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    Phoebe's Duty
    Phoebe's Duty
    Phoebe's Duty
    Ebook68 pages1 hour

    Phoebe's Duty

    By Lesley-Anne McLeod

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    Phoebe Rackson is determined to help her family's faltering finances. When she learns of the Soho Bazaar, established specifically to aid the widows and orphans of war casualties, she sees a way. After convincing her widowed mother of the wisdom of her plan to take counter space at the Bazaar, she organizes the entire family and sets up in business.

    The Honourable Tobias Wavendon likes the Soho Bazaar. Prohibited from a military career by his family, he takes an interest in helping the families of deceased soldiers. Whenever he can he makes purchases at the Bazaar and his three sisters are among the fashionable clients of the popular establishment.

    He finds the goods and the young woman in attendance at one counter of particular interest. The finely crafted needlework provides him with gifts and the detailed wooden carvings intrigue him. The dedicated, determined young lady who operates the stall fascinates him. When his idle brother, heir to their father's earldom, learns of his interest in that certain stall holder, he decides to make mischief.

    Phoebe Rackson is confused. One of her customers, dark-haired and attractive, is reserved, polite and kindly one day and flirtatious, indiscreet and merry the next. The turmoil he causes escalates until she forbids him to visit her stall.

    Their mutual attraction, though ill-fated, cannot be denied. Class, pride and fortune stand in their way, and duty becomes a curse.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUncial Press
    Release dateSep 16, 2016
    ISBN9781601742193
    Phoebe's Duty

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      Book preview

      Phoebe's Duty - Lesley-Anne McLeod

      http://www.uncialpress.com

      CHAPTER ONE

      Phoebe Rackson had triumphed. She had undertaken a long campaign to convince her mother that she should take a table at the Soho Bazaar. During the struggle she had often thought of her late father. He had seen his duty clearly during such difficult operations in his military career, she was certain of it. Eventually her campaign had been successful. Mama had been persuaded of the necessity at last.

      She had been horrified when Phoebe first suggested the notion. But it seemed to Phoebe the most sensible of ideas, indeed almost an answer to prayer. Mr. John Trotter had established the Bazaar to aid the widows and orphans of soldiers killed in the late war. The Rackson family certainly needed help. Since their father's death at the Battle of Bayonne, his pension had been barely sufficient to cover the needs of his five children and his widow.

      Despite Phoebe's success however, today as she and Jonah, her sixteen year old brother, prepared to visit Mr. Trotter, Mrs. Rackson required reassurance.

      Are you certain we must do this, Phoebe, my love? she asked. Are we doing the right thing? I wish you did not have to undertake this business.

      Phoebe could merely have pointed to the insufficiency of the threadbare cloak she was about to don against the chill of the January day, but she said patiently, I also wish I did not, Mama. But we are doing the right thing for we must supplement Papa's pension. In order for Jonah to be taken on as a clerk, he must be educated, and so we must pay his tutor. You can teach the children from Grandpapa's lesson plans, but we need more paper and pens and ink. Enoch needs shoes, Cecily a new cloak; we must make every penny do the work of two.

      Mrs. Rackson fairly wrung her hands. I know, my love, I do know it. But for you to become a shop girl; your Papa would not have wished it. Indeed, he would not.

      Phoebe tied the strings of her velvet bonnet, a re-trimmed one of her mother's. He would have wished me to do my duty, Mama. As he did. Phoebe swallowed hard. Their father's death a year earlier had had a frightful impact on them all. The emotional cost was immeasurable, but they had gradually become accustomed to the loss of his vital energy and enthusiasm in their lives. The difficulties of their financial circumstances had only been born in on them as they recovered their interest in the world around them.

      The Bazaar is all that is respectable, Mama. With Cecily to aid me, and Jonah's help, we shall do. She smiled at her younger brothers and sisters, all crowded in the shabby entryway of their small house. Come, Jonah. The sooner we go the sooner we will return to tell everyone the details.

      Bolstered with hugs from the younger children, Phoebe stepped out into the chill day followed by her brother. She took his arm after he had wrapped the long scarf knitted for him by Flora, their eight year old sister, around his neck several times.

      There were few pedestrians on the pavement that grey, damp forenoon. The carriages in the street rushed by as though the horses, their breath steaming into the chilly air, were eager to reach their destinations and return to their stables.

      Phoebe, shall we manage? Will we have enough money, even with the Bazaar income?

      Phoebe had to look up to her brother; he was bidding fair to be as tall as their late father. I am confident that we will, she said, though she asked herself the same question nearly every day.

      She felt some of the tension leave her brother's thin shoulders.

      I know that Mr. Trotter started his bazaar to aid the families of deceased army officers so why does he require testimonials from those to whom he lets counters? Jonah's voice was muffled by his scarf. He had no hat and had tucked his chin into the woollen folds.

      Because it would be so very easy for persons of ill-repute to fudge their circumstances. Mr. Trotter wishes, I understand, to have only persons of the utmost respectability trading in his building, and so requires the testimonials to prove their good intentions. Phoebe could not hide a shiver as the icy pavement struck cold through her worn half-boots. They were walking as fast as they could for the warmth of the exercise.

      Do you think the word of the vicar of St. Giles and of Papa's colonel will be the ticket?

      I hope so. I certainly should think so, don't you?

      I suppose. Jonah sounded downcast.

      Phoebe clasped her brother's arm more tightly. It was unlike Jonah to surrender to doubt. They turned into Great Chapel Street, passing maidservants hurrying with their heads down, street sellers feeding their braziers with charcoal, and even a few little street urchins who had huddled in a doorway, keeping each other warm.

      Poor little beggars, her brother muttered. I wish we had something to give them.

      When we are rich, we shall buy them baskets of penny buns, and faggots for a fire, Phoebe said, trying to lift both their spirits. She paused in the middle of the pavement regardless of the icy sleet that had begun

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