DESIRE & DUTY
by MEL

INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
TBC

DESIRE & DUTY

Chapter Two

Given the time it took the Starlings' messenger to traverse the trans-Atlantic distance, Mr. John Crawford had barely a week in which to digest the contents of the letter and dispatch a servant to air out one of the third floor guest rooms, before the rattle of a carriage announced the arrival of their guest. Far from being inconvenienced, Crawford could only be thankful that in this instance the letter had arrived before his guest. Her letter, sealed with red wax in the customary form of business, was intriguing to him. He had met Starling's wife only once, some years ago, upon their wedding day. He remembered her red hair and her luminous skin, but most of all he remembered the way she looked him in the eye. He remembered the inappropriate response his own body had rendered to that look. But he and Starling had been too good as friends, and business associates, to let a woman come between them. He had dallied with other men's wives over the years, Bella being the sickly wife that she was, but Mrs. Starling was always out of bounds. She had been out of reach entirely when they had up and moved to the Americas, her homeland, but a year after they were married.

As the carriage came into view at the end of the drive, he stepped out of the vestibule and into the afternoon sunlight to admire the curricle, drawn by two well-matched bays, in which she arrived. The coachman hopped lightly to the ground and opened the carriage door. Preceded by a young woman, presumably her maid, was Mrs. Clarice Starling. John Crawford unconsciously patted his hair down and tugged at his shirt cuffs. She had barely changed in the seven years since their last meeting. Although her head was covered by a bonnet, strands of fiery red had escape at the nape of her neck and her eyes, as she looked out from under the brim of the hat, were the same pale, piercing eyes he remembered. She was standing in front of him with a bemused look on her face by the time he realized he had been daydreaming.
"Mrs. Starling." He came to attention and took the gloved hand she offered, raising it. His lips hovered a discreet few inches above her hand for a moment, before he let it go and bowed politely. "How good to see you again. It's been far too long. I regret the circumstances that bring you here, please accept my condolences for your loss."
"Thank you, Mr. Crawford. I appreciate that." She turned to introduce Annie. "Mr. Crawford this is Annie."
Unaccustomed to being introduced to the help, Crawford managed a jerky bow, and muttered his name, and a quiet, 'pleased to meet you.' Annie on the other hand, quite used to her mistress's unusual civility, curtseyed deeply,
"Annie, sir. Annie Benning. An honor, sir."
Annie stepped back and watched the exchange with interest. As far as she understood, they had no more than a passing acquaintance, but they certainly knew all about one another and were indubitably linked by the business of Mr. Starling. Mr. Crawford seemed a warm, pleasant man, but Annie detected a hint of reserve in her mistress.
"Now, I would dearly like to catch up with you and Bella, but I fear I carry too much dirt from the journey."
"Of course, I'm sorry" Crawford quickly remembered his place. "Let me show you to your rooms."

Lowingham was a relatively modest country house, having only three floors and around 100 acres of land. There were a few tenants on the property but none were in view of the main house, and all performed some duty towards the upkeep of the estate. The overseer had a small cottage just beyond a small rise and the other tenants were scattered over the far reaches of the land. Apart from them, the nearest house was an empty manor around five miles away by road. Clarice looked out of the window at the pleasant aspect afforded by her new lodgings, as the servant who had shown them upstairs told her about the estate. She found the seclusion extremely soothing, immersed as she had been for so long, in the bustle and dirt of the cities and towns, as business had required. She had been unwilling to stay for long in her marriage home after her husband had passed on, and had the put their great town house up for sale. For the next year she lived in a hotel in New York, the rooms having nothing to remind her of what she had lost she found herself able to heal more easily, able to get on with the many articles of work that needed attending to without the spectre of her husband's memory to drag her back into unhappiness.

They had moved there in search of a better market on her suggestion, being familiar as she was with New York and Washington, and they had become more successful than they could ever have managed, had they remained in England. Their life together had been charmed, more loving and trusting then she had hoped her marriage would be. She knew how it went, she knew how many came about. One individual of fortune seeking a title, one titled spendthrift looking for an amicable arrangement. Both having commodities desired by the other, the marriage made perfect sense on paper, but invariably came to disharmony and hatred. She thanked god every day for the trust and love she had shared in her marriage, she knew how lucky she was that her husband listened to her, knew her to be intelligent. They discussed business the way many couples discussed the dinner menu. They conversed easily with a mutual respect. Clarice was thankful for the store he placed in her; she could not have borne a less equal footing, knowing herself as she did. It wasn't until the reading of the will and testament that she realized how wholly her husband had embraced her as partner in all. In what promised to be an unpopular decision, he had eschewed tradition and social expectations and entailed his entire estate upon his wife. He had stated that she be left to dictate the leadership of their business, C-Star Holdings, or have complete freedom to appoint whomever she desired. A fresh wave of grief began to well up inside her, but she fought it down, determined to remain strong and do his memory justice. She had grieved long enough. She must move on. And the first order of business was one she imagined John Crawford to be as anxious as she to address.


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