Chapter Fourteen #3
‘They have this scheme here,’ Mr Somersham said, turning back to Will, ‘Where if you have a little spare coin, and you are able bodied so likely to be able to find a job that pays a little on a day to day basis, they let you out of the prison at eight in the morning and you do not have to be back until six at night.’
‘It would not work for you,’ Amelie said, sharper than she intended.
‘You have no skills, no contacts in the city. You cannot just walk out of the prison gates and find work.’ She shook her head.
Her father hadn’t worked a day in his life and she was under no illusion that he would start now.
If he was allowed out even for a single day, no doubt he would find his way to a gambling den and wager what he didn’t have to sink himself further into debt.
‘I understand there are jobs that you can take on in the prison that allow you to earn a little money or extra food,’ Will said quietly.
Her father scoffed. ‘Shovelling filth or cleaning up after the warden and the guards? I could not debase myself in such a way. I am a gentleman.’
Amelie did not even feel any disappointment.
She had long ago resigned herself to the fact that her father did not really want to help himself.
He wanted to be out of prison, that was undisputed, but he was not willing to do any of the actual work to achieve that goal.
Often Amelie would wake at night in a cold sweat, but her dreams had not been filled with ghouls or ghosts; instead they’d been filled with her own father, a dead weight around her neck, dragging her down until he destroyed their whole family.
Will laid a hand on her shoulder and she could feel the tension pulsing through him. This was not his fight, not his family, and it pained her that a man she barely knew cared more about her sisters and brother than their own father.
‘Perhaps rather than wallowing in self-indulgence you might like to ask your daughter how your other children fare,’ Will said, his tone deceptively light.
He pushed on before Mr Somersham could speak.
‘Your son has been unwell with a fever, but thankfully it looks like he will make a full recovery. All three of your younger children have been living in a damp and cramped set of rooms with a woman who does not care for them as she should. And your eldest daughter has been working hard as a servant in order to keep a roof over their heads and to pay your bills.’ Will’s voice rose at the end, the anger apparent in his rigid stance and his harsh words.
‘You dare…’ Mr Somersham began, but Will silenced him with a flick of his hand.
‘A decent man who had got himself into this situation would be willing to do anything and everything to get himself out so he could relieve his daughter of the responsibility for her kin—but instead you sit here, declaring yourself too good to clean up after others.’
‘I do not have to listen to this.’
‘Actually, you do. You are prisoner here, unable to leave. Or had you forgotten?’
Amelie’s father flashed Will a look of disgust, but the importance of respecting the social hierarchy had been drummed into him for too long; he could not rant and rail against a duke.
‘Amelie worries every second of every day about the future of Marie, Harriet and Charles, but they should not be hers to worry about. They are not orphans; they still have their father. You should be ashamed of yourself.’
He held out his hand for Amelie and she stood, shaking.
No one had ever spoken to her father in this way before, although it was long overdue.
Time and again he’d shifted responsibility for the loss of their home, the loss of his fortune, never admitting he was the one at fault.
It was liberating to hear someone tell him that he was entirely to blame.
‘Goodbye, Father,’ Amelie said softly.
‘You cannot mean to leave me here.’ There was a note of panic in her father’s voice now, as if he realised he might lose his shared room and be tossed into the communal cell with no guarantee of any food.
‘I will be back in a month, but not before,’ Amelie said, feeling the prick of tears in her eyes.
For the last few years she had desperately wanted her father to be better.
Every time something terrible happened, she hoped it would be the occasion when he finally stepped up.
Although it was heartbreaking, she was finally ready to accept he was not going to change.
She would not abandon him, but she would not waste her hopes on him either.
With Amelie clutching Will’s arm, they walked back down the narrow stairs and through the courtyard.
Only once they were outside the main gates of the prison, with the stench and the oppressing walls behind them, did Amelie start to breathe properly again.
She did not know whether to laugh or cry.
She felt on edge, hysterical, and she was glad when Will helped her up into the carriage and they rattled over the cobbles, away from the prison.