Will and Testament // Sequel to the Rosie Grey series

Chapter Five

Grandmother's sudden declaration that she would be coming to supper, regardless of how Mother and Father felt, sent the entire household into a tailspin.

Mrs Smith complained under her breath about having little to no warning about additional supper company and I heard her mention something about Mrs Jenkins, the old housekeeper, at the same time. She busied herself with preparations for supper with the help of Mary and Helen who handled the sudden flurry of activity like professionals. The same, however, could not be said of Father.

He took the next day off work, sending a message to both the hospital and Doctor Isaacs about a family incident that had cropped up. I watched from the doorway the evening before the supper as he fretted about what would happen and how both Grandmother and Aunt Matilda would behave during the meeting. At one point, he started to reel off a list of excuses we could use to back out of a meeting that had been thrust upon all of us; apparently, Grandmother expected me to be there.

I wanted to take the day off school so I could help with the preparations, but Mother had none of it.

"School is important, Izzy. You missed enough last week and I doubt Miss Reid would be pleased if you missed anymore," Mum had said when I asked her at supper.

"But I want to help. It's just one day."

"One day on top of the several you missed out on last week and the lessons you missed when we were at the seaside. You can't miss any more school days until the end of the academic year. That's my final decision on the matter.

"Your mother is right, Izzy," Father said. "You can help out when you get home, I'll send Marsh to get you from school. Education is important and you shouldn't miss it because of Mother."

"Fine." I huffed and stabbed a carrot on my plate, sending it hurling across the table and almost landing in Father's wine glass.

After supper, I retired to my room so I could work on the mathematics problems we had tackled in class; I still didn't fully understand them. In my room, Father had placed the old writing desk that had once been his which I perched at with my chalk slate resting on top. The desk faced out the window with the fading sunlight almost mocking me because I couldn't go outside and instead had to do my schoolwork.

I worked my way through some additional mathematics problems but my mind kept back to the supper we were hosting and just what might have caused the rift between the family. It had to be serious, there would be no reason for such a deep rift if it had been something simple like an argument over supper. Not only that, but it also had to be something bad enough for no one to want to even discuss it, even if it was twenty-four years after the fact.

My entire family had turned on Grandmother for what she did and yet I couldn't for the life of me imagine what it could have been. I drummed the end of my pen on the desk and continued to stare out the window, trying to figure out what had happened. Uncle Christopher had said they were trying to protect me, but protect me from what? Although he said that they weren't treating me like a child, it still felt that way.

It felt like they were keeping something important from me, something that I should know about. They couldn't protect me forever and I didn't like being treated like one of the twins when I could make my own mind up and decide what I wanted for myself. If Miss Reid thought I was old enough to determine my future, then why couldn't my parents see I was old enough to know the truth about what caused the rift?

At school the next day, I spent our lunch break brainstorming potential professions that might interest me in the future. It turned out to be a rather difficult task.

"What are you doing?" Evelyn asked. She dropped down in the chair at the desk beside mine and tilted her head towards the piece of paper.

"Miss Reid asked me about my future prospects yesterday and I'm drawing up a list of things I might want to do," I said.