Chapter 4 #2
A young thing with long dark locks sat just a few seats down and nodded sagely. “Exactly. How shall we be interesting people if we do not have interesting conversations?”
Muriel gave a grave nod to acknowledge that she took the girl quite seriously. “You’re very right.”
“I’m Miranda,” the young lady declared without hesitation. “I have to say that I think you are quite interesting.”
“Do you?” Muriel replied, amazed by her confidence.
“Yes.”
“And why is that?”
Miranda looked most dramatic as she said, “Because you are clearly a scholar, and I do not think there are enough lady scholars in the world. When I grow up, I should like to be a lady scholar.”
“Like your cousins Emilia and Celia?” the dowager duchess suggested.
“Yes, exactly,” Miranda replied firmly.
Muriel blinked.
She had not been aware that there were Briarwood scholars, but then two ladies swept in, identical twins who looked as if they were into their twenties.
“She means us,” said one of them with a merry look, her red-tinged hair in a loose knot atop her head. The cinnamon strands curled wildly about her face. “I’m Celia.”
“Exactly,” said the other, her cinnamon curls braided in a halo, wisps of curls escaping as if they had a will of their own.
“I’m Emilia. Though everyone is very well-read, we are the scholars of the family.
We have no interest at all in the ton, and we often hide away in the library, but we’ve retreated to our own personal library upstairs so that you might have use of the family one while you research.
A thing we heartily approve of. Besides, we are always very busy with our work. ”
The twin ladies sat down opposite Muriel, quite energetic and to the point.
Perseus strode up behind them, plunking himself down beside his twin cousins. He’d clearly been listening as he added, “She loves Shakespeare too, you know.”
The twins looked at each other, then looked back at her, their eyes sparkling.
“Do you?” Celia asked.
“How wonderful,” declared Emilia, arranging her periwinkle-blue skirts. “Anyone with sense should love Shakespeare.”
Celia pulled at her sage-colored sleeves and enthused, “Exactly. I’m deeply suspicious of anyone who doesn’t like Shakespeare, but we can’t all be perfect.”
They were so bold, yet clearly unmarried, and definitely old enough to be so. Muriel didn’t know what to make of them. So she marveled instead, and she hoped to know them better.
“Will you come to the theater tonight?”
Celia shook her head. “No.”
“We have a project that must be completed tonight for the children we will teach tomorrow.”
“We do love a play as much as the next person,” Emilia said brightly, eyeing her wine glass that a footman filled with a ruby hue. “But we actually spend most of our time teaching Shakespeare to young people in the East End of London.”
Celia nodded passionately. “We don’t have a lot of time for the silliness of the ton, you know?”
She nearly choked on a sip of water. “S-silliness.”
Emilia beamed. “I am so glad you agree. Perhaps you can avoid a Season too, since you are so interested in scholarly affairs.”
Emilia snorted. “All that parading about in fine costumes when good work can be done by teaching Shakespeare to those who have nothing. Hope! And love of literature. Those are the only things that matter.”
“I truly believe it could solve all the problems of the world if this was done,” Perseus said without a hint of disdain.
She gaped at him.
He meant it.
“You two are teachers,” she said to the twins, trying to make sense of the rapid conversation that was nothing like the conversation which occurred about her dinner table.
Plates were placed before them all, and the delicious scent of roast beef and potatoes with butter and cream wafted into the air.
“Yes, we spend very little time at Heron House. We sleep here, of course,” added Emilia with a cheeky grin. “Most of our time we spend in the East End of London with our pupils. We adore them, you know?”
Muriel swung her gaze between the two girls, then to the duchess and then the dowager duchess. Last, she sneaked a look at Perseus.
This was permitted? They were the nieces of a duke and they were teaching the poor?
“Surely, you did have a Season,” she blurted.
Celia’s grin only widened, and she lifted her glass in salute. “Not a one.”
“I didn’t know such a thing was possible unless something was…”
Emilia laughed. “Unless something was inappropriate with someone?”
Celia shrugged. “Our family is singular. It’s true. We’ve been in the background for most of our lives, not because our family has put us there, but because we prefer it.”
“I adore you for it,” the dowager duchess said, her voice deep ringing with pride.
The two girls looked at their grandmother with so much love that it almost hurt to witness.
“The ton is all well and good,” Celia said.
Emilia snorted. “It’s gilding is hiding rot inside.”
Celia sighed. “Our younger brother, Deimos, seems to enjoy it.”
“Probably because he’s a man,” groaned Emilia.
She sneaked another glance at Perseus, who seemed to be enjoying this immensely.
This was what he wanted. He’d wanted her to meet these ladies. To understand one could choose a different life.
But could she?
“We can’t waste our time with the ton,” drawled Celia.
“I don’t understand,” she ventured.
The duchess watched her nieces, allowing them to take their time to explain themselves without intervention.
Celia’s brow furrowed. “Well, the world is so unjust. Both Emilia and I couldn’t put that out of our hearts.
All the family cares about justice, but we seem to have it burned into our souls.
We spend our entire time devoted to the improvement of the lives of people who have so little. The ton doesn’t need us.”
“That is very admirable,” Muriel said, feeling as if she had been propelled into a land heretofore unknown.
“Thank you,” Emilia and Celia said together.
“Now, it is time to eat,” the duchess declared.
And with the permission of precedence now established, everyone began to eat their fill.
The other half of the table was deep in conversation about either the opera or the terrible state of affairs of the soldiers who were struggling to reintegrate into society after a war that had lasted for more than twenty years.
Perseus leaned towards her. “Don’t be too intimidated by those two,” he said.
“I’m not,” she blurted. “I think they’re wonderful.”
Perseus’s eyes flared with some emotion she couldn’t name, but she knew she had earned his approval.
“They don’t really care about fripperies. They care about their pupils. I think they’d live in the East End if their mother would let them.”
Celia laughed merrily. “We would, but Mama says it’s not the best for our health, and so we have to use the privilege that we were born with and not throw ourselves into disaster just to prove a point.”
Emilia sighed. “That would be a waste of everything that we have, and so both of us do everything that we can to ensure that anything extra we have is given to our pupils, you see?”
Muriel stared at her painted plate, filled with the most delicious of food. “I don’t know if I’ve ever met anyone who does such a thing.”
“They’re unique,” Perseus said, reaching out and squeezing Celia’s hand. “And I adore them for it.”
The dowager duchess smiled. “And so do I,” she said again.
“They take care of children who were just like me when I was little—unshod, starving, without any chance to read, alone—and my granddaughters make certain there’s a bit of joy there.
How could we force them to have a Season when the work they do is so much more important? ”
Muriel swallowed.
It had never occurred to her that there could be more important work for a young lady than having a Season. It had never even occurred to her that such a thing would be allowed.
Act.
That’s what he’d said to her. He’d suggested that’s what she wanted.
She shook the thought away quickly. She could never be an actor, not her, not anyone like her, and that’s all there was to it.