"Of course, though it took me a while to see it, I wish I would have known sooner for I fear this might have started long ago right?"

"Yes..." I declared ashamed of how long I had hidden it yet glad Mrs. Hall knew of it, for she was fair and a decent human being who was likely to be capable of wisdom I could not attain for myself.

"It was not until you were gone I was sure of it, one day I delivered his food and saw his sketches in great detail of your lovely face."

"So the staff knows, everybody knows?"

"No, I took good care for them to not see anything, as far as they are concerned there is nothing to it. I wish you would have come to me with this sooner child, I might have been able to warn you about the master. We might have discussed how he was not ready to reciprocate any sentimental attachment you might have had..."

"Well I learned it rather quickly before I took off as a lady, Mr. Howard rejected me with words I try to burn out of my mind..."

"Oh of course he did, I never thought he would approach another woman during his lifetime. I know it is to be expected but Mr. Howard could have gone on to become a priest and none of us would have been surprised. His lot in life was cast and none who knew him ever dared expect he'd ever change, he is too good at being this way."

"It's because of his marriage to Lydia right?"

"You know about Lydia?"

"Yes and so do you."

"How could I not child?"

The mention of Lydia brought out no reaction from Mrs. Hall this meant I was missing some key element in the relationship between Mr. Howard and Lydia for she was not altered by the name.

"Come Mrs. Hall do you have nothing to say on the matter?"

"It is not my place to tell you his secrets, but I will say this his engagement with the outer world was not for his own pleasure for it brings him none. All this going on about like an earl from circle to circle, hosting dinner parties, being in London are very off the character for the master I know. Indeed any observer who'd look beyond the proprieties of society and it's set ways understanding who he is would understand the trail of crumbs lead back to you."

"Please do not say that, it will only make it worse, I will only regret what has taken place today," I began to cry again and Mrs. Hall held me in her arms.

"Oh dear, your feelings are much more rooted than I imagined them to be."

"Yes and I... I cannot seem to..." in between the words were the gulps of crying while trying to breathe as well. "To stop them... They grow rooted deeply into my bones and Mr. Howard is..."

"A complicated man, with a stubborn ideology, and his own set of past tales which have turned him into the man you struggle with today, oh it would have been so much easier if it were you and Joseph."

"Yes," I dried off some of my tears and looked at her.

"I should have known something was amiss when you refused Joseph, or when you went to London and Mr. Howard set into a constant despair. And now you are engaged to Mr. Henry Walker, I fear to think what the master may do next, for this engagement will have made a way for deep resentment between you and him..."

"This was not supposed to happen, this engagement, Mr. Henry did not even warn me of it and it has not been a year, we have not courted properly, nothing is going as I thought it would..."

"Are you saying you do not wish to be engaged or are you merely upset the master found out this way?"

"Both though I did not know it until the moment... until I saw Mr. Howard from across the room looking at me with such... Oh God it was unbearable to smile in front of all... And then Mr. Howard wanted me to say yes to running off with him but all I could think of was Lydia, Joseph, the past and how could I tell if he was to be trusted? I know nothing, if they told me up was down I could barely see it for what it was... I need your help Mrs. Hall, please help me."

"Calm down dear, we will get this resolved but first we must go back before we set anything in motion, for one more wrong move and you could end up tied up forever to Mr. Henry. We must use get you out of what you have thus been entangled to unwillingly, unfortunately you have been your own worst enemy and your youth has not helped in the least."

"My youth?" I giggled, "how funny when the weight seems to say I am a century old and tired of everything."

"You are too young to give up, you have not even started to know what is life and as you have to continue on you might as well fight your way out then settle for the weight."

"Yes I suppose so, but how?"

"Do you love Mr. Henry Walker?"

"I... um I am grateful to him, very grateful, he was a gentlemen and very wonderful through my mother's sickness so I..."

"I understand you are indebted to him, but do you love Henry?"

"I..."

"Do you love Mr. Howard?"

The tears tried to come back out and in shame I nodded, for no one had asked me this before.

"But is love enough?"

"Of course not, there are a great many other things, like a house is not only its walls, or its floors, it is a combination of many important parts and so it is to commit to another human. But if you do not even have a foundation what is the use of everything else? If both are not willing to build the same house?"

"Right."

Images of floors, stones and windows coming together then lamps, paintings, and beds to make a beautiful residence flashed in my mind where one person opened the front door with a smile and I knew very well the rest of my earthly days this is who I wanted.

