“And who’s that sitting beside her? The scowling fellow.”
Dummersby’s eye twitched nervously. “Professor Gabriel Tarrant from Oxford’s geography department,” he said, andclutched his pipe a little tighter. “He’s Mrs. Sterling’s brother. Don’t approach him, whatever you do.”
“That’sProfessor Tyrant?” The student whispered the name, taking a cautious half step backward. “We know about him even in Stanford.”
Dummersby sniffed with the apparent disdain of a man who himself wasn’t even known in Cambridge, let alone another country. “The woman beside him, who appears to be wearing two different earrings, is his wife, Professor Elodie Tarrant. Try to ignore the way they look at each other—such unseemly behavior in public, even if they are geographers!”
“Hm,” said the student in a carefully neutral tone.
“You probably know the others at the table.”
“They’re Professors Pickering and Lockley, aren’t they? The famous orthi—orithno—birders! I wonder if I could get their autographs.”
Before Dummersby could advise him against such a course of action, the library door swung open with an ominous creak. Silence clamped down on the entire company. Standing tiptoed for a better view, the student saw a man enter. This newcomer did not wear proper tweed but instead was clad in a suit so expensive it looked plain. His hair shone like heavenly gold in the lamplight, as if he were the god Apollo, come for sherry and a chat at the club. He read a book while walking, and when he turned a page, a bejeweled wedding band glinted on his ring finger. At the sight of it the student, despite having a fiancée back home, felt an inexplicable regret.
“Sterling!” the crowd chorused.
Looking up, the man blinked in surprise. “Goodness, is it that time of night already? Uh, nice to see you all again, I suppose!”
This was spoken with a good cheer that only barely concealed his obvious dislike, but the majority of the crowd did not seem to realize. They shuffled forward in the hopes of shaking the hand of the fellow who’d done what each of them secretly dreamed for themselves: leaving academia to become a full-time novelist. But before any could manage it, he slammed shut his book, staring across the room.
Silence clamped down again. As one, every head in the crowd turned.
The woman at the table stared back at Mr. Sterling, her eyes darker than the night outside.
“Oh dear, here we go again,” Dummersby muttered, and puffed his pipe disconcertedly.
—
Amelia watched withtrepidation as Caleb approached her. He was grinning…Indeed, his entire walk was like a grin, and the lamplight seemed to glitter around him out of sheer delight for his existence. She began to flutter internally.
“Close your eyes, Gabriel,” she murmured from the corner of her mouth.
“What?” Her brother looked at her with a bemused frown. “Why?”
There was no opportunity for Amelia to provide a further warning, however. Caleb arrived, and without even so much as a glance at the others around the table, let alone a polite greeting, he cupped Amelia’s chin in one hand. Tilting her face up, he afforded her one hot, electric second to prepare before he bent and kissed her.
“Ahem.”Gabriel cleared his throat disapprovingly. Everyone else at the table chuckled, and Amelia thought she heard acharmed“Aww”that was no doubt from Elodie, who tended to see romanticism in a mere handshake and could be relied upon to melt dreamily when anyone in her vicinity actually kissed. Which was of course a rare occurrence, since this was England, where the general consensus was that expressions of marital affection ought to take place in private. With the curtains closed. And the doors locked for good measure.
Caleb seemed to be on a one-man crusade to overturn that.
Thankfully, he released Amelia before she (and Mr. Dummersby as well) needed to be checked by a cardiologist. “Hello, wife,” he said, and Amelia blushed as if he’d not taken every opportunity to say that in the past three months since their wedding. Then he tossed himself into the empty chair beside her and grinned at the others present. “Hello, you lot.”
“Hello,” they replied (except for Gabriel, who said a proper “Good evening”).
“Sorry I’m late, I was chatting to my publisher upstairs in the Shakespeare Lounge.”
“Is that it?” Beth asked excitedly, indicating the book Caleb had placed on the table. “A Regal Love?”
Caleb patted the plain white cover with the kind of wry fondness that comes from having spent months in a complicated relationship with some eighty thousand words. “Yes. Well, it’s an early copy that I’m editing. Turns out I’m unconsciously obsessed with the wordrealize; and you’d think King Edward the First had a nervous tic, considering how often I describe him blinking.” He gave Beth a warm smile. “It’s nice to see you, sweetheart. Congratulations on being awarded High Flyer for your presentation on the giant carnivorous moa.”
“Thank you,” Beth said demurely, although she became luminous with his kindness. “Devon did most of the work, though.”
Her husband scoffed genially. “I just held your parasol—”
“And used it to beat off the smugglers who were trying to capture the moa,” Beth added, with a chiding look in which Amelia could practically see lovehearts. It made her feel like crying happy tears that her cousin Devon was so adored.
Then again, she cried happy tears at breakfast this morning when her first spoonful of porridge was the perfect temperature. And she cried them yesterday too, upon seeing a child skipping on the steps of the British Museum.
