Page 102 of My Deal with the Wrong Duke

“Indeed, I am.”

“And you wish to court my daughter.”

“Indeed, I do.”

Charles Fairchild shifted in his seat.

“May I ask why you are here, rather than simply proceeding? You have rank and wealth sufficient to court anyone in England. My permission is a courtesy you are not required to observe.”

Oliver leaned forward. “I am here because Louisa is not a woman who should be courted by a man who bypasses her family.”

The older man’s gaze sharpened.

“You know her well?”

“Better than I know most people. Which is still not well enough, and I suspect she would agree.”

Another silence. Fairchild looked at the stack of unopened letters on his desk. His fingers moved toward them, then retreated.

“She ended her engagement to Lord Langley,” he said quietly. “Her mother informed me. I should have heard it from Louisa herself, but she did not come to this room, and I did not leave it to find her. I have been poor company for my family this year. For several years, if I am truthful. Langley never asked my permission to court her. He didn’t believe it mattered, and I suppose I cannot fault him entirely for that.”

“Louisa spoke of you once,” Oliver pressed. “She said you taught her to read account ledgers. That you sat beside her at this desk and showed her how to balance columns, and that she loved every minute of it because you gave her your full attention and treated her as though her questions mattered.”

Fairchild’s fingers stilled on the blotter.

“She also told me,” Oliver continued, “that those afternoons stopped when the investments turned. That the door to this study closed, and it has remained closed since. She does not blame you for it. I believe she misses you.”

The words sat between them. Oliver waited.

Fairchild pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead. He held it there for several seconds, his face hidden, his breathing slow and deliberate. When he lowered his hand, his eyes were bright, though nothing spilled.

“I lost their money,” he said. “Not all of it. Enough. The canal scheme looked sound. Every gentleman in my club invested. The surveyor’s reports were thorough. And I sat in this chair and signed the papers and felt clever for the last time in my life.” He looked at Oliver, and his voice dropped to barely audible. “A man who loses his family’s security has no business offering opinions about their futures. I forfeited that authority when I signed those papers.”

“You forfeited nothing.” Oliver’s voice was quiet but firm. “You made a decision that went badly. Half the gentlemen in London have done the same. The ones who kept their confidence did not lose it because they were better men. They lost less money.”

Fairchild almost smiled. “You are blunt, Your Grace.”

“I have been told that recently. By your daughter, in fact. Repeatedly.”

This time the smile arrived and stayed, faint and rusty, like a hinge that had not been used in too long. Fairchild sat back in his chair and looked at Oliver as though seeing him properly for the first time.

“She argued with you?”

“She still does. Constantly.”

“And you wish to court her?”

“Yes. Partly because she argued with me. Among other reasons, of course.”

Fairchild nodded slowly. He looked at the stopped clock, then at the crusted inkwell, then at his own hands resting on the leather blotter. His study had become a museum of his withdrawal, every object frozen in the moment he had decided he was no longer qualified to participate in his own household, and Oliver watched him take inventory of it, watched the recognition settle.

“I should like to meet you again,” Fairchild said. “Under better circumstances. When I have opened those letters and wound that clock and perhaps had a conversation with my wife that does not consist entirely of her informing me of events I should have witnessed myself.”

“I should like that very much.”

Fairchild stood. He offered his hand across the desk, and Oliver took it. The grip was firm despite the years of retreat, a handshake that remembered what it was for even if the man behind it had forgotten.

“You have my permission, Your Grace. Court my daughter. But if I discover you have treated her as less than she is, you will find that a diminished man is not the same as a harmless one.”