Elizabeth Mansfield by Poor Caroline Read Free Book Online Page A

information and been prepared.”
    “Prepared to take the lady in, and her little brothers, too? Are ye daft?”
    “Damnation, Mick, there is such a thing as familial responsibility!”
    “She was yer uncle’s ward, not yours.”
    Kit turned from the window and stared at Mickley through the gathering gloom. “Are you saying I should forget the matter?”
    Mickley shrugged. “Fer the time bein’ anyway. Take yersel’ a bit of rest, like you been wishin’ to do. Plenty o’ time later to start facin’ responsibilities.”
    “Perhaps. But do you know what I’ve been thinking for the last few minutes, Mick?”
    “No. What?”
    “That perhaps this inheritance of mine won’t turn out to be quite so fortunate as I first thought.”
     
     

 
     
    SIX
     
    Though Caroline and her brothers tried to put a good face on it, they were not very happy living in Letitia’s little town house on Mortimer Street. They were grateful indeed for her many kindnesses, and fully aware of how much they owed her, but they could not prevent their feelings of misery from showing.
    After a fortnight of watching their forced smiles across the dinner table, Letitia—who could be quite discerning despite her tendency to escape from reality into daydreams—admitted to herself that something had to be done. She put on her black bonnet, called for her coachman, and rode the short distance to Hanover Square. “Martha,” she said urgently, as soon as she’d ensconced herself on the sofa in her sister’s drawing room, “we must do something for poor Caroline.”
    Martha’s eyebrows rose. “I thought we already had.”
    Letitia shook her head, causing the black rose on her bonnet to tremble. “We didn’t think the matter through,” she said, clenching her fingers in her lap. “They are all dreadfully unhappy with me.”
    “Nonsense,” Martha declared firmly. “How could you possibly make them unhappy? You are the kindest, most good-natured female in the world.”
    Letitia was so startled by this unexpected praise from the sister who so regularly insulted her that she was rendered momentarily speechless. When she regained her voice, she launched into as full an explanation of the situation as she was capable of. But the difficulties Caro and her brothers faced were caused by circumstances that Letitia, with her limited experience, could not fully understand.
    To begin with, there was the house itself. It had (as Caroline realized but Letitia could not) an atmosphere that was basically uncongenial to boys. Though they appreciated the good-natured affection with which “Aunt Letty” showered them, the boys found it difficult to live in a house that was pathetically tiny and overcrowded, especially when compared with the huge, uncluttered homestead they’d been accustomed to. They could find no space for games, for exploring, or for simply larking about. What was worse, the small space that was available was completely taken up with feminine accoutrements. Every room was full of small ornaments that could fall over and break if a boy merely breathed too hard. Every shelf, every table, every surface of every room herd a profusion of knickknackery—-porcelain figurines, china vases, crystal sculptures, framed miniatures, enameled flowers, and every other sort of delicate decoration. The house seemed to the boys like an overcrowded museum, its fragile contents poised for inevitable disaster.
    It took only two days after their arrival for the first disaster to occur. Gilbert, having nothing better to do, decided to examine a Dresden shepherdess on the mantel of the downstairs sitting room. He lifted her up gingerly and turned her about in his hands. Somehow (though he never could explain how) she slipped from his fingers to the brick hearth, where she crashed to her doom. Caro, viewing the remains, was utterly devastated, but Letty, in her kind way, assured them that she had never liked the piece anyway. Both the culprit and his sister