A/N: I have missed having the time to write. Such madness here. I worked 11 days straight and extra hours here and there. I know work will call tonight to tell me they are short again. So, I am getting this done now...

Thanks for all the lovely reviews and comments.

This is my last chapter, so bask in all the Carson – Hughes goodness with me. And let me know you are still out there.

"We need to do something, you know that, don't you?" Charles Carson said, as gently as he had ever said a thing.

He sat down next to his wife then as she pulled her stockings on, and he smiled. He had never in his life imagined a sight such as this would become so blessedly ordinary that he could have a conversation while he watched it.

"Elsie," he prompted when she didn't answer.

She stood now that she was all properly put together. She smoothed out her dress and heaved a sigh. "Yes, I know it. But do you want to go to Lady Grantham now and confess all this. Is this the best time?"

"You are wondering if this is a good time to lose our positions?" he tried to smile.

"To be blunt."

"We've put away enough money over the years that we will be fine should it come to that. Fine until something else comes along."

"There's no avoiding this, I suppose." Was she asking him or telling him, he wondered.

"Do you wish we had never..." he felt compelled to ask.

"Of course not. I have never, never been so happy as since I married you." She gave him a good natured thump on the chest.

"I think things could be better still," he told her. "I want a chance to actually live as if we are married, Elsie. Do you understand? That is part of why I am willing to tell the family."

"I do understand. Now come closer and kiss me or I'll never make it through the day in this mad house."

/ / /

But they were beaten to the punch.

Carson was called to see Mrs. Crawley in library. Sensing this was the end to their charade and possibly their careers, he lingered long enough below stairs to drag the housekeeper into the pantry. Against everything the dire situation demanded, he smiled at her. He petted her cheek and asked, "Do you know how much I love you?"

"Enough to marry me despite all this insanity we've caused?"

"Something like that."

And he kissed her like a younger man. Like the bravest of men. A man with nothing to prove - because he possesses absolute surety.

He picked her up and twirled her gently then.

"I love you, you crazed, darling thing," she told him, gently. Once on her feet, she said, "Wipe that satisfied look off your face. And go."

/ / / / / / /

The library was a tense place before the butler even arrived. He was surprised to see that Lady Sybil was there, especially because he could tell that Lady Grantham did not want her there. It seemed the young woman knew something of what was happening and had refused to leave.

Lady Grantham turned when Carson entered and after a tongue tied pause, she managed, "I have heard some odd things about you Mr. Carson. And, unfortunately, we need to discuss this."

"Yes ma'am."

"I have been told that there is some irregular behavior below stairs... that it involves you and Mrs. Hughes..."

"Might we get her then, Ma'am?" Carson asked in all innocence. "Should she not be here if she is suspected of something?"

"I'll get her," Sybil offered too quickly. And at something just short of a run, the young woman was out of the door.

Carson had the advantage in the room suddenly. He could stand as impassively as the pyramids while they waited. And he did. He was that well trained.

But more. He was married. He saw now how right that decision had been. They could not blacken his good woman's name. Because he had not done anything more than marry the woman and attempted to live as such.

The only causes of impropriety suddenly were the rules of this fine house.

Elsie, when she arrived, did not enter with the youngest daughter. Nor alone. Mary was now with Sybil.

"Girls!" Mrs. Crawley moaned.

"Sybil told me you were arranging nothing short of a firing squad, Mother. Just what is going on?"

"If I might," Mr. Carson said. "I would venture to guess that Miss O'Brien has complained about us."

"Yes," Cora replied. And the fact that the man showed absolutely no shame disconcerted her some what.

"She has figured out that there is a relationship between us. But she has not, perhaps, come to understand that we are married."

They were arranged in frozen silence. The two daughters and Lady Grantham stood staring from one side of the room at the now revealed Mr. and Mrs. Carson on the other.

It was Sybil who roused herself first. She crossed the distance and offered her congratulations and a broad smile to the pair.

Lady Grantham shook her head as if to clear it. "I don't know if this is better or worse than what I had imagined, but it is rather more permanent." The woman lowered herself to a chair as if the disclosure or the strain of dealing with it were physically too much.

"I don't understand," she continued. "Just what are we supposed to do now? Why do these things happen when your father is not here?" the lady of the house complained.

Mary, who was normally as inconstant as a broken compass, was suddenly moved to show a near rabid loyalty, "Why do we need to do anything?" she wanted to know, and with that she changed sides of the room to stand nearer to Carson.

Lady Grantham was not taking the news nor the obvious defection well. "Something must happen now. Not that I can drum up the proper British response. We don't have this problem in America. Where I am from the cook is supposed to be married to the gardener and give birth to little farm hands. And the occasional boot black."

She received near identical eye rolls from her daughters in response.

"Yes, and 60 years ago in America you called that 'slavery.' That doesn't help, Mother," Sybil said with a firmness that ceased to waver.

"Then, well, write or telephone your father." Lady Grantham stood then to pace across the carpet again. "Really, Carson, you are supposed to be running this house! The pair of you are. Something like this should be your problem."

