Page 127 of Lord Hartwell’s Refuge

She knew Mr. Salmond well enough now that when Roman said at dinner one night, “Salmond has had another idea,” she replied, “Should I be alarmed?”

“Probably.”

She’d raised an eyebrow. “Is it practical this time?”

His slight smile grew. “Certainly not.”

“Then consider me alarmed.”

Roman smiled into his wine.

Sometimes he explained what had been discussed at a meeting and Tamsin understood perfectly. Sometimes she asked questions that made him stop halfway through an answer and stare at her before saying, “I had not considered that.”

She liked those occasions.

There were others when he spoke for several minutes about some scientific or antiquarian matter before pausing to study her expression. “You have no idea what I am talking about.”

“Not the faintest idea, no.”

Roman blinked.

Tamsin waited for the old impulse to appear: the one that insisted she ought to understand, ought to be useful, ought to find some intelligent observation that would justify the time he had spent speaking to her. If it did, she let it pass. “I was hoping it would become clearer if I allowed you to continue.”

“And did it?”

Honesty slipped out before control took a hold. “Not really, no.”

His mouth twitched. “Would you like me to begin again?”

“Not particularly.”

He laughed, and Tamsin smiled because it was an honest reaction from both of them.

There were evenings when they spoke about nothing of consequence whatsoever. There were mornings when Roman left before she had finished breakfast and afternoons when Tamsin went out without him. There were dinners with friends and calls upon acquaintances and letters from her family that Tamsin no longer opened with the immediate conviction that whatever problem lay inside would shortly become hers to solve.

Sometimes there was no problem at all. That remained surprising.

When there was one, Tamsin became better at asking herself a question she had never thought to ask before. Is this mine to hold? Do I wish to fix it?

Sometimes the answer was yes. Increasingly, it was no. She discovered the world did not end when she allowed it to remain so.

Roman never congratulated her for this, but he seemed to understand, and it might have gone on in that way indefinitely.

Then her husband came home one afternoon the last week of January, and he stopped in the entryway after handing his gloves off to the footman.

Tamsin had been on her way to the front sitting room when the door had opened, and she paused. There was nothing dramatic in his expression—that was what made her stop.

Months ago, she might not have recognized it. She would have seen only Lord Hartwell arriving home with his mouth set rather more firmly than usual and his shoulders held very straight. Now she knew him. “What has happened?”

For one instant, she saw the answer he might once have given: Nothing. Or, not a matter that concerns you. Or perhaps merely, I will tell you later. Instead, his gaze shifted briefly toward the footman, who had taken his hat, then back to Tamsin.

“Walmgate Barbican is the next to face the vote.”

Her heart sank. “Oh.”

Roman pulled off his remaining glove. “They mean to widen the approach. There is talk of removing the entirety of the barbican, just like the others. Possibly more.”

Tamsin remembered the battle with the Corporation. She remembered ink on Roman’s fingers and papers spread across his desk, his certainty, then his hope, then the terrible quiet after the vote. She remembered a man who had lost something and afterward shut his grief away like a shameful secret, behind a locked door.