All's Fair in Love and War

Chapter Eleven

“This morning we are going to work on fractions—one of my absolute favorite mathematical topics.” As Georgie had been making headway with their daily routine, she saw no reason to change the children’s schedule for their second week, even with the captain gone. Getting the mathematics done first thing got it out of the way and with Felix’s combative attitude toward it, felt prudent.

Once that chore was done, they would move to something all the children enjoyed—history. Made all the better by the fact that they had reached William the Conqueror in their chronology of notable kings and queens of England, and that tyrant was a fun one to teach. There was blood and guts and gore galore from the beginning of the fellow’s reign to the end. And then there were all the oppressive castles he built. Who didn’t want to learn about castles? Or sieges and rebellions?

And perhaps, simply to prove the point to the captain that chaining the children to their desks for hours on end every day wasn’t the best way to encourage them to learn, she would teach the history outside. Set them all free of this classroom for an hour or more despite knowing that he wouldn’t be happy about it. If, by his own admission, Mrs. Rigsby did not have to suffer his interference in her kitchen because she had put her foot down, then surely Georgie could do the same? Especially as he was currently miles away in Portsmouth. She only had till August, after all, to prove all her untested theories about education correct. She had certainly waited long enough for the opportunity, so it seemed a shame to waste it. Especially if the captain’s bark was worse than his bite, as she was increasingly convinced that it was, beneath all his regimented pomposity.

The easily waylaid part of her certainly wanted that to be the case, as he had rather occupied her thoughts since Sunday night’s thunderstorm. So much that it had taken over an hour to plan this one lesson alone. It didn’t help that she’d been having vivid dreams involving a dimly lit but homely kitchen, damp clothes drying before the fire while she warmed the naked captain up in the most improper way. Dreams that felt so real she had awoken breathless and flustered this morning. That was most unlike her. She blamed that scandalous wet shirt, his deep, silken whispers, and the potent finger brush, as clearly those three things combined in such quick succession had done wonders to scramble her wits.

And everyone knew that the night played tricks on the mind, especially when Lottie’s improper suggestion about Georgie using her wiles had also been so fresh in it. She had also never been so intimately alone with a man, so was it any wonder her tangled thoughts had run together and had given her imagination nonsensical romantic ideas since?

It really all had little to do with him.

When Georgie allowed a man to properly scramble her wits, she was resolute that it would not be a nitpicking and pompous military man.

No, indeed! She’d had enough of those to last a lifetime.

Two lifetimes!

Although why she was compelled to keep pondering it at all was a mystery.

It wasn’t as if a handsome, wealthy, eligible, ambitious officer of the crown would even think to look at a lowly, stumpy, orange-haired temporary governess as anything but what she was.

Thank goodness.

And there she went again, thinking of him when she was supposed to be teaching the children maths. “Can anyone tell me what a fraction is?”

“Urgh.” Felix displayed his disapproval by lolling back in his chair. “Who cares.”

Georgie smiled as she rolled her eyes at Marianne, expecting his sister to roll hers right back as had quickly become their habit whenever Felix complained about doing any sums. Except she didn’t. Marianne huffed too.

“For once I agree with Felix. It is too nice a day to waste on dreary fractions. I think we should put on a play instead.”

“Yes! Let’s!” Little Grace bounced in her seat so fast she almost fell off it. “Can I play a princess?”

“No.” Marianne did not even bat an eye. “I am always the princess because I can sing and dance like one, but you can be a fairy.”

“Urgh.” Felix again, sliding down the chair. “I think I’d prefer fractions.”

“That is just as well because fractions are what we are doing.” Georgie handed out the diagrams of circles that she had prepared, all with a dot to mark the center. Then she gestured at the two separate blocks of fractions written on the board. Grace would work on the top to find the half, then the quarters. Marianne and Felix would do the same but would continue to measure out the eighths and the sixteenths. Once that was done, the eldest two would use their diagrams to learn to add the fractions together while the youngest used hers to find and shade in three quarters.

“A fraction is what we call a segment or part of a whole—”

“Urgh!” Felix’s head hit the desk this time. “I really can’t be bothered with mathematics again. It really is a pointless waste of my time.” Assuming that she couldn’t see, his feet nudged the already sleeping Norbert beneath his desk to encourage the dog to distract him. Delighted, the big dog jumped up, stretched, and began to furiously wag his tail as he waited to see what fun his manipulative young master had in store.

