Chapter 16
Though having met the solicitor only a time or two in the weeks since Mr. Gleason had recommended him, it was impossible to mistake the seriousness of his tone, though Frederick still felt the need to clarify.
“The money is gone?”
Mr. Gleason nodded. “There is some evidence that the whole venture was a farce, but we cannot say with any certainty that Mr. Howlett’s behavior was dishonest. But whether the drainage scheme was legitimate or not, there isn’t a single penny left, so it is time to discuss your next course of action. ”
“If it was fraud, then surely we can seek compensation or retribution—something to recover a portion of the funds at the very least,” said Frederick, glancing between the pair.
Mr. Moulton’s shoulders drooped. “The courts move slowly, and even if we could prove ill intent and deceit, it would be squeezing blood from a stone. The best we can hope for is that they end up in prison, but it will cost you dearly in time and money.”
Leaning forward, Frederick pinched his nose and considered what to do.
The fire burning in his heart insisted that punishment was better than naught, yet he trusted the pair seated before him, and if they believed it was a lost cause, there was nothing to be done about it.
These troubles were the result of bad investments, and Frederick refused to follow Father’s example by wasting the last of his funds on another.
“It is gone,” he murmured, the words seeping in and dousing the flames. Despite having known this was the likely outcome, the truth sat heavily in his chest, weighing him down with all the terrible imaginings he’d tried to ignore.
“It is,” said Mr. Gleason, though there was a long pause after that statement, as though wishing to say more.
Dropping his hand, Frederick straightened and examined the fellow, but he was exchanging looks with Mr. Moulton.
“Out with it,” said Frederick. “As you said, it is time for us to decide the path forward. Now is the time for honesty.”
The solicitor nodded and lifted the portfolio that had been resting in his lap. Opening it, Mr. Moulton placed several sheets of paper on the desk, turned them toward Frederick and pointed at the figures.
“Though my clerks and I haven’t completed the full catalog of the assets in the house and on the property, I have a decent estimate of the value.”
Mr. Moulton paused, a weightiness filling that brief moment.
“If you sell all the interior assets, you should settle many of the debts. However, the interest alone on the mortgage is half your annual income. Even if we cut your expenditures and find a tenant to let Dunsby Hall, you will not be able to set aside enough funds to pay off the mortgage in your lifetime.”
With a heavy sigh, he added, “It just isn’t possible.”
Frederick stared at the figures, though his eyes did not see them.
Then Mr. Moulton said in a hesitant voice, “However, if you sell it all—the buildings, furniture, art, and even the linens and candlesticks—you will have enough to cover all the debts—from outstanding bills to the mortgage—with a few hundred pounds remaining to help you get resettled.”
“Sell Dunsby Hall?” said Frederick, his mouth supplying the words without thought. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t known it was a possibility, yet his mind reeled as the hypothetical coalesced into reality.
Good gracious. What would become of them?
With his education and position in Leeds, Timothy had the means to provide for himself, however meagerly, and his eldest sisters were happily married, leaving Lucille and Pippa’s dowries safe in their husbands’ keeping, but Father’s recklessness had consumed any money set aside for Mother and Phoebe.
Now, they wouldn’t have even a roof over their heads.
Mr. Gleason leaned forward. “In all honesty, this is far better than I feared. All your debts will be settled, and you will have funds enough to establish yourself in a profession.”
“What profession would that be?” Frederick managed to ask. “I am too old to secure an apprenticeship, and I haven’t a university education, nor do I possess any discernible skills or connections that would allow me to find employment beyond being a master of an estate or a steward.”
Mr. Gleason nodded at that last bit, though his bleak expression was hardly comforting. “Such positions are highly coveted, but I can make inquiries.”
“And I know a banker who is willing to take you on as a clerk,” added Mr. Moulton.
“As it is an introductory position, the pay would be negligible—hardly enough to feed you, let alone keep you housed and clothed—but if we can set aside a few hundred pounds from the sale, the interest should allow you to live frugally.”
Frederick rubbed his forehead. “I know nothing about banking.”
“You are intelligent and have an aptitude for finance. I have no doubt you can learn it,” said Mr. Gleason. “And the profession is respectable—”
Hand falling to the desk with a thud, Frederick scoffed.
“Do you think I care one jot about respectability? One cannot feed one’s family with social standing.
I will do what I need to save us from penury, and if our friends and acquaintances are appalled at the lengths we must go, then they can hang. ”
Mr. Gleason’s brows rose at that, though there was a gleam of appreciation in his eyes.
Meanwhile, Mr. Moulton gave him a half-smile. “Good for you, lad. Do what you must. And do it quickly.”
