He looked at the façade of the house; it looked muchthe same as it had the last time he had been here; the only difference was that the walls were heavily covered in ivy where there had been very little then.
As Henry looked around the parts of the park he could see. It was not quite as well kept as it had been in his father’s time. He wondered why James had allowed things to slip in this way. That was not the James he remembered who had been so very proud of the estate which would be his one day. Longbourn was the largest estate in the area, earning close to four thousand pounds per annum.
There was a clearing of a voice behind him. There stood a man dressed in the garb of a senior staff member; Henry guessed he was the butler. “The master and mistress were not expecting callers. Who may I say is here?” The man enquired evenly.
Henry handed a card over to the man—he had some made up in London, but without his direction, only his name—and did not miss the way the man’s eyebrows shot up before he schooled his features. “I am Hill, the butler,” he stated. “Please follow me, Mr Bennet.”
The butler led Henry to the study, a room he remembered well from his youth. Henry heard him knock. “Enter” was called out, but it was not James’s voice, of that he was certain.
“Mr Henry Bennet,” Hill announced after he allowed the older Mr Bennet to step into the study ahead of him.
As he looked around, Henry saw that there were many more bookshelves in the room, all of them full of tomes. There were a few on the desk. He too liked to read, but from what he could see of the younger man behind the desk, he guessed his nephew enjoyed his books at the exclusion of the duties he should have been executing.
“U-uncle Henry? I thought you were lost in India,” the man behind the desk sputtered.
“As you can see, I am very much alive. I can only assume you are James’s son or one of them. Pray, introduce yourself and tell me where my brother is,” Henry drawled.
“I am Thomas Bennet, the only child born to James and Beth Bennet. I was born in March of 1765. I became the master some four years past when my father and mother were both taken in a carriage accident. As Father never heard from you after he wrote about Grandfather’s death, he assumed that you were no longer alive,” Bennet explained. “Where are you living?”
“In London. I have found a house in the country somewhere. Why do you ask?” Henry wondered. He did not lie; he chose for now, not to mention his estate in Nottinghamshire or his wealth. His nephew gave the air of an indolent man.
Bennet indicated one of the chairs before the desk. Once his uncle had seated himself, he sat in his own chair. “My wife is rather concerned about the entail, and she may see you as wanting to take the estate from me because you are my late father’s brother. I am afraid she is rather deficient in intelligence and will not grasp the subtleties of the fact the line flowed from my father to me and that you would only be in line if I perished before you,” Bennet revealed. “I made the mistake of choosing a pretty face without knowing if we were truly compatible. There is nothing to be done now, and besides, Fanny is with child. She is sure she will bear a son to break the entail.”
“From what I can see, the estate is looking a little sad; why is that?” Henry asked.
At first, Bennet thought to get indignant, but then he looked somewhat chagrined. He knew he did as little as was needed to keep things running. When he had a son, he would exert himself. He articulated something similar to his uncle. “I will not exert myself too much just for one of those Collinses totake the estate if I do not have a son.”
“Thomas, have you read the entail documents?” Henry enquired as he shook his head.
“No, why should I? The estate is entailed to the male line,” Bennet replied petulantly. “It will not change anything if I take the time to read the document, although I do have a copy in the safe where my late father kept it.”
“Take it out,” Henry barked.
As he disliked conflict, Bennet acquiesced. Once he had the document, his uncle directed him to the second-to-last page. He read and looked up at his uncle. “No Collins may inherit,” he realised. He read more. “And if I have a daughter, her son may.”
“Are you aware that your late father and I had a sister?” Henry saw his nephew shake his head. “If your wife does not bear you a son, and Felicity has been blessed with a son, he, or his son, would be ahead of a potential grandson born to a possible daughter of yours. Did you know you have an aunt who moved to the American Colonies before that petulance in 1776?”
“I did not. Father never mentioned her. Either way, a Collins will never have this estate. I will have my brother-in-law Phillips, who is a solicitor, send a letter to Clem Collins, who keeps on demanding access to hisbirthright. Phillips is married to my wife’s older sister. My wife is Frances Gardiner as was, called Fanny by all. Her late father was the local solicitor until Phillips took the practice when her father passed away some four years past.”
“Is your wife related to Edward Gardiner?” Henry asked nonchalantly.
“Yes, Fanny is the youngest of the three Gardiners; her brother is the middle child. He is in trade in London. How do you know his name?” Bennet enquired.
“He is rumoured to be very good with investments. Doyou invest with him?”
Bennet looked away. He was more than aware of how many times Gardiner had urged him to invest, but it had been too much trouble, even to turn over Fanny’s dowry of five thousand pounds to him. “I do not.”
Seeing what he did—the laziness in his nephew and his poor choice of wife because he was taken in by a pretty face—Henry decided that he would not share his true financial position with his nephew. He was sure Thomas would just want to have everything solved for him.
“Am I to meet my niece?” Henry queried.
“I suppose you must. Just be prepared for her effusions, which are often rather vulgar,” Bennet warned.
‘As her husband, you should be helping her and not tearing her down to me as you are,’ Henry thought. ‘Yes, I am sure that my wealth must be hidden from these two.’
His nephew stood, and Henry followed him out of the study.
Chapter 1
