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Summary
Edmund Birchley is the prodigal son of a railroad investor, reluctantly returning home from a summer of college celebrations and city debauchery when his cousin writes to him about his father's declining health. He does not receive a warm welcome - in his father's eyes, Edmund has never shaped up to be anything but a disappointment.
By comparison his Lordship's newly acquired clerk and confidant appears to satisfy his every expectation. Polite, reliable and well-composed, the indentured Callan has quickly risen high above Lord Birchley's own son in every regard. But Edmund is forbidden from interfering with the object of his abject jealousy: Until his father's death delivers the young man directly into his possession.
From one day to the next, Edmund finds himself responsible for a household, a large share of a thriving business, and, to his great triumph and satisfaction, the very life of his father's beloved clerk. But he quickly learns that his new power doesn't make him any less alone, and the slave he previously despised might just be the only person wholly at his disposal.