Wise to that trick, Georgie retrieved a chunk of carrot from her desk and called his name, wiggling it. As he loved carrots almost as much as sausages, the dog instantly headed her way, then sat obediently at her feet as he awaited it. “Good boy, Norbert… now lie down.” She pointed to the floor beside her desk and he collapsed there, his big brown eyes transfixed on the drawer where he now knew the carrots lived in case another chunk was forthcoming.

“If you look at the diagrams on your desks and imagine that the circles are apple pies that need to be sliced ready for a tea party—”

“I don’t feel well.” Looking in the finest of fettles, Marianne suddenly stood. “May I be excused so that I can go and lie down?”

“No.” Georgie folded her arms to reiterate how unconvinced she was. “Sit back down and stop wasting everyone’s time.” Then, because all three of them were behaving oddly, she shook her head. “What on earth is the matter with you all today? I’ve never seen you all so distracted so early in the day.”

“I am going to be sick.” Rather than comply with Georgie’s instruction, the girl folded her arms too, but across her stomach, then feigned a few fairly convincing gagging motions to add credence to her lie. “The room is spinning.” That was where the performance failed, as Marianne was overacting now for all she was worth. “I might even faint too if I don’t lie down soon, Miss Rowe.” The subsequent swaying would have been comical if Georgie hadn’t been so irritated by the blatant attempt at sabotage. She was almost as irritated by that as she was by her unpalatable, imagined, intimate, and amorous nocturnal surrender to the captain—of all people.

Drat that damp shirt!

“Some fresh air would help.” Felix bounded to the French doors, and with no whiff of any additional carrot to keep him where he was, Norbert bounced beside him as the boy wrestled with the lock. The second it opened, his theatrical sister collapsed in a graceful heap on the floor, and believing it—or in cahoots with it—Grace flew out of her seat to fuss over her.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake!” Georgie’s fists made their way to her hips as she gave them all her best schoolmistress’s stare. “Do you all think that I was born yesterday?” As Felix already had one foot out of the door and Norbert was prancing about on the terrace in readiness, she marched toward them and yanked the doors closed with the dog on the other side of them. “Go sit down this second, Felix.” Her pointed finger brooked no argument, but still he dragged his feet as he belligerently did as he was told. “And you can get up, too, Marianne. I am well aware that you are playacting and I am not the least bit impressed by it.”

Marianne remained prostrate, her eyes too tightly clenched to be in an actual faint, testing Georgie’s mettle. Grace, however, started to waver under her steely teacher’s glare and shook her sister to encourage compliance. When her sibling refused to wake, she glanced up at her with a trembling bottom lip. “I think she might be dead, Miss Rowe.” Within a split second, tears spilled over the little girl’s cheeks, and the moment they did, Felix used it to his advantage.

“Marianne is definitely dead.” He wrapped a brotherly arm around his weeping baby sister’s shoulders. “It’s just us now, Grace. Just you and me. No more Marianne. No Mama. No Papa. Even Uncle Harry has deserted us. We are all alone now.”

That was too much for the sensitive five-year-old to bear and, clearly believing it, the little sniffs turned into full-blown cries as her whole world fell apart. Beyond the glass of the French doors, the now-exiled Norbert followed suit and howled in sympathy for all he was worth.

With her lesson plan now unraveling faster than the sensible bun she had pinned her horrid hair in, it was Georgie’s turn to huff as she gathered Grace into her arms. “Marianne is not dead, darling. Your brother and sister are playing a cruel joke, is all.” While Marianne still did her level best to resemble a corpse on the floor, she turned her most evil eye to Felix. “A very cruel and callous joke indeed, and they should both be heartily ashamed of themselves for upsetting you so.” A crime that could not go unpunished, so she sighed again. This time for herself.

As much as she preferred to spare the rod, Miss P had instilled in her the need to ensure that punishments were fair, fitting, and had to be followed through if you wanted to be taken seriously. Empty threats or deferring the power to their uncle when he returned, or their parents, weakened her stature in both the short term and most especially in the long. Seeing as the two eldest were already testing her authority today, she had to stand firm now or she might as well wave the white flag of surrender and give up all hope of ever being an effectual governess to these three until August. “As penance, they have both lost all playtime privileges for the rest of the day, which means that during the morning break and after luncheon, neither of them will be allowed outside.”

