Page 54 of Give Him a Chance

“The Earl of Lindow.” His wife grinned. “I am almost certain she is in there. She usually is, about this time.”

Which made absolutely no sense to Bernard. True, he had found her writing letters there a few times, but that was typically after her father had finished in there. Why on earth it being luncheon, and near the end of the month, mattered, Bernard could not say.

“Right. Well, thank you,” said Bernard helplessly.

There was only one thing to do. Try the study.

He could hear her voice before he even opened the door—before he even reached it. There was a lightness to Lucy’s voice that Bernard had never heard in another. That, or he had just never noticed it before.

He was not going to interrogate precisely what that meant.

“—and that’s a shilling extra because I know—no, I know you deserve it and I won’t take a penny of it back,” came Lucy’s voice, cheerful and stern all at the same time.

Bernard smirked. No one gave orders like Lucy.

“And Miss Sharp, here’s half a crown, and I hope that you will…in the future?”

The middle of her sentence had become muffled, overcome by the cries of delight from a woman who sounded young—very young. A child.

Bernard stepped to the door of the study, which was slightly ajar, his eyes widening as he looked through it.

There was Lucy, seated in the chair behind the desk, imperious and yet warm like an empress. And there were—goodness, at least five other women in there, ranging in ages and all attired in clothing more akin to a servant. A servant who had fallen on hard times.

What on earth is going on?

“And here’s a crown for you, Mrs. Marithorpe,” Lucy said, handing over something that glittered in the streaming sunlight, “and can I entrust you with these three shillings for Miss Simons? I see she was unable to be here today.”

The clink of coins, and murmured thanks, and gratitude pouring off the women… Bernard groaned.

She was giving them money.

Oh, he was all for the support of the poor. He’d known poor people, especially since he had started working for Hovell, and most of them were good sorts born to poor parents or fallenon hard times themselves and having to work laborious jobs to make any sort of shift for themselves.

They were not bad people. They were in bad situations.

But just handing over money like that—oh, Lucy. That was not the way to do it.

She’s making herself a target.

The thought flickered through Bernard’s mind before he could call it back, but it was true. If the woman started handing over money at a moment’s notice—and based on the small amount of time he had been standing out here, she was giving away a great deal—it would not be long before someone, and it would be an unpleasant someone, decided to relieve her of all such coin in one go.

Bernard leaned his head against the doorframe and winced. She meant well. Oh, he had never met anyone who meant better.

But she was a danger to herself, his Lucy.

Not his Lucy. Obviously.

Bernard straightened up and cleared his throat. Definitely not his Lucy.

“And I have three extra pennies here, so whom have I forgotten?”

Well, time to end this charade. It couldn’t go on. Her parents certainly could not know the danger she was putting herself in, Bernard observed darkly, or else they would have forbidden such a thing.

Charity was all very well, but it did not begin at home.

Wait a moment.He’d gotten tangled there.

“Ah, Bernard!”