"Yes, since you have dealt with the worst of Mr. Howard and yet you love him, there is no remedy to it anymore is there?"

"If there is a cure I do not know it yet."

"And he has seen you ar your worst for accepting another ma must have been the most ghastly thing that has happened to him since Joseph's birth."

"Surely then he shall never forgive me."

"First do what you will for yourself, break off the engagement with Mr. Henry for forgiveness will come to Mr. Howard easier than trust. If the master cannot trust you he cannot love you and trust is not easily earned from him so if you ever hope to gain his trust then you will finally know his secrets."

"Are we not the same? If I could but trust him none of this would have taken place," I shook my head with an ironic chuckle, "I mean have you ever tried reasoning with someone this stubborn?"

"Yes, I have, I knew someone once very much like Mr. Howard which is why I seem to know the master so well."

"Is this the story you promised to tell me one day?"

"Come my child do you really wish to hear tales of an old woman?"

"Yes I do, please make me forget of my foolishness for a while."

"Very well then only because it might do you some good to learn from my mistakes... When I was young, maybe a year younger than you I became engaged to a soldier."

"A soldier?"

"Yes a soldier, the most handsome man I'd ever beheld though not all agreed with me. We were raised near each other though he was from a poor family I was from a nearby orphanage."

"You? You were an orphan?"

"Yes left behind by a common whore they told me, the orphanage was where I spent my whole life before going into service for the same family he worked for as the gardener."

"A gardener? Oh how lovely."

"Yes it was, my room was always filled with flowers he stole for me from our employer's garden." Mrs. Hall sighed and looked down blinking away the memory and I silenced myself as to not bring her back from her heart's joy.

"By the end of that year we were engaged and suddenly as we talked about our life after marriage without as much consulting me or anyone for that matter he volunteered to go away under royal commands. I remember the speech he prepared of going away in order to give us and our future family the life we deserved though I insisted we could both just take up work and live a simple life, I had not been raised to be grand nonetheless he was decided and stubborn."

"Like Mr. Howard."

"Exactly so I begged, I cried, I threatened to dismantle the engagement, I asked him sweetly, anything to change his mind but... He went and he was right his luck did change I was well taken care of even to the point of leaving my post at the house we worked for and moved in with his father who was old and needed care as he gained riches abroad. He rose up quite quick in the ranks and as I got ready to be the lady of the house of a respectable soldier things seemed safe and headed to our dreams being a reality." Mrs. Hall's hands trembled and she looked at the skirt of her dress pausing before getting to what I assumed would not be a good part of the story.

"Then right before he was to come back to England for our wedding day things became unclear, first he was taking too long to arrive back so I would personally go to the train station every day to sit and wait on him. Every day I thought this is the day I will see him and be cross with him for taking too long. But after three weeks, 22 days of sitting out there I think I knew what I would hear when I opened the door of our home and found his father and a man in uniform looking back at me with pity in his eyes."

"Oh..."

"The soldier was his friend and he told his father and I how my fiancé had come to past, he explained that his head was... Cut off from his body while he slept by a local who hated the British soldiers overseas."

"I'm so sorry..."

"I believe I expected something like it in the beginning when he went but not years later when everything was well off and peaceful, so it was not the war after all who separated us. It was one man with a knife and a mission from the depths of hell who spun my future into a very different life than I previously imagined," as a few tears came upon her face she took her handkerchief and wiped them at once and that was it.

"Mrs. Hall," I hugged her.

"This horror would not have happened if he had listened to me, if he trusted my womanly feelings as these hard headed men refuse to accept..."

"Yes I see that."

Mrs. Hall let go of the hug and held my hands, "Good then you must make a choice my dear which will affect your whole life, do not let men choose for you, get ahead of them and choose first, stand strong and do not let them change your mind as Mr. Henry has done."

"I should have taken the weight myself, I have been weak, it is all my fault Mr. Henry mistook my gratefulness for love, that I thought gratefulness was enough."

"Then we must make sure your disengagement is done with care."

"How? Did you see the spectacle he made of our union?" Though Mrs. Hall had an answer for everything so I carefully listened to her plan of action....

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No part, character, names, plot, setting, conflict or resolution, point of view, theme or symbolism of this story may be replicated.

Copyright: All Rights Reserved to A. Sena Gomes.