“I trust that I’m not to be shocked to death?” Georgie asked, but he held the wires without waiting for Radnor’s response. The earl might be eccentric, but nothing Georgie had seen suggested recklessness.
They proceeded in this manner for most of the morning, Radnor ensuring that each wire was properly connected to the trestles, and Georgie stealing furtive glances at the earl. Georgie watched how Radnor absently rubbed his beard when he was thinking, and how he pushed his hair off his face in such a way that pulled strands haphazardly out of his queue. With his hair at sixes and sevens and his beard covering the lower part of his face, only Radnor’s eyes and nose were really visible. His nose was nothing special, perfectly unobjectionable as far as noses went. But his eyes were an eerie, almost luminescent blue. Georgie couldn’t think of anything quite that shade, not even a gemstone or a pricey bit of Italian glasswork, but he knew that if he ever came across anything that precise hue, he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from thinking of Radnor.
He didn’t like the idea that he wouldn’t be able to shake the memory of Radnor loose from his mind, even after he was miles away, years into a future that now seemed bleak and lonely. He had always appreciated being able to start fresh with each new job: a blank slate, his misdeeds wiped clean away. But this time he wouldn’t be able to do that; he’d carry the memory of Radnor with him, along with his knowledge of whatever harm he did the man.
Only when they heard footsteps coming up the tower stairs did they pause in their work. Or, rather, Radnor paused, going utterly still, as if the footsteps might belong to a marauder instead of a servant bearing the usual ham and apples. But Radnor was usually holed up in his study at this hour, and Janet simply left the tray outside his closed door. Today, he would have to actually encounter the girl.
Georgie stood and went to the top of the stairs, intending to act as ambassador between the girl and her master. Passing Radnor, he whispered, “Her name is Janet,” but he wasn’t sure if the earl heard, or if he even knew what he was supposed to do with that information.
“A fine morning, Janet.” Georgie reached for the tray. “Let me take that,” he offered. “It’s wires and whatnots all over the place, and I don’t want you to trip.”
She cast a wary glance at the wire cutters and bits of the broken glass tube they had dropped earlier. It likely looked very ominous to an outsider. Georgie felt a totally unexpected rush of pride that he was not an outsider—he and Radnor were two of a handful of people who knew that this device was even a possibility.
“Mrs. Ferris told me to ask you down for tea,” Janet said.
“No,” Radnor barked, appearing from around the corner. Both Georgie and Janet stared at him. “He’ll take his tea with me. Send up whatever is needed. Biscuits or . . . ” He gestured vaguely. “Muffins,” he said decisively, before turning to go back to his work. Then he paused, halting his step. “Thank you, Janet,” he said, without looking back.
“Well,” Janet said on her way downstairs. “I’ve been here three years and that was the first time he’s spoken to me, let alone thanked me.”
“He’s making an effort,” Georgie said, realizing it was true. Radnor was trying to be a good employer. A good man. The realization was like a blow to the gut. Georgie could hardly suck in his next breath.
“I think he’s fond of you,” Janet said. “Tea. Whoever would have thought?”
Oh, hell. A good man, fond of Georgie. Georgie wanted to hide under the covers of his bed—some other bed, far away from Penkellis.
He didn’t deserve this. Neither of them did. Radnor didn’t deserve to be deceived. Georgie didn’t deserve anything like fondness, not from a good man, not from anyone at all. Radnor’s kindness felt unearned. Stolen.
Georgie left the tray in the study and rejoined Radnor in the corridor. The earl was bent over the place where the wires twisted together.
“It’s nearly ready.” Radnor spoke without looking up. “You send the first transmission, and I’ll send something back in return.” The point of today’s work, Georgie understood, was not only the greater distance between the two trestles but also seeing whether whatever Radnor had done to the battery would prevent short circuits.
