My mind raced ahead at all the possibilities, all in the time it took for Dorian and Grace to look at one another.
They could run their own funeral home. Grace had the capital, she’d have the qualifications soon enough. They both had the business knowledge, if Grace was as good with figures as she claimed, and besides, her husband would be an accountant.
They’d be perfect for one another. It would be the noble thing to do, to set them up.
But I didn’t want to. God, I didn’t want to.
“Lovely to meet you, Grace,” said Dorian, showing his hand. Grace took it, her girlish smile breaking through as she closed her fingers around his.
“And you, Dorian,” she said.
“Is that a Yorkshire accent I’m hearing?” he asked. I noticed that their hands were still clasped together. “My mother’s Irish by blood, but she was raised just outside of York.”
“I’m from the Dales,” said Grace, her smile spreading into a grin.
“It’s nice to hear a voice like that in London,” said Dorian, finally letting her hand go. “Makes me feel at home.”
Colour flooded Grace’s cheeks. Maggie finished pouring the rest of the teas and glanced up at me from the tea tray, as if she was thinking the same thing. I cleared my throatand spoke before I could selfishly change my mind.
“Grace is new to London, Dorian – she doesn’t know a single soul around town. What do you say to taking her out for lunch and showing her around a little? How about this Saturday?” My voice didn’t sound my own, but at least I’d done the right thing.
Dorian beamed. “I’d be delighted to, if you’re up for that, Grace?”
She stuttered, glancing to me for help. It made my heart give a little tug to see her look to me for affirmation like that. I nodded, urging her to accept.
“Of course,” she said eventually, a little breathlessly. “I’d like that.”
“I’ve a function to attend, actually – just a little do in the afternoon with some old friends of mine. It’s a charity dinner, some dancing afterwards...does that strike your fancy?”
“It does,” said Grace, looking happy but flustered. “I’d love to go.”
My heart ached. I reminded myself she wasn’t mine in any sense of the word. Certainly, I shouldn’t be feeling envy. But I did, and there was little I could do about that. I was far, far too old for Grace, and now that I was her educational mentor, there was more than social expectation and age-appropriateness to consider. There was her future, and what was good for her.
I had no right at all to pursue her, and that was that.
I clapped my hands together, smiling as if I was overjoyed to have paired them together.
“That settles it, then.”
Maggie left the room with a little smirk on her face,knowing just as I did that they had to be made for each other. She patted my arm as she passed, as if she was proud of me. Even if they weren’t perfect for one another, one of Dorian’s friends would be, and Grace would not be single for long.
I wondered, momentarily, if Grace had ever had a boyfriend. She seemed so innocent and yet also grown up, far beyond her years. She certainly looked virginal, with her strange, puritan dress sense.
“Shall we have our tea and then get to work, Dorian?” I asked. He seemed a little flustered, too distracted by Grace. He cleared his throat and came back down to earth.
“Right, of course,” he said. “Grace, will you be joining us?”
“She will,” I said, taking my cup of tea and standing by the fireplace. “She needs to learn the business from the ground up, and there’s no time like the present.”
♥
Once Dorian had left, I took Grace into the office to go over some administration details. I limped a little. Stress of any kind – even the irrational kind, like envying a young man for being so clearly enchanted by my apprentice – caused my back pain to flare up. Not only did I have a slipped disc that caused sciatica, but I had knots and aches in my back from decades of working in the mortuary. There was nothing to be done about it. Like most pain, I simply had to live with it.
Grace waited patiently beside me while I opened up our online banking and asked her to fill in the relevant details so I could pay her wages. She did so, her slight fingers typing her details out slowly.
“Did you have a computer at home?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “Nothing of the sort. We had a small library beside our community school – I learned on that. My parents didn’t know.”
