I realize I have no idea where exactly we are going.
“What is your business in town?”
“I must see Mr. Perry.”
“What for?”
She shrugs. “Arrangements for the estate. I want to make sure everything runs well in my absence.”
“You seem to take very good care of the estate.”
“I hate to see anything done badly. Especially when the estate employs so many. My father ran the place very ill. He hardly turned a profit. And his workers were not happy. I have been working to reverse this state of affairs.”
“Have you been having success?”
She scoffs. “Of course. To be fair to my father, I have access to reserves of capital of which he could have only dreamed. You must invest money—albeit wisely—to make money.”
I, of course, know nothing of such things. I have never dealt with money matters beyond my own expenses.
But when we enter Mr. Perry’s offices, I am surprised to hear what Annabelle has come to say.
First they run over the accounts, and I appreciate afresh how intimidating my wife is in business. Of course, the only business dealings I have had with her previously concerned my own debauching—and I see she brings the same tenacity to her purely pecuniary affairs. She questions Mr. Perry on minute concerns. Nothing regarding the estate seems to escape her notice.
But when she begins to lay out plans for providing the cottagers on her rent rolls with monthly stores of food, I am taken aback.
“Each household should receive a bushel of the apple harvest—and the blackberries too. In the winter months, the families with children need an extra pound of flour monthly from the mill. And poultry too, whether the wild turkeys or the chickens when they come up for slaughter—one bird a month for each cottage,” she lists to Mr. Perry who writes down her requests. “And if anyone in town needs work in the winter, we should give it and pay for the labor well.”
“Anyone?” I ask. I can hardly scruple her generosity to her workers, but hiring from the townspeople that menaced her hardly seems safe.
Mr. Perry appears to have the same thought because he stops his scratching.
“Yes,” Annabelle says. “We may need the extra help and in Trescott the winters are often quite lean. There may be families that need the extra money.”
“Surely you wouldn’t hire the men who threatened you.”
Annabelle shrugs. “Most of those men have children. They shouldn’t starve because their fathers are fools.”
“Annabelle, those men are more than fools. They are violent.”
“And yet here I stand,” my wife snaps. “No worse for it.”
“If I may, Mr. and Mrs. de Lacey,” Mr. Perry says smoothly. “Such a move could be diplomatic. If they are employed by Trescott, if they are directly enriched by the estate, they may drop their hostilities.”
Annabelle nods. “For the winter and spring planting, hire anyone who will work, and pay them well. And,” mywife looks down at her cuff sleeve, “send the extra flour to every home in the parish right after our departure. For Christmas we can send something else—preserves perhaps. I agree, Mr. Perry, that the current state of relations between Trescott and the town cannot be borne. If better relations can be bought, then I will buy them.”
I am nonplussed by this conclusion. These men threatened my wife—and she wants to placate them.
“Annabelle, I am not sure that this is wise. They may see it as a sign of weakness.”
“Are you questioning me, Alfred?” she says, her tone icy.
“I amprotectingyou. These people are dangerous—and who knows how they have reacted to our marriage. They may see it as a provocation and want to harm you further.”
“Alfred, I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”
“Yes, you didn’t need me atallwhen that angry mob nearly seized your carriage.”
“You exaggerate,” she huffs.
