“Is it that weaselly-looking nephew of hers?” said Daniel. “He had the audacity to ask me where I purchased my tie, and I don’t think he meant it as a compliment.”
“That’s it,” said Agatha. “For once you are perspicacious, Daniel.”
“Are you suggesting I am usually a fool?” said Daniel.
“Of course, in the event of an unforeseen decision in the unfavorable direction,” said the Headmaster, smoothly refusing to engage in answering the question, “I will make myself personally responsible to return Miss Nash to her family entirely unburdened by any travel expenses. So there is no need to worry at all, young lady.” He smiled widely and patted Beatrice on the arm. She fought against the urge to push him to the ground.
Agatha took her other arm and pressed it firmly. “We shall see you at tomorrow’s meeting and Lady Emily and I will rely on your continued support,” she said. “We must not tolerate underhanded machinations.”
“Not unless we instigate them, of course,” Beatrice heard Daniel whisper to Hugh. “We must do something to help Aunt Agatha, Hugh.” She could not help but admire and despair of the family loyalty expressed in his urgent tone, which only highlighted her own lack of any family to stand with her.
“I am sure it is all quite a formality,” the Headmaster was saying. “But it was not within my power to refuse.”
“I think I would like to go home now,” said Beatrice faintly, the pleasures and potential pleasures of the conjured afternoon falling away like so many blowing ashes. As she allowed Hugh to lead her away, she gathered up a few thoughts of the lovelier parts of the afternoon and stowed them away in the back of her mind, where they might remind her at some future date that lovely afternoons do not survive the chill of dusk.
Despair had a way of making tea taste bad. Beatrice recognized the feeling and knew that the lady’s parlor of the finest coaching inn along the high street was probably not as drab as it appeared to her at this moment. The white wainscoting seemed bright enough, and fresh flowers adorned a low table in front of the fireplace, but the floral upholstery of the chairs made her dizzy, and the sun, lancing in at tall courtyard windows, was painful to her eyes.
A sleepless night counting and re-counting her small stock of money had left her feeling weak. By no creative arrangement or stringent budgeting could she contrive to manage independently on the small allowance under her control. She might have managed abroad, in some small French town perhaps, but her father’s family would never advance her the funds to establish herself and she had no intention of humiliating herself by asking. In the dark she had considered writing again to those American friends of her father to whom she had already written, thanking them for their condolences. There had been expressions of concern and support on their part, and perhaps she had been too elliptical in her replies. But in the pale hours of the dawn, she knew she had been clear in her expression of a desire for meaningful work and a productive life. She had all but asked them to find her a position. Only two had found it necessary to reply again, and both carefully worded letters had extolled the virtue of home and reminded her of her father’s dying wish to see her safe in the bosom of his family.
She had declined one other teaching offer in favor of Rye. A northern mill town had offered just the productive life, the challenge of public service that she craved, but her heart had failed her at the thought of soot-blackened streets and rows of tenement cottages running across the hills. She had been forced to laugh at her own hypocrisy in choosing seaside Sussex over the surely greater educational impact she might make among the children of factory workers. Now she wondered if she would have time to write again and ask them to reconsider her. If not, she might eke out a few weeks at a friend’s home near Brighton, but her chances of finding some other position immediately were not good. She had no romantic notions of becoming a parlor maid or an actress, and she had never had patience with those more literary heroines who solved their problems with a knife or an oncoming train. She would have to write to Marbely Hall at some point and ask to come back.
“Excuse me, miss,” said a serving girl, peering around the door. “They’re ready for you in the Green Banqueting Hall.”
“Thank you,” said Beatrice, rising reluctantly from her chair. She shook out her skirts and smoothed a hand across her hair, looking at her face in the over-mantel mirror. She would face the Board of Governors with her very best smile and a forthright presentation of her skills and qualifications. She would not let them see that she knew the answer was already decided. They would pick the man over her, but she would make sure they knew, in their hearts, that she was the better candidate.
—
Hugh and Daniel were hovering outside the coaching inn, which presented an august Georgian fa?ade to the high street and was the site of many a municipal meeting and festivity. Or rather, as Hugh acknowledged, he was hovering, conspicuous in his anxiety, while Daniel leaned against the inn’s front wall, smoking a cheroot and gazing upward in the annoying way he did when he was suddenly struck by some fortunate arrangement of words. Hugh could only hope he would not start pulling out his notebook and a pen when time was so precious.
“He said he’d be here,” said Daniel, still musing. “I do wish you’d stop fidgeting.”
“And Harry Wheaton is the most reliable man we know,” said Hugh.
“He is most reliable when there’s a prank to be played or a girl to be courted,” said Daniel. “He seemed to regard the removal of Mr. Poot as a lark.”
“Well, Poot is sitting in the hallway now, and Miss Nash is already in with the governors,” said Hugh. “We should go and talk to him ourselves.”
“Poot?” asked Daniel. “What would we say? ‘Could you please withdraw so our aunt can beat your aunt’?”
“We have to do something,” said Hugh. While Daniel and Harry had agreed that Bettina Fothergill could not be allowed to usurp both Aunt Agatha and Lady Emily with her machinations, Hugh found himself unusually indignant at the unfairness of Mr. Poot snatching away a job from a young woman who so clearly deserved it. As he peered through the inn’s open door again, to where Mr. Poot sat very straight on a wooden settle, looking like a skinny toby jug, he reassured himself that ordinary chivalry demanded action and that his indignation had more to do with Miss Nash being alone in the world than with a pretty face or the intelligence behind her eyes.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, he’ll see you,” said Daniel. “We’re trying to be discreet, remember?” Just then an automobile horn gave a loud blast and a large black car swerved to a halt with Wheaton, attired in a voluminous duster and goggles, at the wheel. The chauffeur rode next to him, tight-lipped and gripping the door.
“Am I on time?” called Wheaton. He removed his goggles, wiped his face with a driving scarf, and hopped out of the car. The chauffeur slid over to take the wheel. “We dropped off my mother earlier and I took the old car for a spin. Still getting the hang of it. Round the corners it’s like trying to steer a cow.”
“Ridden many cows?” asked Daniel.
“A few,” said Wheaton. “At least that’s what they tell me. I can’t say I remember clearly.”
“We are too late,” said Hugh. “Miss Nash is already being interviewed, and they may send for Poot at any time.”
“Well, we’d better get to work,” said Wheaton. “Daniel and I will lure Poot into the taproom while you slip your aunt a note and ask her to stall as long as possible.”