Of course, they were really Jem’s cuffs, as he had borrowed this shirt from his brother.
The thought cheered him at once.
Henry leaned back in his chair and regarded the fruits of his labor. Jem’s shirt: ruined. His desk: in need of repainting. His hands: speckled as a quail egg.
All for two meager words. That wouldn’t do.
He wiped the pen and put it away, the habit of order too strong for him to dismiss even as his mind stumbled around for a solution. He couldn’t ask Jem or Emily to write out his reply. They’d be so delighted for him, they’d be buying a special license by morning. And Caro had asked him to keep her letter a secret.
Then he had an idea.
He could answer this letter with a little help from the right person. From someone who held Caro’s full confidence and whom he thought he could trust with his.
He stood, smoothed his clothing, and rang for Sowerberry.
“Could you please,” he asked the butler, “ask Lady Tallant to summon Mrs. Whittier for a call tomorrow?”
Five
Frances sucked in her breath, hard, against the tight lacing of her stays. “This is completely ridiculous,” she gasped. “I can wear one of my own gowns.”
“No, that is completely ridiculous, because this gown will be perfect,” Caroline said as she and her lady’s maid gave the laces another determined yank. “There, that should do it. Goodness, Frannie, you’ve got a sweet little waist. It’s got to be some sort of crime against good society for you to wear plain clothing.”
Frances passed her hand down the smooth sweep of the stays. “The only crime is the one you just committed, suffocating your own cousin.”
“If you’d truly been suffocated, you wouldn’t be able to talk such rubbish,” Caroline said, picking up the bronze-green silk from Frances’s bed. “Besides, it’s not like this is a court dress. It’s simply more elegant than your usual.” She held it up to Frances’s chin. “Millie, I told you the color would be ravishing on her.”
“Yes, mum,” the maid agreed, and began helping Frances into the garment.
“I’ve no idea why Emily summoned you, but it must be important,” Caroline mused, sinking into a chair next to Frances’s bed. “Perhaps she needs your help recalling something.”
“Lord Tallant always wears black,” Frances replied in a singsong voice.
Caroline grinned, but Frances couldn’t manage another joke. She could barely draw breath, struck as she was by a sudden fear that squeezed her inside her stays.
It was the letter. Lady Tallant knew about the letter Frances had written to Henry, and she disapproved. She intended to warn Frances away, wanting something better than a widow of no family and means—well, not anymore—for her one and only brother-in-law.
In her distraction, she hadn’t noticed that Caroline and Millie had finished their assembly. “I knew it,” Caroline said. “Ravishing.”
“Then it’s a shame I won’t be doing any ravishing today.” Closer to the truth than it ought to have been, since a call at Tallant House was almost a call on Henry.
Maybe she would catch sight of him while she was there. Maybe he would like the way she looked in this borrowed silk.
Maybe she was letting her imagination gallivant around when it ought to tread sedately.
Caroline smirked. “You never know what the day will bring, Frannie. There might be ravishing in it yet. Look how the gown brings out the color in your cheeks. Do you see?”
As Frances knew exactly why the color in her cheeks had suddenly blazed high, she spared herself no more than a glance in the mirror. “All I see is a sow’s ear tucked into a silk purse.”
“You just feel that way because you ate an embarrassing amount of ham for breakfast,” Caroline said. “Now go find out what Emily wants, and tell me everything as soon as you come home.”
After five minutes in Tallant House, Frances was fairly sure Lady Tallant didn’t want anything at all. She had barely greeted Frances, only welcoming her into the morning room and then excusing herself in a hurry.
So, the call wasn’t about the letter to Henry. Probably.
Whatever the mysterious reason, Frances knew how to deal with the whims of the aristocracy. One waited them out. Calmly and as comfortably as possible.
She found a gold velvet chair that looked promising. The bronze-green gown’s heavy skirt rustled as she sat.
Hmm. That was rather a pleasing sound. She stood again, then sat with more force. Shussshh went the dress against the nubby golden upholstery of her chair.
Good advice; she probably ought to shush and behave with dignity. At least she had a pleasant space to mull over her social mystery. Frances loved the morning room in Caroline’s house, and this space was just as sunny. Three of the walls were stenciled, white filigree over buttery yellow, and the wall opposite the door was covered with a lush mural of the goddess Athena soothing the Ithacans and their long-lost warrior king Odysseus to peace with one another.
The old soldier returning home to such unrest and ingratitude. Poor man. Still, he had been able to return home to his family. It was more than many were able to do.
“Thank you for your call,” said a low voice behind Frances.
She had not heard the door open behind her. She would have startled at the sound of the voice had she not been so pleased to hear it.
“Henry-not-Hal.” She turned, a smile tugging at her lips. “How are you?”
He need not even answer; she could see he looked well. More than well. His eyes were crinkled from a grin; his hair was the rich shade of old gold in the coal-smudged daylight filtering through the tall windows. Surprisingly, he wore no coat, and the fine linen of his shirt and silk of his waistcoat lay lightly over the lean planes of his shoulders and chest.
She felt a little warmer within the swaddle of her borrowed gown. She’d been summoned here the day after sending a letter… he wore no coat… they were alone…
She knew the parts of a logical argument: premises, inference, conclusion. Given those premises, there was only one inference she could make… and one way to carry this encounter to its conclusion. He had read the letter; he had liked the letter; he wanted more. More what?
She felt very warm.
“I’m quite well, Frances,” he said, “though I’m also greedy and presumptuous.”
Humor rather than heat? This did not follow the same fluid line as the other premises. She tilted her head. “How delightful?”
“Well, maybe. You see, I have to ask a favor of you.” His grin slipped sideways, rueful and crooked. “I need to write a letter.”
“To me?”
When he stared at her in surprise, she knew she’d blundered somehow. A new heat of embarrassment colored her cheeks. “Of course not to me. Here I sit, so there’s no need for a letter. To whom, then?”
A secret smile brightened his face. “Caro. She sent me a letter last night, and I wish to answer it. The sooner the better, before she forgets about me.”
Frances was suddenly very glad for the punishingly tight lacing of her stays. Their stiffness was the only thing that held her upright. “You got a letter… from Caro?”
He dropped into a chair across from her, then leaned forward conspiratorially. “It came under her seal. Quite a lovely note. I hadn’t realized she cared so much for my friendship.”
“Oh.” Frances’s head seemed stuffed with cotton. “Yes, she’s very kind.” She drew in a breath as deep as her lacing would permit. “But the letter—”