His inheritance was nowhere near the value of Hazel’s dowry, yet it put Duncan in a very different economic position than he was right now. It was generous for Duncan’s situation in a similar way that Hazel’s dowry was generous for hers. But his inheritance would be his own, while Hazel’s, because of the patriarchal laws of England, would belong to her hypothetical husband. She tried to tamp down her irritation at such laws by keeping her focus on Duncan’s situation.
“Uncle Elliott would purchase the building and deed it into your name?”
“He already owns the Burrow Building and would only need to sign the deed over to me.”
Duncan lived and worked in a building Uncle Elliott owned? Uncle Elliott had played quite a hand in the organization of Duncan’s life, it seemed, and was now trying to manage even more of the details.
“You must be very excited by the prospect of owning the building.”
Duncan turned his attention to a hard-boiled egg. “Owning the building would be a grand financial security for me and therefore exciting, yes. But I do not want to marry.”
“Why not?”
He speared some egg onto his fork and did not answer until he had sufficiently chewed, savored, and swallowed. “I have been told that I am odd, and a genteel woman would never marry a clerk. I, therefore, do not feel my prospects are high in regard to making an arrangement that would satisfy Lord Howardsford’s terms.”
Hazel’s cheeks turned hot at the ease with which he spoke of the sort of things most people never said out loud.
“What did Uncle Elliott create for you to inherit upon marriage, Cousin Hazel?”
Hazel felt instant offense at the impertinence of his question but immediately saw the hypocrisy. It was only fair that she answer as honestly as he had.
“A dowry,” she said flatly. “Fifty thousand pounds.” She hadn’t said the words out loud until now, and the marvel of it shimmered down her spine. Then the offense shimmered back up to her head where it buzzed like an angry hornet.
Duncan straightened, his shoulders drawing back as he looked at her with wide eyes. “Fifty thousand pounds? That is an incredible sum! Is that in addition to your existing dowry from your parents or is it a combination of the two?”
His enthusiasm was surprising, and a little bit gauche. “I did not have an existing dowry.”
His eyes moved back to her chin. “You did not?”
“No one has ever expected I would marry, dowry or not. And my father tended to spend any money that came his way, not set it aside for his children.” Harry had followed their father’s pattern of not worrying about anyone but himself. Gallant men, the Stillmans.
“No one but Lord Howardsford, you mean.”
Hazel pulled her eyebrows together. “What?”
“You said no one has ever expected you would marry, dowry or not, but apparently Lord Howardsford does expect you will marry.”
Hazel would have laughed out loud, but she was still a gentlewoman. “For fifty thousand dollars, a great many men would marry their horses.”
Duncan pulled his eyebrows together as though trying to make sense of her statement.
The pause went on long enough for her to feel awkward. “Never mind,” she said, shrugging one shoulder to feign her indifference.
Satisfied with her acknowledgment, Duncan returned his attention to his plate, which was nearly cleared. She finished the last bite of her cold egg on toast and took a sip of cold tea, watching him.
It had been Harry who had told Hazel about Duncan several years ago, when they’d been home from school at the same time—a rare event outside of Christmas holiday.
“Did you know we have an illegitimate cousin?” Harry had said, his eyes wide with fascination as he’d plopped down beside her on her bed where she had been reading Robinson Crusoe for the fourth time that week. There was a limited selection of books at Falconridge, and she’d not thought to borrow from the extensive library at St. Mary’s before she’d left.
“We do not,” she’d said in the authoritative tone she used most often when talking to Harry.
“We do.” His eyes were bright with anticipation to share his gossip. “I heard Mother talking to Mrs. Moyle about it just now. It seems our Aunt Catherine—she died when we were five years old—took up with a man who already had a child, and Mother called Aunt Catherine ‘his mistress.’” Harry had grinned at the delightful scandal. “Catherine promised Uncle Elliott she would marry that man, but she never did, and then he died, and she was left with the care of his son, who became her ward. He is twenty years old and works as an apprentice clerk in Ipswich. Mother said that Uncle Elliott has paid for all the boy’s schooling and helped him find an apprenticeship, and she is furious.”
“If the boy’s parents were married when he was born, he is not illegitimate,” Hazel had said.
“But his father never married Aunt Catherine, and that is how Mother identified the boy to Mrs. Moyle—‘Catherine’s illegitimate son.’”
How should they reference this boy’s relationship to their dead aunt? Hazel had wondered. Catherine hadn’t been his stepmother, because she’d never married his father. Not wanting to admit she didn’t know the answer, Hazel had gone back to her book.
“You are an imbecile, Harry. Why does petty gossip hold such interest to you?”
Harry’s cheeks had gone red, and he had grabbed her book and thrown it against the wall, breaking the binding, before jumping off the bed and running from the room while she screamed additional names after him.
Now Hazel watched their “illegitimate” cousin take the last bite of his breakfast and calculated that if he had been twenty years old when she had been eleven, he was thirty-six years old now—the same age as her cousin Peter—and nine years her senior. She wondered what it had been like for Duncan to live in rented rooms above shops with a woman who was not his mother. What a strange life.
Duncan took another drink of ale.
Hazel decided to push for more information. “You do not find the requirement of making a genteel match offensive?”
Duncan leaned back in his chair. “Lord Howardsford said that he hopes to help each of us establish what he himself was unable to have in his youth. His hope may have blinded him to reasonable expectations.”
“Did you tell him that?”
Duncan shook his head. “As he has always done me such kindness, I did not want to be rude. I was taught to always say thank you when given a gift.”
“You had more manners than I did, then,” Hazel said, pushing both of her empty plates aside and feeling foolish for having spoken her mind so directly yesterday in light of Duncan’s restraint.