“Not the way you speak it,” Theresa muttered.
“So if Evelyn—”
“She’s Lady Evil at the moment.”
A more appropriate name for the cat could not have been given. Judith accepted the interruption without even blinking.
“As I was saying. Since I cannot communicate with Lady Evil, I’ll leave it to you to do so when she graces us with her presence.”
Theresa snorted. “This is why the cats never listen to you.”
This was why doing the simplest thing in the Worth household took nine hours and a committee. Judith sighed. “Please hold your tongue, Theresa.”
“I told you, it’s literally impossible to hold one’s tongue.”
Judith ignored this. “I am going to have to leave town extremely early tomorrow morning on business,” she continued. “I shall be gone until very late in the evening. Theresa, Benedict, you’ll have to look after yourselves.”
Her two siblings exchanged glances. Then Theresa burst into a delighted smile that made the hair on the back of Judith’s neck stand up.
“Lovely,” Theresa said. “Why all the fuss and ceremony? Don’t worry about us. We’ll see you when you return.”
Judith persisted. “If there is an emergency, if you need someone, you will go find Daisy, who has kindly volunteered to help. She’ll be at the flower shop until two in the afternoon, and then in her flat across the way. Understood?”
Theresa rolled her eyes. “Yes.”
“A badly made sandwich is not an emergency. A desire to see the circus is not an emergency. It’s not an emergency unless you are in peril of your life.”
“Or a cat’s life,” Theresa put in.
Ducks alive. There was a loophole to end all loopholes.
“Only Squid, Parson, and Caramel,” Judith said. “No other cats.”
Theresa’s eyes rounded in horror. “Not Lady Evil?”
“Definitely not Lady Evil. I’d drown her myself.”
“Oh.” Theresa scrunched up her nose. “You’re teasing me. Lady Evil is your favorite.”
Technically, she was. Judith refused to admit it, not when she could tweak her sister instead.
“You’re mean.” Theresa frowned at her.
“Like a queen,” Judith agreed.
“Eating beans,” Theresa finished.
“Where are you going?” Benedict asked.
No point dissembling there. “I am going to see our uncle William.”
Theresa sat up. “Will you see Camilla?”
Benedict frowned. “For what purpose?”
Judith didn’t look at Daisy. She had never told Daisy of her past before they met. If Daisy knew that her uncle was a viscount, that her father had been an earl, she’d think that Judith had been making fun of her with their game.
“I’m simply seeking out answers to some questions. That’s all.”
“Are you going to bring Camilla back?” Theresa asked.
“She’s always welcome, but—”
“Where will she sleep? In our room? There isn’t room for three in that bed, not if we want Lady Evil and Squid and Parson and Caramel to still be able to stretch out.”
“You are getting ahead of yourself, Tee.”
“But I don’t want to put the cats out of the room.”
“It’s a social call,” Judith said a little more loudly. “Nothing more. Nothing less. And your sister is more important than a bunch of cats.”
Theresa inhaled in horror. “What!?”
“It’s a social call. On a relative.” Who might be embezzling the trusts I so painstakingly earned for you, Judith did not say aloud. “Please stop extrapolating from a single visit to the end of the world.”
“But if the world is coming to an end, I would very much like to make sure that the cats are taken care of. The cats are my responsibility. You always say so. I’m just trying to be responsible. Is that so very wrong?”
There was nothing to do but completely ignore this. Judith gestured. “Daisy will look in on you once she’s finished at the shop. Mind her when she talks to you. Do not use the kitchen stove yourself. Do not try to burn the house down. Do not get into a knife fight—”
“I have never wanted to fight with knives.” Theresa tossed her head scornfully.
Judith, of course, noticed that her sister did not disclaim interest in any of the other items on the list.
“And whatever you do, do not adopt any more cats,” Judith finished. “Four is enough cats. Understand?”
Two had been enough cats. One had been enough cat.
