Page 17 of A Modest Independence

First had been that despicable business with the Earl of Warren. And then Myra Culpepper had arrived unannounced. By the time she’d stormed from his office, Tom was in no frame of mind to be dealing with anyone—least of all Jenny Holloway.

And yet, here he was. Not only calling on her after dark and without the presence of a chaperone, but sitting beside her on the sofa, so close that her skirts pressed against his leg.

It wasn’t very polite. Indeed, it was rather presumptuous of him.

But she was his friend, she’d said.

She was also beautiful and vibrant and unlike any female he’d ever known.

They had only this one night together. Tomorrow she’d be gone, both from England and from his life. Perhaps that was why he felt such an uncommon urge to confide in her. To share something of himself that he’d never yet shared with anyone. “I give her an allowance,” he said abruptly.

Miss Holloway’s eyes met his as she handed him his tea. “Mrs. Culpepper?”

He balanced the porcelain cup and saucer on his knee. “It’s more in the way of a quarterly bribe.”

“What in heaven for?”

“Initially? It was because I wanted to see her. To know her.”

“And she wouldn’t allow that unless you paid her? How very mercenary.”

“Can you blame her? She has no education. No breeding. No opportunity for ready coin in her pocket. Her life has been nothing but hardship.”

“She looked quite well when I saw her.”

“Yes, well…since I entered her life, she’s developed a taste for fine things.” To put it mildly. Myra Culpepper ran through her quarterly allowance like water. Whether she spent any of it on her husband and children, Tom had no notion. All he knew was that her demands for money were increasing of late—as was her vitriol when he refused them.

“How did you find out she was your mother?” Miss Holloway asked.

Tom raised his cup to his lips. The tea within was piping hot and brewed just as he preferred it. Was it happenstance? Or did Miss Holloway remember?

He certainly hadn’t forgotten the afternoons she’d had him to tea while in residence at Half Moon Street last October. Their visits hadn’t been particularly intimate. They’d talked mostly of Justin and Lady Helena. But Tom had looked forward to them. He’d dressed for them, too, making certain that his suits were pressed and his hair combed into meticulous order.

It was the closest he’d ever come to properly courting a girl.

Except that he and Miss Holloway weren’t courting. And she was—by her own admission—many years past girlhood.

“There was an office in the orphanage,” he said. “The fellow who ran the place—a creature by the name of Cheevers—had a sort of filing system there. The door was always locked, but I was a small lad. The smallest among us. One afternoon, Thornhill boosted me in through a crack in the window so that I could rifle through the orphanage records.”

“Your mother was listed there?”

“The admittance records weren’t very meticulous, but yes. Her name was there. Thornhill’s mother as well. They were scullery maids up at the Abbey, back when it was owned by Sir Oswald Bannister.” He hesitated. “Are you familiar with the local history?”

“Only what Helena’s told me.”

Tom wondered how candid Lady Helena had been with her former companion. Had she told Miss Holloway that the late baronet regularly debauched his female servants? That the orphanage had not only been under his patronage but populated with several of his bastards?

“Was Sir Oswald your father, too?” she asked.

Ah. So she did know something of Sir Oswald’s relationship with the orphanage. “No. He’s Thornhill’s father but not mine.”

“Thank goodness for that. I should hate to think—” She broke off. “That is to say, with her being only thirteen.”

“Quite.” Tom refrained from pointing out that such concerns had never stopped Sir Oswald before. “Though I can’t say I’d have minded having Thornhill for a brother.”

“He thinks of you as a brother, regardless.”

“And I him.”