Chapter Text
The advert had been brief but informative.
“A young woman with some experience with children is wanted for the care and guidance of an exceptional young girl, aged 10. Some knowledge of art, music and literature is preferred. Intelligence and kindness are required.”
As Melinda May stared at the paper, her mind whirled at the prospect of joining the service.
She had followed the drum for the past 15 years of her life, first with her father, a man braver and kinder than any she had ever known. He had been a brilliant and learned man and had insisted upon teaching his young daughter everything he knew about the world, despite her sex. Upon his death she had met her husband, with whom she had enjoyed a startlingly brief courtship and a mercifully brief marriage. She bit her lip at the seemingly un-Christian nature of the thought. Yet had she not been relieved of her young husband by his death at the hands of the French; she was sure that after his final beating of her she would have likely run him through with a rapier herself.
Now at the tender young age of 23, she was widowed and she was alone. She had the meager portion her father had left and the widows pension the army provided. Neither of which was truly sufficient to support a young woman fully, let alone allow her to save for the future.
Yes, entering the service was the single most prudent choice she could make. Marriage was of course an option, but after John the scales had fallen from her eyes. She would never again be blinded by passion, if she did ever marry again it would be far more mercenary reasons. If she was going to hand over her freedom, her independence it would only be for a kingdom, or a duchy at the very least. She suppressed a small smile at the thought; there were certainly no Dukes or Earls, not even a minor Baron, waiting to pay court to her. If she ignored the local butcher and the squire’s third son (whom she was sure would never be allowed to marry a poor young woman three years his senior) she had relatively few admirers clamoring at her door.
As she replied to the advertisement, she suppressed a small sigh. She felt very much that she was signing away any prospect of future adventure and passion for the sake of prudence and security.
How wrong she would eventually prove to be.
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Lord Philip Coulson gazed at the sweetly bowed head of his young niece. She was so much like his beloved younger sister that at times his heart clenched at the memory of sweet, sweet Alice who had perished far too young. That she had left behind this splendid young child had been a miracle, especially arriving in his life when she did.
As a darling three year old babe Jemma had been entrusted to him by the late Mr. Simmons’s mamma, who had had the caring of Jemma since Alice’s death two years prior. The elder Mrs. Simmons had grown weak after a fever had affected her heart and she worried about her ability to care for Jemma as she grew.
Jemma, was a ray of sunshine from the start, the favorite of every person who lived at Hartley, from the humble footman to its Master. At the age of 10, Jemma’s old nurse had been pensioned off and Lord Coulson had taken over her education himself. As a scientist of great repute he had met hundreds of brilliant young minds; yet, he had never anyone with Jemma’s raw brain power combined with her earnest and insatiable thirst for knowledge. Soon she was mastering concepts university students struggled with; he was very sure that someday soon she would be his equal.
Yet, he realized upon a recent trip to London that he was doing his young darling a disservice by not introducing her to the feminine arts and by providing the gentle influence of a woman in her life. She was 10, and she was expected to enter society at 16 and had mastered none of the feminine arts that society expected, nay demanded, in a young woman. At the advice of old friends he had decided to hire a governess for Jemma, someone to remediate any deficiencies in her education. Yet, he didn’t want someone who had seen nothing of the world turning his little darling into simpering society miss. He wanted a lady of intelligence and elegance who could help Jemma become a better version of the wonderful young person she was. The agency he had contracted claimed to have found someone to fit the specifications he had required and she would be arriving on the morrow. He expected that she would be the matronly figure Jemma needed without overly disrupting the fragile peace of his household.
How wrong he would prove to be.
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Jemma had been the greatest surprise of Melinda May’s life
She was a delight whose every aim had seemed to please her new governess. Rather than the chore that Melinda had anticipated caring for a young girl would be, she found herself eager to have Jemma throw her arms about her waist each morning each breakfast. They would walk throughout the estate, discussing propriety, society, what constituted good behavior and manners. She would teach her piano and occasionally they would paint in the solarium. At precisely 11 am she would relinquish her young charge to her uncle’s library where she would undertake the study of science until 4 pm when she would be released back to May for tea. May had initially anticipated that she would be present during Jemma’s scientific education, but Lord Coulson had balked after the first day, claiming she was too great a distraction.
So May was left to her own devices and found herself going on long walks through the countryside, reading in the deliciously well stocked library or practicing her fencing in the long ballroom. It was as idyllic an existence as Melinda could have imagined for herself, and she realized that for the first time, perhaps since she was a child, she was happy.
That her happiness was due in no small part due to her interactions with her new employer were something she did not allow herself to recognize, let alone explore. Each evening after Jemma had been put to bed, Melinda would join Lord Coulson in his library while he took his port. That first evening she had anticipated a brief discussion on her duties or an explanation of her future role in Jemma’s education. Instead he had asked her, leaning forward with an elbow balanced on his knee, if she had any opinion of Britain’s Spanish strategy. She had been so taken aback to be spoken to as an equal, let alone questioned on military strategy that she had been struck mute for a full minute. He had apologized, and said that he had noticed the book on ancient warfare that she had been reading and assumed that she may be interested in military strategy. She had interrupted him quickly with a three minute soliloquy on her certitude of the strategy’s imminent failure, outlining both the conceptual problematics of the plan and delving into the minute specifics of the fallacies of the arguments of the plan’s proponents. When she finished, her face serene but her heart racing, it was Lord Coulson’s turn to be struck dumb.
