“Ah, I see.” Evelyn patted the back of her straw bonnet, uninterested in speaking of Knockton just now, lest she lose heart and decide to stay. Did women in London still wear bonnets? She frowned as her eyes fell upon the girl’s own hat, for the question had not occurred to her in the two weeks since she’d decided upon this path.
“Are you truly a Wolfenden?”
The girl’s eyes shone, not with tears now but with admiration, and for that Evelyn supposed she could be grateful.
“Of course I am,” she sniffed, slightly irked by the question. What would she be if not a Wolfenden, whose family had resided at Methering Manor for centuries? The mere idea of being anything else was appalling.
The girl tilted her head appraisingly. “Now, you must be the baron’s daughter, not the fine lady who married his son.”
The unfavorable comparison to Selina, her newly widowed sister-in-law, irritated Evelyn more than she thought it should. She did her best to appear unaffected.
It must have shown on her face, though, for the girl followed up by stuttering, “N-not that you’re not a fine lady, only I… I can recall the wedding that day, six years ago. She was asucha handsome bride.”
“Yes, she was,” Evelyn added disinterestedly.
Handsome and useless. She loved her sister-in-law, but the past six months had been trying for everyone in the house, and especially worrying for Evelyn as her father had no other issue. It had been only her and Edmund. Her father didn’t have any brothers, andhisfather hadn’t any brothers either. And her father, the current Baron Methering, was getting on in age.
Not to mention his penchant for recklessness. Why, just last month he’d given them all a dreadful scare, as he’d taken it upon himself to scale the manor gatehouse, for no other reason than because the half-timbered frame offered excellent footholds. Somehow he’d managed it with only minor damage to the building and none to himself, but Evelyn had begged him to cease all scaling from that point forward.
Selina had offered no opinion on the matter, as per usual since Edmund’s passing. Rather than offer up any ideas for solutions to their plight, Selina had done nothing but mope about the manor, red-eyed and listless, allowing her daughter Leonora to terrorize the entire household. Though at least Selina had the decency to keep her sobbing confined to the privacy of her room.
The girl spoke again, bringing Evelyn back to the railway platform.
“I’ve been away since,” she said, “and I don’t recall hearing of any others. Weddings, that is.” Her last words were tinged with sorrow, perhaps at the thought of matrimony and the fellow she was leaving behind in Blackburn. “Have you married?”
At that Evelyn laughed.
The girl colored, then hastily added, “I mean, are you to marry? Ought you to marry?”
“I vowed never to marry.”
“Oh,” the girl said, her voice betraying a hint of disbelief.
“Stupid of me, really.”
She had no inclination to explain further. Thankfully there would be no need to, as the sound of an approaching whistle blasted through the air, followed by the train heaving into the station, all hissing and chugging, overpowering any potential attempts at conversation.
And besides, there was no time for it, for Evelyn had urgent matters to attend to. Her brother would not be coming back. Her father was beyond siring children. Selina had no connections of which to speak and even fewer inclinations to save her and Leonora’s futures.
No, it all fell to Evelyn.
For the entirety of her charmed, bucolic life, no one had ever expected much of her. And, she supposed, no one now expected her to save the Wolfenden women’s livelihood, either. But she expected to save herself. She had to.
Evelyn blinked, the smoke from the engine stinging her eyes.
The train was coming to a stop, and Evelyn had her ticket and her instructions. Board this train. Disembark in Manchester. Board the next train. Disembark in London.
Propose to her prospective husband.
She turned to the girl and offered her a wan smile before walking toward the first-class carriage.
The girl stared after her, open-mouthed.
“And you’re quite sure they’ve been opening the windows in the evenings?” Towle asked as he mopped his face with a handkerchief.
“Why wouldn’t they?” the Honorable Marcus Hartley, member of Parliament for Knockton, replied, perturbed that the conversation had once again derailed.
He didn’t want to speak of his servants at the moment, hot though his house may be. He’d stood for election to right wrongs, not to play host. If he’d wished to be a society darling he might’ve attended more parties, leaned harder into his mother’s connections. She’d been born a Sedley, famously wealthy purveyors of boot blacking.
