The Master Finale | manxman | (Book Four: The Master Collection)

I - Renewed Conflict

"Yes, Beatrice has gone. I said goodbye to her just earlier."

"I see," the man nodded, "Perhaps sometime we can all get together again for a dinner. It would do a man well to be surrounded by his family just once more."

The wording of his father's confession caught Jasper at a curious angle, but before he could question further, Ronald reached forward and jostled Master Jasper's shoulder. "Speaking of family, my son, there has been something I have meant to speak with you about. Please, come sit down with Scarlett and I."

Nervous for a moment, Jasper went along and took a seat.

While he made himself comfortable in a dark blue cushioned walnut winged armchair off to the right of the white sofa, he sat back and crossed one leg over the other, hands interlinked in his lap as Lord Ronald took his place beside Scarlett once again. "If I may ask, Jasper," he said, "How has your marriage to the fair Lady Darcy been these past years?"

"Just fine," Jasper declared, "Why do you ask such a thing?"

"As a father–."

Jasper immediately wanted to roll his eyes in contempt.

"–it is important for me to know that my children are happy with the lives they have built now that they are on their own. And you, my son, it is as though you have been alone for quite a long time...especially after the death of your mother." Ronald let his gaze trail off to the side, rubbing the back of his neck unconsciously to ease the awkwardness brought on by his admission. "Beatrice has found love with a man, has a beautiful daughter of her own, and while you and Darcy have spent a long ten years together, I cannot help but notice there are no little ones running about. I know this is a personal question, Jasper, but are you and she planning to bring a child into the family, or can she simply not produce one?"

That was a question Jasper hoped to never hear so long as his father was alive, but still it was a question greatly understood coming from him. Ronald Lancechester was a revered nobleman with great wealth, property ownership and a rightfully entitled name. With their family originating such an esteemed and respected title during the rule of Queen Elizabeth I's royal days, each generation of Lancechester's down until today's Queen Victoria was a relationship Ronald wanted to keep. Still acquainted with the monarchs of Great Britain, the association each Lancechester kept with the royal family was also a key point that made it capable for them to retain such reverence. And Ronald wanted to make sure that after he no longer walked the earth, his son and grandson would be around to keep the veneration in their name strong. Over the years, having the ear of a royal member of the monarch had always proved their family beneficial.

In hopes of side stepping the question, Jasper said, "That is a rather personal question, father."

"I know, my son, and I do not mean to make offense, but...it is important for you to provide yourself with an heir for our name. Our great, great and even further extended grandfathers worked far too hard, I am working far too hard, and you will be working far too hard once I have passed to simply be forgotten in time. You will require a son–," he spread his arms out as if addressing to their surroundings, "–to hand all of this down to when the time comes when you, too, are withered and old. The massive properties owned by myself and your grandparents, Dorothy and Bernard, will become solely yours when we all have gone, and what you own now under your name along with those will be given to your son in the far future. If left untouched, there will be no one to stop parties from swooping in to divide and hand off what is ours, what the name of Lancechester worked to build and retain for nearly three-hundred years. You must have a son, Jasper. Soon."

Sitting in his own frustration with the man before him, Jasper was about to comment when Lady Darcy stepped into the dimly lit day room. She was still dressed in her white satin gown, but she'd removed the diamond necklace and earrings from before, having wiped off her bright red lipstick as well. She was Jasper's wife, and though they were not married on behalf of either true love or proposed betrothal, Jasper still loved her greatly for the honest friendship she had given him from the start, and he was more than content with referring to her as his wife.