The Widow of Larkspur Inn (5 page)

“One would presume more than enough, Mrs. Hollis. There are twelve pounds left, plus some odd shillings. But I shall send for a railway timetable to be certain.”

How can he stay so composed,
Julia wondered,
when this turn of events affects his life as well?
While Jensen had never pretended anything but veiled hostility toward her, surely he had some misgivings about serving a new employer. He simply stood there awaiting further orders, his face its usual austere mask.

“I don’t wish to interrupt the children’s lessons, but I should tell them as soon as they’re finished,” she said, rising to her feet. “Before word travels around the house. And if the servants ask why we are leaving, I would appreciate your not mentioning my husband’s debts. They’ll know soon enough after we’re gone.”

Jensen nodded again. “That would seem appropriate, madam.”

He held the door for her to leave the room, and she could feel his eyes upon her back as she walked toward the staircase.
No doubt he’s gloating inside over his victory,
Julia thought.
Perhaps he’ll even dance a little jig when we’re gone.
By the time she reached the bottom step, she could stand it no longer. She turned, and sure enough, he was still watching her from the open doorway.

“I know you’ve never cared for me from the beginning, Jensen,” she said in a voice remarkably clear, considering her frame of mind. “Although I don’t understand why you should begrudge a seventeen-year-old girl for becoming mistress of the house. I never interfered with your authority—never.”

He simply stared at her for several long seconds. When he finally seemed to be opening his mouth to reply, Julia did not allow him the opportunity to speak. “I’m not finished,” she said flatly. She had kept certain matters inside for too long now and needed to give them vent. “But no matter what grievance you have against me, I can’t imagine anyone being so callused as to have no pity for the children. They’ve just lost their father, and now their home. Will it make you happy to think of them living in poverty, Jensen?”

She went on up the staircase, aware that she’d given him more cause to dislike her, but caring not one whit. In the nursery corridor she pressed her forehead against the closed door of the schoolroom. She could hear eleven-year-old Aleda’s muffled voice reciting the months of the year in French to her tutor.

“Forgive me for my bitterness and doubts, Lord,” she prayed under her breath. “But I’m so afraid.”

Having lived all her life under the provision and guidance of her parents and then her husband, Julia had never needed to depend upon God totally. Now she was learning a lesson in how weak her faith really was.

A thought came into her mind then, something she supposed she’d heard in church. No matter how weak our faith, God’s Word still stands true.
And it says you’re the Father to the fatherless. Please show me how to provide for your children
.

“Are we poor now?” thirteen-year-old Philip asked that afternoon as Julia and her children sat together in the day nursery’s window seat. Like his mother and Aleda, he had hair that became burnished copper in the sunlight shining through the glass. The cobalt-blue eyes were inherited from his father.

Julia put her hand upon the boy’s shoulder. He was only a few inches shorter than her own five feet four now. Though the knowledge of her husband’s irresponsibility hurt more than any sickness she’d ever experienced, and their sudden plunge into poverty frightened her immensely, she managed to keep her tone of voice as encouraging as possible. “We won’t have servants or many belongings as nice as we have now. But you’re never poor if you have family and a place to call your own. And this
Larkspur Inn
belongs to all of us, from the ridge pole to the cellar.”

“I don’t see why we can’t bring my piano,” Aleda said from Philip’s other side. “When the Simmons moved in next door, they shipped all their furniture from their old house in Yorkshire.”

“I’ve explained that,” Julia told her patiently. She couldn’t fault the eleven-year-old for despairing of giving up her music. Aleda had a natural flair for the keyboard and had taken lessons for the past five years. “Perhaps one of our new neighbors will have a piano and allow you to play occasionally.”

“Will there be other children?” asked Grace at Julia’s left. Grace was the only one of the children to inherit their father’s curly, chestnut brown hair, though like her older sister, she had Julia’s emerald green eyes.

“I’m sure Gresham is full of children. And you’ll be able to go to school there. You’ll have many nice friends.”

Aleda wrinkled her freckled nose. “I don’t think I’ll like going to school with country children. They seem rather dull to me.”

“Why, you’ve never met any,” Julia admonished lightly. “I’m sure they’re no different from city children.”

“And schools have competitions, and recesses when you can go outside and play,” Philip told his sister.

Julia felt a pain knot up inside of her at the forced optimism in his voice. He was trying so hard to be the man of the family now, helping to encourage his sisters. How could she for even a second have considered allowing him to quit school to take on a job?
We’ll take in washing, plant a garden … anything to keep him from giving up his education.

“But why can’t you sell that old house so we can stay in London?” Aleda pressed.

“Because it would be almost impossible to sell.” Julia gave the children a brief explanation of the coaching inn business decline, as told to her by the bankers. “But just because no one else wants it doesn’t mean it won’t make a lovely home. And think of all the room we’ll have to potter about.” Aleda’s shoulders sagged, and Julia knew she was thinking of the neighborhood friends she would be leaving.

“It’s too bad your jewelry is gone,” the girl finally sighed. “You could have sold it like Charmagne Courtland did when the Duke of Torbay tried to take her land. Then we could stay here.”

“Charmagne Courtland?” Julia frowned. One of the nanny’s duties was to read to the children at bedtime, but reading had never been Frances’s favorite activity—unless it was a serialized story from a magazine. “Has Frances been reading magazines to you again?”

