Chapter 5 #3
“Before we come to any final arrangement, you should consult Mr. Peters, and I will review what documents my solicitors have regarding the property. For the present, I propose that we allow the whole matter to wait until after the New Year. That’s less than a fortnight, and that fortnight, according to every earthly authority, is supposed to be merry and bright.
I am newly returned from years of travel.
I need to get my bearings, and for that matter, I don’t even have my luggage yet. ”
“You propose that we do nothing?” The notion had so much seductive appeal, Hope was instantly skeptical of it. “We simply rub along, boarder and landlady, for the duration of the holidays?”
“Yes, more or less. I have proven that I can be useful to the household. Counsel for the defense points to my expert shoveling skills and my unique ability to impersonate both a wolf and a convincing granny. More to the point, something as significant as the sale of a house or the creation of a mortgage on a house is always well documented. Your Mr. Peters, the bank, somebody has information we both need to resolve ownership of the house.”
“This is my house, Joshua Penrose. My husband paid dearly for it. Too dearly for me to cede the field without a fight.”
He saluted with his empty mug. “This is my house, Hope Burdette. I paid dearly to retrieve it from creditors who would have demolished a fine old building to put up cheap tenements where my legacy stood. Then I paid yet more to bring this place back up to the standards my grandfather set for it. I will not cede the field without a good reason for doing so.”
Hope finished her tea, which had cooled to lukewarm. “You admit that such a reason might exist?”
“I don’t want to.”
“I am determined to go down fighting, if defeat is to be mine. But…” Edwin had been an utter dunderhead where money was concerned and too prideful to allow Hope to manage anything more than her pin money.
“But Edwin could be rackety.” Joshua rose and put the sugar bowl back in the breadbox.
“He might have signed a lease-to-own agreement, which has been voided by your late mortgage payments. We simply don’t know.
I grew a bit rackety myself.” He resumed his seat just as one of the candles on the mantel guttered.
Rackety. Hope and rackety were familiar foes. She did not like the sound of that lease-to-own business at all, and it hadn’t occurred to her that a few late payments might open the door to foreclosure.
The notion of Joshua describing himself as rackety, though…
She patted his hand. “Were you forgetful at times? Weepy for no reason? You couldn’t sleep through the night, but then you’d drag yourself through the day in a fog?
When you finally started feeling a bit more like yourself, everybody treated you as if you were the barmy old auntie who came to supper in her riding habit? ”
Joshua caught her fingers, gave them a squeeze, and let go.
“The uncle who wore his shooting jacket to Sunday services. I tried to be mindful of my business affairs, but I must admit that some document or other might have had less than my full attention. The possibility is remote, but Eric went to his reward, and that… I was not expecting to ever weather that blow.”
The weathering, based on Joshua’s expression, was ongoing. “Eric?”
“My step-son. He preceded his mother in death by twenty-four hours. I never told her he was gone, but I think she knew.”
Of course she’d known, but she’d allowed her husband to spare her the news because that was one of few gifts he could give his fading wife.
“She loved you very much, Joshua, and you loved her and that boy.”
“He was easy to love. They both were.” Said simply, a recitation of facts holding back an ocean of sentiment.
“One day, Maureen was whistling Christmas carols—she was a virtuosic whistler, despite the horrid impropriety of the habit for ladies—and the next, she’d developed a slight cough.
By the time she took to her bed, Eric had a slight cough too.
More than slight. I don’t remember much of the ensuing fortnight, but I remember her lectures. ”
What a hammering fate had delivered to his heart. A cruel disruption of not only life, but of faith in the natural order.
Children were not to precede their parents in death. To think otherwise was to contemplate an unspeakable offense to the heart.
“You remember the love,” Hope said. “The love makes the loss both worse and bearable.” What had any of this to do with deeds and mortgages and solicitors?
Nothing and everything. “I accept your proposal. We will agree to disagree regarding ownership of this house, for now. When the New Year comes, we’ll see what’s to be done. ”
“Because you feel sorry for me? I did not tell you of my loss to elicit pity, Hope.”
His losses. Plural. Another candle guttered.
“When Edwin died, all I could think was that Holly would be next. I’d have to go back to my family, whom I haven’t heard from in years.
No note of condolence, no little card at the holidays.
Then I was caught up with the notion that I might die, and Holly would be consigned to the poorhouse.
Had Mr. Peters not kept matters sorted for me, I’m sure I could have unwittingly signed away this house.
You do not have my pity, Joshua. You have my understanding. ”
He sat back. “I’ll take it and be grateful.
” His relief was evident in the first true smile Hope had seen from him.
“I am your lodger until the New Year. You are my landlady. I propose that, by way of rent, you make me responsible for stocking the larder, and if I can manage a few sacks of coal, I’ll do that as well. ”
Inordinate, unreasonable relief cascaded through Hope, along with a touch of hesitance. With nothing more than a shovel and some ingenuity, Joshua had provided immediate rations for Hope, Holly, and the lot of ragged boys.
If something—or someone—seemed too good to be true… And yet, there was no more good silver left to steal, and the coalhole was nearly empty.
“Shall I make you up a bedroom? We have all the linens and such, and the main apartment is quite comfortable.”
“I slept there for years, and I agree, but coal is dear, and we have little enough of it. Heating the kitchen and the study will tax us sufficiently that I’ll make do with the sofa.
When my luggage arrives, we can pawn some of the contents—I won’t be needing my dancing slippers—and Holly will have her happy Christmas. ”
Ah. He was doing this in part for Holly. Hope respected him for that. “We have a bargain,” she said, extending her hand across the table.
He shook, his smile becoming bashful. “Shall I bank the fire or wash the mugs?”
“You tend to the fire.” Hope rose, fatigue hitting her as a physical heaviness in her limbs. Worry did that, weighted the whole body with doom.
She rinsed out the mugs, dumped the contents of the tea sachets into the hens’ bucket, and resisted the urge to cry.
The holidays had become an ordeal since Edwin’s passing, not that they’d been unfailingly jolly in previous years.
To spend this Yuletide with companionship, with an ally even, was an unlooked-for boon.
Whatever was true about ownership of the house, Joshua Penrose was a decent man, and he’d not see her and Holly turned out without a groat.
He blew out the remaining candles, which left only the banked coals to illuminate the kitchen.
Hope crossed to the hearth, wrapped him in a swift hug, and drew back. “Thank you. An agreement to disagree is eminently sensible. I’ll see you in the morning.”
He bowed slightly in the darkness. “Until morning.”
Hope hurried off to her bedroom, half mortified by her own forwardness and half tempted to repeat it.
Which would not do. At all.