“But what if—”
“There are no buts,” Judith said, “just as there are no more cats. Or fires. Or any of the other things on the list. The only thing I want to hear right now is ‘Yes, Judith.’ If you can’t say that, hold your tongue.”
“Yes, Judith.” Theresa rolled her eyes. “But I still hate that expression. ‘Hold your tongue.’ Have you ever tried to hold your tongue? I have.” She stuck out her tongue. “Look.” She tried to grip it with her fingers. “It’th too thlippewy. Like a fifth.” She frowned. “A fifsth.” She spat out her own fingers. “Like a fish, even. The tongue is an unholdable object. Why does anyone still say that?”
Judith narrowed her eyes. “That was not a simple ‘Yes, Judith.’”
“Wait. You didn’t make Benedict say ‘Yes, Judith.’ So he’s allowed to get in a knife fight? It’s not fair. If he gets to cut people, I want to, too!”
Judith sighed. “Benedict?”
“Yes, Judith,” Benedict said. He had been watching her with a somber expression, without any of his usual liveliness in his eyes. His reply was almost perfunctory. “I’ll do none of those things.”
When it came to Benedict, Judith just hoped he would leave his room.
“Lovely.” Judith stood. “Daisy is going to make sure that you all have something to eat in the evening. I’ll be gone before you wake. Please, for me, try to behave a little. Go for a walk. A sedate walk. Along the river will be nice this time of year, don’t you think?”
Benedict shrugged.
“Lovely,” Judith repeated. “Then… Daisy, thank you for stopping by. I’ll walk you to the door?”
It was an excuse to get her friend alone, and a none-too-transparent one.
“Judith,” Daisy said, turning to her once they were out of eavesdropping distance, “are you in difficulties?”
Judith sighed. “Nothing I can’t manage.”
“Because if you’re going away for a day, I can’t help remember that there was a man who visited. He was too well-dressed, too…too…” She paused. “He really could have been a marquess. Not that I would know anything about them.”
“No,” Judith said. “All your experience is with dukes, as I recall.”
Daisy sighed. “Dukes and scoundrels. All I am trying to say is that if you…that is, if he… If this is not precisely a matter of business, one that will take you to see this supposed long-lost uncle who has not extended a hand to help out in all the years I’ve known you—if it’s something else, if you’ve decided to, um…”
“Um?”
“Sell your virtue,” Daisy said after a mortified pause.
They rarely said a word to each other about their problems, but Judith knew that she worried about Daisy and how many turnips she purchased because she’d had some bad months in the beginning when she’d counted carrots, too. If Daisy was worried about Judith’s virtue, it was probably because she’d had her own tussel with reality on that score. Judith wanted to protect Daisy from the worst that had happened to her; clearly, Daisy felt the same way. She could have hugged her.
There was a reason they so rarely talked of reality. Reality had far too much ugliness in it. In many ways, it would have been easier for Judith if she’d simply lost her virtue. That, one needn’t speak of. Losing one’s father, one’s brother, was another level of impropriety entirely. If Daisy thought that street-walking was beyond words, Judith didn’t wan
t to know what she might think of her father selling his loyalty.
“I am calling on my uncle,” Judith said. “And you’re right, he has done an excellent job of ignoring our branch of the family these last years. I don’t imagine that it will be a particularly pleasant call. Any time money is involved, it rarely is.”
“And the man yesterday? Is he bothering you?”
“An old family friend.” Judith shut her eyes. True, yes. True and so false. “From before we moved here. Our stations are no longer congruent. I believe we horrified him sufficiently.”
“If you say so.” Daisy looked her over. “But, please…” She trailed off.
Judith reached out and took Daisy’s hand. “Of all the things you have to worry about, my virtue should not be on the list. I know how you feel about such things.”
Daisy shifted uncomfortably.
“You’re a good friend,” Judith said. “An excellent friend. Thank you for looking in on the monkeys tomorrow. Are you sure I can’t pay—”
Daisy cut her off with an embarrassed motion. “I wouldn’t think of it. You’ve looked in on my mother too many times.”
