Page 54 of The Gentlewoman Companion

Did he want to connect himself to someone who may have done something truly wrong? Was she something other than what she seemed? Was she like his father, hiding shame behind charm and good humor? His chest turned cold. He wanted to believe she was the fresh innocent she appeared but could not bear it if⁠—

“Have you considered what you will do about that letter you found?” Louisa asked.

The letter? What—of course. “I wrote to the woman. Sarah.”

Beside him, he felt Louisa straighten. “That was noble.”

At another time, her compliment would have warmed him. Now, it seemed the woman at his side was out of reach, made distant by some secret she would not share.

That wasn’t it. She had no obligation to tell him anything, nor did he wish to know her every mistake. He’d made plenty of his own. Everyone had. Rather, the pull her past had on her drove a wedge between them. They could not become closer until she resolved it.

He cleared his throat. “I’m convinced your instinct to help them was correct. I received a letter from Sarah’s daughter Margaret, who is presumably my half-sister, informing me that the mother has passed, and the children do not need my help.”

“I suppose you won’t think of them anymore?”

“Do you believe that the best course of action?” He suspected she did not.

“You might send someone to look in on them.”

“I thought of that but don’t wish to involve anyone in such sensitive affairs. I will go and determine what is to be done.”

“You have a strict sense of duty, of right and wrong.”

“No more than you.”

“I am far more likely to allow impulse to guide me headlong into trouble.” She shifted and turned to watch the countryside.

He sensed she was alluding to what she had called her misdeed, not simply her tendency to jump horses on a whim or paddle into a pond during a downpour. Ought he to press her on the matter?

“Sheep!” she said. “I know it’s a common sight, but nothing is as charming as an emerald hill dotted in white. Oh, and poppies! So late in the season. James—er, Lord Halverton, look!”

He smiled at her slip up. “Call me James. Perhaps I am foolish, but the title Lord Halverton is a mantle I always expected to wear proudly. I don’t want it anymore.”

She made a sound as one examining a wound and adjusted the reins into one hand. Her fingers wrapped around his wrist and gripped. Understanding radiated from her touch. He settled his hand over hers, and for a long moment they rolled forward, their gloves entwined in mutual compassion. The gesture did not change the imbalance in their friendship, but perhaps with time she would grow to trust him.

The five-day journey worked to diminish some of the discomfort between himself and Louisa. When she stilled or silenced at unexpected moments, he held his tongue. Though her occasional reserve tasted bitter, he continued to seek her out, offering his company as she drove Nimbus.

They’d arrived in London only the day before. James had spent the morning and half the afternoon pacing the townhome’s study in Grosvenor Square until Louisa slipped in and told him to get on with it before he wore a hole in the flooring. He knew she was telling him to find Margaret and was also aware that without her urging, he may never have found the courage.

He told his mother he had business that evening and stepped into London. The woman who’d thrown flowers at him the last time he had been in town seemed to lurk on every corner, symbolic of all he did not understand, representing a class of people he had almost never considered—a galling insight to his own lack of empathy. Until he’d seen Margaret’s competent but unpracticed scrawl, words written by his own flesh and blood in suspicion and contempt, the lower classes had existed only in abstract.

James left behind respectable neighborhoods and crossed into East London. He dodged begging children, drunks, and dogs through a narrow street thick with the smell of boiled cabbage and humans packed together. A baby, swaddled in filthy rags, cried out. His mother, sitting behind a cart of wilted vegetables, shushed him with her breast. Like dirty flags, grey laundry flapped from poles. A toddler of about three huddled, asleep, against the side of a building.

He stopped in front of number 27 Rosemary Lane and pulled the letter from his pocket, double checking the address. He descended three steps, then knocked. A cart rumbled down the road, deafening him to any noise that might come from inside the house. He counted to twenty and knocked again.

The door swung open, then stopped short, only partially revealing the young lady who stared back with bronze-colored eyes just like his father’s. Her curly auburn hair, a trait she must have inherited from her mother, escaped its pins, but her straight nose, decided chin, and long fingers resembled his own.

“Margaret Cooper.” He didn’t need to ask.

She flinched. “I know who you are, my lord. We want nothing from you.”

He stuck his foot into the path of the closing door. “Please. Can I speak with you?” He pushed against the door and met resistance but no reply. “I will return tomorrow and the next day and the next. I will pester you until we come to an arrangement.”

Her fingertips pressed white against the door. She stuck her head out and scanned the street. “Your sort always gets what they want.” She gestured for him to enter.

An empty hearth, three chairs scattered on a floor of swept earth, a roll of blankets shoved into a corner, and a single candle burning on a rickety table made up the entirety of the cramped space. A small window at level with his head admitted a dusty shaft of light, and a door ahead of him led elsewhere—likely a bedroom that was just as small. Was the boy in there? The apartment was cool and would be freezing in a month.

Margaret nodded at a rattan chair and turned her back to him before sitting. She pulled a white shirt from a basket and began to stitch, hunching near the candle’s light.