“Mrs. Adler!”
The friendly call jolted Lily out of her reverie, and she looked up to find two gentlemen strolling toward her. One of them she recognized instantly: slightly short, slightly round, and always cheerful, Mr. Andrew Harlowe was her friend Margaret’s husband. He stopped before her and bowed, beaming with pleasure.
Lily bowed in return, smiling back. It was impossible not to. Andrew Harlowe was a dear man, and she couldn’t begrudge him the interruption. Her mind needed a break anyway. “Mr. Harlowe. A pleasure to see you.”
“And you, ma’am. Beautiful morning for a stroll, is it not? I know we shall see you tonight, so I apologize for interrupting your solitary reflection, but of course I could not see you and fail to make my greetings.” He gestured to the man beside him. “May I make known to you Mr. Matthew Spencer? Mr. Spencer, this is Mrs. Adler, who has been my wife’s friend for years.”
Mr. Spencer bowed, and Lily tried not to stare as she returned the courtesy. He was one of the handsomest men she had ever seen, with lightly tanned skin, curly dark hair, and eyes of such a deep blue-black that they looked as if they could have been painted. It was only as he straightened that she took her eyes from his face long enough to realize that he was also missing a limb; his left arm ended just above where his elbow would have been, and his shirt and coat sleeves were folded and neatly pinned.
“Mrs. Adler.” Mr. Spencer’s very blue eyes met hers, and she had the feeling that he took in every inch of her, from the newness of her gown to the damp grass stuck to her walking boots. The smile he gave her would have been disconcerting on such an absurdly attractive face if it had not been so warm and friendly. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
“Yours as well, sir. And how are you and Mr. Harlowe acquainted?”
“I have, on occasion, contributed some work to the efforts of our Parliament.”
“Some work.” Mr. Harlowe, who currently worked as the parliamentary secretary of a peer and expected one day to hold a seat in Commons himself, laughed. “How modest of you. Spencer here has had many occasions to butt heads with Lord Walter, whom you know so well,” he added, glancing between them with poorly disguised pleasure. “I’m surprised the two of you did not cross paths before this. Though of course, Mrs. Adler, your black gloves meant you were not venturing out in company so much at one time.”
Though he phrased it politely, Mr. Harlowe’s meaning was plain, and she saw him glance at Mr. Spencer out of the corner of his eye as if to see how he would take the news that Lily was recently out of mourning. Lily was starting to guess Andrew Harlowe’s intent in introducing them and wondered if his wife had dropped a hint. But she hid her discomfort as she always did: behind a facade of cool intellectualism. “Were you one of those working with Lord Walter on the recent passage of the Corn Law, sir?”
Mr. Spencer looked taken aback by the question. “I am afraid I am more Whiggish in my tendencies. Lord Walter was still kind enough to tolerate my presence from time to time.”
Andrew Harlowe laughed. “Be honest, Spencer, you are almost too much a reformer for the Whigs.” He beamed at Lily. “Not unlike you.”
Mr. Spencer suddenly looked far more intrigued. “Is Mr. Adler in politics? I am afraid I do not recognize the name.”
“My late husband had intended to stand for a seat,” she said, trying to ignore the tightness in her throat. Even though she knew her father’s cruel words from the night before weren’t justified, they had stuck with her, making Freddy’s absence feel sharper than it had in months. “And you are a member, I assume?”
The look Mr. Spencer gave her made Lily suspect that she had not sounded quite as serene as she’d wanted to. But he responded to what she had said rather than how she had sounded, for which she was grateful. “Not a member. But I have the privilege of making my voice heard to many of them.” With a sideways glance at Mr. Harlowe, he added, “Whether they wish to hear it or not.”
Lily would have pressed further, curious to find out exactly what he had meant, but she saw him glance surreptitiously at his pocket watch. “That is an intriguing statement, Mr. Spencer, but I suspect I shall have to wait for its conclusion. Please do not let me detain you.”