Judith nodded. “See you in a few days, then.”
“Of course.” But when Daisy left, she glanced over her shoulder. And Judith remembered everything she was holding back.
Chapter Nine
The Waterloo Bridge station fell away as the train made its way out of London. Across the seat from Christian, Judith looked very—well, not proper. Proper was absolutely not the right word.
She was wearing a demure brown traveling gown. At least he thought it was brown; colors were not his forte.
There was nothing improper about her, not from the top of her head, covered by a wide-brimmed, sober traveling bonnet, to her ankles, which were properly hidden from view by the dark folds of her skirt. A dark cloak hung on a hook and her fingertips were gloved in gray.
But this was the same gown she’d worn to the solicitor’s office. The cuffs had long since lost their crisp, sharp edge; the fabric at the elbows had been maintained carefully, but it had worn just a little thin, showing years of use.
Not that Christian was exactly good at identifying clothing. If there was an opposite of a fashion expert, it was he. His female relations had long since learned that “What do you think of my new bonnet?” was likely to be met with a frown and a response of “How very…brown…and…hatlike it is.”
Which was usually met with shrieks of horror, because invariably¸ brown bonnets were not “brown.” They were some other color that women could magically detect, something like “plum” or “burgundy” or “red.”
Brown. They were basically all brown. There were only three colors, as far as Christian could tell; everything else had just been made up. So Christian knew that if he noticed Judith’s gown, something was truly amiss, and it wasn’t just the fine dusting of cat hair.
This was not a proper gown. A proper gown would have been fitted to her figure, allowing him to see every curve he knew she had. A proper gown would have shown the skin of her neck, the little bones of her wrist.
No, this was a sensible gown. Sensible ladies could be a great many things—respectable, dignified, astute, clever, and realistic. They weren’t inherently improper; in fact, quite the reverse.
But they were never the sort of woman his mother would hold up as a lady to be admired for anything other than her fortitude in handling unfortunate circumstances.
Christian was the unfortunate circumstance at the moment. Judith sat across from him, not looking his way, very carefully reading a newspaper. Even in her sensible gown, even turned away from him, he could hardly make himself look away. She read very methodically, very deliberately. Reading every column in order, without stopping to think or skipping ahead or pausing to converse with him.
When she’d finished the final sheet of the paper, she frowned at it and started once again at the beginning.
Which was not very flattering, as the first sheet of The Morning Post was given to advertisements announcing charity balls and governesses for hire. That was where Christian ranked with her: somewhere below the notice of royal charter for incorporation of the London Company for Fire, Life, and Marine Assurances. Probably below mice, roaches, and other vermin.
This was what sensible ladies did when forced to spend several hours in the company of unfortunate circumstances like former family friends.
“What do you make of the transatlantic cable?” Christian asked.
Out the window, wheat fields gave way to grassy meadows. Waving fresh stalks, hip-high, lined the banks of a slow-moving river. Willow trees along an avenue gave way to an orchard, one of brilliant leaves and tiny, scarcely detectable fruits.
She looked up at him. “I beg your pardon. Which problem?”
“The transatlantic cable that it is being laid,” Christian repeated. “It’s mentioned on page two of the Morning Post, in some considerable detail.”
She blinked. “Likely,” she finally said, “you, as a member of the House of Lords, are more versed in the matters involved than I am.” She looked back at her paper.
“I ask because you seemed to take an interest in the lengthy discussion regarding Foilhammerum Bay. You read the entire three columns about it, after all. Twice.”
Judith sniffed. “I have no interest in Foilhammerum Bay. Or transatlantic cables. I am not certain it will do us much good to be able to send messages at such speeds. Such rapid communication will only give us the opportunity to embroil ourselves in affairs that would otherwise resolve themselves without our intervention.”
She rustled the paper and brought it up again.
