CHAPTER FOUR
“Watch me, Papa! Watch!”
Thistle’s voice rang across the garden as she scaled the old oak tree with the determination of a mountaineer conquering an uncharted peak.
Mel observed from her position on the bench near the rose bushes, her hands folded in her lap and her attention ostensibly on the book she had brought outside for the afternoon’s lesson.
The book remained unopened as there were more interesting things to observe.
Mr. Langford stood beneath the oak tree with his head tilted back, watching Thistle’s ascent with an expression that mingled pride and barely concealed terror.
He had removed his coat at some point during the morning’s activities and rolled his shirtsleeves to the elbow, and he looked nothing like the composed gentleman who had appeared in the study two days ago to inspect his beneficiaries’ progress.
He looked, Mel thought, like a father.
“That’s high enough,” he called up.
“Any higher and you’ll give Mrs. Kemp a fit.”
“Mrs. Kemp isn’t watching!”
“I’m watching, and I’m more important than Mrs. Kemp.”
Thistle paused on her branch and considered this claim with visible scepticism.
“Are you?”
“I fund the household. That makes me the final authority on tree-climbing heights.”
“Miss Grace funds the lessons. Does that make her the final authority on lessons?”
“I fund Miss Grace as well, so technically I’m still the final authority.”
“That’s circular reasoning,” Thistle said, with the confidence of a child who had recently learned the term and was eager to deploy it.
“Miss Grace taught me about circular reasoning. It means your argument goes in a circle and doesn’t prove anything.”
Mel kept her expression neutral, though something warm flickered in her chest at hearing her lessons reflected back with such precision. Mr. Langford, meanwhile, was staring up at his daughter with an expression of mingled admiration and exasperation.
“When did you learn about circular reasoning?”
“Yesterday, during logic hour. Miss Grace says logic is the foundation of all proper thinking.”
“Miss Grace is entirely correct.” He glanced over his shoulder toward the bench where Mel sat, and their eyes met briefly.
Something passed between them in that moment, something Mel could not quite name but felt nonetheless, acknowledgment, perhaps, or the beginning of an understanding that neither of them had yet put into words.
“Come down now,” he said, turning back to Thistle.
“Your sisters want to show me the nature collection, and I believe Brutus has been promised his afternoon constitutional.”
Thistle descended with considerably more speed than caution, dropping the last several feet and landing in a crouch that would have alarmed any mother but seemed to merely amuse her father.
He caught her before she could sprint toward the house, lifting her briefly to check for scratches, then setting her down with a gentle push toward the garden path.
“Go tell Anna and Viola I’ll be there in a moment.”
Thistle ran, as was the norm for her. Walking was for people with insufficient enthusiasm for life.
Mr. Langford watched her go, and Mel watched him, and without speaking neither of them spoke.
A span of three days had passed in silent scrutiny. She cataloged each detail with the methodical eye of a natural philosopher, until the weight of the evidence became impossible to refute.
Anna had his jaw, the same stubborn set, the same way it tightened when she was preparing to argue a point. When Anna stood her ground about the proper order of afternoon activities, her chin lifted at exactly the angle Mr. Langford’s did when he was debating with Mrs. Kemp about household matters.
Viola had his eyes, the same deep brown, the same habit of watching and assessing before committing to action.
When Viola emerged from beneath a table or behind a curtain, she looked at the room the way Mr. Langford looked at the study, cataloging, evaluating and deciding whether the space was safe enough for her presence.
Thistle had his fearlessness. The same absolute confidence that the world would rearrange itself to accommodate her ambitions.
When Mr. Langford had climbed the oak tree himself yesterday, responding to Thistle’s challenge with a competitive spirit that was entirely inappropriate for a grown man, Mel had seen the same reckless joy in his face that Thistle wore when scaling forbidden furniture.
They were his children, all three of them. The story was an utter contrivance, and so poorly constructed that the seams were visible to any eye of common sense.
Mel was not shocked by this revelation as she had suspected something of the sort since her first week at Hartfell, when she had noticed the quality of the children’s clothing and the quantity of their books.