Georgie watched the earl disappear around the corner, his strong thighs straining the buckskin of his breeches, his overlong hair barely contained in a queue, and felt a strange sort of unease, as if he wanted to keep the man in sight. Which was nonsense, of course. Radnor wasn’t anything to him, and he wasn’t anything to Radnor, interesting midnight interludes notwithstanding.
Last night, Georgie had stopped himself just in the nick of time. Another instant and he would have pressed his body fully against Radnor’s, letting the other man feel the force of his desire. Radnor wanted him, that much had been abundantly clear. Equally clear was that he had no intention of acting on his desire. And Georgie wasn’t in the habit of coaxing potential lovers into being free with their favors, not when the world was filled with people who weren’t afraid or ashamed of what they wanted.
“Now, Turner!” Radnor bellowed from around the corner.
Oh, bugger it all. Georgie had never been good at resisting temptation. He sat on the floor before the trestle and tapped out his message before he could think better of it.
During the next few silent minutes, he started to worry that he had badly miscalculated, that he had gone too far. But then the bubbles started to rise. He picked up his pencil to write down each letter.
Georgie’s transmission had been short, modeled after the earl’s own transmission the previous week: Thatbeard. If Georgie’s waistcoat was fair game for telegraphic scorn, then so was Radnor’s blasted beard.
He looked at the paper on which he had transcribed the earl’s return message. Whatofit. What of it? His heart beat faster, not only because his message evidently hadn’t annoyed the earl, but because the device was working. Here they were, having a conversation several dozen yards apart, by way of wires and tubes and bubbles. This wasn’t something he had even contemplated two weeks ago, and now he was witnessing it. And it was Radnor, for all his eccentricity, who had done it.
As quickly as he could, he sent his next message. Soft.
He waited. Had he gone too far? Had the machine failed? A full minute passed, more than enough time for his message to have gone through.
He heard the sound of heavy footsteps approaching him. Radnor’s massive boots came to a stop inches away from where Georgie sat. Just for the thrill of it, Georgie let his gaze travel ever so slowly, decadently, up Radnor’s massive frame. The earl’s ensemble was as deplorable as ever today, but there was something to be said for worn buckskins on a man built like Radnor. Looking up further still, he only allowed himself the briefest glance at the placket of Radnor’s breeches. He had felt enough last night to know that what was behind that placket would not disappoint. And then there was his shirt, threadbare and overlaundered and barely concealing muscular chest and arms. Radnor’s waistcoat had apparently gone on holiday with the man’s coat. Georgie found he couldn’t complain.
“We need a question mark.” Radnor’s voice was gruff.
“Pardon?” Georgie wasn’t following. He was too busy thinking of what other articles of the earl’s clothing he’d like to see vanish.
“Your transmission. I can’t tell if it’s a question or a statement. We need to add wires for punctuation.”
Soft. He had meant it as a question: Is your beard soft? “It was a question. I don’t have enough data to make a definitive statement.” He looked Radnor directly in the eyes. “Unfortunately.”
Radnor shook his head. “You can’t go on like that. I . . . you don’t know what you’re doing. If you knew, you wouldn’t say such things.”
Georgie ignored this. “Really, Radnor, today you ought to be celebrating.” He rose to his feet and took a step closer. No harm in trying, he reasoned. “Your machine has succeeded. You’ve done what no other man in England has even attempted.”
> Radnor briefly squeezed his eyes shut, a helpless little gesture that Georgie was amazed to discover he found endearing. “You don’t understand.”
“I understand perfectly well. You’re brilliant. You’re talented.” Georgie let those words drop out of his mouth in much the same register as he’d say you’re so big and hard in another context. And why not, when Georgie’s desire was being wound up by Radnor’s mind as much as it was by any other part of his anatomy. Tentatively, as if reaching out to pet a strange dog, Georgie lifted his hand and lightly touched the earl’s beard.
“Perfectly soft,” Georgie murmured.
Radnor grabbed Georgie’s wrist and held it away from him. “Stop,” he growled. “You cannot know what you’re doing to me.”
