“I fear I have already inadvertently taken advantage of your hospitality here at The Grand Palace on the Thames, and I cannot thank you enough for what you have done for me. And if you’ll forgive my unfortunate choice of words, I would do murder for a whiskey, if your hospitality extends to such.”
This was met with a brief and fascinated silence.
Then swift smiles.
Perhaps because he had the kind of accent that, like rare orchids and fine liquor, could only be a product of cultivation and good breeding. Impossible to fake.
“Well, whiskey, and possibly a mirror, since your fixed stares suggest my appearance inspires some horror, or at the very least astonishment. Or were you all still under the impression that I was Mr. Bellingham?”
“You could do with a shave,” the egg-shaped man critiqued. “I’ll lend you my soap and brush and razor,” he added kindly. “Mrs. Gallagher told us who you are.”
“Thank you, sir. You’re a true gent. I suspect you’re the man with the case of remedies. Mr. Delacorte.”
“I am he,” Mr. Delacorte said proudly, and bowed. “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Hawkes. I import ’em from India and the Orient. Pills and teas and powders and ground-up animal bits and bobs. Sell them up and down the coast to surgeons and apothecaries. Most of ’em work a treat and some of the others are good if you like a hallucination or two, which, mind you, I don’t, but I won’t judge. Anything you need next time you’re stabbed, or shot, or aching of head or limp of—”
“Thankyou, Mr. Delacorte,” interjected the dark-haired woman swiftly.
“A pleasure, Mr. Delacorte,” Hawkes said. “I do hope I can someday repay your generosity. And may Inever have need of that last remedy you mentioned,” he said smoothly.
A lot of little smiles were swiftly suppressed here, which boded well, given that he was likely going to stay for a while and that was the sort of thing he often said.
“Perhaps you’ve a footman who would be willing to run out and fetch a few things for me from my previous location?” he suggested to Mrs. Durand and Mrs. Hardy.
This suggestion was met with a puzzling, awkward, and decidedly glum little silence. He let it lie for now.
“Bolt sewed you up,” Mr. Delacorte, who had likely been a champion silence breaker his entire life, said. He gestured with his thumb to Bolt, who bowed in turn.
“My thanks, sir,” Hawkes said humbly to Lucien. “You must be the viscount. I haven’t had a chance to inspect your handiwork, but given that my insides remain inside and the bleeding has...”
It just wasn’t done. A gentleman didn’t discuss gore in front of ladies. Regardless of whether they were the ones who’d cleaned his blood from the marble foyer. He wasn’t going to do it.
Bolt said easily, “I should thankyoufor the opportunity to practice that skill. I considered stitching ‘bless our home’ on you, but ran out of room.”
Hawkes laughed.
And this was how they knew they spoke a common language, that of manly men being men, and pretending that nothing ever hurt and that stitching up a human was child’s play and so forth.
The rest of the introductions followed apace, accompanied by bowing and curtsying. His guesses about who everyone might be proved correct. And the maid was named Dot.
“You’re the screamer,” he guessed.
“Yes, sir,” she said shyly.
“Impressive. I’ll never forget that sound,” he told her sincerely. “You ought to lead cavalries. We could save the money we’d normally spend on trumpets.”
She flushed scarlet in pleasure. “Thank you,” she whispered.
“I do have a burning question. Is Mr. Bellingham real, or is he a figment of Mrs. Gallagher’s imagination?”
He said it specifically because he knew it would either make Mrs. Gallagher smile or get her lovely eyes to crackle and either of those things would be as bracing as that cup of coffee.
She met his swift sidelong glance with a wry sidelong glance of her own.
Her hands were folded together protectively in her lap, and he realized she had kept them folded for much of their conversation, earlier, too. As if she wanted to occupy as little space as possible.
Suspicion shivved him.
As if she were perpetually braced to bolt if necessary.
