For a Year She Read Aloud to a Blind Stranger in the Park — He Was the Duke Who'd Refused Her
Chapter 8
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"The grass is white," she said. "Every blade of it has an edge. The water has a skin of ice, thin as paper, and a moorhen is walking on it as if it were furniture. Hobday is pretending he is not crying.""I am not," said Hobday."The sky is the color of a pewter spoon. A woman is crossing the far path with a basket.""Go on," said the Duke."That is all there is," said Verity."It is enough," he said.But the season was not yet finished with her.Hobday had carried the home farm book to Lord Loxbourne in August. The Earl was deaf, slow, and perfectly fair. He had written to ask for the other 11 ledgers. Mr. Gaunt had found out. He did not rage; he rationed.By Thursday, all of Mayfair knew the Duke of Rayford was blind. By Friday, they knew that Miss Brandreth sat with him every dawn and read to him for hire. They heard hire as another word. By Saturday, three invitations had been withdrawn, each in a hand of exquisite regret. Verity entered them in her aunt's ledger under sundries.Aunt Octavia read the rumor in three drawing rooms and closed the door of her own."They say you are paid," she said."I have never been paid in my life," said Verity."That," said Aunt Octavia, "is the grievance."On Monday, she went to Lady Danforth's morning, because a woman who hid had been priced correctly."They say Rayford has gone mad in his seclusion," said Lady Danforth to the room at large. "And blind, which is nearly the same. Poor creature. And that woman reading to him for money."Verity put down her gloves. She had not meant to speak."He is not mad, Lady Danforth," she said. "He has merely been badly read to."The room went quiet. She could not have said why she had defended him. It was the second time that year she had left a room that still. She found it did not grow less satisfying.On Tuesday, Mr. Gaunt laid a petition before the Earl. He asked to manage the Duke's affairs for the Duke's own protection. Lord Loxbourne appointed Thursday for a hearing. Mr. Gaunt, who disliked a small audience, chose the venue: it was Lady Danforth's drawing room.Hobday stood on Aunt Octavia's step on Wednesday evening with a card:His Grace requests the reader at Lady Danforth's on Thursday. He says to say, "Bring the figures." He says to say it is not an order."And what do you say?" said Verity."I say the reader will come, miss, because she is a fool. I say it with respect."On Thursday, Aunt Octavia put on her second-best bonnet, which was her best. She announced that she would attend as chaperone. She added that anyone who wished to say anything aloud might say it to her face.That Wednesday night, Verity sat at the kitchen table with the home farm figures, though she had them by heart. She wrote nothing down. She said the numbers aloud to the kettle.Aunt Octavia came in at midnight in her wrapper and set a cup of tea at her elbow."Your father," she said, "would have been very much in the way tomorrow. He would have wept. He would have apologized to the Duke.""He would have apologized to Gaunt," said Verity.