Nodding, Frederick rose to his feet. “Unless there is anything else we need to discuss, I would like to consider my options before I take action.”
“That is wise, but decide quickly,” said Mr. Gleason. “Midsummer is nearly upon us, so we cannot avoid the quarter interest payment, but we can save you from the next, and Michaelmas will be upon us in the blink of an eye.”
Selling Dunsby Hall was the logical conclusion—he knew it already—yet the steward spoke as though it was a foregone conclusion, and the words struck Frederick hard in his chest. By September, his home would be gone. Everything they owned, sold off.
“Can we make provisions for the staff?” asked Frederick, frowning to himself.
“I do not know if we can guarantee the new master will keep them on, but I would hate to see them suffer for my father’s mistakes.
” Pausing, Frederick considered the steward.
“And you, for that matter. If I sell Dunsby Hall, will you lose your position?”
Mr. Gleason’s brows rose at that. “With a property this fine and in good repair, we will have our pick of buyers. It shouldn’t be difficult to find one who will keep us on, sir. But I thank you for your concern.”
Nodding, Frederick shook their hands and gave a few words of farewell, though he didn’t know what he or they said. But on the threshold, Mr. Gleason paused and retrieved an envelope from his breast pocket.
“I reviewed the records thoroughly, and I am confident these are all the amounts noted in your father’s ledgers that do not appear in mine,” he said, handing it to Frederick.
The fellow lingered a moment, eyes fixed on the paper, his mouth opening and closing as if to speak.
Then with a sigh, Mr. Gleason shook his head and turned on his heel, striding from the study.
Slumping into his seat, Frederick set the envelope on the desk and stared at it for a long moment.
All was quiet, save the faint ticking of the clock upon the mantelpiece and the soft rustle of leaves outside the tall windows.
He sat motionless, staring at the room as though it might offer some hidden escape he had not yet uncovered, and the word “Michaelmas” echoed in his thoughts again and again, dull and unrelenting.
A few months, and his family’s legacy would be given over to a stranger as the Vosses were quietly erased from its halls.
Frederick pressed a hand to his brow as his throat tightened.
Respectability meant little to him, but Mother would not bear the loss with dignity.
The lady welcomed the sympathy that widowhood afforded her, but the world would not see the Vosses’ fall from grace as tragic.
The same neighbors who once dined at their table would shake their heads and whisper of the family’s moral failing and weak stewardship—even labeling it as punishment from On High for some unknown sin.
Mr. Gleason’s envelope stared at him from the desk, poking and prodding him to break the seal. This was the undeniable proof that no correlation existed between his family’s ledgers and the church’s. None whatsoever.
And yet, his palms grew clammy as the silence pressed in on him.
Forcing himself to move, Frederick broke the seal and unfolded the page to see seven neat entries. Retrieving the church’s ledger, he opened it to the first date on Mr. Gleason’s list, and Frederick stared at an entry for “pew repairs.”
His heart sank—but rose again when the sums did not match. A coincidence. That was all. Just as it was a coincidence that none of the entries predated Father’s time as churchwarden. And if the price felt bloated, what did Frederick Voss know of the cost of repairs?
The figures blurred and re-formed, and as his finger slid down the columns, the reassurances grew thinner and thinner as the church’s expenses matched, shilling for shilling, the entries on Mr. Gleason’s list.
Leaning back in his chair, Frederick stared at the far wall, his eyes unfocusing as a question bobbed in his mind, demanding an answer. An honest one. How many coincidences must one see before one accepts the truth?
Yet how did one accept such a strong shift in one’s world?
Father had made terrible financial decisions, but that was a far cry from thieving. And there were no bills to prove the entries in the church’s ledger were anything other than what Father had claimed them to be.
Perhaps Mr. Gleason had misread the ledgers.
And yet the numbers stared back with such calm precision that his stomach churned. The ink seemed darker now, the weight of it holding his gaze fast as Frederick rubbed a hand over his mouth. There had to be an explanation.
Reaching into the drawers, Frederick tore apart the desk, digging into every nook and cranny. There had to be an answer. Something here he’d overlooked. Some solution that would prove his salvation. Though heaven knew what that might be.
“There is more strength in you than you know. You’ll manage in ways I never could. You’ll do just fine, Frederick. Better than I have.”
Father’s final words flitted through his thoughts, spurring him on as he tore through every inch of the desk.
When that uncovered nothing, Frederick turned to the cabinets.
Then the books along the shelves. As he fanned through the pages of his father’s last journal, a letter tumbled free and landed at his feet—with Frederick’s name scrawled across the front in his father’s tidy script.