Chapter 8
The letter from Caroline was here.
One of Mr. Banner’s younger sons had brought it—skipping away with a silver penny in hand for his trouble—and Georgie took it into her makeshift art studio and closed the door.
She held it for a long moment, reluctant to break the seal. Opening it would bring this magical time in Kilbythorpe to an end, forcing her back out into the real world.
With a bracing inhale, she broke the seal and unfolded the letter.
Dear Georgiana:
I am so sorry to hear of your dreadful situation. Who would have thought that your father would leave you destitute?
He had not, as far as Georgie knew. Her monies were being held back by her cousin. Had she not made that clear?
My great-aunt Lady Denholm is in need of a companion and I would be pleased to recommend you for the position.
The pay is not much, of course, but you would have no need to worry about your next meal or having a roof over your head.
However, I fear your pets would not be welcome.
Aunt Denholm has several dogs to which she is very attached, and they would not get along.
Georgie’s fist clenched without her volition, crumpling the paper.
She ought to have known any potential employer would never allow her to keep her otters.
She sank onto the chair near the window and looked out at the leaves that were just beginning to turn.
Autumn was approaching and the otters would need to be brought indoors for their own safety.
They certainly were not equipped to survive a harsh winter like the one they had had in Sussex only two years ago.
She would have to leave them here. With Peter.
I will have to leave Peter.
Her heart clenched as she cursed her own recklessness in accepting his hospitality. She had thought herself in control of her own feelings, told herself she could leave without a second thought, but she had been lying to herself just as much as she had lied to Peter.
She was in love with him. All unknowing, her feelings towards him—her admiration of his intellect, her appreciation of the gentle care he gave the people whose well-being he was responsible for, even his increasing affection for her otters—had grown from friendship to love.
The letter dropped from her hand onto the table as she buried her face in her palms, tears rising in her throat as she tried to swallow them back down.
He must never know, of course. There would be a terrible scandal if it came out that a bachelor clergyman had been living with an unmarried young woman for weeks on end. No one would ever believe it had been completely innocent on both their parts, not with the current reputation of the Avondales.
She had to leave before her masquerade was revealed. For his own good.
Even if it ripped out her own heart.
Late that afternoon, Peter tapped on the door of the small drawing room and opened it to see Morley set down his paintbrush and stretch.
Another half-completed watercolor was on the table in front of him, now angled to catch the best light from the windows.
A crumpled piece of paper—a letter?—was pushed away.
Peter gave it a curious glance before he spoke.
“I have not seen you since breakfast this morning. Would you like to go for a walk?”
“Yes, of course,” Morley said. “I’m ready for a break.” With seeming nonchalance, he moved the painting to half-conceal the letter and got to his feet.
Morley fetched his hat from the front hallway and they strode off across the meadow. Peter pointed to a small hill in the distance, topped by a tree whose leaves were beginning to turn golden.
“Is it too far?”
“No,” Morley said. “I think it’s just about right.”
They talked of small things as they walked—the news of the parish, Morley’s progress on his sermon notes—but Peter savored having the company.
After the previous evening’s fiasco, he had decided to enjoy having a companion while he could rather than pressing Morley to share his secrets.
He had not seen much of Morley today, and the other man seemed tense this afternoon.
Peter frowned to himself. If he needed to apologize for his manipulations, he was fully prepared to do so.
Peter noticed that Morley seemed to be uncharacteristically dawdling as they walked. “Is the distance too far?”
“No, not at all,” Morley replied. “The countryside is beautiful here.”
“Yes, it is.”
“I have found a position,” Morley blurted, and Peter’s own steps faltered for a moment.
“That’s wonderful.” The words sounded hollow even to his own ears. “I am… very happy for you.”
“Thank you.” Morley looked ahead, gaze focused on the small rise as they approached it.
“May I ask where it is?”
“Bath. I am to be a… private secretary.”
Peter nodded. “I wish you all the best, of course.”
“Thank you.”
This was the most stilted conversation they had had since Morley’s arrival.
They reached the tree and sat down in the shade of it, leaning their backs against the trunk.
