“The worst of it is not that you willfully deceived me, but that you stole funds to indulge your habit.”
He looked up and she was shocked to silence at the sight of his face when he braced his hands on the mattress. “Stole?”
With his hand before his face, she had not been able to see that his eye was swollen almost closed, the skin around it turning vivid hues of purple, black and blue. He had indulged in fisticuffs, as well!
“Goodness, Arthur.” Patience took a step back, the discussion of his gambling completely forgotten. “Your eye!”
Gambling. Drinking. Brawling. Was there no end to his degenerate habits?
“Is blackened, yes,” he said without interest, his tone tinged with impatience. “I might insist that my opponent looks worse, but I am not certain that is the case. Fear not, Patience, I am otherwise uninjured, and sufficiently whole to survive your chastisement.” He frowned, wincing at the pain it caused him and she realized he had other injuries, too.
“Do not mock me, sir!” she fumed. “Do not feign ignorance of what only you could have done. I will not stand by and watch you cast your life aside, to abandon every asset, to surrender every shred of decency simply to play your wretched cards. What will become of our venture now that the funds are gone?”
Arthur rose to his feet in alarm. “What funds are gone?”
“The ones intended for Mr. Fanshawe!” she replied in a heated whisper. “Gone, and doubtless forever.” She gestured to the chamber. “I see no pile of banknotes in your chamber and I doubt you would leave them in your pockets for Taylor to count. The money is gone, spent likely as soon as you put it down on the table in some gambling den…”
“Gone? Are you certain?” he demanded, now looking to be wide awake.
Patience was startled. “Of course, I am certain. It is gone. You took it.”
“I assure you, I did not,” Arthur said crisply. He strode to her room, opened the bookcase and crouched down before it. He lifted out the false book, as if hoping to prove her mistaken, and she knew from his expression when he looked within it that he told her the truth. He stood for a moment, staring at the empty box with a dismay that surely equalled her own, then raised his gaze to her. “You do not make a jest upon me to prove your point?”
Patience folded her arms across her chest as her doubts grew. “No. I would not find such a jest amusing in the least.”
“I cannot imagine that Gellis would even find it,” he mused. “Much less that she would take it.”
“No,” Patience agreed, moving to his side. “Then you did not take it?” She had to be certain.
“No.” Arthur shook his head and replaced the box in the bookcase. They both stared at it for a long moment, then Arthur turned aside, moving past her, and swore with a vigor she had not known he possessed.
“I am sorry, Patience, but I did not take the money. I know you did not take it, but it has vanished nonetheless.” He spared a glance over his shoulder at her and she caught her breath at another view of his eye. “I am sorry to break my promise to you.”
“I am sorry that I blamed you,” she said. “I should have asked you instead of making an accusation and assuming your guilt.”
“Why, Patience? Because I have told you all of the truth?” Arthur shook his head. “No, it was fair that you thought the worst of me.” He grimaced and she urged him back toward his own chamber.
“The eye is not the sum of it, is it?” she asked.
“Not nearly,” he acknowledged.
“How much brandy did you drink?”
“None.” He almost smiled when she looked up at him in surprise. “I do not drink when I play, Patience.” He lifted his shirt away from his chest and she saw the golden stain upon it. “This was a waste of good brandy, for no one enjoyed it.” He grimaced again when he sat down on the bed once more and looked so defeated that her sympathy rose.
She perched on the mattress beside him, placing a hand upon his arm. “Where were you? What happened?”
He spared her a glance. “Am I no longer assumed guilty of every debauchery, then?”
Patience flushed. “I am sorry. You look terrible and you smell like a distillery. You were out all night. What was I to think?”
“Only what you did.” He sighed and frowned, then considered her. “I would tell you of it, if you would listen.”
“I would like to know. Who struck you?”
“The Earl of Fairhaven,” he ceded. “He saw us at Mr. Fanshawe’s and has learned the truth.” Patience caught her breath, for Arthur seemed to view this as very bad tidings. If the earl had told Lady Beckham, she imagined it might be. “He demanded a discussion, considering our choice to be an insult to his family name, and I returned to the club in the hopes of placating him. In truth, he did not wish to talk. No sooner had we retired to a quiet room alone than he assaulted me. He and his companions took me by surprise, and gave me a pummeling. Perhaps he meant to teach me a lesson, or urge me to reconsider.” Arthur shrugged, raising a hand to the back of his head. “I remember feeling my head strike something and I fell, then he cast the contents of a glass of brandy over me.”
“Arthur!” Patience whispered, horrified that he should have been so abused. She found herself feeling the back of his head with gentle fingertips and located a small bump.
