by Archer, Kate
Sir John nodded. “I have the honor.”
“What do you fellows do all day?” Lord Grayson asked. “I presume fencing and shooting are not the thing, else I’d join myself.”
“We conduct research and present our findings,” Sir John said curtly.
Kitty was incensed. Lord Grayson was going out of his way to mock Sir John and there was no doubt that Sir John knew it.
“Have you discovered anything noteworthy, Sir John?” Miss Danworth said pleasantly.
“I am working on a paper that I hope will have some merit,” Sir John said, “though I would not advertise it as such until rigorous testing of my theory has been completed.”
“I am certain it shall have great merit,” Kitty said.
Lord Grayson appeared surprised by the endorsement. “It sounds dreary, though,” he said. “Spending all one’s time in one’s mind. I’d much rather do things, than think about things.”
Sir John looked at Lord Grayson with cold eyes. “Our ability to think deeply is what separates us from the animals. Apes and dogs can do all manner of things.”
Kitty pressed her lips together to hide a smile. Lord Grayson might be able to parry with a sword, but Sir John’s words were sharper than any metal.
Lord Grayson’s hand tightened on his fork. “Do you imply, sir, that I am an—”
“I never imply, Lord Grayson,” Sir John said. “I am very particular in my speech. I did not call you an ape or a dog, I merely pointed out that they can do many things. My apologies if you did not understand me, the fault is always to be laid at the door of the gentleman who has spoken.”
Kitty was delighted with Sir John. His phrasing was certainly meant to mirror Lord Grayson’s comments on Sir John’s dancing—the fault is always to be laid at the gentleman’s door. Sir John had overheard the comment and he would not be browbeat by such a one as Lord Grayson.
She watched with satisfaction as a faint tinge of pink crept across Lord Grayson’s cheeks. It did not, however, stop him from talking.
“Perhaps Sir John will allow Shakespeare’s opinion—things won are done, joy’s soul lies in the doing,” Lord Grayson said, his voice giving away his irritation.
“Miss Dell,” Miss Danworth said hurriedly, “I understand from Lord Grayson that you are exceedingly learned yourself.”
Kitty smiled, just imagining what Lord Grayson had said about that. “I would not claim to be exceedingly learned, Miss Danworth, but I do have a curiosity for the knowledge the world has to offer.”
“You must call on me, then,” Miss Danworth said. “Lord Childress’s library is becoming well known for its interesting volumes—my father has recently acquired the Palaskar collection.”
Kitty took in a breath, as did Sir John. The only person in the conversation who did not appear to understand the significance of the Palaskar collection was Lord Grayson.
Mr. Palaskar, now long-deceased, had traveled the world in search of rare and unique volumes. The gentleman was gifted with languages and it was said he had been fluent in seven of them. He’d spent the majority of his career translating his treasures into English.
“Miss Danworth,” Kitty said, “is it true that for each volume there is a translation?”
“For most,” Miss Danworth said. “Mr. Palaskar’s own works are all bound in red leather and they sit side by side to the original work. We have employed a librarian, a very skilled and multi-fluent gentleman, to organize it all and translate the ones that were missed. I am certain Mr. Crackwilder would be happy to show you about.”
“You are most kind, Miss Danworth,” Kitty said.
“And you too, Sir John,” Miss Danworth said pleasantly. “You are welcome to come and have a look. I am at home on Wednesdays.”
“A rare and important honor, Miss Danworth,” Sir John said gravely.
“Wait a minute,” Lord Grayson broke in. “Crackwilder? Jeremy Crackwilder of the tenth?”
“I believe he was a soldier, Lord Grayson,” Miss Danworth said, “but I would know little further. He walks with a cane, if that identifies him.”
“Of course it must be him,” Lord Grayson said. “He was my lieutenant.”
Kitty found herself frustrated that Lord Grayson would manage to make the conversation about himself. She very much wished to hear more of Palaskar’s library. She was also hard-pressed to imagine Lord Grayson charged with a lieutenant. How on earth had the man located pressed shirts and snowy cravats in a war?
