Chapter 68
<68> The Women of Dunville Park (1)
The next day, Ian arrived at his sister's Estate, Dunville Park.
As he had requested by telegram, a carriage was waiting at the train station. He took the carriage to Fairfax Manor and went straight inside, asking a servant for his sister. He was told that the mistress was in her private drawing room.
He went straight up to the second floor and opened the drawing room door without knocking. Mrs. Fairfax was sitting near the fireplace, cradling little Ian, who was not even a year old, in her lap.
And beside Mrs. Fairfax sat her beautiful thirteen-year-old blonde daughter, Olivia Fairfax, shaking a toy at baby Ian.
It was a picturesque scene symbolizing domestic peace, but he had no qualms about shattering the image. He strode straight into the room.
"Oh, my. Without knocking!"
Mrs. Fairfax exclaimed in surprise at the sight of her younger brother. Olivia Fairfax, who was next to her, stared at her uncle with wide eyes.
Ian took off his hat and asked, "Are you well?"
"I'm fine. But you don't look so good? Did you catch consumption in London or something? Why do you look like that? You're nothing but a pretty face."
"Mother, don't say that. He's still handsome, Uncle is."
Olivia quickly defended her uncle's face. In fact, her uncle was still wonderful in Olivia's eyes. Ian Dalton was the quintessential prince she had always dreamed of.
"Olivia, how have you been?"
"Oh, Uncle. I told you not to do that!"
Ian politely took off his hat and bowed as Olivia always asked him to. Then, taking the hand of his niece, who had offered it with the air of a socialite, he kissed the back of her hand.
"How have you been, Lady?"
"Heh, fine, thank you. Uncle, ah, no. Sir."
He let go of Olivia's hand and turned his gaze back to Mrs. Fairfax.
"I've found a tutor for Daniel and George."
Mrs. Fairfax looked bewildered.
"When did I ask you to find a tutor?"
"You didn't."
"So you hired a tutor without even telling your nephews' mother?"
"If they're going to go to public school, they need to start getting tutored now."
"That's true, but I don't know. My husband and I both agree that any teacher who has to take care of them will be miserable."
"You two are the only parents in the country who joke about their children's education like that."
"That's the secret to our marriage."
He asked Olivia to excuse them for a moment. Following the orders of her admired uncle, she got up from the sofa, curtsied slightly, and left the room.
"Sister."
"Sounds like you have something serious to say. Should I ask Ian here to leave for a moment too?"
"Miss Pendleton will be here soon."
The hand that had been soothing the baby stopped.
"She's the new tutor."
"...But she's a noblewoman. How did she...?"
Ian put his hat on the nearby stool and sat down next to his sister. Then he told his sister everything about Laura.
That her mother and father had eloped, which was why she didn't have a good position in the family. To make matters worse, her father was American, and her grandmother, who had protected her, had passed away, leaving her with no property and kicked out.
"Miss Pendleton must have suffered a lot."
Mrs. Fairfax sighed with a look of pity. Not being prejudiced about lineage was a trait they shared.
"She'll be here in a week. I called her. I'm going to have her tutor Daniel and George for five hours a day."
"You're going to put the woman you love through such an ordeal?"
"I came to ask you for this favor anyway. Before she gets here, you need to fix their manners. Let me take care of the kids for a while."
"Alright."
Mrs. Fairfax handed over her two sons as casually as if she had been asked to borrow two pairs of forks from the table.
"But Miss Pendleton coming as a tutor means you still haven't won the young lady's heart, right? If you think she's the one for you, you should grab her quickly. Why are you dragging your feet like that? When are you going to get married and have kids?"
His face darkened at the mention of children again. There was still something he hadn't told his sister. It wasn't a big deal for him, but it was an important issue for his sister.
"There's one more thing I should tell you."
"What is it?"
"She's a year younger than me."
Mrs. Fairfax's mouth dropped open, even though she hadn't cared when she heard that Miss Pendleton was an illegitimate child of an American father.
"Then she's an old maid!"
I knew it would be like this. Ian grumbled.
"If she's an old maid, what does that make me, who's older than her?"
"Are men and women the same? As long as a man's back is healthy, he can make children at any age. But a woman's time to have children is limited!"
"Isn't the child you had at forty-two drooling on your hand right now?"
