there is any bent to his mind. He is rather more straightforward than that.”
Marisol communicated her doubt. “If you say so, but in my experience men possess twists and turns of thought that make me dizzy. Do you have my note?”
Emma indicated that she had slipped it under the belt. “I won’t lose it.”
“Promise me that you’ll come back directly.”
Emma knew this was not because Marisol had any concerns for her safety but was desirous of hearing the details of the meeting sooner rather than later. “The rain will encourage me to return quickly.” She went to the door, opened it, then paused on the threshold. When she looked back, Marisol was already moving toward the window. “Marisol?”
“Yes?”
“I won’t do this for you again.” Emma turned away but not before she saw that her cousin had the grace to blush.
Chapter 1
“You have a visitor.”
Restell Gardner made no response to this announcement. He remained as stone in his bed, refusing to surrender to a single twitch that would indicate that he was not deeply asleep.
“It is no good, sir,” Hobbes said as he poured water into the washbasin. “You have warned me of this very trick yourself and begged me not to be fooled by it. So we are at odds, you see, for I am armed with the knowledge of your pretense and must act accordingly, while you will continue to lie abed and favor me with an abrupt snore to put me off. When that does not have the desired effect, you will roll to your other side and compel me to hobble around the bed to address you directly. You will, of course, continue to ignore me, forcing me to take measures that may well relieve me of my employment. You will understand, sir, that such an outcome is hardly in keeping with your promise to treat me fairly.”
At his first opportunity to be heard, Restell offered a weary observation. “Is it your plan, Hobbes, to speak at length on this matter?”
“Yes, sir.”
Restell did not open an eye. “I don’t snore.”
“I can’t say that I know if you do or don’t, Mr. Gardner, only that you’d pretend to.”
“Where did I find you, Sergeant Hobbes?”
“In the mews, sir, just behind the Blue Ruination, drinking bad gin and bemoaning the loss of my leg.”
“I don’t suppose you miss the mews.”
“No, sir. Nor the gin. Still miss my leg, though this peg has its uses right enough.”
Restell rolled onto his back and rubbed his eyes. When his hand fell away, he brought Hobbes into focus. The former regiment man was standing at his bedside—towering, really—with the water pitcher poised at a threatening angle. Restell waved him off. “You didn’t mention water torture. I’m thoroughly awake, thank you very much.”
“My pleasure, sir.”
“I was being sardonic.”
“So was I.”
Grinning, Restell pushed himself upright, stuffed a pillow under the small of his back, and leaned against the bed head. He ran one hand through his pale, sun-bleached helmet of hair, leaving it furrowed and in perfect disarray. “What was the hour when I returned?”
“Gone three. It was a late night for you, sir.”
Restell needed no reminder. It had been an age since he’d trolled the gaming hells. He could not recall that he had ever been made so weary by it. “And the hour now?”
“Not yet eight o’clock.”
“The hell you say. And I have a visitor?” He had to restrain himself from pulling the covers over his head. “God save me, it is not my mother, is it?”
“No, sir. Nor any other of your family.” Hobbes skirted the bed and went to the washbasin, his limp hardly noticeable this morning. “I understand she is female, though.”
“That alone does not account for the hour of her visit. Who is she?”
“She wouldn’t say. Mr. Nelson asked her for her card, but she declined to give one.”
“Curious.”
Hobbes nodded. “I thought the very same.” He set towels to warm at the fireplace, then began whipping lather in a cup for his employer’s morning shave and ablutions. “Do you wish to bathe?”
“Above everything. I reek of the gaming hells.”
Hobbes made no comment about this last, though it was true enough. “I’ll see to it.” He set the lathering cup down and crossed the room to ring for assistance. “Will you break your fast here or in the morning room?”
“Here.” Restell swept back the covers and threw his legs over the side of the bed. He sat there for several moments, head in his hands as though to steady it, then kicked his slippers aside in favor of padding barefoot across the cold floor to the dressing room. “Do you think she’ll wait?” he called to Hobbes.
“I couldn’t say, sir.” He picked up the warm towels and carried them to Restell. “Does it matter?”
“She is an inconvenient female. I should like the opportunity to tell her so.”
“Do you think she doesn’t know? They frequently do, sir.”
“Then they should try harder to resist their nature,” Restell said sourly. “Have you a headache powder, Hobbes? Satan’s minions are doing a gleeful dance inside my skull.”
Hobbes made sympathetic noises. “Right away.”
Restell felt marginally better after he bathed and shaved. He was returned to human form by the time Hobbes tied his stock, brushed his jacket, and the headache powder began to work. Following a leisurely breakfast and perusal of the morning paper, he pronounced himself prepared well enough to receive his visitor in the library.
He had only just begun to seat himself in the wing chair by the fireplace when Nelson announced her. It was all rather awkwardly done—the announcement because Nelson had no name for their visitor, and Restell’s rise from the chair because he unfolded in a manner reminiscent of a jack-in-the-box. Restell noted that the butler quickly exited the room, but not so fast that he missed Nelson’s lips begin to twitch.
There was no reaction from his visitor, at least none that Restell could observe. Her features were obscured by a gauzy veil secured to the brim of a leghorn bonnet. He wondered at the affectation. Clearly she was in high mourning, making it known by choosing black as the single color to drape her slim figure, but the veil was not at all in the usual mode. Did she wear it all the time? he wondered, or had she chosen it purposely for this morning call?
“Have you been offered refreshment?” he asked. Although he had yet to hear her speak, he had it in his mind that she was a woman of no more than middling years. There was no discernible hesitation in her step, and her carriage was correct but not rigid. She was
