Reluctantly ushering her off his lap, Jacob went to the stairs and called:
‘Smith, are you up?’ Alex had been on night surveillance of a cheating servant.
There came a grumpy ‘I am now’ and Alex appeared at the top of the stairs in his dressing gown. Golden haired and with the physique of a Greek god, he was a most useful employee to charm the ladies– and the gentlemen who wished to emulate his social allure. He stomped down the stairs, yawning, hair going every which way, jaw showing his pale stubble. ‘Morning, Dora.’
‘I believe you will find it is afternoon,’ she said pertly as he dropped a brotherly kiss on her cheek.
‘Pedant.’ He collapsed into the visitor chair.
‘Slugabed.’ The usual exchange of gentle ribbing over, Dora fetched him a mug of tea and a bread roll from their larder. ‘We’re going out and leaving you in charge.’
‘Thank you.’ He raised the cup to her. ‘Did I hear voices earlier?’
‘New client,’ said Jacob. ‘Henry Austen. Do you know him?’
Alex’s eyes lit up in recognition. ‘Military chap before going into banking?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘If I recall correctly, he was paymaster for the Oxfordshire Militia and made the right connections there for his new profession.’
‘Then he never served abroad,’ noted Jacob adding that to the client file. ‘He’s probably not been to France or the Peninsula.’
‘He got as far as Ireland, but I don’t think he saw action,’ agreed Alex.
‘It always amazes how you upper class types gossip about each other!’ said Dora.
‘There are fewer of us than there are of your lot,’ said Alex with a smile.
She pretended outrage. ‘Who am I? The common as muck type?’
‘You said it, not me. Besides, the Austens are a respectable family from Hampshire with relatives in town. Of course we all know them! I’d say they are fairly unremarkable apart from the two sons rising in the navy– oh, and one was adopted by a noble family, lucky beggar.’
Jacob added the details to the notes. ‘I’d heard of Edward’s good fortune, but it’s Frank Austen I know best. He’s the captain who pulled me out of the water at Corunna. I think I bled all over him, but to be honest my memory of the retreat is hazy.’ That night in 1809 had been a turning point in Jacob’s military service, leaving him with a scar that ran from chest to hip.
‘Indeed? I’ve not met him. He sounds a fine man. He isn’t out and about in society like his banker brother, Henry, and his wife.’
‘Could that be because Frank is too busy defending the realm?’ said Jacob laconically.
‘You might have a point.’ Alex grinned and took his empty plate to the little larder for Kir to wash later when the lad came to do his office-boy tasks, and then he tucked in his shirt, evidently thinking the day should get started for him. ‘Aside from Frank and the younger one– what’s his name? I forget. Charles or something of that sort– the most interesting person in the Austen clan is undoubtedly a woman.’
‘One of Henry’s sisters?’ asked Dora.
‘Not them. They are your usual boring spinsters, living with their mother in some village, entirely forgettable.’ He went to the map of England they had pinned up on the wall and examined Hampshire, which lay to the south-west of London. ‘Near Winchester, if I recall the details. Edward Austen, the lucky one, has a property that way.’
Dora scowled. ‘Alex, you shouldn’t talk like that about us spinsters.’
He turned to her with a mischievous grin. ‘You, my dear Dora, hardly qualify for that title.’
‘I mean,’ said Dora, approaching to clip him around the ear lightly, ‘that single women should not be dismissed just because we are unable to have careers in the navy or army. Or because we don’t get adopted to inherit estates.’
‘Who do you have in mind?’ Jacob asked before Alex wound up Dora any further. He’d doubtless made his comments about spinsters to elicit that exact reaction from her. Alex took his role as her adopted brother seriously. Siblings had to torment each other, then turn on the rest of the world when they were threatened.
‘He’s going to be talking about the exotic widow, of course,’ said Dora with a grimace.
Alex folded his arms and leaned against the sideboard under the map. ‘Yes, I was talking about Henry’s wife, Eliza. She’s a cousin of the Austens, her mother being the sister of their late father.’ He wrinkled his nose. ‘I don’t hold with cousin marriage, but families like Henry’s seem not to have a problem with it. Eliza is wonderfully spirited, despite the hard knocks life has dealt her.’
‘What hard knocks?’ asked Dora dubiously.
