AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Thirty-Three
This time, Thomas took his recovery seriously.
He remained in bed, only rising to wash or relieve himself, for a full week. He took frequent naps. He did not aggravate his condition.
Yes, he did have his writing utensils brought to him in his quarters, so that he might at the very least delegate some of his foreign tasks through correspondence.
But other than that, Thomas was the perfect patient. His headache ceased. His bruises faded. His side quit screaming.
At the end of seven days’ time, Henry Jones, the physician who had cared for him in the immediate aftermath of the attack, reappeared to tend to his wounds once more. Gerard had thought it might behoove them to ask after a physician in closer proximity to Elvington Manor, but Thomas insisted on Henry, determined not to let him walk away without proper payment this time, plus a little extra.
“You seem to be healing up well,” Henry said, sitting back when his examination was concluded. “While I would still encourage you to take things easy, you should be able to begin returning to some form of normalcy.”
What is normal, anymore?Thomas wondered to himself.
“Thank you, Henry,” Thomas said out loud instead. “I truly do not know where I would be without you.”
“Six feet under, most likely,” Henry joked, but then a look of insecurity came over him, and he averted his eyes.
Thomas shook his head. He could guess what this was about—Henry was a physician who typically worked with more common folk. He was unused to tending to the likes of a duke.
Yet Thomas felt far more at ease with Henry than he did with any of the other medical professionals who associated with theton. He was more straightforward; easy to talk to.
Other than Gerard, who did Thomas have in his life like that now?
“Do not worry yourself,” Thomas insisted, wishing he could find some way to truly, properly thank this man. “Believe me, such jests are in short supply here on my end of town. I’m grateful to have a conversation with a little more spark to it.”
Inside, Thomas thought,Lady Evelina would take to Henry rather fondly, wouldn’t she?
But for the majority of the week, he’d managed to avoid thinking too deeply about Lady Evelina, and the rift that was now between them. It made little sense to go back on that now, not when he had only just been deemed fit to return to work.
“Thank you, Your Grace,” said Henry, with a little incline of his head. “Should your condition backslide to any degree, you will know where to find me.”
With that, the butler showed Henry out. Thomas remained in his room for some time longer, staring at the ceiling, taking internal stock of his waning injuries. After a long while, he sighed, and rose.
The study was exactly as he had left it.
Books strewn about the floor. Papers crumpled and stepped on, tossed this way and that. Even the chair at the desk had been overturned. Had Thomas truly been in such a fit, when he came back here from Alderleaf Manor and collapsed?
“I will re-organize everything,” Gerard had offered, two days into Thomas’ bedrest. “In all honestly, I likely know where the materials go more so than you would.”
Though Gerard had not intended it in such a way, something inside Thomas smarted at the comment.
“That’s quite all right,” he said. “I shall be up and about in no time. You have your own business to attend to. After all, I’m the one who created the mess. I should be the one to clean it up.”
Now, upon seeing the true level of catastrophe the study had been left in, Thomas was regretting not taking Gerard up on his offer. If only he could pawn the cleaning off on the household staff…but no. They would not be able to make sense of which-records-go-where than a random person off the street.
With a sigh, Thomas knelt and set about his task.
He gathered up papers into groups by year, and then went back into those and separated them by month. He learned things about the business his grandfather had kept. He even learned things about the affairs of his great-grandfather.
Then, of course, were the papers and accountings written in Father’s confident hand, which were taken over by Gerard’s in the month following his demise.
Thomas did not spend too great of a time looking over those.
The light of the day was turning golden outside the window when Thomas came across something unexpected—a little box, tucked away behind a set of files from the year before Gerard was born, tied with a blue ribbon.
It did not look like the sort of thing that should be hidden away in the study. Curious, Thomas pulled the little box from its place and gingerly untied the ribbon. He lifted the lid.
