A Gentleman’s Position(77)
“I have found it to be ill judged in friendships,” Richard said. “Is this your utilitarian philosophy again?”
“I don’t have a philosophy. I decide what I want to achieve, and I do what I can to make it come about. Lord Maltravers lets his aims be blotted out by his self-love. He would like to be well dressed, but he overrules his tailor and abuses his valet rather than be obliged to a lesser man, and thus he fails. Do you see?”
“I think so, yes.” Richard paced on. “It is a common habit for men in high positions, I suspect. One must consider one’s manner, live up to certain standards, keep at an elevation. My father…” He trailed off. “Uh, you don’t have anyone in my brother’s household, do you?”
“No. I thought you’d prefer it if I didn’t.”
Richard’s hand brushed his. “Thank you. David, will you tell me something honestly?”
“Probably,” David said with caution.
Richard snorted. “Well, then: I know that I offended you with my offer. Was that my clumsiness, or would you truly not wish to change your role given the right opportunity? Would it not be more comfortable for you? I am not pressing you, not at all, but I should like to understand.”
“I like my work,” David said. “It’s second nature now, I can think while I do it, and the results please me. Putting things to rights. Besides, being a valet gives—gave—me freedom to do the other things for you too. People might be wary of a secretary in a way they are not of a valet. And…” He grimaced in the dark, but he had to be able to tell Richard the truth, and Richard had to be able to hear it. “The fact is, I don’t know if I should be a very good secretary. I read and write adequately, but no more than that. I have never worked with a pen in my life. And I like to be very good, and I should not wish to hold a post for any reason other than that I was very good. I’m an excellent valet.”
“Yes,” Richard said slowly. “I beg your pardon. I should have thought of that. I assumed that you could do anything you wished.”
“My mother gave me the best education she could,” David said, feeling a little defensive. “But I always wanted to be working—we needed the money—so it never seemed the most important thing to do, and I never acquired the habit.”
“Philip can barely read,” Richard said. “Not for lack of effort or education, but he has no capacity. And he is the best man I know. There is no shame in it.”
David had known that, since he had made it his business to know about Richard’s life, but Richard had never spoken of it before. He knew damned well there was shame in it, and what it meant for Richard to give him that truth, and his heart clenched in his chest.
“It never bothered me before,” he said. “But Silas reads all the time. Have you read this? Have you read that? I had no idea anyone read so much. All the things he knows, and talks about, and I can’t remember the last time I read a book.”
“Dominic is a great reader too. I suppose that’s what they talk about.”
“Yes.” David knew that all too well. Mr. Frey and Silas had come together to fuck, but what joined them was a passion for an abstract world of ideas and stories and words that David knew to be far out of his own reach, and well within Richard’s. “Is that something you’d want?” He stared at the vague shapes of his feet as they walked. “To be able to talk about—books, and Latin, and scholarly things?”
“On the contrary. I cannot tell you how often I have begged Dominic to speak of something else. I like to read, granted, but I can find literary conversation very easily. Whereas your point of view is unique.”
There was such affection in Richard’s voice. David bit the inside of his lips, but he couldn’t stop the smile from growing. “I, uh, think we’re here.”
They had passed St. Giles church and were on the wide thoroughfare of Broad Street. Skelton lived just a short way from Bow Street, on Plumbtree Street. Its dark opening yawned ahead.
David glanced up at Richard as they crossed the silent road, seeing his face as a pale oval in the darkness. “I had better go alone from here. Wait for me?”
“Good fortune, my fox. If you need me—”
“Stay here, and bail me out if I get caught.” If he were caught, there would be a terrible hullabaloo, and he was quite positive Richard would come running. He would do well not to be caught then, at anything.
On the other hand…it was black night, well past one in the morning. There was not a soul on the streets, nobody to see. He reached up for Richard’s shoulders and at the same moment felt hands closing on his hips.