“Not at all, ma’am,” he said, looking a little embarrassed at being caught. “I believe we were the ones detaining you.” But then a smile tugged at his mouth, and he admitted, “I am afraid I have an appointment soon, and I must abandon both the pleasure of your company, Mrs. Adler, and my conversation with you, Harlowe.”
“More like a browbeating than a conversation,” Andrew Harlowe said, laughing. “We shan’t detain you any longer, then. But of course we will see you tonight at dinner, will we not?” As soon as Mr. Spencer nodded his assent, Mr. Harlowe clapped his hands together, beaming once more. “Splendid! The two of you will have the chance to continue your conversation there.”
Lily couldn’t protest without seeming rude, but she was thoroughly embarrassed until Mr. Spencer caught her eye. His wry smile said he saw through their mutual friend’s machinations as easily as she did, and his obvious good humor about the situation set her at ease.
“Then I shall look forward to making your better acquaintance, Mrs. Adler. Good day, Harlowe.”
Lily watched him leave. “What a kind man.”
“One of the best,” Andrew Harlowe agreed, giving her a pleased look. “I know no one more pleasant or more idealistic, for all that he has reason to be jaded. He lost his arm in Italy and his wife to rheumatic fever, all within a year. Dreadful. But that was some time ago.”
Lily tried not to wince at the obvious direction of his thoughts. Andrew Harlowe meant well—and if he was making assumptions, there was a good chance it was Margaret’s fault. Lily held back a sigh. She would have to speak to her friend at dinner and make it clear that she was no more interested in finding a new husband now than she had been in April.
Mr. Harlowe beamed once more, oblivious to what she was thinking, and offered her his arm. “May I escort you home, ma’am? Or wherever you might need to go.”
Lily yanked her thoughts away from her friends’ unwanted attempts at matchmaking. There were more pressing matters to worry over. Taking his arm, she gestured to Anna to follow them. “Home, if you would be so good, Mr. Harlowe. I have some correspondence to catch up on.”
Whether he approved or not, Mr. Page needed to know what she had learned. And she, in turn, wanted to know what he could discover about Sir Charles Wyatt’s will.
CHAPTER 14
Lily paused at the top of the stairs. Surely she had misheard—but no, there it was again. The murmur of masculine voices was coming from the drawing room. She frowned to herself. If someone had called for her, surely Carstairs would have notified her. But who would her father, curmudgeon that he was, be willing to receive?
A sudden suspicion arose in her mind; there was one man her father would never turn away. Her steps were more forceful as she stalked down the staircase and showed herself into the drawing room.
Her father and Frank Wyatt glanced up from their card game, then both stood politely as she entered.
“Lily,” Mr. Pierce said, raising his eyebrows at her gown, a floaty confection of gold-and-bronze silk.
The dress had been a gift from her mother-in-law, Lady Adler, in the hope of encouraging Lily to leave her mourning behind when she returned to London. “So that you have something beautiful to wear when you are ready for colors again, my dear,” she had said, wiping her eyes.
Mr. Pierce regarded it with clear disapproval. “I thought you were going out,” he said, his mouth drawing into a tight line.
“Captain Hartley will be calling for me at eight,” she said. “Good evening, Frank.”
“Lily.” He bowed. “I understood from your father that you were not at home, or I should have paid my respects more speedily.”
“My door is open to you, of course,” Lily said quietly, taking a seat on the settee near them. “What brings you to c
all on us this evening?”
Frank scrubbed a hand through his hair. He wasn’t dressed for a formal evening call, she realized; he still wore his daytime clothes and looked slightly disheveled. “Mr. Pierce was named one of the trustees of my father’s will, as our solicitor informed us this afternoon. And I needed his advice.”
“Come deal for us, Lily,” Mr. Pierce said abruptly, tossing down his cards. “I should prefer vingt-et-un, and that’s no good with just two people.”
Lily’s heart sped up. Normally she would have resented her father’s imperious tone, especially after he had gone to such lengths to ignore her during the rest of the day. And especially when he was in Frank’s company, which he always made clear was preferable to her own. But they had mentioned Sir Charles’s will.