Felix’s sharp intake of breath told her that he considered that a fate worse than death, whereas Marianne remained unmoved, determined to remain as tragically dead as Pyramus in act five of her beloved A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

“Furthermore, should Marianne refuse to be resurrected from the grave in the next ten seconds, then she will also go to bed tonight without any supper for playing such a cruel trick on Grace.” The girl stiffened slightly but still refused to budge. “One… two… three…” Georgie’s expression was purposefully deadpan, her tone simultaneously clipped but calm. “Four… five…”

Felix nudged his sister with his foot. “I think she means it, Marianne.”

“Six… seven… eight…”

“Marianne!” Felix kicked her this time. “Stop!”

“Nine…”

With a Sleeping Beauty–type yawn, the middle Pendleton stretched as if she had been indeed in the deepest of slumbers and cracked open one eye. “Did I pass out?”

Clearly, it was going to be a very long and arduous day.

“Get back in your seat, both of you, and pick up your pens.” Dispassionately, she walked to the door, still carrying the hiccuping Grace, and let Norbert back in. Thankfully, his howling stopped immediately, but sensing the suppressed anger held inside her, rather than bounding in, tail wagging, his scruffy tail hung limp. So did his ears as he edged in, as quiet as a mouse, before he collapsed, contrite, beneath Felix’s desk, staring at Georgie intently over his crossed paws in case she decided to give him a telling off too.

“As I previously stated, a fraction is a smaller portion of a whole…”

Georgie had higher hopes for a better Tuesday after the miserable Monday. After the fake faint in the first lesson, and despite the punishments she had been forced to dole out, the rest of that day had gone rapidly downhill, necessitating both Marianne and Felix to go to bed without supper. Even little Grace lost all her playtime privileges after she decided to run in a rapid circle around the classroom and then accidentally crashed into the wall. They had all clearly made the collective decision to do as little work as possible and to test her boundaries—and test them they had.

But Tuesday was as challenging as Monday had been and the less said about the shambles that had been Wednesday, the better. Now, everyone in the classroom was as miserable as sin—including Georgie. Even Norbert’s plaintive but lackluster howling from the back of the house where he had been banished had lost all hope, as if he didn’t expect this miserable existence they were all trapped in together to get any better. The only consolation was that the captain wasn’t around to inspect the shambles. But as the days stretched since she had last seen him on the landing, the threat of the next inspection when he returned while she was now fighting a war with the children was keeping her up at night. Almost as much as the memory of him in that dratted wet shirt.

This wasn’t the sort of teacher she had always wanted to be, and these dry, uninspiring, desk-bound lessons resembled nothing that she had ever wanted to teach. The children certainly had no enthusiasm for the silent book learning she had been forced to implement to get them to realize that poor behavior would not be rewarded. The written work they had produced in the last three days was at best substandard, at worst nonexistent, and they hadn’t been able to do anything even remotely fun at all as a result. The only positive was that they were halfway through Thursday and, so far, she hadn’t had to lock horns with anyone nor hand out any serious reprimands. Instead, the three Pendletons sat dejected, pens in one hand and depressed chins in the other, willing the interminable day to end.

“Pens down, everybody.” Someone had to break the tense monotony, and it stood to reason that someone was her.

Praying that she could salvage things before the die was cast for all eternity and without the classroom reverting to anarchy again, she smiled at them all for the first time since Felix’s initial rebellion. “I think we can all agree that, so far, this week has been a thoroughly awful affair.” Warily, both Felix and Marianne nodded.

“If it is any consolation, this…” Georgie gestured to the comprehension questions she had written on the board concerning the dry text they had been studying because the excitement of Grimms’ Fairy Tales had proved too distracting. “Is not how I envisaged teaching the three of you the usually joyous subject of English literature. I had planned to do things that were a bit more fun and intended for us to turn ‘Hansel and Gretel’ into a play that we could perform for Simpkins and Mrs. Rigsby…” Marianne’s eyes lit up at that. “But couldn’t because, unfortunately, the three uncooperative Pendletons who have been sitting in this classroom since Monday are not the same three that I taught last week. We did have more fun last week, didn’t we?”

