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“No one likes a cravat, trust me. Cravats look great, but—”

“Feel like a noose.”

Noel blinked. “You could say that.” He only hoped the lad never had to make the comparison in real life. He tried to look past James. “Are the ladies ready?”

James rolled his eyes so dramatically it was a shock they didn’t pop out of his head. “They’re ladies. They take forever to be ready.”

The boy had certainly picked up an understanding of some things in his few years. “Then may I come in to wait?”

“If you wish, my lord.” He turned to walk toward the table that sat in the middle of the small room.

“Call me Noel,” he heard himself saying and marveled at his casual tone. He’d never been one to be havey-cavey about following the rules of societal behavior, so this was a first.

“Mother and Sissy said I have to call you ‘my lord.’ ”

“Ah, but you’re the Baron Archer—or you will be one day—so that makes us equals,” Noel said and winked at the boy, something else he never did.

“All right, then,” James said, and tugged at his cravat.

Noel stood gazing around what was apparently the kitchen. At last, he’d advanced to the inner sanctum. It appeared that the only other room was a parlor. Everything was clean and neat as the queen’s drawing room, showing that both Eve and her stepmother did their best with limited resources, where another pair of women might have given up in despair. Still, the fact that there were only two rooms downstairs disturbed him.

He’d gone to the Baron Archer’s town house in Mayfair once in his youth, when the whole Davenant family had been invited to dine there. The place had been three times the size of this at least, and well furnished. It sobered him to see how easy it was for a family to be laid low. At least his own father had made sure no one would dispute Noel’s right to the title.

And what the devil was wrong with Eve’s uncle that he wouldn’t provide for his niece, at the very least? She was certainly the legitimate daughter of his brother.

“I take it that the bedrooms are upstairs?” Noel asked.

“We’ve got two,” James said proudly. “It’s better than in Verdun. We all slept in the same room once Papa’s credit ran out.”

From what Noel understood, there’d been a lot of that going on in the detainee camps.

James’s face fell. “Being as we’re equals and all, I should offer you tea, but we don’t got … don’t have any. Sorry. We ran out this morning. Besides, Mother won’t let me make tea. She thinks I’ll burn myself.” He crossed his arms and frowned. “I’m not a baby, but she thinks I am.”

“I doubt that. She’s just being a mother. Mine is like that, too.”

The lad’s eyes widened. “Does your mother scold you?”

“She does.” Or rather, she used to. Before Father died and left us on the brink of financial ruin, and Natalie died, snuffing out the candle of our joy. Before Mother stopped caring about anything but her grief. “I like it when she scolds me.”

James blinked at him. “Why?”

“Because it shows that she cares.” He strolled through to the sitting room or whatever one called a room holding a misshapen couch and a hard wooden chair with a cheap table. Sprigs of holly lay strewn about the chair as if Eve had been drawing them in different positions. And on the table was a heap of embroidery pieces.

“Are these your sister’s work?” he asked as he looked over a series of beautifully done scenes and designs and even some ribbon embroidery. She was an artist with a needle, no doubt about it.

“Hunting for examples of my needlework again?” asked a female voice lightly from the doorway.

He turned to see Eve standing there with her mother, both practically swallowed up by their worn woolen cloaks. He couldn’t tell from her tone if she was still angry over yesterday’s kiss and his words afterward.

So, he decided to pretend nothing was amiss. “Do you mind if I take some of your work to show my mother, Miss Archer? You may not remember, but she’s interested in embroidery in all its forms.”

“We would be honored, my lord,” her mother said. “Wouldn’t we, Eve?”

“Of course,” she said in a chilly tone, though she looked incredibly vulnerable. He had an insane urge to take her in his arms and ask if she’d spent all night thinking of him the way he’d been thinking of her.

But that wouldn’t be wise.

So, after tucking a couple of her smaller embroidery pieces inside his greatcoat pocket, he stepped up to offer Lady Archer his arm, leaving young James to accompany his sister out the door. Moments later, they were all climbing into his carriage, where hot bricks wrapped in flannel helped keep it warm.