Lady Mary groaned at her mother's unwillingness or inability to confront the situation.

"When did you get married?" Sybil wanted to know of the Carsons.

"Six months ago when the family were in London, Mi'Lady. We drove over to Ripon." There was a sideways glance then. A quick shared look between husband and wife. At least one pair of eyebrows hovered a tad higher for a moment at the inescapable memories.

"Six months. See, Mother?" Mary demanded. "In six months the biggest problem has been that they are thought to have dressed in the same room!"

The unthinkable happened with that statement. Mrs Hughes coughed before regaining a normal breathing pattern, and Mr Carson blushed and quickly examined the ceiling.

"Mary's right," Sybil said. "It isn't as if we have suddenly had a rash of late meals or dusty rooms. It isn't as if the servants have run wild."

"But that is exactly what your father is going to think happened in his absence," their mother fired back. She turned then and finally sat down again. "Carson, why did you have to do this?"

The question may have been rhetorical but Charles could not remain silent. "I'm in love with her, madam. And it's what I needed to do."

The room was rendered still then until the youngest Crawley daughter sighed with emotion. "Oh, Mother!" Sybil announced. "You can't possibly sack them now! That is the most romantic thing I have ever heard."

Mary took two steps to her mother then as if placing herself between her and the beleaguered couple. "You let them go, mother and I'll... "

Lady Grantham held up her hand to beg for quiet. "Really, we can't just hush this up. The staff must all know something by now with all these secret meetings," Cora tried to explain. She closed her eyes and pinched at her brow. The woman groaned then with the effort of finding a solution. It seemed an interminable pause for those who waited for the verdict.

With suddenly clear eyes and a firm jaw her Ladyship told the pair of servants, "There is only one thing to do. For all our sakes. We will tell people that we sanctioned this from the onset. Otherwise his Lordship and I look like complete dolts who've had the wool pulled over our eyes. And the two of you look like Communist conspirators."

"We'll throw a party," Sybil suggested.

"That may be taking it too far," Cora said, as she narrowed her eyes at her daughter.

"And an extra half day off for everyone!" Sybil exclaimed then. The young woman was too far gone to pick up on any of the silent daggers that her mother was projecting.

"Unless we have any other life altering pronouncements to make," Cora said, "I suggest we adjourn!"

...

Lady Grantham quickly excused herself.

If there is a pause to Sybil to wonder at propriety, it is unnoticeable to those who remain. With an untameable grin, she embraces them. First Mr Carson. And then Mrs. Carson. And she congratulates them again ... on their wedding and on 'love's triumph' before she leaves.

Moving much slower, as if a thousand thoughts are weighing her down, Mary approaches the couple. Once she has congratulated them in the most formal, but heart felt terms, Carson begs he be excused to see to household business.

"I should also..." Elsie began as her husband left.

"Mrs Hughes," Mary said to still her. "Thank you."

There was a pause while the two regarded each other. And finally Mrs. Hughes said softly, "I don't understand, Lady Mary. It is I who owes you our thanks."

"I want to thank you for making Mr. Carson happy. I can't explain other than to say that." She looked off at the door he has left through, as if she could still see him walking away. "That man has been like my knight all these years. The one person who never criticized and only supported me. And I am thrilled he has you... because it's obvious that it makes him... whole. Not that I ever saw anything lacking."

Elsie was going to reply with 'it's been my pleasure,' but that would have seemed an unfortunate double entendre, she decided.

"Is there anything the two of you need," the young woman asked, "since you are living as married rather than hiding the fact. Does it mean anything below stairs needs to change?"

Ram rod straight and with nary a pause for thought, the older woman said simply, "A bed." And there was, remarkably and quite notably, absolutely nothing untoward in the request simply because of the way it was stated.

"Just... a bed?" Mary repeated, as much with her eyebrows as her mouth.

"Yes," Mrs Hughes said levelly. Her hands were clasped calmly in front of her and her eyes met the young woman's.

It was plain to Elsie that Mary could not understand the simplicity that was marriage at its most basic. But that she desperately wanted to.

If she had had the courage in that moment she surely would have asked.

…

"You told her we needed a bed?" her shocked husband demanded, as they lay together on their oversized couch that night.

"It was done in privacy and with decorum," Mrs Carson insisted.

"And how did she take it?"

"I thought she seemed to be trying to figure something out. As if she wished she could ask me something more. So, I merely told her, "It is the time and space to be together that makes a marriage. Once you find the right man - then there isn't much more you need. Just a place to which you can both retreat when your work is done. And the knowledge that your days can start and end together."

"You told her that?"

"Not with words, as such," his wife hedged. "But I do believe, she understands all that now." The woman smiled harder suddenly. " After all, I've heard Matthew Crawley has been invited over for dinner."

"So, I had heard," he replied sounding satisfied.

"Plus, Lady Mary told me the bed will be here next week."

"And better," he whispered into her neck, "so will we."

/ / / / /

Author's foot note: (And Miss O'Brien won't.)