The eldest two nodded again warily while Grace did not know how to respond, so simply shuffled in her seat.

“So what changed?” It was a perfectly reasonable question and one Georgie had pondered incessantly herself—almost as much as she had pondered her peculiar overreaction to the captain. “Why were you able to focus and behave last week and not this week?”

An odd look passed between the eldest two, which both quickly quashed to a shrug.

“Come on now, you are obviously very intelligent children who were, while boisterous, still a delight to teach right up until the end of Friday, and perfectly lovely company on Saturday morning and all day Sunday when we had no lessons. Yet this week you have been… well, frankly… a nightmare. Belligerent, lazy, defiant, disruptive, and so disengaged that every single day has felt like three weeks since, and I think we’d all much prefer to pull out our own teeth than be stuck here together like this in perpetuity.”

Another odd look passed between Felix and Marianne. One that confirmed there was something else afoot than them merely testing her patience.

“Well, I suppose if we cannot have a frank and open conversation about the problem to see how we can all collectively fix it, things shall just have to stay as they are then until your parents return to rescue you from the endless torture of silent book learning…” She turned to wipe the blackboard with a duster, then picked up her chalk. “Back to our dull English comprehension…”

“We don’t have any incentive to behave,” said Marianne, sounding like the most spoiled child who ever lived. “And we are not used to this way of learning.” She gestured around. “We do not have a classroom at home, and I so miss home.”

“An incentive?” She sympathized with the whole classroom argument as this change to their usual routine probably did feel constricting and alien, and she empathized that they were homesick because she missed being at Miss P’s. Being here in this lovely but strange house with all these new people was too reminiscent of her nomadic, rootless childhood to feel comfortable. The loss, albeit temporarily, of the reassuring security of the only home she had known since the age of sixteen was most disconcerting, made more so because she was simultaneously missing the daily presence of an irritating, wholly unsuitable man she did not want to be missing. But still— Georgie had never heard the like.

“Something to make behaving worth our while,” clarified Marianne, as if her solution was a magical wand.

“As in a gift or payment of some sort?”

“Yes, precisely, as that is what we are used to,” said Felix, nodding as if his sister’s explanation for their shoddy behavior was perfectly reasonable. “Uncle Harry forgot to promise us anything to behave this week, so perhaps, as we haven’t seen him, if you did…”

“I see.” Although she didn’t—unless… “Why would you expect a material incentive from either me or your uncle to do anything?”

“Because Uncle Harry always promises something whenever we come to visit.” This also came from Felix. “Always.”

“Right…” And because things were beginning to fall into place, she pulled a thoughtful face as if contemplating the merits of a similar arrangement with them. While she heartily approved of the odd reward here and there for consistent hard work or doing something truly exceptional, she also knew that rewarding the mundane was a slippery slope. “What sorts of incentives work best for Uncle Harry to ensure he gets the best out of you?” She smiled rather than frowned because she wanted to prize more information out of them.

“Well, last week it was ice cream,” said Marianne, unaware that she had just opened Pandora’s box. “As much as we could eat at Gunther’s if we behaved for you all week and didn’t immediately frighten you away—but usually it’s a sixpence or a shilling if it’s just to get us to behave for an afternoon.”

Clearly there was a sliding scale to the bartering system, and they were used to their palms being greased.

“Or some sweets,” added Grace shyly. “Toffees are my favorite.” The last was added hopefully as if she believed Georgie might immediately go out and buy her some for simply mentioning it. “But Felix and Marianne prefer licorice.”

“Do they indeed?” Suddenly all the silent, cryptic looks between the siblings last week made sense. As did their forced compliance. For three children who were not at all used to traditional schooling, they had certainly settled into it fast enough. She should have known that that was too good to be true, when every class of well-behaved pupils at Miss P’s had always tested her boundaries first. Proper respect always came at a cost, after all. “Out of interest, how long has he been incentivizing you?”

“Always,” said Marianne. “He’s always liked to buy us things.”

“We used to get some splendid things when he came back from a long voyage. He brought me back a spear from Africa once.” Felix’s face lit up at the memory as if that dangerous piece of inappropriateness was the best gift he had ever received in his life. “Mama has locked it away though—until I grow up. In case I accidentally kill something with it.” His furrowed brows suggested he thought that a grave injustice.

