Page 60 of Apt to be Suspicious
“Exhausting.” Pen echoed it now, looking him up and down. “And you’re recovered this evening?”
“Mostly. I have given a thorough report to Uncle Alexander, and he’ll be round to look at me tomorrow. I’m not to do complex magic until he has, though that’s mostly a precaution. If he were actually worried, he’d have made time earlier today.” Edmund was absolutely secure in that knowledge. “And honestly, Master Benton’s skilled in making that kind of evaluation. He’s done it for Papa often enough.”
Pen leaned back, and now she was chewing on her lip. Edmund was rather pleased by that, that she was letting him see that. Mind, of course, she almost certainly had less training and practice hiding what she was thinking than he did. But seeing it, that was something that mattered to him. “And who was Circe meeting with?”
This one, he’d given some thought to. “I said I had some idea of what you did in the war. Without getting into details, I visited there a few times, as an aide to someone higher in the decision tree. So, him.” It was a circumlocution, but his oaths let him get that out, so it would do.
“Why? I mean, why would you introduce Circe to someone like that?”
“Because, well.” Edmund looked off instinctively to where the Channel lay and the continent. “Europe’s changing constantly. There’s a need for people who can move around, bring back information. The man I arranged things with is an old family friend. Both Mama and Papa, before you ask, but Papa and Master Benton first. He wrote to me earlier to say that he’s sure he can find something of mutual benefit. Enough salary for her to keep her sisters fed and housed, and work I think she’ll be good at.”
“That does not explain why you’d, I don’t know, extend yourself for someone whose family doesn’t get on with yours.” Pen crossed her arms, looked down at them, and then sighed and leaned forward to pick up the meringue again, as if she were unable to resist it.
The way Pen put it made Edmund chuckle. “That’s an understatement, at least on her aunt’s side. But—” Now he leaned back. “I was thinking about a book at the end of the Iliad. The funeral games for Patroclus. It’s rather odd, because the games are set up so that there are clear likely winners for a number of the competitions. But Achilles, who is hosting them, is deliberately being exceedingly generous. I’d been talking about it a little with Uncle Alexander. He pointed out that it is one mode of handling extremely competitive and violent people. He has rather extensive experience of the type. Give them something where all the competitions have pleasant results for everyone involved. A demonstration of skill, an acknowledgment of that skill, but no one loses.”
“Nice trick if you can manage it.” Pen said it immediately, but then she tilted her head. “So, in this case, introducing Circe to someone who might hire her, at a steady enough salary. Even though she’s a woman. It’s not just secretarial work, is it?”
“Oh, no. Not what my superior is looking for. Not that the secretaries aren’t also highly competent, actually. I’d never want to be on their wrong side.”
“I bet you annoyed them too. By being ...” Pen waved a hand. “Like you are.”
“Ah, now you’ll need to specify.” Edmund said, parrying it back and trusting that she was relaxed enough now to perhaps give him an answer.
“You’re, you’re...” She swallowed, looking away, down at the table. “You’re too good to be real, that's what you are. It has to be a false front of some kind. I don’t know what you’re covering up. You’re handsome. Your clothes look like they’d never dream of being anything other than perfect. You speak well. You have pots of money, and everything that goes with money. You’re endlessly polite. And you’re competent in every direction, even the ones I’ve no idea about. You can’t be real.”
Edmund nodded once. “Excellent points, really. And yet, here I am. The question is what you want to do about that. Going forward.”
Chapter 38
That evening
Pen found herself blinking, feeling like a fool. She could feel her cheeks flushing, the heat of it, but even here and now, Edmund did not do the wrong thing. He just waited, as if he were cordially ignoring her embarrassment or whatever it was called. “What I want?”
“It's simpler to have a conversation about it than make assumptions, surely.” Edmund turned away, but only to reach for his meringue. “Would you like another meringue? I have more.”
Desire warred briefly with uncertainty, trying to figure out the hidden meaning in the offer. She swallowed, then said, “Yes, please. They’re delicious.” He stood, disappearing into the kitchen area and coming back with two more, before putting one on each of their plates. The gesture gave her some kind of idea of where to start. “Why do you keep offering things to me?”
“Ah.” Edmund settled down, his feet more relaxed and out in front of him, now crossed at the ankles. It would make it more awkward for him to lean forward, toward her, and she thought that might be deliberate. “I enjoy offering you things and seeing what you’ll accept. Also, what you’ll question, what you’ll think about, and what you’ll let sit. Not many people do the latter, had you noticed? They’ll grab for pleasure in the moment, without thinking of the consequences.”
“I know people who argue that’s the war for us. The effect of it. Grandfather suggested it. That it’s human— though perhaps not moral— to reach for the momentary pleasure, because who knows what will happen tomorrow.”
“It’s a good point. Me, I like the pleasures. I don’t see a reason to deny myself the ones within reach, just because some people thought the ascetics might have an interesting idea or two. I’m like Papa that way, enjoying the pleasure.”
“You were— you were going to talk about your parents?” Pen had to make it into a question. “You’re fond of them. I’m clear on that. Not a cypher there.”
The phrasing made him chuckle, and she watched the way his eyes lit up. He was letting her see that, Pen was sure of it, but the trick was working on her. It made her want to do that again, to see him unguarded. “Papa never expected to inherit. I can tell you enough of the story of what happened with Margot Williams, but it’s not pleasant. Nor what I want to talk about tonight. And we don’t know all of it. But something she did with Uncle Temple— Papa’s older brother— rotted his land magic. Then he died— was killed— and his wife as well. Papa was on an expedition in Kenya, and he knew. So he came back, and had to sort things out, and figure out how to steady the land magic. While he wasn’t at all certain who to trust.”
“And he wasn’t married yet?” Pen considered. “When was this?”
“1922. Papa had served in the Great War, and— well. He nearly died a couple of times, once with a particular injury. Bad shoulder, still.” The three words sketched out exactly how bad it was, to put it so plainly. Like any other woman of her generation, Pen was an expert in reading that sort of understatement correctly. “He met Mama in 1924, when both of them were investigating something specific. From different angles. They’d met once, both of them with their public faces on. He fell over her in a bush while trying to figure out how to get into a particular party. If you like, I’ll get them to tell the story sometime. It’s quite funny.”
“And your mother is— your father’s sort of people?” Pen was slowly piecing the bits together.
“First Families on her mother’s side. Cornish— Fourth Families— on her father’s. Her father and uncle were explorers, too. Their ship disappeared in 1920 on an expedition. They’ve been presumed dead since the year after. Mama was trying to keep things together for her and my Aunt Laura.” Edmund shrugged, just one shoulder, before reaching to finish his first meringue. “It was rough going, and then she found something she was good at. Papa stumbled over her, and they sorted things out quite promptly.”
“That’s also why you understood Circe. Your mother and aunt?” Pen reached for her own plate, taking a little bite, giving herself a moment of that pleasure. As she swallowed, she noticed Edmund’s blue-grey eyes focused on her, as if there was nothing else he’d rather be looking at.
“Mama would do anything for Aunt Laura. And Aunt Laura for Mama, though it doesn’t usually go that way.” He added after a moment, “Aunt Laura’s married to a journalist. He writes for the Trellech Moon. They don’t have children. She sorts out what people who’ve been seriously ill need afterwards. What kinds of things will actually be helpful and what are just the show and awful.”
