know you do not want to hear it. But I cannot help but speak,’ she said. ‘I love you, Adrian Longesley.’
He swallowed. Then he said, ‘Thank you.’ And then he left her, tapping his way to the steps of his door.
Thank you.
What an idiotic thing to say to a woman who had just bared her soul to him. But what else could he say to her? The response she wanted was not the one he wished to give her. And anything else seemed inadequate.
‘Hendricks!’ Adrian handed his hat and gloves to the footman and went directly to his room, hearing the secretary fall into step behind him.
‘My lord?’ Hendricks said, the words muffled by what was probably a mouthful of his breakfast.
‘What time is it?’
‘Half past eight. Very early for you, my lord.’ This seemed to be not a reproof, but as an apology for his own lack of preparation.
‘Very early for any coherence, you mean. Well, prepare to be surprised. Not only am I sober, but I have slept, breakfasted and gone for a walk.’
There was a little cough from behind him, as Hendricks inhaled a toast crumb from the shock.
Adrian smiled to himself. ‘I am getting ahead of you today, it seems. Go, finish your breakfast. Or, if you wish, bring it to my room, along with the paper. You are welcome to use the table by the window, if you wish. The breeze this morning is particularly nice. And the view, from what I can gather, is quite pleasant.’
‘Thank you, my lord.’
His valet had preceded him and was waiting in the bedroom to take his coat, making every effort not to appear as flat footed as Hendricks. As it slid from his shoulders, Adrian reached, as he always did, for the miniature in the breast pocket.
His fingers brushed something unexpected. It was a moment before he remembered the bit of card that had been forced on him in the park.
He balled his fist in frustration, then quickly relaxed it so as not to crush the paper. He had not handled that well. He should not have laughed at her attempts to help him, or snapped. It would be all his loss if she left him after one of those outbursts of temper.
Especially when fate had then demonstrated just how small his problems were in comparison to others. Perhaps his lover was wrong and he had reached the end of his usefulness. Perhaps he would spend the rest of his life sitting in the window, listening to the world pass by. But at least he would not be forced to spend it on a corner with a tin cup.
The image in his mind of such a common thing, a future in Paris, or anywhere else, with his lover sprawled close to him on a chaise while they drank wine and read poetry to each other, had been sharp and painful. The idea that there could be any permanence in what they had seemed as unattainable as if she’d told him they would fly to the moon.
As he sat to be shaved, he fingered the card in his hands, tracing the rows of pinpricks with his nail. If he’d simply attempted to read the thing while she was there, she’d have seen how hopeless it was, and she’d have given up bothering him with it.
Or he’d have proved her right. His pride must be a very fragile thing, if he feared success as much as failure. He ran his fingers over the surface of the card, noting that the bumps were set in patches, and the patches in rows. And when he forced himself to move very slowly, he could begin to make out letters.
She was right. It seemed to be in French. He chuckled, as he began to understand the words, wondering if she had attempted them herself. How hard could it have been to read them, if one was able to make out the embossing on the page?
“Love is both blind itself and makes all blind whom it rules,”’ he read aloud, and heard the valet grunt in irritation and give a stern warning of ‘my lord’ against sudden movement while at the mercy of a man with a razor.
Adrian smiled cautiously to prevent injury and thought of the woman who had given him the card. It was very like her to choose these as the first words he had read in months. For a moment, he thought it might be Shakespeare, and nothing more than an ironic choice on her part. But she had been wrong about the contents being poetry. It seemed that the man was not a poet at all, but a Latin scholar, and a blind one as well.
He traced his fingers over the letters again, faster this time, as they grew more fluent with the feel of what he found there. Still not as fast as if he could read. But it felt good to recognise the ideas forming under his hand. The writer had called blindness a divine good, rather than a human ill. The idea made Adrian smirk, causing another groan from his valet. If the Almighty had smitten the Folbrokes in an attempt to make them divine messengers of goodness, then God must be blind as well. Choosing such an unworthy lot did not bespeak much for His taste in servants.
And yet …
‘Hendricks.’
‘Lord Folbroke.’ His secretary, who had settled at the little table by the window, answered in a voice clear of any obstruction.
‘Can you recall—has there ever been a Member of Parliament who was struck blind?’
‘Of course, my lord.’
Adrian leaned forwards hopefully, only to hear, ‘You, my lord. And your father, of course. And grandfather.’
‘No, you ninny. Someone from another family.’
‘None that I know of, my lord. But certainly it is not impossible. There are those that are lame, aren’t there?’
‘And deaf, as well. And probably without sense,’ Adrian added. ‘For how else can we justify the decisions that are made by them?’
‘I can look into it, if you wish. But I suspect that they would have little choice but to make accommodations for … any peer that was so inconvenienced.’
Good old Hendricks. He had been about to say you—and had taken care to stop himself, lest he be guilty of putting words in my lord’s mouth. ‘Please, do. And let me know what you discover. I have another task for you as well. I need to speak with someone in the Horse Guards to see if there is anything to be done about locating the fate of a soldier. I met the man’s mother in the park today …’
‘In the park,’ Hendricks parroted, as though he could not quite believe what he had heard.
‘Just outside of it, actually. Circumstances had reduced her to begging in the street. And I said that I would attempt to help her, if she came to my rooms tomorrow.’
‘A beggar is coming here, my lord?’
‘Yes, Hendricks. A blind beggar. She is the mother of a soldier.’
‘I see, my lord.’
‘And whether the news is good or bad, if some sort of pension could be arranged for her …’
‘Consider it done, my lord.’ Hendricks set down his cup and rose from his chair, ready to
