Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Sophie’s family home was stately and well-maintained.
With perfectly manicured gardens, a drive that would not have deigned to allow a rock out of place, and cream stone with ivy climbing up the north wall, one would never have known it was only built a generation before, when her father’s father had come into an inheritance from a cousin.
Sophie took a bolstering breath, but only the one. There was no point in prolonging this encounter.
Andrew escorted her from the carriage, his knowing eyes watching her closely. “Shall I stay?”
Having support would be rather nice, actually. But she had to face her parents on her own. So, she shook her head.
He stepped back toward the carriage, nodding. “I will return for you in the morning?” The words were half statement, half question.
“If you do not mind?” She’d been hesitant to ask that of him.
“Not in the least. You must be back in London tomorrow afternoon for your position, and I must return for work. We cannot have you late for your first appointment. I will… I will help you find lodging nearby, if that is amenable to your plan?”
Now that the job had been secured for the time being, she could afford that.
And it was clear that Andrew had originally only agreed to her staying with him while understanding her to be married.
Despite their close family relationship, she knew he was a man of honor and that he could not allow himself to stay in the same home as her when she was unattached.
She’d been too desperate before to care overmuch, but could not allow the situation to go on any longer for his sake.
Yet she felt the loss of his camaraderie already. It would be replaced with the likes of Mr. Whitcomb—a sobering thought.
“Thank you.”
He bowed, she curtsied, and they parted.
At the foot of the stairs, Sophie glanced back.
Andrew was not watching her, but rather staring off toward the gardens at the side of the house, wearing the thoughtful yet serious expression she’d seen on his face more than once in the carriage. What did he have on his mind?
It would be better for her to be imagining what her parents had had in their minds five years past. And even better than imagining, would be discovering it for herself. She reached the door, but it opened before she had a chance to knock.
“Miss Sophie,” the butler said, his mouth softening in a smile that brought out more wrinkles than she recalled in the man.
His gray hair had grown white in her absence, and she barely refrained from hugging the dear man.
He had aided her escape from the house numerous times and helped her pilfer sweets more than once growing up.
“Pritchard,” she said with a smile.
He ushered her in. “It is wonderful to have you home, miss.”
Miss. Did he not know of the charade her parents had enacted? Or was it just a slip of the tongue?
“We had no idea you were coming to visit.” He took her bonnet and pelisse, directing a footman out to grab her trunks.
“It is only a small bag,” she corrected. “I intend to stay just tonight. I must be in London tomorrow.”
“Well, we will take you for however long we can. Let me send a servant to find your parents.”
Her chest became inexplicably tight at that, and she nodded. “I will await them in the drawing room.”
She did not have to wait long. In hardly a minute at all, Mother came in, chin high, and Sophie’s father just behind her.
“Sophia,” Mother said. And if Sophie had managed to imagine some warmth in that tone over the course of six years apart, the illusion was now shattered. “You might have told us you were coming.” She kissed Sophie’s cheek, grasping her fingers with cold hands.
“I did not know until last night.” And she’d not wanted them to have time to concoct more lies to cover their previous. She turned to her father. “Father.”
Father only nodded. Theirs had never been a close relationship—Sophie expected it was because Sophie had been the last chance at him gaining an heir, and instead, he’d gotten a third daughter.
But the chill between them had grown insurmountable following her failures in society.
He’d not written her once in her absence, though she had tried every few months for that first year.
She masked the pain of those recollections with well-honed practice.
A maid brought in the tea, and no one even attempted polite conversation. That was well enough—Sophie had a point for being here and had best get to it. “I have come to ask why all my neighbors believe me married.”
She’d expected shock or at least surprise. But Mother simply sipped her tea, and Father met her gaze with only the slightest raised brow. The silence grew uncomfortable, and Sophie itched to end it, but she knew her parents. They would speak eventually.
Sophie counted eighteen ticks of the clock before Mother gave in. “We did you a favor, Sophia.”
A handful of tart responses nearly sprang to her lips, but they would not work with her parents. “Might you explain that?”
Mother pursed her lips then, setting down her cup with hardly a clank of porcelain on porcelain. “You would have been the laughingstock of the town. Everyone kept asking why you had gone, and so it was easiest to let them believe what they would.”
“So, they all simply believed I was married?”
Mother nodded, all regal contentedness.
“And you never encouraged that belief?”
“Oh, certainly, we had to every now and again. But you know how gossip is, these things do spread.” Mother tossed her hand in the air to exhibit her point.
Sophie bit her tongue. Somehow, their placid unconcern over the affair made her blood grow hot.
It was as if they were entirely devoid of emotion, because she’d siphoned it all for herself.
Her hands tightened on her teacup that she’d yet to drink from; the grip tilted it, spilling some of the tea onto the saucer in her lap.
As carefully as she could manage, she moved it to the table beside her, forcing herself not to back down from this conversation.
She was not the same fifteen-year-old daughter that they had tugged this way and that to accomplish their own means.
“I do not believe it,” Sophie said with a calm and serious face, forcing herself to meet Mother’s eyes, then Father’s.
Mother scoffed. Father quirked that brow of his again.
He was balding. It gave her a strange sense of satisfaction to see the way he’d changed the combing of his hair to hide that fact.
To hide his perceived failing. That was what this was—just her parents hiding another failure with a temporary solution.
Because had they truly not thought ahead to what would happen when Sophie inevitably returned unmarried?
It was just like them to choose an easy, quick solution without thought.
