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She braced herself, then pivoted to face him. It wasn’t his fault that he’d sent her thoughts winging down the darkest road.

“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for introducing me to Botticelli, and Bellini, and the others.” She managed a smile. “I owe you Chelsea buns.”

“I’ll take anything but clover pie.” He was studying her.

She gave a snort. “Not to worry. I wouldn’t feed London clover to a rat.”

He looked as though he wanted to say something else.

“Well,” she said briskly, and started across the room.

It wasn’t until they’d returned to Casa De’Ath that she noticed he’d left off his spectacles and that it didn’t seem to affect his ability to see at all.

—

That evening, Nina discovered that Monsieur Rouget didn’t stock the kitchen with castor sugar.

“Currants?” she asked, with fading hope.

De’Ath’s chef chuckled behind his fan of cards. Dinner preparations over, he’d cleared the table and dealt a game of five-card loo. He and Kessler and McAdams were gambling with oysters from a bucket.

Nina opened another cabinet and a shining wave of utensils clattered to the stone floor.

“Ouf!” cried Monsieur Rouget. “The can opener! You found it!” He squinted at the open cabinet and sighed. “All this time. If I had but known . . .” He turned back to the game.

Nina collected the forks and knives and set about rearranging the cabinet. She brought the can opener to Monsieur Rouget. “Cinnamon?”

Monsieur Rouget pointed the can opener at a shelf. Nina lifted a sauce-crusted apron and uncovered a rotating spice rack. Cinnamon. Cloves. Nutmeg. Rosemary. Fennel. She gave the rack a satisfied spin, hung the apron on a peg, and went on the hunt for cake tins.

Once she’d finished her inventory, she wrote out a shopping list in her notebook. The kitchen wasn’t orderly, but it was clean enough, with the oven well swept and Monsieur Rouget’s bed made up neatly in the corner. The range wanted polish, but she’d been blessed with hardy elbows and planned to blacklead it herself. If De’Ath was willing to buy the ingredients and equipment she required, she could make miracles in this place. Unless Monsieur Rouget resented the incursion.

“Monsieur Rouget.” She approached the table. “You’re quite sure I’m not stepping on your toes?”

McAdams caught her eye. “No onion soup.”

“That’s his specialty,” said Kessler. “Off-limits.”

“And rooster poached in white wine,” said McAdams.

“And rousing tales from the Paris Commune,” said Kessler.

Monsieur Rouget cocked his head and sniffed. “My soup, my poulet au vin blanc, my stories of revolution—wasted on buffoons.”

“He’ll let you bake,” said McAdams. “If you let him talk your head off.”

“It’s a perfect arrangement.” Nina smiled at Monsieur Rouget. “Revolution, you said?”

McAdams and Kessler exchanged a glance and dropped their cards as one.

“Drink?” asked Kessler.

McAdams stood. “I’ll get the glasses.”

While Kessler poured the absinthe, Monsieur Rouget began his tale, a jaunty one, about building a barricade out of carriages requisitioned from the nobility by order of the common man. Nina laughed and sipped from her glass. Kessler and McAdams groaned and finished the bottle.

“There’s more,” said Kessler, as Monsieur Rouget paused his narrative and rose to rummage the shelves. “There’s always more.”

“I’ll hear more tomorrow.” Nina rose too. “When I’m back to bake Chelsea buns.”