“We represent the British Empire,” Christian said, watching her. “Embroiling ourselves in conflicts where we do not belong is our imperial business.”
But she didn’t glare at him. She didn’t even recognize that what he’d said touched on the heart of her family’s treachery. She simply glanced at him over the edge of the paper and raised one eyebrow. “Pushing yourself unwanted into someone’s attention may be your particular specialty, but I cannot think it a national pastime.”
“Why, thank you,” Christian said. “I am particularly good at that. In this case, though, it seemed to me you might have opinions about what you were reading.”
“Oh, might I, please?” She gave him a brilliant smile.
Even though he knew she was being sarcastic, that her expression was manufactured, that smile nearly knocked him backward against the seat with its force.
“Thank you so much, Lord Ashford. I didn’t know it was allowed.”
“You see?” Christian said, smiling in response. “That’s better. Much better. We have an alliance to strengthen and if you don’t talk with me, how can I do my part? Rapid communication. That is the key to your hatred and our mutual antipathy. Why, if we didn’t tell each other how we felt, we might lapse into a mere tepid disregard. We can’t have that.”
She inclined her head. “I see your point. That would be dreadful.”
“So yes, Lady Judith. I give you my full, outright permission to think, to create your own opinions.” He gave her a little sitting bow. “If it’s too difficult to come up with your own, of course, I remind you that I’m a man, and I’m more than happy to share mine.”
She was trying not to smile in truth now.
“It’s one of the things I admire most about English gentlemen,” she said. “They are always willing to provide their opinions to ladies. One hardly even needs to solicit one any longer.”
“Perfect.” Christian nodded soberly. “I was worried that my brilliant good looks and easy manners would make me impossible to hate, thus ruining our fragile alliance. But this will be simple. Just tell me all the subjects you are an expert in, and I shall endeavor to explain them to you.”
Her lips twitched.
“Clockwork. You do still like clockwork, yes?”
She tilted her head to look out the window. “I do.”
br /> “Well, I saw a clockwork horse the other day. Clever thing. It tossed its head back with a little…um, moving motion. That takes some complicated gears and thingummies.”
“Probably a crank spindle,” Judith murmured. “Fitted to—”
He frowned at her. “I’m pretty sure that thingummy is proper terminology,” he said as stuffily as he could. “The clockwork-ologists I know all referred to it as a thingummy.”
She laughed. “You are such a goose. You obviously remember Mr. Mortimer, don’t you?”
Her father’s man of business. He’d been dreadfully stuffy, always lecturing Judith as if she were his concern. Christian had helped her escape from the man a time or twenty, even before he’d thought of her as anything more than an underfoot pest. For a moment, they smiled at one another across the train, as if remembering the time that Christian had replaced all the ink in the man’s desk with acorns.
Then Judith pulled back as if stung.
“Oh, damn,” Christian said. “That was a slip. I’m being remiss in my duties.”
She picked up her newspaper.
“It’s just a little slip,” he said. “We can fix it. Do you know what will fix it? A list.”
“A list?” She looked up. Her nose wrinkled.
“A list!” He nodded vigorously. “Lists fix everything. Watch: here’s a list of reasons you hate me. One, that book you got in trouble for losing when you were eleven? That was me. I did it.”
“What, the Gilbert? The one on heathen mythology?”
“Yes,” he said. “I dropped it in the stream one afternoon. I didn’t want to tell you because the cover said it was for young ladies.”
“And you never told anyone? I was made to stay inside for five days for mislaying it, and you know how I hate staying inside.”
“I know,” Christian said sadly. “Look at my despicable character. Formed at a young age, and my bad habits were never unlearned.”
“Oh, good.” Judith leaned back. “Keep going. This is working.”
“Two,” Christian said. “That was a lie. Sorry. I didn’t lose the book. I had nothing to do with it. I just told you that I had so you would hate me more. Look at me; I’m a hardened teller of falsehoods. You can’t trust a thing I say.”