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Frederick shook his head. “I vote for Cassio. Quite likely he suggested wording or altered what your father had dictated. What if your father concluded the letter before Cassio had managed to include everything he needed?”

“Some letters are distinctly awkward,” Livie said, sitting up. Feeling a stab of embarrassment, she rose and patted Frederick’s shoulder. “You are not my brother-in-law, and you never will be, but I appreciate your kindness.”

None of her father’s harangues were elegant, but one of the seven missives had struck her as odder than most. For one thing, it was short: only a single page rather than two to three. For another, the dots were clustered toward the bottom of the sheet.

“Listen to this,” she said, picking up that letter. “He bids me farewell and then he adds an addendum: “The dark shore of the heart may engender fornications, murders and thefts.”

“I have the oddest feeling that your father wouldn’t approve of me,” Frederick muttered.

“There are two large dots over ‘dark shore,’ as well as one over ‘May’ and then, spelled out, ‘f-o-u-r-t-h’. My father is not poetic. ‘Dark shore of the heart’ doesn’t sound like him.”

“Mr. Cassio reveals untold poetic depths,” Daisy cried. “Right! He is guilty of bad poetry and treason, both hangable offenses. Is hangable a word? In any case, Frederick can let his father know, and this nightmare will be over.”

“No!” Livie said. “I have to tell my father first.”

Frederick raised an eyebrow. “Having spent the better part of a day reading your father’s tender missives—while remaining woefully sober—I agree with Daisy.”

“I can’t turn over private letters that my father wrote to me to a judge without informing him,” Livie said. “He’d never forgive me.” She didn’t say it, but she was a little afraid that he wouldn’t forgive her anyway.

“The captain likely won’t believe you. You’ll have to bring the letters as evidence,” Daisy said, tactfully avoiding the question of whether her father placed the dots himself.

Livie nodded.

“Lord Devin must accompany you,” Daisy continued. “You’ll never get into the Tower without him, Livie. Besides, his lordship obviously needs to know about the coded letters.”

Livie winced. The idea of Lord Devin reading her father’s letters was embarrassing to her personally—but not as terrible as having one’s father executed for a crime he didn’t commit.

Daisy hopped up. “I’ll write Devin a note.”

After the door closed behind her, Frederick asked, “Do you think that your cousin is alarmingly enthusiastic about carrying on a clandestine correspondence, or is that just my imagination? I’ll admit to having a filthy one that frequently sees tupping where there’s none going on.”

“Tupping?” Livie asked.

“Intercourse,” he said flatly. “You need to know the meaning of that word, whether you marry my brother or not.”

“Not,” Livie said, equally flatly.

After a moment’s silence, Frederick said, “Joshua doesn’t mean to be so rigid.”

“Actually, I think he does,” Livie said. She discovered she was rubbing her chest again and dropped her hand. “Don’t you dare think that I am drawing attention to my chest!”

Frederick gaped at her. “Why would I?” His eyes dropped. “Now that you mention it, it’s a very nice bosom.”

“Your brother did,” she snapped. “I gather that’s what a swindler like me would do. A ladybird bent on seducing him into saving my father’s life through … through nefarious means.”

Frederick sighed. “Would you like to marry me instead?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Oh, good. I felt that the family honor required that proposal but honestly, I’d rather not.”

“I shall find a husband who respects me and doesn’t think I’m a strumpet,” Livie said, struggling to hold back tears.

In the end Frederick hauled her back onto his lap and took up awkward patting once again.

Not, he informed her this time, in a brother-in-law fashion, but like an uncle.

“A very, very sober uncle.”