Could the man really not see how Georgie felt? He was being as overt as he possibly could without actually jumping on him. “Why don’t you tell me?” Georgie purred, trying to make it obvious for him.
“I . . . ” Radnor swallowed. “I have perverse tastes.” He winced, as if it physically hurt to speak those words aloud. “Deviant inclinations.” He must have mistaken Georgie’s silence for confusion, because he went on. “Men. Criminal.”
“I understand,” Georgie said quickly, to spare Radnor from the pain of further elaboration, and also because he didn’t want to hear his own desires painted in such a shameful light.
“I choose not to act on my urges. Anymore. But, still, you wouldn’t touch me if you knew what I felt when you did. You would keep your distance, as would be right.” He closed his eyes and took a deep, shaky breath. “You have nothing to fear. You’re in my house and under my protection, and I won’t do anything to lead you astray.”
Georgie stood perfectly still. Whatever he had thought Radnor might say, it wasn’t this. Protection? Georgie hadn’t been protected by anybody since he was a child. If anyone in this musty corridor needed looking after, it was Radnor himself, especially since, in addition to his odd habits, he was apparently awash in shame and humiliation.
Pity, like a hard lump, sat in Georgie’s belly. He suddenly felt a wave of gratitude that, whatever hardships he had faced, he had managed to figure out that people simply liked what they liked, and that embarrassment didn’t need to figure into it.
All the same, Georgie was touched by the man’s care. “Don’t worry about me,” he said gently. Georgie cleared his throat. “You were married,” he ventured. Of course he knew that some men who enjoyed the company of men also sought pleasure with women. Georgie himself found that his desires were pretty evenly split between men and women. But there was something about the way Radnor had spoken of his desires that made Georgie think that he believed all his desires to be forbidden.
Radnor laughed, bitter and short. “Briefly. I’m no fit husband. Isabella ran off with some blackguard and died in Italy. I can hardly blame her. She couldn’t very well spend the rest of her life in a place like this. With a person like me.”
Georgie knew from Jack that Radnor had gotten married before he was of age and that a child had been born. Presumably the child had died in Italy with the mother.
“Never?” Georgie asked.
“Pardon?” Radnor said, his voice hoarse.
“You never act on your . . . impulses?”
“Not since I was a young man.”
“You’re not yet thirty. That’s no way to live, Radnor.” Georgie could hardly stand the idea of Radnor alone, ashamed, turning away from companionship and pleasure. Life was too short, too cold, too bloody hard as it was, without making it worse.
Georgie would make it easy for the earl. It was a small thing he could do. It would not be a hardship at all. He felt his mouth curve into a smile and watched Radnor’s eyes go wide in answer. Not a hardship in the slightest.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Lawrence leaned on his shovel and wiped the sweat from his brow. Halliday had come by earlier to tell him he ought to hire laborers to do this sort of job. “Spread the wealth,” the vicar had pleaded. “Throw some money around and endear yourself to your tenants.”
Lawrence hadn’t any answer to that kind of nonsense. He could offer any sum and still nobody would come to work at Penkellis ever again. And thank God for it. Less noise, fewer people, and Lawrence could cling to the last bits of his sanity for a while longer. If he had known that blowing up the conservatory would bring him such peace and quiet, he would have done it a decade ago.
This trench ought to have taken two full days to dig by himself. But after this morning’s damnable conversation with Turner, he had needed fresh air and physical exertion, and now he had a ditch running nearly the length of the castle. With any luck, he’d have the wires safely encased in an insulated pipe and buried in the trench by tomorrow evening, and then he could test the device under those new conditions.
With a grunt, he buried the shovel in the earth and lifted out another mound of soil, tossing it onto a hill with the rest of the dislodged dirt and weeds. His muscles ached but his head was clear. Tonight he would fall into bed and sleep easily. Last night he hadn’t even tried, not after grappling on the floor with Turner.
That thought sent unwanted sparks of desire through his body, like so much electricity coursing through copper wires, only more dangerous. He looked over his shoulder to check the progress of the sun, to see how much daylight he had left, how much time he had to burn off this restless energy.
