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Ophelia stiffened, remembering she had rung the bell for the maid. “What has happened? That, I do not know how to put into words.” She shook her head as she backed up from the broken mirror. When she collided with the bed, she sat down on it, feeling the tears threaten.
My father would never have forced me into a marriage.
***
“One week?” Elliot asked, pulling at the cravat around his throat to loosen it. The solicitor nodded slowly.
Sighing, Elliot sat forward, resting his hands on the desk and hiding his face in his palms for a minute. He knew when he had returned to the house this afternoon that the solicitor waiting for him at the door could not have been good news, but he had not expected it to be this bad.
“The death tax is extortionate. I cannot raise the money within one week.” Elliot raised his head. “Please, Mr Withers, you have to find me more time.”
“I wish I could.” The solicitor grimaced. Elliot knew him to be a good man. Already Mr Withers had delayed the payment as much as he could, but probate had to be completed sooner or later. “It has to be paid, Your Grace. If there was anything else I could advise, I would. What of your country estate, can that be sold?”
“I have made enquiries.” Elliot swallowed, feeling such dryness in his mouth that he was beginning to heat up with panic. “It seems no one is in a hurry to buy an estate that needs money spent on repairs, with many tenants to take care of, too.”
“What of this townhouse?”
“I have asked around.” Elliot shifted in his seat. He’d sent out enquiries that week, but it seemed thetonfeared his financial worries were contagious. No one wanted to buy the house of a fallen man. “I do not know what to do.”
Within a week, he’d have to give the house to the bank to pay the loans and the death tax. With it, he’d have to put himself in debtor’s prison.
What then happens to Grace?
The thought of her made Elliot look at the two doors in his study. One led back out into the corridor, but the other led to the adjacent withdrawing room. It was then Elliot noticed the door was not completely closed and there was a shadow in the gap.
Grace, you are listening in, are you not?
“Please, Mr Withers, write down the final sums for me.” Elliot figured it was a way to protect Grace from hearing the exact numbers. Mr Withers did as he asked as Elliot sat back in his chair, listening to it creak as he pulled at his cravat around his neck another time.
He had to think of what to do for Grace’s sake. Once he was in debtor’s prison, she would need a home. There was a chance a distant cousin might take her on, but he feared she would not be well taken care of. His better hope was to ask Harrison if he would consider having her as his ward.
“There, Your Grace. Here are the numbers.”
“Thank you.” Elliot placed the papers far away on his desk, aware out of the corner of his eye that he could see Grace moving in the gap of the door. “In fact, thank you for all your help, Mr Withers. You have been very good to us. Leave this matter with me and I will see what I can do.”
“Of course.” Mr Withers stood to his feet and bowed. In the doorway, he hesitated, not quite leaving right away. “For what it’s worth, Your Grace, I am truly sorry. It’s a sorry situation all around.”
“I appreciate that.” Elliot smiled one last time for the solicitor. After the man parted, he called to the shadow in the doorway, “He’s gone. You can come in now.”
“How did you know I was here?” Grace asked, opening the door wide and stepping in. She was wearing a rather demure dress today. Elliot had not missed how her gowns had become more and more humble. She had offered to sell the finer ones in order to pay off some of their parents’ debts, but as they were secondhand, they hadn’t raised much.
“The power of sight,” Elliot answered her and turned over the papers where the figures were written, hiding them.
“Oh, Elliot, you look so tired.” Grace sighed and sat in the chair the solicitor just vacated. “You are not sleeping well, are you?”
“No, I’m not.” Elliot accepted it was the truth. The last two days since the ball, he had barely slept at all. He had thought of their parents’ debts and how wilfully their parents had left them in this mess. The only comfort he’d had was the occasional scrap of sleep that had been filled with a rather pleasant dream.
He kept seeing the stranger from the ball, the lady who had been readingRomancing the Forestin the library. This time, though, things had played out very differently in that library. The meeting had ended in stolen kisses with the stranger, conjuring such excitement that Elliot found the chance to forget the real world for a minute.
If only it had been real.
Elliot shook himself, returning to real life and forgetting his dreams.
“What are we going to do, Elliot?” Grace asked.
“I do not know.” Elliot opened the drawers in his desk, as if they would offer up some wild idea of what to do. In the bottom drawer, he found something that gave him an answer.
There were a few bank notes left, not many at all. Beside them was a chip from one of the gambling halls in town. Elliot had found a couple of them in these drawers, suggesting their father had been gambling and lost track of what he had won or lost until he couldn’t even tell when he still had tokens in his pocket.
