Chapter 10
The morning light fell soft through the tall windows of Stoneleigh House as Viola broke her fast, alone, the great house quiet around her.
She had risen earlier than she meant to, her sleep cut short by the lingering strangeness of her new home.
It still felt as if she were only a guest here for a short while, as if the house were not hers at all, but belonged to someone else.
She had taken her chocolate in the small breakfast room, the least of the house’s many rooms, and even it was grander than any chamber she had known at home.
The table might have seated a dozen. The silver ranged along the sideboard alone — the coffee-pot, the chafing dishes, the little covered things whose uses she did not entirely know — would have settled her father’s debts twice over and left enough to spare.
Sunlight moved across a carpet so deep her slippers made no sound upon it, and warmed the gilt frame of a landscape she had not yet dared to ask the name of.
Everywhere she looked there was more — more light, more space, more quiet wealth standing about as though it meant nothing at all.
She thought of her father’s study at home: the single candle he carried from room to room, the fire laid small and let die early, the careful economy of a man who had learned the cost of every lump of coal.
She had grown up counting. It had been the habit of her whole life, to know what a thing was worth and to do without it — and now she sat in a house where no one counted anything, and she did not know how to become the woman these rooms seemed to expect of her.
Down the corridor lay Lady Warrington’s study, its door still closed — Viola had not yet found the courage to open it, half certain she would find the lady herself seated within, looking up to ask what Miss Trent imagined she was doing in such a house as this.
She sipped her tea and sat back, thinking over all that had passed.
Her dance with Lord Carrington the night before had been a very pleasant one, and had led to a good many others, though none so delightful as that first. The other gentlemen had wanted her company for one reason only: Stoneleigh House.
Every one of them had spoken to her of it.
Not one, as Lord Carrington had, had asked about her family, her life, herself.
They wished to know only what she had, never who she was.
It was rather tiring.
And yet she had enjoyed the evening. His lingering presence had been a comfort, and she had found herself drawn to him in a way she had not looked for. It was as if, in deciding to work together, a faint trust had grown up between them — a trust she prayed would only deepen.
A letter from her father had come with the morning’s post, and she had propped it against the chocolate-pot to read once more as she ate.
His hand was as she remembered it, a little crabbed, sparing of the paper.
He was glad, he wrote — so very glad — and begged her not to spend a single thought on him, but to enjoy every ball and every kindness the Season might offer her.
He asked after Hannah. He asked whether London was much changed.
He did not, in the whole page, ask for anything at all.
That was the part that undid her. Twenty thousand pounds sat somewhere in Mr. Braithwaite’s careful keeping — more money than her father had seen in all his life — and she had already settled in her mind how the first of it must go: quietly, to clear what remained of his debts, and to see the roof at home mended before the winter, whether his pride liked it or no.
She would find some way to manage it so gently that he could not refuse.
She owed him that. She owed him a great deal more besides.
A quiet rap at the door drew her from her thoughts. “Come?”
Mrs. Roberts stepped in, a ledger in her hands, her lips pressed thin. “I do apologize for disturbing you so early, miss. But a matter has come to our attention that requires your consideration.”
Viola sat up, her tea forgotten. This, she understood, was part of taking on Stoneleigh House — responsibilities she had never before had to carry. “What is it?”
“I can wait until you have finished, miss,” Mrs. Roberts said quickly. Viola shook her head. “It is only that the coal merchant is soon to call, and so I came to you now.”
“There is no need to delay.” Viola spoke practically, though inwardly she shrank from whatever was to be asked of her. Had she the wisdom for it? Could she act, as Lady Warrington would have, with fairness and compassion? “Pray, what is the trouble?”
Mrs. Roberts set the ledger beside her and drew a letter from her pocket. “Mr. Sowden, the coal merchant, sent this morning, miss. I had written to say the number of sacks on his receipt did not match what his men delivered. His reply is rather… short. If you would read it?”
