“Is there a reason you’re not wearing it?”
“If you’d ever attempted to scale a tree while wearing a gown you wouldn’t need to ask that question.”
“Fair enough. May I presume you’re in your current predicament because you were trying to escape from another rampaging creature?”
“Two animal attacks in such a short period of time would be remarkable even for me. But since you don’t seem keen to go away without some type of explanation, I heard a cat mewling and discovered it stuck fifteen feet from the ground. I couldn’t very well have left the poor thing up here.”
“Don’t you have a footman who could have rescued it?”
“Cats are unpredictable. There was every chance a footman would have startled it and caused it to scoot farther up the tree.”
“You weren’t worried you were going to alarm it?”
A snort escaped her. “Please. I may alarm society members on a frequent basis, but cats understand me. With that said, this kitten and I seem to have suffered a misunderstanding because as soon as I was close enough to snag it, the little darling bolted down the tree, jumping from branch to branch and then scampering out of sight. I think it may still be hiding amidst what’s left of the leaves, but I thought it best to leave it alone for a bit.”
“Or you thought you’d leave it alone because you’re actually stuck up there but are too stubborn to admit it.”
“I never get stuck in trees. But if you must know, I decided to take a few moments to appreciate the soothing sound of the rustling leaves. After the day I had yesterday, and then the troubling notes my mother received today, I was enjoying a moment of unexpected serenity—until you showed up.”
“I’m sure serenity has been rather lacking for you after the incident with the swans.”
“Indeed, but now isn’t an opportune moment to discuss the circumstances of last night. I am, after all, inappropriately attired. With that said, off you go. I’ll need a good ten minutes, and then I’ll join you at the house where we can discuss swans, cats, or better yet, Frank Fitzsimmons. I assume, since no word has reached my ears through the servant grapevine about you in the company of an unconscious member of the criminal persuasion, you were successful getting him away from the Nelson house undetected.”
“You didn’t mention anything about an unconscious member of the criminal persuasion being present last night.”
Adelaide stilled for the briefest of moments, having completely forgotten Gideon had obviously been speaking with someone before he’d called out to her. Who that someone was remained to be seen, but her voice sounded familiar, and...
Mortification was swift when she finally placed the voice with a face, and it took a great deal of effort to resist the urge to scramble higher into the tree because . . . her morning only needed this.
Why Camilla Pierpont had accompanied Gideon was curious to say the least, since it wasn’t as if Adelaide had ever spoken to the lady except to exchange the expected pleasantries. Nevertheless, the fact that the most proper lady in society was currently in the vicinity of the tree she was perched in, while barely clothed, was the icing on a far-too-concerning cake.
“Miss Pierpont,” she finally forced herself to call. “I didn’t realize you were with Gideon.”
“Miss Duveen, good morning,” Camilla called back. “I must beg your pardon for descending on you without notice, but I willingly admit that my unexpected appearance has turned advantageous for me. You see, Gideon, being Gideon, has been less than loquacious about what he was up to last night. I had a feeling you’d have some details about the matter, and it turns out I was right about that.”
“Oh dear,” Adelaide said.
“Indeed,” Camilla agreed. “But before you apologize to Gideon for divulging one of his many secrets, know that I would have eventually gleaned all the particulars from him. I’ll also be much obliged if you could expand a little about this Frank character, who is apparently a criminal.”
“I don’t actually know anything else about him, except that Gideon was forced to render him unconscious when Frank went on the attack,” Adelaide called back, stilling when additional leaves that had been giving her relatively little concealment in the first place began drifting to the ground, probably because she’d shifted on the branch. She glanced down to where Camilla and Gideon were standing, relief flowing freely when she caught sight of the tops of their heads, which meant, at least for the moment, they weren’t looking upward.
“Why did Frank attack him?” Camilla called next.
“I have no idea. Gideon will need to explain that because I’m sure he discovered why Frank tried to assault him when he questioned him at some point last night after getting him well removed from the Nelson dinner party.”
“That’s a discussion that can certainly wait, at least until you’re out of the tree,” Gideon said, which, if Adelaide wasn’t much mistaken, was his way of trying to redirect the conversation.
Unfortunately for him, she wasn’t willing to accommodatehis desire for redirection, not with all the questions she’d been dying to ask him, ones that had left her unable to sleep and had seen her rise from her bed before dawn.
“I think now is the perfect moment to continue this discussion since there’s relatively little chance anyone will overhear us,” she called back.
“You told me not two minutes ago that you wanted me to make myself scarce. Now you want me to launch into a discussion about Frank while you’re still, if I need point out, in a state of questionable attire.”
As arguments went, that was a fairly valid one. However, she wasn’t willing to concede defeat just yet. Thankfully, a perfectly credible response suddenly sprang to mind.
“Satisfying my curiosity may help me recover that state of serenity that went missing the moment you showed up underneath my tree,” she began. “Besides, if you ask me, it’ll be to your benefit to appease Miss Pierpont’s inquisitiveness, at least to a certain extent, because that won’t allow her time to formulate in-depth questions you know you won’t want to answer. I say there’s nothing like the present to placate her curiosity.”
“I don’t see why I need to placate Camilla at all. I did tell her that learning too much about my activities could place her in jeopardy, something I mentioned to you as well.”