“He once bought me ballet shoes from the Bolshoi.” Marianne’s expression was dreamy. “I loved those shoes.”

“So much they fell apart,” added Felix with a curled lip of disapproval. “She pirouetted everywhere for six whole months. It was very annoying.”

“I love my dolls’ house.” Grace was eager to share the captain’s largesse too. “Uncle Harry fetched it all the way from Amsterdam. I would have brought it with me here, but it’s too big to travel.”

“Don’t forget all the puppets and the theater.” Marianne again, with a grin at her brother. “We each get a new puppet for every birthday and Christmas. I got a ballerina marionette last Christmas, Grace got a pony that makes clippety-cloppety noises when it moves, and Felix got a spider.”

“It even has hair,” said Grace with a shudder, “so Mama has expressly forbidden him from chasing me with it, as he knows that I don’t like them.”

“What lucky children you are. It sounds as though your uncle has thoroughly spoiled you all for years.” And good gracious, that new knowledge did further unwelcome things to Georgie’s heart. A heart she was determined to keep hardened against him but which still seemed rebelliously determined to quicken for the dratted man instead.

Felix nodded. “Mama always says that it makes Uncle Harry happy to buy us things. She said it was his way of making up for spending so much time far away across the sea and being too busy to come home to visit us in Devon.”

And they had clearly continued to use that generosity against him.

What clever and enterprising little rascals they truly were—and what a well-intentioned but blithering idiot the captain had been. He had the gall to question her untraditional approach to child rearing when his superior “rigor” basically involved out-and-out bribery! If Captain Kincaid had been home now, she’d have marched to his study and given him a piece of her mind for such misguided but flagrant stupidity.

Did the captain not know that if you gave children an inch, they took a mile, and that they would ruthlessly exploit any chink they saw in the armor? Those things did not make these children bad because they were children and that was precisely what children did if they did not know where the boundaries lay. But as an adult, and apparently as a great leader of men, Captain Kincaid should have known better. Instead, thanks to a combination of guilt and most likely exasperation, he had effectively surrendered all the control he had over these tarnished but resourceful little cherubs because they now ruled his roost.

But not on her watch.

“And do you usually receive similar incentives from your parents to do all the things that you should?”

While the two eldest shared another telling look to gauge how to answer that leading and potentially damning question, Grace shook her head emphatically, and they both winced. “No—of course not! Just Uncle Harry.”

“Interesting…” Georgie gave them all a conspiratorial smile before she stared directly at Felix. “Why just Uncle Harry?”

“Because he likes things to be just so and gets all…” He looked to Marianne for the right word to explain it.

“Twitchy.”

“Yes… twitchy when they aren’t.”

The plot thickened—but still she smiled as if she wasn’t absolutely horrified by the manipulative skulduggery she was hearing, even though she was strangely comforted by the sublime new knowledge that even the impeccably, effortlessly perfect captain possessed an Achilles heel. “So, let me guess, you all work together to ensure that he gets as twitchy as possible whenever you visit to reap the rewards?”

“Not always.” Felix shrugged. “Sometimes we make him twitchy without actually trying to.”

“But still reap the rewards regardless, I’ll wager.”

As Felix grinned, Georgie rested her bottom on her desk and folded her arms, allowing her smile to slide from her expression and be replaced by a look of utter disappointment. “Do your parents know that you’ve basically been conspiring against, and then shamelessly blackmailing your poor uncle for years by misbehaving unless he pays you what is tantamount to a bribe?”

The silence was deafening, but she let it stretch until all three of them hung their heads in shame.

“Am I to assume then, that you intended that he hear all about your misbehavior this week from me, or Simpkins, or Mrs. Rigsby, or Polly, so that he would feel obliged to incentivize you a bit more?” Marianne stared at her hands and Felix chewed his bottom lip guiltily while little Grace’s started to quiver. “Are you proud of being so underhanded to a man who so obviously adores you?”

Three bent dark heads shook in unison. But because Miss P had taught her that it was always best to allow the wrongdoers time to contemplate their actions, Georgie waited some more until one of them panicked and broke ranks. Interestingly, the one who broke first was Marianne, but she did so in a way that attempted to mitigate the consequences rather than face them.

“You are right, Miss Rowe. We’ve been bad. Very bad and we are heartily ashamed of ourselves.”