He folded his hands over and over in his lap, when he finally moved to speak, his face had broken into a wide smile. As he leaned back into his chair he said, “I couldn’t agree with you more Ms. May; however as to your third point have you considered….”
They talked at length for hours that first night and it was only when Melinda spied the clock on his deck and she realized that her young charge would soon be awake and eager to start the new day did Ms. May excuse herself.
When she left, holding herself with more grace and elegance than Lord Coulson had previously seen in a hundred debutantes put together, that Lord Coulson finally rose, feeling as if he had suddenly both gained and lost something infinitely. When he sat down, he felt his head fall into his hands and unbidden a small groan leave his mouth.
Good Lord what had he done.
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It had been on Ms. May’s third day that Jemma had mentioned her Aunt Audrey in passing.
No one had previously spoken of a mistress at Hartley and Melinda had assumed that Lord Coulson was a bachelor. The notion that he had had a wife was startling disruptive to Melinda’s equilibrium. Upon further reflection she wondered at the fact that she had not wondered about it before. He was everything any woman could require in a spouse, handsome, brilliant, well-spoken and kind. It would be a marvel if he had never married.
Being Melinda May however, she felt it not her place to inquire after the mistress of the Estate, as she was never spoken of by the staff with whom she interacted. She did begin to understand the faint whiffs of melancholy that seemed to occasionally permeate Hartley and she felt her long dormant heart clench at the sight of the veil of sadness that seemed to fall over Lord Coulson’s face when no one was watching.
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In this mostly happy state of existence the three of them persisted for years, the days melding into months which flowed seamlessly into years. Suddenly Jemma was 13 and becoming a young woman, and Melinda suddenly could not imagine a life without her or her Uncle. She couldn’t imagine leaving Hartley behind, not for any price.
That thought, coupled with the harsh reminded that she was a paid companion- hardly more than a servant- and the knowledge that one day she would indeed have to leave Hartley was enough to make her nearly ill. She had forgotten her place and if she was honest with herself she fallen in love. Completely and irrevocably in love with Jemma, Hartley and most of all Lord Coulson. The thought made her ill.
She took to her bed for two days; yet rather than sleep she lay awake, plotting and planning on how to begin to harden her heart to the beguiling inhabitants of the Manor. She knew at once that she needed to expand her acquaintance, perhaps help Lord Coulson search for a new mistress, one more suitable for the role than a paid companion. Perhaps then she could begin to prepare for the inevitable separation that would occur when Jemma came of age.
So it was a calm demeanor, but a nervous heart, that a few nights later Melinda asked Lord Coulson why he had never remarried. He seemed to still, and then swallow convulsively for a moment before replacing his teacup on its saucer. He looked up at her then, and Melinda felt that in his gaze he conveyed a longing more poignant than she had ever before seen. She ached to go to him then, to wrap her arms around his shoulders and draw his head to waist.
In that gaze he communicated that she was not alone in their silent love affair, and suddenly the question she had asked became immaterial as a hundred long hidden truths were silently revealed. Although they had fallen in love through intelligent conversation, words suddenly became unnecessary between them.
Finally, finally, after what seemed like hours but was in truth a few minutes, he spoke, his voice raw, “I cannot. I…” he faltered then, seemingly at war with himself, “my wife still lives you see.”
At that answer Melinda could not help but suppress a gasp, her heart suddenly in her throat. Rather than face her surprised face, Lord Coulson rose to the window, clutching the frame as if it were a lifeline.
Internally a war raged within her, she felt at once betrayed and God, so horrified. But the man before her was tortured, and she loved him.
If she could help him, she would. She rose and perhaps in the first real physical contact that she had had with any man in years, she gently laid a hand gently on his back.
He let out a shuddering gasp and at once she found herself enfolded in his arms. The surprise of his action stunned her, and although haltingly at first, she found her own arms drawing around him, providing him with the comfort she had longed to give for years.
He pulled away, apologies falling from his lips, and as he placed a hand on his forehead he urged her to sit and he told her everything.
He had long ago met a beautiful young debutante who had played the cello at a musical he had attended. He had been immediately entranced by the beauty of her face and by her music. Although they had little in common they were soon married and at first there was happiness at Hartley. Yet, she was a creature of society and he a rather solitary serious type of man, happy with his books and his science and content with the small society that surrounded them. She at first had urged him to go with her often to London. He had initially acquiesced, but as his scientific renown grew he spent more time with his work and abroad, working and consulting with other scientists. Audrey, his wife, became increasingly dissatisfied in their marriage and when she met a handsome young musician she had a torrid affair and eventually became pregnant, uncertain whether it was his child or her lovers. She and her lover had planned to elope to the continent when Lord Coulson had learned of everything. He was heartbroken but unable to entertain the possibility of losing his child, so he followed them till he reached France. There he found Audrey abandoned, she had undergone a severe apoplexy, possibly brought on by her journey and her pregnancy. He brought her back to England, but en-route she lost the baby. He had installed her in a sanitarium by the sea, now he was neither married nor single. He was now 31 years of age; hopelessly and irrevocably tied to a woman who could barely recognize him.
By the tale’s end Melinda was in tears, the first tears she had shed since her father’s death all those years ago. She longed to embrace him, but this new found intimacy between them made everything suddenly more fraught with danger. The understanding that her misplaced affections were returned, made even the slightest touch into an invitation; something she could not trust herself to offer.
“Do you hate me for lying to you,” he asked, his voice quiet and solemn.
As she sat stone still by his side, the hem of her skirt barely touching his leg, she uttered a single word, “Never.”