Hardly a Husband (Free Fellows League 3)

"Nothing," she said. "The rectory and the living belong to the rector."

"And?" he prompted when she finished speaking.

"Aunt Etta and I do not."

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Chapter Four

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Chance reveals virtues and vices as light reveals objects.

— La Rochefoucauld, 1613-1680

"Someone else has been awarded the Helford Green rectory and the living attached to it." Usually exceedingly quick on the uptake, Jarrod could only blame his temporary stupidity on his surprise at having Sarah Eckersley pay him a late-night call in order to present him with such a tempting and troubling proposition. He should have discerned the situation immediately.

"Yes," Sarah confirmed. "And that someone would be the new rector."

"Surely a man of God can find it in his heart to allow a grieving daughter to remain in the only home she's ever known," Jarrod suggested.

"As a matter of fact, Reverend Tinsley did ask that I remain in residence at the rectory — "

"See?" Jarrod interrupted with a self-satisfied smile. "I knew it."

"As governess to his children."

"As governess?" Jarrod repeated the phrases as if he'd never heard the words before. "To his children?"

"Two girls and a boy. Polly, Pippa, and Paul. Ages seven, five, and three." She studied Jarrod's expression, then crossed her fingers and hid her hand in the folds of her nightgown. "I was asked to stay on for a small stipend of twelve pounds a year plus room and board. Of course, I will have to relinquish my bedchamber to the rector's daughters and move my personal things to the little room in the attic."

Jarrod knew the room Sarah described. He had been to the rectory. Before being sent to Knightsguild for his formal secular education, Jarrod had received his religious instruction from Sarah's father at the rectory. The little attic room had been built as living quarters for a maid or a manservant, but Reverend Eckersley had declared it much too small for that purpose and had used it instead as a workshop, where he spent long hours repairing prayer books, hymnals, and on occasion, altar cloths and vestments. Jarrod remembered helping the reverend carry the books from the sanctuary to the workshop and back again. "Not bloody likely."

"Pardon?" He'd mumbled something, but Sarah couldn't understand a word of it.

"What about your aunt?" Jarrod asked instead of repeating his words. "Will she be forced to give up her room as well?"

"Young Master Tinsley will have Aunt Etta's room," Sarah told him. "He cannot share with the girls and there are only three bedchambers in the rectory."

"Why can't young Master Tinsley take the attic room?" Jarrod demanded. "While you share with your aunt?" He didn't like the idea of Sarah becoming governess to anyone's children — especially children who would displace her from her bedchamber in the only home she had ever known. And he didn't like the idea of anyone removing Sarah's aunt from the bedchamber she had occupied since Sarah was a small child. It seemed an especially callous thing to do — especially for a man of the cloth.

Sarah pretended to laugh, but her laughter sounded hollow, even to her own ears. "Because it simply isn't done, Jays. A governess cannot take a room that should belong to a member of the family. You know that."

"I know that it makes more sense to have young Master Tinsley take the smaller of the rooms since he is smaller and to allow you and your aunt to share the larger bedchamber."

Sarah bit her bottom lip. "It makes no difference, Jays, because Reverend Tinsley hasn't offered Aunt Etta a home at the rectory."

"Why not?" Jarrod arched his eyebrow in query.

"I don't know." Sarah lifted her chin a notch higher, looked Jarrod in the eye, and dared him to challenge her decision. "But staying at the rectory or going anywhere else without her is out of the question. I won't consider it."

Jarrod expelled the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and met Sarah's challenging gaze. "I wouldn't expect otherwise."

"I've lost Papa," she said softly. "And I would rather lose my home than lose Aunt Etta."

"I don't own the living," Jarrod announced abruptly. The position as rector of Helford Green came with a glebe of several hundred acres of flourishing orchards, fertile farm and grazing land, rent, and tithes that provided the clergyman with a handsome income. The owner of the living had the duty of inviting a man of the cloth to accept the living and the responsibility of ministering to the souls who lived and worked in Helford Green. Although the Marquess of Shepherdston was the largest landowner in the county, he didn't own the rector's living. It belonged to the present Viscount Dunbridge — the late Lord Dunbridge's nephew and Sarah's aunt Etta's nephew by marriage. Jarrod took a deep breath. "If you've come here tonight with this outrageous proposition because you believed that…"

Sarah sucked in a breath. "I came to you because I've received several proposals since Papa died. But the proposal th