December
Rickmas 2025 Day 20 | The Barchester Chronicles | Obadiah Slope/Grace Madison (OC)
Word Count: 1.1k
Content: pregnancy, death of parent
Part 1: Hello, December
Read on Ao3 or below the cut:
When Grace left to visit the doctor, she expected her husband to wish to accompany her — but instead, Obadiah insisted on remaining at home.
“I sense your father needs my counsel now more than ever,” he said to her earnestly, taking her hands in his to kiss her knuckles tenderly. “Would you forgive me for following where the Lord sends me, dearest?”
“Of course, my love,” Grace agreed — how could she ever deny him her forgiveness for following the Lord’s path, knowing as she did his dedication to the church when they married? “I hope to return with only good news.”
“I’m sure you will, Mrs Slope.”
And Grace was returning not only with good news, but with the greatest of news — not only were her recent bouts of sickness not a cause for great concern, but in fact a cause for jubilation.
She tried to contain her excitement as she walked down the lane back to the house she shared with her husband and her father. What an enthralling year it had been! A chance meeting on the road with the chaplain she had admired from afar for so long had led to Obadiah’s dedicated spiritual guidance for Mr Madison, Grace’s father, and his companionship for her, for he oftentimes spent even longer walking the gardens with Grace than he did counselling her father. After such time spent together, Grace’s warm feelings towards the chaplain only grew — and so, apparently, had his towards her, and by Easter he offered his hand in marriage. They were married in the summer and now, December again, Grace had received the most wonderful news from the doctor — that she was carrying her husband’s child.
Her father was very sick; of that much, Grace was certain. His health had only declined, although Obadiah assured her that Mr Madison’s soul was well-nourished. Grace could only hope that God would grant her namesake and allow her father to live long enough to see his grandchild born.
That hope, it seemed, was not to be.
Grace arrived home to find her husband pacing the hallway, and her announcement of her news froze on her tongue when she saw the concerned expression on his brow.
“My love? Whatever is the matter?”
“My dear Grace… let us sit down.”
Obadiah led her into the living room and guided her to sit on the couch. He took her hands in his and bowed his head sorrowfully.
“My dearest wife… how sorry I am to bear this news. After you left for the doctor, I went into your father’s room — and found him unmoving.”
Grace gasped, a hand flying to her mouth.
“You cannot mean —”
“I am sorry, my dear. It seems your father left us during the night.”
Grace let out an anguished sob and buried her head against her husband’s chest, seeking comfort in his presence as grief overwhelmed her. Obadiah placed a hand on her shoulder and patted it gently.
“There, there, my dear. He is with the Lord now.”
She continued to sob, and Obadiah could do nothing but hold her and wait for her tears to pass.
“How awful that he was all alone!” Grace wailed, and Obadiah rubbed her back, hoping her tears would cease shortly.
Cease they did, but not shortly. Obadiah sat with his arms around the weeping woman for longer than he could estimate, and it seemed only to be once she had nothing left to give that her sobs finally subsided and gave way to heavy, laboured breathing, and at last Obadiah felt he could gain some conversation from her.
“Come, now, dearest. No doubt he was asleep at the time — and now he is with the Lord, comforted no doubt in the knowledge that he did not leave his only child wanting. With the fortune your mother coveted, you and I can live a comfortable life, can we not?”
“F - fortune?” you said with a frown, looking up at him, and at last Obadiah was able to relax his arms from the embrace. “Oh, Obadiah, what a cruel jest — I beg of you, now is not the time to speak of the imaginary fortune that existed only in her mind.”
Grace didn’t notice the way her husband froze, only his eye twitching — she was too wrapped in her grief to notice anything at all.
Obadiah’s mind was reeling. Imaginary? The fortune her mother had died for — the secret fortune her father had supposedly hidden all his life — the very fortune that Obadiah had married this pathetic, pitiful whelp for — was imaginary?!
An entire year, wasted. A year he could have spent romancing Mrs Bold for her very real fortune — and here he had spent his time winning the affections of a girl with nothing to her name. The money wasted on the wedding that he had considered an investment in Grace’s inheritance — gone. He had spent endless hours listening to the most boring woman he had ever met, even taken her to bed with the intent of giving her a child to secure the fortune — all to no end.
He had given Mr Madison only half the bottle of arsenic that now sat hidden in his pocket. Half had been enough for a frail old man on death’s door — would it be enough for a healthy young woman?
Was she even that healthy? Obadiah remembered suddenly the reason Grace had left the house which had given him the opportunity to deliver the poison.
“What did the doctor have to say, my dear?”
Grace wiped a stray tear from her eye, took Obadiah’s hands in his, and smiled, some joy attempting to break through beneath the sorrow that was still etched onto her otherwise plain face.
“I suppose, my love, you might say that where the Lord takes with one hand, he gives with another.”
“…Might I?”
“Yes. The sickness of the past few days is no illness at all — I am with child.”
Grace was smiling, grinning even, the joy of motherhood overcoming the grief of the loss of a parent — but Obadiah Slope felt no such joy. He smiled back, giving platitudes of joy and gratefulness, but inside, his heart was sinking.
He should have delivered the poison to the father much earlier — before he had had chance to impregnate the daughter. He would have had no qualms about delivering a second poison to her when discovering the fortune to be only imaginary, ridding himself of the useless wife and perhaps gaining the sympathy of Mrs Bold, sympathy which might turn to comfort and affection — but it was too late. The stupid girl was carrying his child, and he would not be so callous as to poison a pregnant woman.
…Would he?
