It wasn’t that he regretted marrying, or regretted choosing Miss Richman as his wife, Octavius simply felt that the two of them didn’t need to be quite so formal with each other.
Like when she’d first come home earlier, everything about that had felt natural, giving him a sense of having a home.
Wait, had he already come to feel that sense of home here? That seemed almost unbelievable, he’d only been staying here a few days!
Octavius could hardly believe it himself, perhaps it was just an illusion. Away from London, away from all those tiresome affairs, he simply didn’t need to keep his guard up here, and could relax a little.
Wouldn’t the same be true anywhere else, though?
Having put a question mark on the answer he’d come up with for himself, Octavius watched as she easily picked up a wooden bucket and walked past him toward the room he’d just come from.
“The rest of the work is quite tedious, you’re welcome to leave if you’ve had enough watching.” Mary needed to pour it into the molds now, and wouldn’t have time for anything else for a while.
“It’s fine, don’t worry about me.” Octavius wanted to stay a little longer, he needed to figure out what exactly was going on with him right now.
Fine, then, Mary really did stop paying him any attention after that, focusing entirely on the task at hand. Night was falling, and she needed to pick up the pace.
The man simply watched, recalling the two of them’s very first meeting.
Back then, he’d already been under pressure to marry for some time. Utterly unwilling to accept an arranged match, and grateful he was no longer as powerless as he’d been as a child, he’d thought of a way to handle it.
Hadn’t the Prince of Wales always resented his existence? All it would take was leaking the news to him, and he’d surely act on it. To give the man extra motivation, Octavius had even sent along all the information he’d gathered on eligible, marriageable princesses.
A duke’s heiress, the King’s eldest daughter, a wealthy young widowed duchess, these few alone were enough to make the Prince of Wales feel thoroughly threatened. After all, aside from being the Prince of Wales’s own cousin, the Princess of Wales had nothing else going for her, no money, no power. And the two of them were already separated, so she was of no help to him whatsoever.
Sure enough, within a month, one candidate after another his father had favored had turned down the proposed match.
Since nothing had been formally announced, few people knew about it at first. But afterward, thanks to some deliberate spreading of the news, everyone came to know that Prince Octavius, Duke of Cambridge, had been rejected as a marriage prospect.
Then, old events from years past were dug up again. This time, word spread even further, reaching the royal houses of neighboring countries as well.
With that, his chances of ever marrying a princess had all but vanished. After all, no princess wanted a husband who was a murderer, a habitual one, at that, who’d first killed at the age of eight!
Octavius, thinking back on it, let out a silent laugh.
His father the King, wracked with guilt over it, had actually allowed him to find a wife on his own! The only conditions were that she not be Catholic, not a widow, and not born out of wedlock.
The following months had turned into quite the farce. As one noble young lady after another proved too particular for his taste, the King grew impatient and set a deadline.
That day, Octavius hadn’t actually meant to stop Miss Richman’s carriage at all. Her carriage had simply happened to pass by at the right moment, and by then his own patience had been running thin. That was how the scene with the baker, who was really his plump steward, chasing after him had come about.
It had simply happened, by pure coincidence, that Miss Richman had paid for the bread, which technically satisfied the requirements. The investigation that followed soon turned up results, and looking it over, Octavius found that aside from lacking noble birth, this young lady’s own qualities put her far ahead of everyone else.
Not only could she look after herself, she’d looked after her own parents too. No fine dresses, no expensive jewelry, her whole life consisted of nothing but her family’s 200 acres of land.
Of course, none of that alone would have been enough to bring him to her door. But those who’d gone to Meryton and come back reported that Miss Richman had even less enthusiasm for balls. Just last year, two handsome, wealthy bachelors had settled not far from her small village. They’d hosted balls and invited everyone nearby, and it was at those very balls that both of them had met their fiancées.
And yet Miss Richman hadn’t gone to a single one.