Mrs. Fairfax quickly wiped the drool from little Ian's face with a napkin.
"My case is different! You know that Henry fell off his horse and hurt his back not long after I had him, and he was bedridden for five years. After three years of spa treatment in Bath, he finally got better, and he keeps trying to prove to me that his back is okay..."
"Stop! I don't care about you and George's relationship. Not even a little bit!"
Ian shouted in disgust.
"Anyway, you can't compare yourself to me, Ian. How many children will a twenty-nine-year-old woman have if she has them?"
"Somewhere between one and a dozen. Or maybe none at all. I don't care about that."
"You don't care about children? Is that something a head of the family should say?"
"I'm not trying to buy cattle or pigs right now. I'm trying to get a wife. If the only condition for finding a partner is breeding, how are humans different from animals?"
"Still, twenty-nine is too old."
"Sister."
"The truth is the truth. Twenty-nine is too old."
She readjusted the son in her arms.
"You're blinded by love and can't tell right from wrong, but you need a son. An heir. If you die without a son, Whitefield will go to some distant relative you've never even met. Someone who's never even felt a handful of soil, let alone been born in Whitefield. You're smart, so you know what will happen. If this recession continues, the heir will definitely sell Whitefield. And by the grandchildren's generation, Whitefield will be full of factories. Is that what you want for our hometown?"
Ian sighed. His mind hadn't changed, but he knew what his sister was worried about.
Ian and his sister Margaret had inherited the Dalton name from their father, but they had grown up in very different circumstances. Ian, as the eldest son, had received all the education allowed to men and had inherited Whitefield as soon as he graduated from university. Margaret had only been allowed to receive the education of a bride, and had only inherited a dowry suitable for a daughter of the Fairfax family to take with her when she married.
But the two of them had a common legacy. A love for Whitefield. Although she had married and lived in Dunville Park before she was even twenty, she still loved Whitefield. As much as Ian, who had inherited it, and sometimes even more than Ian.
That was why Margaret Fairfax was so obsessively urging Ian to marry. She believed that land only had value beyond property to those who were born and raised there. To those who didn't love the land, land was just a part of their property.
"If I were you, I would have married a strong woman as soon as I inherited the family and had a dozen children."
"Yes, you certainly would have. I always think that you should have inherited Whitefield. You're someone who would do anything for Whitefield. That's the difference between you and me. As the head of the family, I'll do whatever it takes for Whitefield. Except for one thing. I won't marry to protect the land. Even if the land goes to some distant relative."
"Ian. A little sacrifice is necessary as the head of the family."
"It's an issue I can't concede as a man. I can't live in the same house with a woman who doesn't suit my personality. To put it bluntly, I can't stand the thought of a woman I don't love lying in my bed."
Mrs. Fairfax was about to say something more, but she closed her mouth. What more could she say to that stubborn fellow? There was no point in wasting her energy on something that wouldn't work.
She rested her chin on the warm crown of her son's head as he wriggled in her arms and fell into thought.
Mrs. Fairfax was still negative about Miss Pendleton. No matter how she thought about it, twenty-nine was too old. Even if she got married and had a child right away, she would be thirty when she gave birth.
Childbirth was something to be done in your twenties. She knew all too well, having had to look after four children in her thirties because of her energetic and even careless husband. Giving birth at an older age was something to be avoided as much as possible.
She loved her children. But the memories of when they came into the world were terrible. It was a war-like process full of blood, screams, and pain.
It took a full year for her body to recover even after the process was over. But she thought she was lucky. There were still plenty of women who died giving birth.
That fellow wouldn't understand his sister's worries at all. Weren't men a species that thought children just fell from the sky?
She hummed and rocked her young Ian, thinking. Still, wouldn't it be okay if he got married this year and had a son quickly? He seems to like her that much. And above all, when has he ever been so crazy about a woman?
The fact that Ian had suddenly returned to London a month ago must have been entirely because of that young lady. Her brother was a man who valued estate management, so he had never left the Estate for more than a week since he had inherited Whitefield.
The fact that he had gone to London twice in a few months and stayed there for more than a month showed how much affection he felt for Miss Pendleton. He loved his land, Whitefield, the most. He had come to love someone more than Whitefield.
Ian, who was so picky, had fallen in love. It was nothing short of a miracle.
