happy to provide.”
“Why bring us to that barrister?” Mr. Templeton-Rath said, clearly still baffled. “You knew it would give the game away if we so much as mentioned your false princess, surely? Not to mention her… her bodyguard?”
“I…” Jasper hesitated, shaking his head. “You know, I think I did know that. I think I wanted it to be over, one way or another. But it had to be me telling you in plain speech, not a revelation from too many uncomfortable coincidences. I created this mess. It is mine to live within.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Templeton-Rath with a sniff. “That is something, at least. You have honor, Mr. Townsend. You just need to trust it, in the future.”
He gave a queasy smile and a nod. “Hopefully, I still have one. I understand if you ensure that I do not.”
“Please,” said Mrs. Templeton-Rath, waving her hand. “I am not vengeful, as a rule, unless someone truly merits it. In the end, no actual harm has been done to anyone other than you yourself, Mr. Townsend, and perhaps that young woman you dragged along with you.”
“And her friend,” he added. “Lem got pulled into this too. I’ve got a lot of atoning to do, I think.”
“Perhaps,” said the older woman. “You understand that the forwarding office is now out of the question, I expect? Yes, I can see that you do. But perhaps in time, we can move past this on a personal level. We do like you, you know. We liked her too, if she is anything like her faux princess.”
“She is much like her,” Jasper confessed with a dry chuckle. “At my request.”
“I did think she seemed quite a bit different between the first and second meeting,” Mr. Templeton-Rath muttered.
“Yes,” his daughter echoed. “Ayo was right.”
Jasper silently was thankful that Miss Ayomide Rath was not present for this revelation, simply for the reason that she had apparently anticipated it.
“Is there anything at all,” he said, “that I can do to make this up to you?”
The Templeton-Raths glanced at each other, seeming to share the question silently between themselves.
“One thing,” said Miss Templeton-Rath, blinking at him. “Tickets.”
“‘Tickets’?” he repeated, baffled.
She nodded. “ToRomeo and Juliet. It is the least you can do.”
“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Templeton-Rath, chuckling. “We already know those two can act like the Devil himself. Now allow us to see it on neutral terms. Capital idea, my dear.”
“Tickets,” Jasper repeated, a bit dazed and numb. “Yes, I can do that.”
“Excellent,” said Mrs. Templeton-Rath, standing and popping her parasol open above her head, like an abrupt, ferocious white mushroom cap. “It is a start. Good day to you, Mr. Townsend.”
“Good day,” he replied.
And he sat there for a good while, watching the three of them until they faded over the horizon.
Chapter Thirty
For something somomentous, Libba was a little affronted at how quickly and dryly everything unfolded from inside the courthouse.
A magistrate flipped through the papers, frowning up a few times at Lem standing over a head taller than his “father,” and then reached for an ink stamp and a quill. “You’re certain he’s yours, then?” was all he said to Harcourt.
“Of course he is,” replied the barrister with an easy smile. “Can’t you see the resemblance?”
The magistrate just blinked a few times and then slapped the stamp onto the pages. “There will be a cursory review of the documents,” he said. “Should take a week or so. Return upon summons with two witnesses to finalize status. Good day.”
And that was it.
That was the whole of it.
She’d barely even moved from her position two steps away from the entry and it was already over.