The young ladies who’d become their fiancées lived right next door to her, but she’d shown no envy, no jealousy, instead pouring herself entirely into those 200 acres, always delivering her handmade soap to the London merchants right on schedule.
Did she not want to marry? But her father’s private bank had already gone bankrupt, and the man himself had fled, how was she supposed to survive on her own afterward? Weighing it all over, Octavius had decided to pay her a visit.
Once he had, he’d known he’d come to the right person.
He needed a wife, and she needed a husband, a perfect match.
By all reasoning, everything should have gone exactly as they’d agreed, Octavius only needed to show his face here occasionally, and that would fulfill his duties as a husband.
So, then, what exactly was he dissatisfied with? What was he regretting?
“There, I’m done here.” Once all the soap liquid had gone into the molds, Mary covered them with a wooden board to keep the heat in. Then she took a clean cloth to wipe down the residue on her tools, setting them aside somewhere well-ventilated.
“Aren’t you leaving yet?” Glancing back at the man who hadn’t followed her out, she wondered, surely he wasn’t finding this fun enough to want to try it himself?
“Coming.” Octavius couldn’t quite put a name to how he was feeling right now, nor did he really know what he was thinking.
He’d watched the entire process, start to finish, with patience, without a trace of boredom. In fact, he could have kept watching, simply because it left him feeling calm.
Was it because of the soap-making process itself, or because of the person?
He needed to figure it out.
“Right, I need to close this door.” With the soap done, washing up was essential, so Mary headed to her own room on the second floor. She didn’t expect someone to follow along, all the way to her very door!
“Sorry, I was lost in thought.” Octavius stepped back two paces, simply watching as the door closed in front of him.
No, he hadn’t been thinking about anything at all! He hadn’t even noticed himself following her here. The questions kept piling up, and he hadn’t found answers to the earlier ones before new ones surfaced.
Perhaps, in a little while, he ought to have a proper talk with his wife.
In her room, Mary patted her freshly washed hands against her face. She needed to calm down a little, because in her eyes, someone had clearly lost his composure just now.
If being called by name meant nothing on its own, then what about that long, lingering look back in the workroom? Perhaps she was overthinking it, he might not have meant anything by it at all. Maybe he’d simply been curious, and that was why he’d watched so intently.
But then, what was she to make of him following her all the way to her door just now?
In Mary’s impression, Mr. Ethys, while a bit domineering, had always been considerate of the people around him.
When they’d worked out the specific terms of the marriage contract, he’d agreed to nearly all her requests. Wherever their views differed, it had usually been him who gave ground.
Even the suggestion he’d raised today, about putting up a fence and gate outside, had been something he’d sought her opinion on beforehand.
So what was going on with him? Surely the other Mary showing up at their house hadn’t rattled him that badly?
After changing into a fresh apron, Mary slowly made her way downstairs.
“Mary, let’s talk.” Seeing her come down, Octavius felt this needed sorting out.
“All right, let’s go by the window.” Rain was falling outside, and the sound of it hitting the glass would, to some extent, keep anyone from overhearing. “What did you want to talk about?”
“Just, how you’ve been lately. Is everything going well?” Outside the window it was pitch dark, nothing visible at all, so Octavius could only watch the rain trailing down the glass.
“Not bad at all, and you?” Mr. and Mrs. Richman’s departure hadn’t affected Mary much at all. Once the matter of the mortgaged bank had been cleared up, the people of Meryton had stopped giving her any trouble.
Although the potato deal with the army had fallen through, she’d found an even better outlet in London. And now she’d started a new soap deal with the army too, restoring that relationship.
Overall, Mary had been doing quite well for herself lately. There were people out there having a harder time, but that had nothing to do with her.
“I just finished up a piece of business, so I can take a few days to rest now.” Octavius offered his idea somewhat uncertainly. “Would you mind if I came along to watch, when the time comes? That process is quite soothing to watch, it settles the mind.” Watch a few more times, and perhaps he’d finally figure out what was going on!