Viola took it and read it through. Mr. Sowden wrote with a firmness that wished to give no offence and would yield no ground: if the receipt had been signed by a member of the household, then there had been no error, and that was the end of it.
For a moment the words swam, and she breathed and steadied them.
It would have been very easy to hand the letter back, to say she did not yet understand the running of a house and might the staff smooth the matter over themselves.
But this was a thing Lady Warrington would have taken up at once, without hesitation, and Viola was determined to do the same.
She read it again, more slowly, then raised her head.
“How great was the shortage? And who noticed it?”
“The cook noticed it, miss. We ought to have had two sacks more. With the weather turning, there has been a need for small morning fires — ”
“Which I have been grateful for.”
Mrs. Roberts smiled faintly. “And now the cook needs more for the kitchen, with meals to prepare. There is a fear we may have been… cheated. Though I am loath to suggest it, for Mr. Sowden has supplied this house for years.”
Viola bit her lip and reached for the ledger. “Show me the delivery here.”
Mrs. Roberts ran a finger down the column. The figure matched Mr. Sowden’s receipt exactly. Viola took the receipt up and studied the name signed at the foot of it. “Who signed for this? If fewer sacks came than ought to have, I am surprised it was signed at all.”
“That would be the under-footman, miss. James Martin. He was the only one free to take the delivery — Mr. Sowden’s men came earlier than we expected.”
Viola’s fingers tightened on the edge of the page. “Then would you summon Mr. Martin?”
A faint hesitation in the housekeeper’s posture said she had not looked for Miss Trent to ask for the under-footman directly.
But she inclined her head and went to the door.
Only a few minutes passed before the young man arrived, his eyes wide, his shoulders squared as if braced for a reprimand.
Viola took in the restless movement of his hands and offered him a small smile, hoping to set him at ease.
“Thank you for coming,” she said, keeping her tone gentle. “I must ask you about the coal. Did you count the sacks when Mr. Sowden’s men delivered them?”
The young man swallowed and bowed his head. “I did not, miss,” he admitted, low. “They were in a hurry, and the kitchen was calling for me, and the man said it was all in order — ”
“As I said, they came early,” Mrs. Roberts put in. “James was the only one able to manage it then.” She glanced from him to Viola, plainly afraid the boy was about to lose his place.
Viola let out a slow breath, picturing the bustle of it — the easy assumption that men who had delivered here many times would never cheat a grand house, the sense that to count would seem an insult.
“Your honesty does you credit,” she said, and surprise flickered across his face.
“I do not hold you to blame. But make it known below stairs that, when coal is delivered, every sack is to be counted — not once but twice. Then there can be no argument.”
The footman nodded fervently, his hands clasped before him now. “Yes, miss. Of course.”
Viola turned back to Mrs. Roberts, who looked relieved.
“Send word to Mr. Sowden that we will not dispute his tally this once. But tell him also that the lady of the house expects his men to wait while deliveries are counted, and that, should they come early again, they are to present themselves to you or to the butler, not to a footman with other duties. Then there can be no mistake, deliberate or otherwise.”
Mrs. Roberts held her gaze a brief, assessing moment, then inclined her head, the edge of a smile at her mouth before it was gone.
“Thank you, miss.” She closed the ledger and lifted it, made to turn — then paused.
“I do not mean to speak out of turn, Miss Trent. But I believe Lady Warrington would have made the very same decision.”
Blinking back a sudden, unexpected rush of tears, Viola smiled. “Thank you,” she said, and felt a thread that had been drawn too tight begin, at last, to loosen. “That is more welcome than I can say.”
It was that loosening, perhaps, that carried her down the corridor an hour later, to the door she had been passing with her eyes averted since the day she arrived.
She did not go alone. “Mrs. Hartley,” she had said, finding the companion at her mending, “I think I should like to see Lady Warrington’s study now.
Would you come with me?” And Mrs. Hartley had set down her needle, looked at Viola a long, quiet moment, and said only, “I hoped you would ask, when you were ready. Not before.”