The conversation moved on to speculation over whether Lady Lilith was truly to travel to America. Kitty did not care if Lady Lilith threw herself off a roof, though she worked to pretend interest. Sir John appeared to wish Lady Lilith would throw herself off a roof to be done with the debate. It was only Lord Grayson and Miss Danworth who appeared to find it at all interesting. Kitty purposefully ignored Lord Grayson’s attempt at a penetrating gaze when he’d said, “Sometimes a lady may seem even more distant than America, though she still be in England.”
As she studiously ignored Lord Grayson, Kitty thought with trepidation of calling upon Miss Danworth. The lady had been courteous to extend the invitation, and Kitty would certainly go as she could not miss a visit to Palaskar’s books, but she thought the lady somehow off-putting. Miss Danworth smiled, she was polite, but cool. She was not the sort where one felt an instant friendship spring up. But then again, she did have possession of Palaskar’s books and that must go a long way in her favor.
The discussion over Lady Lilith eventually faded and Miss Danworth engaged in a conversation with Lord Grayson about Kitty did not care what. It left her free to speak to Sir John about her recent encounter with Mr. Lackington and Mrs. Herschel.
“Mrs. Herschel was so kind as to invite me to call on Tuesday,” Kitty said.
“Ah, yes, her weekly salon.”
“Salon?” Kitty said. “Do you mean an intellectual salon?”
“Such as we are, I suppose,” Sir John said. “Those of us who pursue various interests attend. We often have members of the Royal Society come to present findings before they do so to a wider audience more formally.”
Kitty was delighted. She had thought the call to Mrs. Herschel would be quite usual, but not it seemed not usual at all. An intellectual salon!
Though she found herself delighted, she wondered what her mother would make of it. She doubted the baroness would find the idea as invigorating.
Sir John had excused himself from the table and Kitty turned to Mr. Walker to her right. She was well aware that Lord Grayson kept trying to catch her eye, but she would not indulge him in it.
When Sir John returned, he seemed more relaxed than he had been. He spoke on a variety of topics and Kitty wondered how he’d suddenly become so much more voluble. She noticed his eyes had grown darker somehow; she could hardly see where the irises stopped and the pupils began. It struck her as slightly odd, until she speculated that he’d gone off to have a thimble-full of brandy in the library. She must not fault him for not being so naturally outgoing as Lord Grayson. Some gentlemen needed some liquid help in that direction.
Finally, the evening came to an end and Frederick arrived to collect her. She ignored Lord Grayson’s look of outrage when Sir John bowed and said, “Until Tuesday, Miss Dell.”
*
Giles trotted his horse through the empty streets in the direction of Crackwilder’s apartment. He knew his old lieutenant would be awake still, the man never went to bed until at least three and it was just past two.
Though he’d been in the habit of dropping in, he’d not seen Crackwilder in some months. If he’d been more diligent, he’d have already known the fellow had taken employment with Miss Danworth’s father.
What had that Sir John fellow meant by until Tuesday? Were he and Miss Dell to meet somewhere? Were they to meet to view Miss Danworth’s library? But Miss Danworth’s at-home was Wednesday. If not there, then where? What happened on Tuesday?
Perhaps they were to convene at Lacking
ton and Allen. That would suit the two of them. Sir John could wax on about nonsense nobody cared about while pretending to have read every book in the shop.
Sir John was pathetic.
And what of Miss Dell’s brother? Certainly, he could not approve of the milquetoast Sir John.
Ah, there was the building, and a candle still burned in Crackwilder’s window.
Giles dismounted and knocked on the door, preparing himself to face the landlady and her horde of unwashed children.
It was not many minutes before the sounds of a lock turning reached him. Mrs. Radish, pronounced Ra-deesh if one wished to stay in her good books, filled the doorway. Peeking around her rumpled and stained skirts was one of the Radish offspring.
“Go on, Arfur,” she said to the imp, adjusting her nightcap, “go hold the gentleman’s horse until he comes back out again.”