“No soap-making tomorrow, mainly rendering fat. If you’re interested, you’re welcome to watch.” She’d need to mention it to Betsy and Molly when she saw them.
“What time does it start tomorrow?”
“Around eight in the morning, we’ll be at it for several hours.” There’d be other small tasks in between, like preparing the mint extract.
Mary had expected some real topic of conversation, only for it to end up being this? She was a bit disappointed, though she understood well enough. The two of them barely knew each other, after all, and there wasn’t much else to discuss, so be it.
“By the way, that girl from earlier, will her running off like that affect your life here?” Unable to find another topic, Octavius brought up the other Mary.
“No, her influence isn’t that great.” After their previous face-to-face encounter, this time, though she’d come by again and they’d crossed paths, all she’d left behind was a glare and nothing more.
“Good, I wouldn’t want—”
“Sir, ma’am, dinner is ready.” Steward William was busy in the dining room, so he’d sent a servant to fetch them. Seeing the two of them nearly finished talking, the servant had gone to call them.
“You wouldn’t want what?” Mary hadn’t caught the rest of it.
“Nothing, I just didn’t want to cause you any trouble.” The very person standing before him had once said, after all, that this face of his was itself a kind of trouble.
“Not yet, at least. Come on, let’s go eat.” Mary didn’t expect he’d actually remembered her old remark, she smiled and led the way to the dining room.
The dining room wasn’t quite as extravagant as it had been that first night, but it certainly wasn’t plain either. Still, for an occasional treat like this, Mary found she didn’t mind it at all.
Once dinner was finished, and after letting Betsy and Molly know there’d be an extra pair of hands in the workroom tomorrow, Mary went up to the third floor to keep herself busy a while, as a way of settling her meal.
The next day brought rain again, which wasn’t good news for soap-making. Fortunately, the workroom was indoors, so the factors affecting things stayed within manageable limits.
“How much a pound did you buy this pork leaf lard for?” Watching the steaming pot of rendering lard, Octavius had already changed into old clothes and was stirring away at it. Yes, in the end, he really had rolled up his sleeves.
The work wasn’t especially difficult, and he could manage well enough.
“The slaughterhouse’s initial price was one penny a pound, but once I started needing larger amounts, it became two pence for three pounds.” The small town of Meryton alone couldn’t supply that much leaf lard on an ongoing basis, the slaughterhouse had to reach out to neighboring areas to keep up.
Since Mary’s demand was steady, and since the fully grown pigs would be heading to the slaughterhouse themselves within a month, she was still able to get the leaf lard at a fair price.
“That’s quite cheap, though, are you sure you should be telling me all this?” Wasn’t he worried she suspected he might be some sort of business spy sent by someone else?
“Why, are you planning to cut off my supply of leaf lard?” Each order came to less than two or three pounds, did he really think he’d bother with something that small? Mary didn’t even look up, continuing to add cut blocks of leaf lard into the copper pot.
Betsy and Molly, knowing that today was just for rendering fat, had gone off on their own to the third floor to flip the curing soap. With another person present, they still weren’t quite used to it.
“You never know.” Octavius kept stirring away, feeling a genuine sense of accomplishment over this pot of lard he’d rendered with his own two hands. The work itself was rather monotonous, but with someone to talk to, the time passed quickly enough.
“Then go ahead and try it, then.” Mary, of course, knew he was only joking.
Once the workroom held only the two of them, everyone had felt a bit awkward at first. But once the conversation started, it hadn’t stopped, they’d talked about all sorts of things, and somewhere along the way, the distance between them had simply melted away.
“Try it, then, let me think of a way.” If he really meant to do it, the simplest method would be to just buy someone off. If he’d rather not spend the money, hiring someone to sabotage things was another option.
The leaf lard needed for soap-making had fairly high requirements, even the connective tissue had to be trimmed off. If someone truly meant harm—
“Ma’am, ma’am, something’s wrong! Our cargo cart’s overturned!”