But there, leaning against a tree, was a slim, dark figure. Turner. And the way he was standing—legs crossed easily at the ankles, arms folded across his chest—suggested that he had been there awhile.
When he saw that Lawrence had noticed him, Turner pushed off the tree and came closer. “Digging graves for your enemies, my lord?”
Turner only bothered with my lord or even Lord Radnor when he was being facetious. “What do you want?” Lawrence asked, deliberately rude.
“My bedchamber,” Turner said, and for a long moment Lawrence’s thoughts couldn’t get past the tantalizing intersection of Turner and bedchamber. “It’s very clean. Thank you.”
Lawrence turned back to his work, hefting another mound of earth. “Thank the girl,” he said, panting. “She did the work.”
“At your request, I don’t doubt.”
“Can’t have you sleeping in my dressing room.” Lawrence would never have any peace of mind knowing that a single door was all that stood between him and a half-naked Turner. He lifted another shovelful.
Turner didn’t say anything, but Lawrence felt his gaze. Usually Lawrence preferred silence—so much less potential to get things wrong, so much bloody quieter—but there was something about this that wasn’t right.
“Why aren’t you talking?” Lawrence demanded.
“I’m quite enjoying watching, to be perfectly frank.”
Lawrence went still, shovel poised midair. “I told you not to talk like that.”
“No, you told me that if I talked like that I’d cause you to have unnatural desires, or however stupidly you phrased it. And I don’t much care about that, so I’ll talk how I please, thank you.”
Lawrence felt his cheeks heat. He didn’t respond; words didn’t exist that could give voice to the confusion of desire that swirled through his mind. He buried his shovel deep in the earth, savoring the clarity of his muscles’ ache.
“Is that why you avoid people?” Turner asked.
“What?” Lawrence panted.
“Do you think your . . . tendencies disqualify you for human company? That simply by being around another man you’ll contaminate him? Because if it is, I’ll let you know that isn’t how it works at all.” A beat of silence, during which all that existed were Turner’s laughing, dark eyes. “More’s the pity.”
Lawrence laughed mirthlessly. “Of all the qualities that disqualify me for companionship, that’s not even in the top three.”
“Tell me about the top three, then.”
“Madness.” He hefted a shovel heaped with dirt. “Madness.” Another shov
elful. “And more madness.”
“I’ve been here for two weeks, and I’m still waiting to see evidence of this madness.” Turner’s voice was clipped, ironic. If he had displayed the faintest trace of sympathy, Lawrence would have found it easier to dismiss his words as so much charity or flattery. “I have to say, I’m fairly disappointed. I had hoped for some good old-fashioned howling at the moon, and all you do is build ingenious inventions and eat too much ham.”
Another shovel, and another. Lawrence felt rooted in the pain that traveled down his back, through his arms. “My father was stark raving mad. My brother was not only mad but murderous, to boot.”
“But how were they mad? Madness isn’t like a fever, where one can figure out what’s wrong by putting a hand to a patient’s forehead. I’ve asked Janet and Mrs. Ferris, but they only look at one another darkly and refuse to talk.”
Lawrence turned around, startled. “Don’t plague Mrs. Ferris with talk about my family.” He’d tell Turner whatever he wanted to know as long as he didn’t pester Sally. “My father used to spend weeks at a time in bed, generally quite drunk. He was a miserable sod. One day, I came home from riding and found him dead in the stables. We told everyone he died while cleaning his gun, but he left a note. I burnt it.” The old man had been buried decently in the family crypt, as if he had ever acted with the slightest concern for the fate of his soul.
“Do you ever spend weeks in bed?”
“No—”
“Do you ever wish to kill yourself?”
No, he didn’t. He had found his father’s body and wouldn’t wish that experience on anyone. But how to explain that it didn’t matter whether he wanted to or not, because one day the madness would take him? “I hope I never kill myself.”
The Lawrence Browne Affair Page 8