Giles silently made the guess that the boy’s name must be Arthur, which had been mysteriously transformed into Arfur. The unfortunately named Arfur Radish yawned but did as he was bid.
His horse dispensed with, Giles had only to get past the landlady.
“You’ll be wantin’ Mr. Crackwilder, I reckon?” Mrs. Radish said.
“Indeed, Mrs. Ra-deesh,” he said smoothly. He stifled his laughter over the rather foolish question. Who else could he possibly want in her establishment?
“I don’t fancy the hours he keeps and neither does Mr. Ra-deesh,” Mrs. Radish said with asperity. “He walks, you know. Back and forth, back and forth.” She dramatically looked toward the ceiling of the run-down little foyer. “We can hear ’im. Walkin.’ With that cane clack-clack-clacking across the floor.”
Giles waited patiently for Mrs. Radish to conclude her complaint. As it was always the same complaint, he did not feel compelled to answer her. It was his understanding that aside from the clacking of his cane, Crackwilder was an exemplary tenant. It was also his understanding that Crackwilder had thrown a book at the lady’s head the last time she’d mentioned his clack-clack-clacking, leading her to only mention it to her tenant’s visitors.
Seeing that this visitor appeared insufficiently outraged by the cane-walking, Mrs. Radish sniffed and stepped aside to let him in.
He bowed low, as if she were a duchess, well-knowing it was the only thing that could possibly appease the woman.
“Get on with you, then,” she said, mollified. She turned and marched into her own apartment to face her ill-named collection of children.
Giles took the stairs two at a time and found Crackwilder’s door ajar on the upper landing.
He pushed it open and said, “Have you no care for thieves and reprobates? Anybody might just walk in.”
Jeremy Crackwilder was a man somewhere in his early thirties, though a military career and an injury made him appear older and more careworn than his years. He was the son of a tradesman, though had he been dressed in expensively tailored clothes, his manners might have passed muster anywhere. He was as erudite and refined as he was hardened by war.
His rooms were little more than libraries, any pictures having once hung on the walls disposed of to make room for bookshelves. A desk tucked into a corner was piled high with papers.
“You are right,” Crackwilder said, turning from the fireplace. “As anybody has just walked in. And no, I do not usually leave it open, but I heard Arthur whistling outside and saw him holding your horse.”
“You mean, Arfur. Fancy a drink?” Giles said, helping himself to the sideboard. He would not have made himself so free with his friend’s brandy, had he not purchased it himself. After Crackwilder had saved his life at Waterloo, Giles had asked him what he could do to repay his savior. Crackwilder had said, “Keep me in brandy.” And so he had, and then some. Even now, with limited funds, he had not shirked that responsibility. He never would. The world might view him as careless and carefree, but he was reliable to anybody that depended on him. He had even offered Crackwilder a room in his house, when he’d had the funds to pay for a house. His lieutenant had claimed he’d rather hang himself from the highest tree, rather than have to look upon Lord Grayson’s dandified person day after day.
For all his insults, Giles thought his lieutenant was rather fond of him.
Crackwilder nodded to the brandy and limped to the nearest chair. “So? What’s the problem?” he asked.
“Why should there be a problem?” Giles asked, pouring out two glasses.
“You always come here with a problem,” Crackwilder said, taking his glass. “Always late at night, and always with a problem.”
Giles should have had the good grace to blush, but he was too used to his friend’s rather insulting manner. He did not mind it, and in fact thought he might prefer it. He imagined it to be similar to having a brother one has squabbled with since the nursery. He might have the loftiest titles in the world but it was all for naught with Crackwilder.
“You happen to be right,” he said, “though I am not even certain how to explain this particular problem. You see, there is a lady—”
Crackwilder roared with laughter. “I knew it! Some father finally came at you with the dueling pistols! And no, I don’t know how to get you out of it, nor will I be your second. I will say, though, I told you so.”
“Nothing of the sort has happened,” Giles said quickly. “It is just…well, first—I understand you have been employed by Lord Childress to manage a collection of books. Palkar or Palsar or something like it.”
