Charles nodded, as he accepted the book from his father. As much as he disliked numbers, accounting was only a matter of recording your expenses and simple addition and subtraction for the most part. It was nothing Charles felt like he couldn't handle.
He opened the book when prompted and scanned the pages. How on earth was he going to account for any money spent on Piper? Immediately he thought of writing it down as taking in a theatre performance. There had to be several other innocuous leisure expenses he could write the money off as. How did other gentlemen do this? It wasn't as though he were going to actually utilise Piper's "services" anyway. He just wanted to spend time with him.
For a moment Charles looked up at his father and wondered if he could outright ask him. But he couldn't come up with a way to word things that wouldn't sound slightly accusatory. And since he would already be lying about some of the expenses, there was no need to further the lie by pretending he was going to visit a lady of ill repute. No. It was a terrible idea. There was no good way to go about this. He'd just have to figure it out on his own.
Whatever he wrote down in the ledger, he would set aside half of the extra money for potential repairs and save the other half for whatever he liked.
"That is most generous, Father, thank you. I will be diligent," Charles said, smiling once more.