As You Are by Sarah M. Eden Page B

means.”
    Edmund looked up to Johnny, spoke of him almost as often as he spoke of Mr. Jonquil. Clara saw no need to discredit a young man who was, in all other respects, a good example to Edmund.
    “Jim says Mr. Jonquil doesn’t allow any of them to ‘mistreat females.’” Edmund spoke the last two words as if quoting verbatim. “And that if he hears they have, he’s ‘like to tan their hide.’”
    “For mistreating a woman?” Clara asked in stunned disbelief.
    Edmund shrugged and made a face that indicated he didn’t understand the odd behavior either.
    “Mr. Jonquil says that being mean to a girl is worse than being mean to a boy.” Edmund dropped into a chair in the sitting room. He always returned from Havenworth physically spent. “He said that I should always be kind to you and Alice. He said I wouldn’t be a gentleman if I wasn’t.”
    She sat near him, attempting to formulate a reply.
    “I told him Mr. Bentford wasn’t nice to you and Alice,” Edmund said.
    “You told him that?” she blurted, inexplicably embarrassed that Mr. Jonquil should know such details about her history.
    “So I asked him if Mr. Bentford was a gentleman,” Edmund continued, oblivious to her discomfort. “And Mr. Jonquil said if he wasn’t nice to you and Alice, then he was ‘no kind of a gentleman at all.’”
    Clara leaned back in her chair. She didn’t know what to make of Mr. Jonquil at all. He seemed too good to be true.
    “I think he’s right,” Edmund said after a silent moment had passed. “I like Mr. Jonquil better than I liked Mr. Bentford.”
    Clara surprised even herself by saying, “So do I.” She realized with a start that she meant it. Granted, there were few people she didn’t like better than Mr. Bentford. Mr. Jonquil was kind to Edmund, a point decidedly in his favor.
    “Aunt Clara?” Edmund moved to stand beside her chair.
    She knew what he wanted. He’d sat on her lap regularly in the three years since he’d come to live with her. Edmund seemed to need the reassurance. Clara held her arms out to him, and Edmund climbed onto her lap.
    Suzie brought Alice into the sitting room in the next moment, still sleepy and rubbing her eyes.
    Alice spotted Edmund cuddled on Clara’s lap. “Me too, Mama?”
    Clara nodded, grateful the chair was a sturdy one. Alice toddled to Clara’s knee and made a valiant effort to climb onto her lap but found her legs unequal to the height. Before Clara had a chance to so much as adjust her position, Edmund reached his hand down to Alice and helped her climb up.
    Edmund had always been a good boy, but Clara had never seen him offer Alice his assistance without being prompted.
    “I’m a gentleman,” Edmund softly declared, leaning against Clara once more.
    “Yes, you are.” Clara silently thanked the heavens for Mr. Jonquil’s influence on the boy. She couldn’t approve of the man himself, knowing he so wholeheartedly disapproved of her. But he at least seemed to be a good influence. She would give him credit for that much.
    Clara heard the sound of approaching horse hooves. Edmund obviously did as well.
    “It’s Mr. Jonquil!” he declared, scrambling down.
    Alice wasn’t so quick, so Clara swung her into her arms. “Edmund, we don’t know who it is,” she warned, trying to stop him from opening the door. What if Mr. Bentford had found them? What if he was standing on the other side? That question plagued her every single time they had a visitor.
    But she wasn’t fast enough to prevent Edmund from pulling the door open. His face fell, and Clara’s heart dropped to her feet. She reached for Edmund. But the man who stepped inside was not the man she’d feared to find there. It was Mr. Finley.
    He was in the sitting room in the next moment, slipping inside the house as smoothly as a snake. “Mrs. Bentford,” he greeted and bowed.
    She did not like Mr. Finley, didn’t remotely trust him. She stood as firmly and calmly as she could manage, setting