The wolds spread out before them, stretching to the horizon in a series of gentle hills and valleys dotted with sheep and rolls of hay.
In the distance, the harvest was progressing, crews of men working hard to bring in the rest of the crops.
“Will you stay for the harvest festival at Michaelmas?”
Morley was still not looking at him, instead gazing out across the countryside, knees drawn to his chest with his arms wrapped around them. “I cannot. They are expecting me in Bath as soon as may be.”
“I see.” There was something very peculiar at hand, but Peter was unable to decide what it was. “And what of your otters?”
Morley drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and looked at Peter at last. His fine eyes brimmed with tears, and once again Peter was irresistibly reminded of the night sky. He felt a strange urge to reach out and embrace Morley to comfort him.
“I must ask… I need to ask… could you keep them?”
“Certainly,” Peter said slowly. “If you wish it, of course.”
Morley looked away again. “I do not wish it,” he said harshly. “I wish I could keep them, and stay here. But I cannot.”
“If you are qualified to do secretarial work, I could ask my brother the duke if he has space for you. That would allow you to stay, though of course you would move up to the manor.” The more Peter thought of this solution, the more it pleased him.
“Paul is very much a lover of animals and would likely be fascinated to learn all about your otters when he is in residence.”
Morley laughed, a surprisingly mordant sound.
“I appreciate your courtesy, Lord Peter,” he said formally. “I very much do. But it’s best for both of us for me to leave.”
He turned then, to look straight at Peter, and a little shock went between them like lightning. Like nothing Peter had ever experienced, and certainly not with another man. After a long moment, Morley finally turned away.
“I must return to the house and begin packing. But I wanted to let you know as soon as I was ready.”
“Thank you,” Peter said. His emotions roiled as he tried to quantify this new feeling. Perhaps it was… was for the best for Morley to leave, but the way his stomach lurched at the thought put the lie to it.
Morley hesitated for one more moment, then got to his feet. “Goodbye.”
“Goodbye,” Peter said, even as every instinct in him urged him to stop Morley, to argue, to find another way. But he could not see one. Not that, and still be wholeheartedly dedicated to the Church.
As he watched Morley walk away, Peter was suddenly struck by the way he moved. He had never seen Morley walk before, not for so long a distance.
There was something quite… feminine about Morley’s gait. And the way he gestured. And laughed. And spoke. Peter had at first put it down to Morley being barely out of adolescence, but he had never reconsidered once he realized Morley was older than he had first thought.
He thought of what Mrs. Clarke had said the previous evening. Something she had sensed about Morley, but found too fantastical to speak aloud until she thought it over.
What if Morley was not a man at all?
Peter’s head began to spin. If Morley was really a woman, that would be even more disastrous.
They had been living together under one roof for weeks now, completely unchaperoned.
The scandal would be ruinous for the entire family if word got out, and his mother would have fodder for her angry letters for the next twenty years.
He ought to be angry at being lied to for weeks on end, and perhaps a part of him was.
But if it was true… there was another solution. One that would prevent Morley—or whatever her name was—from walking out of his life.
The tears began before Georgie could get even halfway down the hill.
She was aware Peter was watching her go, likely with that same stunned expression on his face, but she could not risk a look back.
If she did, she knew she would run back up the hill, throw herself into his arms, and confess all, and that would be even worse, because what could possibly come of such a confession?
She bit her lip and set her jaw. No. This was the only way to save him from scandal.
Georgie skirted around the meadow to the kitchen door, staying out of sight of the otters’ enclosure. It ripped her heart out a second time to leave them behind, but it was the only sensible thing to do.
Not that she had acted sensibly in any of this.
She crept up the stairs to her room, and closed and locked the door behind herself before sinking onto the edge of the bed. Her knees were still shaking, as were her hands. She twined them together to try and still them.
She must not weep. Peter must never know how difficult this was for her, or how she felt about him. She must fully disappear from his life and never look back.
But it was hard. It was the hardest thing she’d ever done.
She sat there for a very long time, unmoving, barely aware of the dimming light outside. Breathing deeply as she tried to calm herself.