Episode 105: The Public Squabbles Of High Society Men

When society finally cracks, they shall find the hammer in the hands of a well-meaning woman.

I had to bite my lip to keep from exclaiming, for the hilarity of my desperate situation was too much to bear. I found myself sandwiched between two men who had both violated my past in their incredulous attempts to enslave my future. A present predicament unlike any other. Cranley’s suspenders strained to keep his clothes on his burgeoning frame, and his swatch of thinning hair stood on end atop the edges of his head. Whereas Hallen’s stout frame and meaty shoulders heaved in response to the insult being done to him.

“Braun Cranley,” my uncle said, his jaw clearly clenched, for the words barely emerged. “Now is not the time nor the place. As I explained during your prior visit to my estate, I have already made secure plans for my niece. Plans which, I must insist, do not include you.”

“What could this fool possibly think he is doing?” Hallen asked, his cheeks inflamed. “I thought we had an arrangement, Rennington. I was to marry a fully functional expression of your niece, and your family and mine would share our trade routes and thus our future fortunes.”

Edgar Cranley laughed until his belly shook. “You are but a  boy , yet you speak of investment opportunities and marriage arrangements! Where is your father? He is the one with whom we should be dealing in matters such as these. Not the likes of an overgrown school child.”

Hallen balked. “ You  are calling me overgrown? What deluded perspective you must have, Cranley!” He slapped his own chest as if he was compelled to prove it was sturdy and muscular and not frumpy and gelatinous, as Cranley’s so happened to be. “I assure you that I have my father’s every blessing and that he and Braun Rennington have had exclusive and extensive conversations regarding the future of our two families. Both Brauns have full confidence in my role as my father’s proctor.”

Cranley scoffed, beads of sweat popping onto his forehead. “Conversations meant to exclude my company and to muscle me out of the trade game altogether. Well, I will not stand for it!”

“You cannot steal my wife, Cranley! I will not allow it. It has already been decided. All that remains is for her to pass the leanest of musters!”

“It is you who are stealing mine! For we have already shared a night together, my bride and I—”

Duval put his hands out, releasing me at last, for things were far gone and well out of sorts already. “Gentle Brauns, let us take this matter to my personal parlor. We are beginning to draw a crowd.”

“Very well. I shall lead the way,” Hallen said.

But Cranley bumped shoulders with him. “After me, of course.”