Minor Corruption by Don Gutteridge

promise. She
needed someone to talk to. As I did.”
    Robert was pleased to hear his uncle talking
of his loss. It was the first direct reference he had made to it
since Betsy’s death.
    “I’ll have Miss Partridge see that Edie’s
duties are lightened for a while so she can help cheer you up
whenever you wish to have her do so.”
    “She’s a pretty little thing with a wicked
sense of fun, but she’s not Betsy. Thank you, though, for that
thought. I don’t wish to seem ungrateful to you or William. I know
you’re doing all you can to help. Perhaps in a week or two I’ll
feel up to chambers again.”
    “Whenever you say.”
    “And I know you’re needed in many other parts
of the province.”
    “I’m not leaving until I’m sure you’re going
to be all right.”
    “Your dad and Chalmers can look after my
physical and spiritual needs. Please, go ahead and arrange your
trip to London as you planned.”
    “Do you wish to stay here and read, or do you
want me to have Chalmers fetch Edie back?”
    Uncle Seamus, having played the role so often
and for so long, had evolved a jester’s face: when it smiled every
crevice and plane smiled in concert with his vivid blue eyes; but
when it frowned, every wrinkle and rosy patch sagged in sympathy.
At this moment, his smile was struggling to maintain itself. “Have
Edie come back in. I promised to let her win.”
    Robert had put off the inevitable long
enough. “I will, Uncle,” he said “but there is something I must
tell you, even though it may upset you.”
    “I can’t think of anything that would upset
me more than I have been.”
    “It has to do with Betsy.”
    “Oh?” Was it fear or merely a twinge of
further pain in his eyes?
    “There’s no way to lead up to this, so I’m
going to say it directly. Burton Thurgood claims that his daughter
named you as the father of her babe.”
    The colour drained from the old man’s face,
then returned immediately as he began to laugh – a dry, mirthless,
bitter laugh. Finally he was able to speak. “That’s absurd,” he
said more calmly than Robert would have imagined in the
circumstances. “I was her ‘uncle’ and she was my precious little
‘niece.’”
    “I agree wholeheartedly. But three witnesses
heard her reply ‘Seamus’ to the question ‘Who is the father of your
child?’. One of the witnesses was Dora Cobb, the midwife.”
    “But Betsy would have been delirious. She’d
been butchered by that witch.”
    “Exactly what I said to Thurgood when he came
here yesterday looking for money in exchange for his silence.”
    “I trust you sent him packing!” Some fire had
come back into the old man’s face, a slight re-animation of the
laugh-lines. Robert began once more to hope that his uncle’s
recovery was beginning. Certainly this conversation was going a lot
better than he’d expected
    “He threatened to take his case to the
police, Uncle, but I don’t imagine they would act on such a flimsy
accusation. If he does and they do, I’ve a mind to report the
attempted extortion.”
    “Be kind,” Uncle Seamus said. “They’ve
suffered dreadfully over there.”
    At this point there came a tap at the door
and Chalmers half-entered.
    “There’s a Constable Cobb at the door, sir.
He is asking to see Mr. Seamus.” Chalmers raised his eyebrows in a
quizzical gesture that implied an impertinence had been approached
but his response remained uncertain.
    Robert sighed. “At least it’s Cobb.”
    ***
    In the hall, Robert explained to Cobb how fragile a
state his uncle was in. Cobb suggested that Robert remain near the
door so that he could be fetched if Uncle Seamus required
assistance. Cobb also promised to be tactful, insofar as he
understood that ambiguous term.
    Uncle Seamus sat at the library table waiting
for him. He struck Cobb as a character out of Shakespeare, a Feste
or Touchstone in a down moment, the kind they must have had when
the duke wasn’t looking. Right now his gnome’s head