Crackwilder set his drink down and stared at him. “Palaskar. If you are even thinking of making his daughter, Miss Danworth, your latest flirtation, I advise against it. Childress would carve out your heart and eat it as soon as look at you if it did not end with a proposal. Do not ask me to assist in what would be a foolhardy venture concluding in your early demise.”
“I have no interest in Miss Danworth. It is another lady. A lady who is interested in those books and I think she will visit to see them. A Miss Dell.”
“And what does this Miss Dell have to do with me?”
“I don’t know,” Giles said. “I am not sure how to approach the whole thing. You see, she is mad for books. Really quite mad for them. I thought she might put them aside for the season, but now there is this Sir John Kullehamnd who belongs to the Royal Society…”
Giles had trailed off, well aware he was not being particularly coherent. There was little chance that his words could be coherent, as his thoughts were not.
“It just seems improbable that he should be preferred,” he said. “I mean, why does she go on with all the reading? That is what I do not understand.”
Crackwilder picked up a volume from the side table and hurled it at Giles’s head. “Because she likes it, you idiot!”
As this was not the first time his friend had thrown a book in his direction, Giles ducked and it hit the wall behind him, falling to the floor with a thud.
“I suppose you mean to point out that she is not likely to change her interests,” he said.
“Sharp-witted as ever,” Crackwilder said, draining his brandy.
Giles poured him another and said, “I should like to have something to talk to her about, though. She seems keen on comets, perhaps you might summarize what you’ve read about them.”
“I might, and you would not remember a word I said. You are many things, but you are not a scholar. I am acquainted with Sir John and he will run rings round you intellectually. Do not attempt a competition in that area, you will be trounced. My advice is, buy the lady a book.”
Giles sat up straight. “Of course! Why should I torture myself with listening to you drone on about comets when I could just buy her a book?”
“My other advice is, set your sights on a lady who does not so particularly value knowledge.”
“Where would the challenge be in that?”
“This situation is less a challenge and more a drowning man at sea,” Crackwilder said drily.
“If I am drowning, you have thrown me my first rope to gr
ab hold of to keep my head above water,” Giles said. “Let us see if Sir Gloom thinks of buying Miss Dell a book. He will not, I’m sure. A man like that has no originality of thought.”
“And neither did you, until I suggested it.”
*
Kitty had oft noticed that when one wished for time to pass quickly it would insist on passing slowly and when one wished it to slow it felt as if it sped along. A holiday or a treat took forever to arrive, and yet an interminable church service arrived every week with remarkable rapidity.
While she knew time to be a reliable thing and the perception of its changes merely an oddity of the human mind, that did not help Tuesday to come any faster.
The tedium of waiting had been relieved only briefly by a visit from Penny. Lady Cabot had wished to hear her opinion of Sir John. Kitty had, of course, related Lord Grayson’s rude behavior and Sir John’s nimble set down.
As she spoke, it was all for Sir John and against Lord Grayson, which pleased Penny exceedingly. As she spoke, Kitty worked to convince herself of Sir John’s superiority. He was not as dashing as Lord Grayson and had not the lord’s easy manners. Sir John might be just a bit too stern and serious. But what could one expect from a learned mind?
Kitty really felt herself foolish in thinking that it would be wonderful if Sir John were a tad more cheerful. She’d spent months wishing to encounter a gentleman who would discuss serious matters with her and now she had. That her heart did not beat faster at the sight of him was nothing compared to that.
Penny was certain that Sir John was an excellent match. Kitty was determined to be certain of it too.
Finally, Tuesday had come and now she and her mother entered Mrs. Herschel’s residence in Bedford Square. Aside from the other luminaries she might encounter, Sir John would be there. She was determined to like him.
Kitty had prepared her mother with the information she had received from Sir John—this was not to be a usual call, but more an intellectual salon.
The baroness had not been any more intrigued by the idea than Kitty thought she would be. Still, her mother was a naturally cheerful person and accustomed to the intellectual pursuits of her husband and so was confident she would get on well enough.