Felix nodded too with mock solemnity. “You should absolutely send us all to bed without any supper again tonight as punishment because we deserve it—and then we can all draw a line under it.” He also clearly feared any potential repercussions from the other adults in the family more than he did from Georgie.

In solidarity with her brother, Marianne wrung her hands, contrite. “We won’t misbehave for you again, Miss Rowe, will we?” The other two nodded. Much too readily. “We have learned our lesson.”

For a split second that she wasn’t proud of, Georgie considered accepting the children’s sworn compliance. It would certainly make her life easier. It would also ensure that the captain would have no cause to dismiss her between now and August, and thus end her concerns about not getting a decent reference at the end of her tenure. However, she dismissed that self-serving thought as fast as it entered her mind, as it was morally wrong. She might not particularly like—correction—particularly want to like or be attracted to her clearly two-faced stickler-for-the-rules employer, but she would not make a bargain with the devil simply because it made her life easier.

What sort of a governess would she be if she willingly allowed these children to learn the lesson that misbehaving and manipulation was acceptable? That taking advantage of the two-faced stickler’s big heart was something they should continue? It went against everything she fundamentally believed about justice and fairness, and her entire educational ethos.

“I am afraid that, unlike your poor uncle, I cannot be blackmailed and will not be incentivizing your good behavior under any circumstances. At least not with material rewards. I am also, frankly, shocked and disappointed that you think such duplicity is acceptable and suspect your mother and father would be too.” They all hung their heads at the mention of their parents, confirming that the way they behaved at home was clearly very different to the way they behaved here. “However…” She would throw them one bone, as they were children and this situation wasn’t entirely their fault. “I also do not think that it is my place to punish you for all the wrongs that you have plainly done to your poor uncle, nor do I think that a punishment from me will right them.”

Felix exhaled with relief first. “Then you won’t tell him?”

She also refused to make any promises that she couldn’t keep. “I prefer to believe that you will all be decent enough to do the right thing and tell him yourself the next time you see him, as I think you all owe him a huge apology. Don’t you?” When they responded with only dejected silence, she pushed them again. “Well, don’t you?”

“Yes, Miss Rowe,” said Felix and Marianne in unison while Grace’s bottom lip trembled again.

“Is he going to punish us?”

Georgie sincerely doubted it in any way near what he should because he was a soft-boiled egg through and through with these tiny terrors, but she shrugged and let them think they were in some jeopardy. “He should, because you have all treated him very ill in the face of his generosity and kindness toward you over the years. A man who goes out of his way to purchase spears and ballet shoes and dolls’ houses and puppets—the absolute most perfect gifts for the three of you—does not deserve to be blackmailed.”

She would leave that final thought to marinate in their consciences until he reappeared. By which time she had high hopes they would feel so wretched about it, their confessions and their apologies would be heartfelt and she wouldn’t have to force them out of them.

“But that is between you and he. In the meantime, I think we can all agree that your atrocious behavior of the last few days cannot continue. So, I propose we declare a truce.” As three pairs of ears pricked up, she clarified with a wag of her finger. “A truce and not a bargain, and I know that you are all too clever to know that there is a distinct difference between those two things.”

Georgie smiled then and unfolded her arms. “The terms of the truce are simple. If you all make the effort to behave as well as I know that you can, from this moment forth, I shall return to teaching the sorts of lessons we all enjoyed last week.” Like Mrs. Rigsby had, it was time Georgie put her foot down. “I am not suggesting that all of those lessons will be fun, of course, because I am your teacher and sometimes I will need to test you to check that you understand things. And sometimes you will have to learn things that you do not particularly want to, or find difficult or boring, because they are important things that all children need to learn. But I will always do my best to make those lessons as engaging as I can, so long as you try your best to be engaged.” There was also a distinct difference between will and try.

“You’ll notice that all I expect is for you to try your best. I do not expect you to be little angels all of the time, for none of us are perfect.” Not even Captain Kincaid, although that splendid revelation shouldn’t buoy her in quite the way it had, nor make him two-fifths more likable than he already was. She offered them her most benevolent smile. “Do you agree to the terms for our armistice?”

Three dark heads nodded as one.

“Then what say you we get out of this stuffy classroom, fetch Norbert, and practice our reading in the garden?”