“Well, sometimes,” the girl admitted, lowering her green eyes.

“She says the storybooks are too boring. You won’t scold her, will you? She won’t allow us sweets when she’s angry.”

“I’m only going to speak to her about it.”

“Will Frances come with us?” Grace asked.

“Why, no, dear,” Julia said patiently. “We won’t have any servants.”

“Then who’s going to tuck us in?” Genuine worry crossed the child’s heart-shaped face, which saddened Julia more than any of the children’s other reactions to her news. Did Grace actually believe her own mother incapable of providing the nurturing that heretofore had been dispensed by a hired servant?
But Frances made it clear I was in the way
, she rationalized yet felt no better.

What kind of mother allows a servant to dictate how much time she may spend with her own children?
she asked herself, already knowing the answer.
A childish, silly one!

Reminding herself that her self-accusations could be saved for a sleepless night, Julia touched Grace’s cheek. “I’m going to be tucking you in from now on. All of you.”

“You, Mother? And read to us?”

“Every night, Grace.” The smile that lit the little face made her feel better. Yet Julia couldn’t bring herself to tell the children they would be spending most of their waking hours on their own in that unfamiliar house while their mother worked long hours in the cheese factory or on a dairy farm. First, she had to allow them time to adjust to the idea of leaving home.

A shrill, distant whistle sounded through the window glass. Julia and her children turned to peer over their shoulders at the terrace below. Two of the neighborhood boys were squinting up at them, and their jaws dropped at the sight of Julia.

“They’ve come here for the past three days,” Aleda sniffed indignantly. “They want Philip for cricket.”

Julia’s eyes went to Philip, who was directing a negative shake of the head to the boys through the glass. “Would you like to play?”

An eagerness lit up his eyes for a fraction of a second, but then he shook his head again. “It wouldn’t be right. Not yet, anyway.”

Touching her son’s shoulder, Julia said, “You’ve all shown great respect for your father’s memory. But if he were here right now, he would tell you that it’s time to start seeing your friends again.”

“Are you sure, Mother?”

“I’m sure. As much as he loved you, he wouldn’t want you to spend the rest of your lives grieving over him.”

When the children were gone—Philip to his cricket match at Hyde Park, and the girls, under Frances’s watchful eye, scouting for friends with whom to play dolls—Julia rested her head against the window frame and closed her eyes. What she’d just told the children about their father came back to her.

It’s true,
she thought. Anger and hurt had caused her to doubt it earlier, but Philip had loved his children. As much as he was able, that is, for his capacity for loving was obviously not as great as it should have been.
How did that happen?
Even though he’d been orphaned as an infant, Philip’s late Uncle George and Aunt Winnifred had provided a loving home, had even doted upon him. In fact, his upbringing had been similar to hers, with every need and almost every want provided for. His becoming a surgeon had not been out of a necessity to earn a living, but because the science of medicine had always fascinated him.

She wondered now. Had the lack of any real hardship undermined Philip’s character, as it had so obviously stunted her own spiritual growth? Was he unable to love deeply because he had never experienced a loss?

And were the children on their way to becoming just as handicapped? The notion was too taxing for her weary mind to comprehend fully, but it occurred to Julia to wonder if God were forcing them out of their soft lives to save them.

“But I don’t
care
about keeping my position here,” Fiona insisted one week later after packing one of Julia’s skirts into a gaping leather trunk. “I’ve no family but you and the children, ma’am. Please allow me to come with you.”

Julia folded another pair of wool winter stockings and set them down into the trunk. She had never helped pack before but figured it was past time she learned how to perform some of the chores that had always been done for her. “How can you say that, when you’ve family all over Ireland?” Fiona’s violet eyes darkened, making Julia wish she could snatch back her words.

“Aye, they’re family. But I can’t
see
them or talk with them. And none have treated me as kindly as you have.”

It would be wonderful having her with us,
Julia thought as she leaned down to pull open another drawer from her walnut Empire-style chest of drawers. The argument had gone on for the good part of an hour now, with neither side giving quarter.
I wouldn’t worry so much about the children with Fiona there to care for them while I’m away at work
.

But she didn’t want to be selfish. Philip’s selfishness had all but ruined her life and the children’s. How could she ask someone she cared so much about to suffer the hardships that would be forced upon them? To consign herself to a future that promised to be bleak, at best? Straightening, she turned to face the maid again.

“Fiona, there is something you should know.”

“Yes, missus?”

The hateful words swelled and stuck in her throat. Only sheer will allowed her to give them vent. “The children and I aren’t moving away just because we wish to live in the country. We have no other place to go. My husband gambled away his fortune and left us in debt.”

The maid gave a solemn nod. “I’m aware of the debts. I didn’t realize the cause, though. I’m so sorry.”

“How did you know about the debts?”

“Your wedding ring,” Fiona explained. “After those gentlemen from the bank left last week, you no longer wore it. And when Alice asked Mr. Jensen if you’d be taking the silver cutlery with you to Gresham or crating it with the rest of the household goods, he told her that there would be no crating of anything.”

“The silver is to be auctioned … with everything else,” Julia said bleakly but dry-eyed. She wondered if her tear ducts had simply worn themselves out during the past four weeks. “It was a wedding gift from my parents.”