Like a new dress to distract from Sophie’s horrid freckles, or turning down an invitation when Sophie had slouched her shoulders one too many times at dinner the night before, not realizing how that would be perceived by the neighborhood.
Even sending her to Grandfather because they couldn’t be bothered with her for a month or two, without thought of how it could alter her future.
Sophie had not always been a failure to them. But it had long since grown hard to remember a time when she’d not been.
She straightened her dress. “I will go ahead and correct everyone, then, if it was all a simple misunderstanding.”
A flash of something—some minor emotion—passed Mother’s eyes. “I have an even better idea, my dear.”
Oh, my dear, was it? That little pet name only came out when Mother was trying to placate her.
“I cannot imagine a better idea than the truth, Mother,” Sophie said, blinking innocently. She could play this little game as well as they. After all, they’d taught her.
Her mother’s mouth twisted with displeasure, but she did not comment on Sophie’s words. “Your sister has a new neighbor. Or will. A man—unattached—is said to have let the house just down the lane. A wealthy man. Titled.”
Just like the man Sophie was reported to have married. Convenient.
“Elizabeth is happy to host you for a month or two, and I am certain we will have you married in earnest by the start of the summer.”
It was Sophie’s turn to scoff. “You wish to cover your lie?” The words tumbled from her mouth before she could check them.
“Do not speak to your mother that way,” Father broke in. How nice of him to finally address her. A reprimand was a fitting introduction into the conversation.
Sophie reined in her temper. But it was growing more difficult.
All these years, she’d expected to see her parents again when she had made something of herself.
Something they could not help but acknowledge as being worthy.
Yet here she was, back in her parents’ drawing room, being reprimanded by the two of them as though she were sixteen again, and an embarrassment to the family name.
“I cannot do as you’ve requested,” she said through rather gritted teeth. “I have accepted a position in London with a prestigious astronomy project. You might have read about them in the paper, Father. The Whitcomb Astronomy Endeavor.”
There was only the slightest loosening around her father’s eyes to indicate he did, in fact, know of the group of which she spoke.
It was not by surprise that she’d chosen a position with an astronomy group—she knew how her father followed that profession.
Knew his fascination as an amateur enthusiast. It was his love for it that originally drew her to take up the study, if only for something to connect her with her father.
He’d not cared, of course. Always brushing aside her discoveries and comments, never taking her seriously.
“Work,” Mother spat, her placid expression fleeing. “You are to work like a common man?”
If only she were a common man, then Mr. Whitcomb might like her better.
Father, too. “There is nothing common about it, Mother. Some of the country’s greatest minds are coming together on this project.
Mr. Whitcomb has already been credited with discovering several minor planets in the past decade. ”
Mother spluttered. “I did not raise you in all the necessary social graces and skills so that you might squander them on a man’s career.” She said the words as if they were a soiled linen she was forced to hold.
“No,” Sophie said flatly. “You raised me to marry a wealthy, titled man. But it seems I’ve already accomplished that.
So, I suppose I ought to move on to loftier goals now.
” She could stand it no longer and shot to her feet.
What had she expected coming here? Answers?
Never. Her parents spoke in half-truths and riddles.
This was a wasted trip, and she could not remain.
“I had hoped to stay a little longer, but I do not know that it would be wise. I will be in London for another week; should you care to write, you can address it to the Whitcomb Endeavor.” She strode from the room, savoring the feel of success that came from being the one to end the conversation.
She had to savor it, because any moment now, she knew the crushing despair that always seemed to blanket her after a familial interaction would descend.
Especially when she’d anticipated this interaction—or something of the sort—for years now.
And it had been an utter disaster. Fustian, and here it was coming already: a desire to bury her face in her hands and weep.
Pritchard was still in the hall, and his mouth was turned down as she approached.
“It seems I will be for London sooner than I’d expected. My bag, if you do not mind?”
He pulled it out from beside the decorative table. He’d not even put it away. Somehow, that made her spirits plummet even further.
“I am sorry, Miss Sophie,” he said in an undertone. “It truly was wonderful to—”
“Sophia!”
Sophie spun, shocked to see her mother striding into the hall. She had followed? Had something Sophie said actually managed to pierce the woman’s conscience?
“Leave us, Pritchard,” Mother demanded.
With a final nod for Sophie, the butler slipped from the hall.
Mother faced her head on, that chin still tilted. Her hair—colored so like Sophie’s—was still perfectly coiffed. No distress on her face despite what Sophie had heard in her tone.
“Yes, Mother?” Would she apologize? Would she ask Sophie to stay?
“You will not tell anyone you are unmarried.”
Sophie’s mouth hung open, but she clamped it shut. “I do not wish to be a part of the lie.”
“Go to London, do your job if you must. But you will not sully the Renard name by… by…” She could not even finish the demand, because what could she say?
A lifetime of submission to her parents warred within her.
Much as she hated to admit it, she had studied harder knowing her parents did not see the worth in her education, and had gained this position as the culmination of her life’s work to prove to them that she was worthy of their notice.
That her intelligence was worth celebrating.
And they did not care.
They had never cared and never would.
“Sully our name by exposing your lie?” she declared, staring her mother down.
A tick jumped in the older woman’s jaw, a fire burning in her eyes, and of a sudden, Sophie did not wish to fight. She had fought her entire life against her parents and was so very tired of it.
“Do not worry, Mother, I will keep your secret for you. For now, at least.” She had to, or she would have no job to go to, and it was incredibly clear now that it was her only option—build her career alone, or… nothing. There was nothing else.
Her eyes burned.
“Goodbye, Mother.”