She rose without complaint and took her seat opposite them at the card table. “Are we playing for stakes?”
Frank shook his head. “I already told your father I’ll not take his money, and I’ll not take yours either.”
“Then I shall deal only, if you do not mind.” She accepted the newly shuffled deck of cards from her father and laid two before each of them. There was a pause while they both considered their cards.
“Carte,” Mr. Pierce said tersely, and Lily dealt him a third card. He considered it, frowning, then nodded. “Je m’y tiens.”
“I shall venture a guess, Frank,” Lily said as she turned to him, her voice gentle. “I think my father had an easy time convincing you to stay with us this evening.”
His smile was sad as he shrugged. “Home doesn’t have much appeal right now,” he admitted. “Sitting there in the evening is … There are too many memories. And there is no one there I wish to share them with.” He peeked at his cards again. “Carte.”
Lily dealt him a third. “By that do you mean Lady Wyatt or your brother?”
Frank gave her a look of surprise. “So you know about Arthur, then?” He shook his head. “Carte.”
Lily raised her eyebrows. “Really?”
Frank nodded.
Lily dealt him a fourth. “The real question is, why did I not know about him before?”
“No one did. Except your father.” Frank bowed in Mr. Pierce’s direction, an impressive feat while they were seated. “Which is why he was named one of the trustees. He and I are jointly to oversee Arthur’s portion of the inheritance to ensure that he is cared for.” He looked at the card and made a face. “Ah, bust.” He tossed his hand over. A ten, a two, a three, and a nine.
Mr. Pierce chuckled. “Always so bold, my boy. That is not a bad thing. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” He turned his own cards over, revealing a pair of fours and an eight.
“Though caution sometimes serves us well too,” Lily said dryly, collecting the cards and shuffling them. “Or at least logic. Encore?”
“Encore,” her father agreed.
“I was going to lose either way,” Frank pointed out, a little petulantly.
Lily dealt two cards to each of them. “I will guess that it is Lady Wyatt you wish to avoid.”
Frank made a frustrated noise in the back of his throat. “She is … difficult to spend time with. She didn’t even approve of my coming over tonight. But I wanted to speak to you, sir. Je m’y tiens.”
Lily turned to her father, who was frowning in thought at his cards. “Carte,” he said at last. Examining the one she dealt, he nodded. “Je m’y tiens.”
They turned their cards over to discover that Mr. Pierce had won again, eighteen points to Frank’s sixteen.
“Where’s my bold young friend?” Mr. Pierce asked, giving Frank an encouraging smile. “Come, my boy, this will never do. Encore.”
“Your friend is having trouble concentrating tonight, I am sad to say,” Frank said. “I also wanted to ask your advice, Lily, on handling the fellow from Bow Street. You said you had dealings with them before?”
“What is this?” Mr. Pierce frowned, ignoring the cards as Lily dealt once more. “What does that mean, you had dealings with Bow Street?”
Lily sighed. “Lord and Lady Walter had some trouble this spring,” she said, trying to skirt around the issue. “I was there at the time.”
“What made them leave your friends alone?” Frank asked, leaning forward. “All the poking about, all the questions—I cannot abide it.”
“Nor should you,” Mr. Pierce grumbled. “They should be out finding the burglar who did it, not pestering a gentleman’s family. Can you not pay them to go away?”
“You’re one of the trustees, Father,” Lily said lightly. “How stands Sir Charles’s property? Can Frank afford to pay them that much?”
Mr. Pierce scowled. “I’ve not seen the will yet, Miss Impertinence. But it should not matter. They ought to leave our boy here alone.”
Lily bit her cheek, holding back the impulse to protest that Frank was not her father’s boy. “Does this mean you are both satisfied with your cards?”
They fell silent for the third round. Mr. Pierce excused himself after that, presumably to visit the water closet, saying that he would return in a moment. Lily and Frank were left alone.
Lily was busy shuffling the cards when she noticed Frank watching her intently. “What is it?”