Illegitimate children were not unusual among the aristocracy; what was unusual was the care this particular aristocrat had taken to provide for his.
Most men in his position would have sent their natural children to a remote farm or a distant relative, providing minimal funds and maximum distance.
Mr. Langford had established them in a comfortable home, staffed it with loyal servants, and visited monthly to read them bedtime stories and let them climb on him like a particularly tolerant piece of furniture.
It changed things. It changed everything.
“Miss Grace.” Mr. Langford approached her bench, his rolled shirtsleeves still on display and his hair slightly disheveled from Thistle’s climbing enthusiasms.
“I wanted to thank you. For the logic lessons.”
“Logic is a useful skill.”
“So I’m discovering. Though I might have preferred to learn of its deployment before being defeated in an argument by a five-year-old.”
“Six, soon. Her birthday is in three weeks.”
He went still. Something flickered across his face, quickly suppressed.
“You know their birthday.”
“It’s in the records Mr. Grieves provided. Along with their medical histories, their dietary preferences, and their previous educational assessments.” Mel closed her untouched book and rose from the bench, smoothing her skirts with practiced efficiency.
“I make it my business to know everything relevant about the children in my care.”
“Everything relevant.”
“Everything that helps me serve their needs.”
They stood facing each other on the garden path, close enough that Mel could see the individual threads in his waistcoat and the faint lines around his eyes that suggested he slept poorly.
He was taller than she had initially assessed, or perhaps he simply seemed taller now that she was seeing him properly, without the filter of his careful performance.
“And what needs have you identified?” he asked.
“Stability,” Mel said. “Consistency. The knowledge that the adults in their lives will not vanish without warning.” She paused, then added;
“They need to know when you’re coming and when you’re leaving. They need to understand the pattern, so they can prepare themselves for your absences rather than being surprised by them.”
His jaw tightened and she distinctly observed the similarities between his and Anna’s jaw. “You think I should tell them when I’m leaving.”
“I think you should tell them the truth about whatever you can tell them. Children are more resilient than most adults believe, but they are less tolerant of uncertainty. They can accept difficult realities if those realities are explained clearly. What they cannot accept is the feeling that they don’t know what’s happening or why. ”
For a long moment, he simply looked at her. His expression was unreadable, but something had shifted behind his eyes. Something that might have been recognition. Or might have been the beginning of trust.
“You speak from experience.”
“I speak from observation and professional training.” Mel gathered her book and began walking toward the house.
“The children are waiting for you, Mr. Langford. They have been waiting all morning. I suggest you not keep them waiting any longer.”
She did not look back to see if he followed.
The second day of Mr. Langford’s visit, Mel observed from the schoolroom window as he taught Thistle to skip stones on the ornamental pond.
They were both terrible at it. The stones plopped into the water without ceremony, sending up small splashes that delighted Thistle and seemed to frustrate her father, who clearly remembered being better at this particular skill.
“You’re throwing too hard,” Thistle informed him, with the confidence of someone who had never successfully skipped a stone in her life.
“I am throwing exactly as hard as the physics of stone-skipping require.”
“Then the physics are wrong.”
“The physics cannot be wrong, simply because they are…physics.”
“Miss Grace says all scientific understanding is provisional and subject to revision based on new evidence.”
Mr. Langford paused, stone in hand, and looked toward the house. Mel stepped back from the window, though not quickly enough to avoid being seen.
“Miss Grace,” he called out, “Is perhaps too effective an educator.”
Mel did not respond. She simply returned to her desk, where Anna was practicing her French conjugations and Viola was sketching the view from the window with quiet concentration.
But she was slightly smiling.
On the third day, she watched from the doorway of the nursery as Mr. Langford read to the children before bed.
The book was Robinson Crusoe, Viola’s favourite, and Mr. Langford read it as though bedtime stories were the most important thing he’d ever done. He even imitated the voices for each character.
Anna corrected his pronunciation twice. Once for a word he had genuinely mispronounced, and once for a word she simply thought should sound different. Mr. Langford accepted both corrections with the gravity they deserved and adjusted his reading accordingly.