Devil's Daughter (The Ravenels #5)(61)

“Uncle Frederick!” Phoebe exclaimed cheerfully. “I’ve surprised you, haven’t I?”

“My dear niece! A most welcome surprise this is.” He guided her into his private office, lined with black walnut cabinets and shelves, and sat her in a leather upholstered chair.

After Phoebe had explained the reason for her visit, Frederick seemed flummoxed by her desire to collect the Clare-estate account books. “Phoebe, complex accounting is a strain to the female mind. If you tried to read one of those ledgers, you would soon have a headache.”

“I keep the household account books and they don’t give me headaches,” she pointed out.

“Ah, but household expenses are in the feminine realm. Business accounting pertains to matters in the masculine realm, outside the home.”

Phoebe had to bite her lip to keep from asking if the rules of mathematics changed when one ventured past the front door. Instead, she said, “Uncle, the empty shelves in the study at Clare manor look so bereft. It seems only right and proper for the account ledgers to kept there, as they always have been.” She paused delicately. “One hates to break with decades, if not centuries, of tradition.”

As she had hoped, that argument held more sway with him than anything else.

“Tradition is the thing,” Frederick agreed heartily, and thought for a few moments. “I suppose it would do no harm to let the books reside on their old shelves at Clare Manor.”

Seizing on a sudden inspiration, Phoebe said, “It would also oblige Edward to visit me more often, wouldn’t it?”

“Indeed it would,” he exclaimed. “My son could attend to the account books at Clare Manor, and enjoy your company at the same time. Two birds—I rather wonder that he hadn’t thought of it yet. How slow witted young men are nowadays! It’s settled, then. Shall my clerks convey the ledgers out to your carriage?”

“My footmen can do it. Thank you, Uncle.”

Eager to leave, Phoebe began to edge toward the door of his office. However, it appeared she would not escape without additional conversation.

“How are your young lads?” Frederick asked.

“Quite well. It will take some time for them to adjust fully to their new life in Essex.”

“I expect so. I have concerns about what might become of growing boys with no paternal figure in the house. A father’s influence cannot be too highly estimated.”

“I’m concerned about that as well,” Phoebe admitted. “However, I’m not yet ready to marry again.”

“There are times in life, my dear, when one must set emotion aside and view the situation from a rational perspective.”

“My reasons are quite rational—”

“As you know,” he continued, “my Edward is every inch of him a gentleman. An ornament to his class. His qualities have often been remarked on. Many a marriage-minded young woman has set her cap for him—I wouldn’t expect him to stay on the market forever.”

“I wouldn’t either.”

“It would be a great pity for you to realize too late what a treasure you might have had in Edward. As the captain of your family’s ship, he would steer a steady course. There would never be surprises with him. No arguments, no unconventional ideas. You would live in perfect serenity.”

Yes, Phoebe thought, that’s exactly the problem.

On the ride back to Clare Manor, Phoebe sorted through the cumbersome pile of ledgers on the seat beside her until she found one with yearly statements of the estate’s profits and losses. After hefting it onto her lap, she began to page through it slowly.

To her dismay, the information was laid out very differently from the ledgers West Ravenel had shown her. A frown worked across her brow. Was the word “liability” used interchangeably with “debt, or did they mean different things in this system of bookkeeping? Did “capital” refer only to property, or did it include cash? She didn’t know how Henry or Edward had defined such terms, and to make matters worse, the pages were littered with acronyms.

“I need a Rosetta Stone to translate all of this,” Phoebe muttered. A sinking feeling came over her as she looked through another ledger, the crop book. Mystifyingly, some of the tenant farmers’ yields had been reported four times, and each number was different.

As the carriage continued along the flint-graveled road, Phoebe considered what to do. She could ask the estate’s land manager, Mr. Patch, to answer some of her questions, but he was quite old and infirm, and a conversation lasting more than few minutes would exhaust him.

There was always the option of waiting for Edward to return, but she didn’t want to do that, especially since he believed she shouldn’t be bothering with accounting in the first place. And in light of the way she’d commandeered the estate ledgers and brought them home herself, Edward would probably be just a bit smug, and one could hardly blame him.

This would be a convenient excuse to send for West.

Holding an account ledger in her lap, Phoebe leaned back against the carriage seat and felt a pang of yearning so sharp, it hurt to breathe.

She wasn’t at all certain West would come, but if he did . . .

How strange it would be to have him at Clare Manor: a collision of worlds, West Ravenel in Henry’s house. It was scandalous for an unmarried man to stay in the home of a young widow, with no chaperone in sight. Edward would be appalled when he found out. Georgiana would have apoplexy on the spot.