Twenty Years Later 

Colborne Estate

“Mama?” Harriette Gale asked while she entered the sitting room. Esther was sitting and responding to letters she had neglected to reply to for a few days. The young woman of six-and-ten came in, her oval face heavy with a frown. “I need to speak with you, as I found something disturbing.”

Esther cocked a brow, “I should be asking you where are you here and not with your governess? I am sure you have a French lesson now, n’est-ce pas?”

Her precocious daughter, sniffed, “I have declined enough verbs, Mama. I found myself in the attic—”

“During the lesson, I presume,” Esther said.

“Perhaps, perhaps not,” Harriet shrugged, “But I found a letter in of your old trucks, and I must say, I am very shocked and appalled by it. Why had father tried tolie to you? What is this about him being some Captain Morgan?”

Placing her quill on the blotter, Esther reached for the old letter, now yellowed with age and very fragile, and opened it. She did not need to read over it as every word of it had been burned in her mind from the day Felton had sent it.

It spoke about his regrets, his ruse of being Captain Morgan, how he felt pained about the broken courtship between John, her brother, who was now married to another lady, and his sister Catherine. They had been married a year less than Esther’s two-decade marriage. A marriage that had produced twin sons, Harriette’s cousins, Joseph and Jonathan, who  – according to Harriette – were twin menaces.

“And it is true that Aunt Catherine was once married to Uncle John?” Harriette pressed. “Why? What happened?”

Sighing, Esther folded the letter and stood. “Come; let us sit.”

After they had moved to a chaise, Esther began to explain the situation which had arisen two decades earlier. She told her daughter how her brother had once courted her Aunt Catherine, but it had been broken off because of an unfortunate rumor, that they now knew had come from a jealous lady in the ton.

“When your father came back from war, he was assured that John had broken her heart and took steps to settle the score,” Esther explained, “Sadly, he thought the best way to do so would be to use me as collateral. It was a hideous notion to seduce me to get back to John, but that was what your father then thought as the best course of action.”

She paused to collect her words, then added how over their interactions and outing, slowly his mind had begun to change until that night in Vauxhall when his conscience had been killing him, how he had confessed it all.

“By that time, he was in love with me and me, him; I just felt hurt,” Esther said. “I left London for a while, in a, now that I’ve looked back on it, now, futile attempt to run away from my feelings, but when I came back home, I could not outrun then.”

“So, you and father reconnected?” Harriette assumed.

“It took us a while to convince your Uncle John and your Grandmother,” Esther laughed softly, “Do you know about the twelve trials of Hercules?”

Harriette nodded.

“John told your father one morning that he would be so lucky to perform those as the tasks he would have to do to win me over were ten times harder,” Esther snorted. “We got it cut down to one task—that he showed his love for me over a year and then we could marry, but by the sixth month, I had had enough of it. I told John to repeal the law, and we married the month after. I have been happier since.”

Nodding, Harriette’s skimmed over the letter in Esther’s hand, “And how did Aunt Catherine and Uncle Rawden factor into this equation?”

“That night, I met your Mother,” Felton said as he strode into the room. “‘Twas a ball that my sister was bent on attending because she wanted to get ahead of the burgeoning scandal of her broken courtship and to prove to the ton that she was not the party to blame.”

Felton, now edging into his fifties, still looked the most dapper and perfect gentleman to Esther. He was still fit, and the silver threads at his temples only made him that more distinguished to her. Felton dipped to kiss her cheek.

“Back then, I was an arrogant, fool-hardy young man with only one goal, and that was to see that my sister did not suffer at the hands of you Uncle,” Felton peeled his jacket off and came to sit by Esther in his waistcoat. He dropped his hand on her knee, “In some ways, it was the worst and best mistake I ever made by pretending to Captain Arthur Morgan. It was not easy, but I found the love of my life through it.”

Resting her hand over his, Esther smiled, “I do believe that thought eh road was tumultuous and twisted, it all worked out for the best of all of us.”

“Catherine fell in love with the man I asked to distract her from John, and I fell in love with the woman would heal my heart,” Felton said. “With my foolish mistakes and all.”

“I will avoid those,” Harriette sniffed.

“Oh, will you?” Esther laughed. “Please tell me how you will do so as you would be the first person in the history of humankind to do so. Foolish mistakes are rites of passage when you are young, Harriette. You will not avoid them, but I assure you, you will find yourself in some. But—” she looked at Felton, and with his nod, addressed her daughter, “—you will be chaperoned while doing it.”

Her daughter’s wide blue-green eyes shifted between her parents, and when the insinuation began to dawn on her, Harriette cried out. “This year? You will allow me to start the season this year!”

“Yes,” Felton nodded. “But make no mistakes, young lady, you will be supervised. I know the shenanigans those of your age will get to, and I am not having any of it.”

Harriette launched herself at both and hugged them tightly, “Oh, thank you, thank you so much.”

“Don’t thank us yet,” Felton grinned. “Joseph and Jonathan will be with you, and they will be your constant companions.”

Harriette huffed, “I’ll deal with them in my own time, but thank you so much. I’m going to write Isabella about it and—”

“Oh no,” Esther said, “You, young lady, are going back to your French lesson. You can write to your friend after.”

“Fine, fine,” Harriette smiled, “I’ll do it at luncheon.”

As she left the room, Esther turned to Felton, “Do you think we have made the wrong decision about sending her to balls?”

He wrapped his around her, and she nestled into his side, “No. We’ve talked about it for months now, and it is time. She’ll do fine, love; our daughter has a good head on her shoulders.”

“And you have good aim with a pistol,” Esther laughed.

His eyes twinkled. “That too. Nevertheless, she’ll be fine.”

Esther did not speak for a moment, prodding Felton to peer at her. “What?”

“Nothing much,” she smiled. “I’m just so happy I went to the one balcony in a dozen that night.”

He kissed her, “Not as happy I am, love. Not as happy as I.”

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