“I am still waiting for an answer,” he said, his eyes heavy lidded. “How did the Walters manage it?”
Lily debated what she should say in response. In reality, Lord Walter had very nearly made the whole matter go away by paying an enormous bribe to a magistrate. It was only because of Lily’s own interference that the investigation hadn’t been abandoned completely. But she didn’t want Frank knowing that she had been so intimately involved. It would make it much harder to continue snooping around if he and his family were on their guard against her.
“They found the person responsible,” she said at last.
Frank still didn’t take his eyes away from her, and the directness of his gaze was becoming unnerving. A prickling feeling began to creep up her spine. “What is it?” she asked.
Frank’s voice was soft as he leaned forward over the card table. “Why did you really look in the chimney?”
Lily’s stomach dropped, as if she’d tried to climb a staircase in the dark and suddenly found that the step wasn’t where she’d expected it to be. “Captain Hartley told you already. I thought there was a bat.”
Frank shook his head slowly. “Liar.”
Lily felt heat rising in her cheeks and hoped the blush looked like anger instead of embarrassment. “Believe what you like.”
“I’ll play you for the truth.”
Lily lifted her chin. “And if I win instead?”
He considered this. “Then I will answer a question for you.” He grinned suddenly, the first expression of genuine enjoyment she had seen on his face since she’d come into the drawing room. “Or I could kiss you. I’ve been suggesting it for years, as you may remember.”
“You suggested it years ago,” Lily said dryly. “And you weren’t any more serious when we were children than you are now.”
“Does that mean you won’t play?”
“I’ll play for a question. Put the cards in a stack.”
The stack went on the table between them.
“You may draw first,” Frank said, his eyes still fixed on her.
Lily did, and they alternated until each had two cards. Lily took only a single look at hers before laying them back down on the table. “Carte,” she said quietly, drawing another from the pile. She took a swift look at it before laying it on the table. “Je m’y tiens.”
Frank played more slowly, giving the appearance of more caution as he studied her face, then looked at his cards for a second and third time. “Carte,” he said at last, then examined his new hand. “Carte.” Lily held her breath. Frank grinned at her. “Shall I be bold? Carte.”
His grin faded as he glanced at the fifth. For a moment he looked genuinely angry, and Lily drew back. She had seen him sour when he didn’t get his way, but she had nev
er seen him truly angry before. The ugly twist to his mouth was almost shocking. Then the expression faded as he laughed ruefully, petulant and nothing more. “Bust.” He turned the cards over. A five, a two, a two, a three, and a queen.
“So close,” Lily said, her smile a little taunting, though she still felt shaken. “Vingt-deux, as it were.”
Frank shrugged, still looking put out. “What did you have?”
Instead of showing her cards, Lily slid them back into the pile. “I win either way, do I not? Since you overshot.”
He sighed. “What is your question, then?”
She tilted her head to the side as she gathered the cards and shuffled them once more. “I believe I shall save it. By the way, you should be kinder to Lady Wyatt.”
“She should be more considerate of our Frank,” Mr. Pierce said, his cane thumping as he strode back into the room.
“You needn’t encourage his rudeness, Father,” Lily said, exasperated as she dealt again.
His shoulders stiffened. “I am sure Frank displays no such quality.”
“No.” Frank sighed, all signs of petulance gone as soon as Mr. Pierce rejoined them. “I am afraid she is quite right. Lady Wyatt and I do not … Well, we seem to have gotten off to a bad start and never recovered. I cannot feel easy around her.”
“And why should you?” Mr. Pierce insisted. “Your father had no need to go marrying again. It is unaccountable. After all, it is not as if you needed a mother.”
“No, she is not my mother,” Frank said, with surprising force. He immediately looked embarrassed, clearing his throat loudly and fixing his attention on his cards.
But Mr. Pierce, instead of looking disapproving at the burst of emotion, just shook his head sympathetically. “Unaccountable,” he repeated.
“Perhaps he married to please himself and not his son?” Lily said dryly. “Some people do enjoy the companionship of others.”
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