Dorning when he leaves,” Vera said, “as we all will. You are correct that he’s good company. He’s also a perfect gentleman toward Catherine, a good influence on both Mr. Forester and Alexander, and he makes you smile over a hand of piquet. I’m very much indebted to your uncle for recommending him.”
“Uncle Richard recommended him? I suppose that makes sense.” Miss Diggory rose without being excused. “I’ll return to the schoolroom and look for some French poetry Catherine might enjoy. If you’re giving Mr. Forester charge of her mathematics lessons, please let him know. I would rather be spared his grumbling when he’s asked to take on that responsibility.”
Vera hadn’t made that decision, nor would she be manipulated into it. Bad enough if Catherine was developing a girlish tendresse for Oak, worse yet if she turned her nascent wiles on Jeremy.
“Miss Diggory?”
She paused by the door. “Ma’am?”
“Your grumbling is no more attractive than Jeremy’s. You are paid a generous wage to look after one reasonably pleasant young woman who deserves every advantage in life I can give her. I will instruct Mr. Forester to take on Catherine’s math curriculum, but I expect you to help her with it.”
Miss Diggory’s expression became a blank mask. “Yes, ma’am. Of course, ma’am.” She curtseyed and lifted the door latch. “Oh, I did have one question, if I might ask it?”
“Of course.”
“I went searching for a penknife the other day and thought I might find one in Mr. Dorning’s studio. Did you know he keeps those chambers locked unless he’s working there?”
“Of course he does. Some of the pigments needed to render a subject in oils are dangerously toxic. Mr. Channing was adamant that any room used as a painter’s studio, whether his own or a guest’s, be kept locked when not in use. Mr. Dorning is exercising the basic prudence I expect of any household member.”
This was a fabrication, or an improvisation, more like. White pigments, some of which were lead-based, were powerfully toxic. Dirk had kept his pigments locked up, but never his studio, for who would have dared intrude on that holy ground uninvited?
Miss Diggory dipped a hint of a curtsey and withdrew, leaving Vera to sip cold tea and ponder the exchange. Tamsin had developed a curious inability to keep track of her penknives. Her understanding of mathematics apparently bordered on rudimentary, and she wasn’t able to provide Catherine a curriculum that challenged her in any subject.
Bracken came in to clear the tray a moment later.
Vera was tempted to ask him what he thought of Miss Diggory—and Mr. Forester, for that matter—but Bracken’s immense dignity prevented such informality. She would instead ask Oak for his opinion, and he would give it.
That too, was a shift Vera could lay at his handsome feet. She took greater notice of her surroundings thanks to Oak Dorning’s observant company, and she considered ideas that Dirk Channing’s meek, devoted helpmeet would not have entertained.
Perhaps Tamsin Diggory had been a poor choice. Perhaps Jeremy Forester wasn’t the ideal tutor for Alexander. Perhaps Richard Longacre was a fine source of artistic guidance, but not as knowledgeable when it came to finding staff for a nursery.
He’d been a friend to Dirk and to Vera, but she honestly did not know Longacre all that well.
What she did know was that she’d miss Oak Dorning sorely for the rest of her quiet, rusticating widowhood.
“Oak wants the traveling coach sent up to Hampshire.” Valerian announced that development as if Oak had requisitioned every fungible asset Dorning Hall possessed. “He’s now trafficking in art, purveying the widow’s castoffs. He sent me a sketch of her.”
Grey watched Valerian, the Dorning sibling with stores of self-possession equal to any social challenge, the king’s man, the consummate solver of human conundrums. Valerian paced the carpet in Beatitude’s private parlor like a mare in anticipation of foaling.
“He sent me a sketch of the Channings as well,” Grey said, sanding the letter he’d just finished. “The little fellow stood on one side of his mama, the girl on the other. Quite charming.”
Valerian halted before Grey’s desk. “You describe a family portrait, Casriel. It needs only the addition of a doting step-papa to be complete.”
Beatitude had come to the same conclusion, though the prospect of Oak as a husband and step-father had not distressed her as it was clearly distressing Valerian.
Valerian tossed himself into the chair opposite the desk. “We did not send Oak to Hampshire to become some widow’s…”
“Plaything? I have never been a plaything, myself,