by C. J. Archer
At first I thought Charity had conspired to help her sister sit near Matt and then I realized that Hope had been next to Cyclops. Charity smiled at him as she sank onto Hope's vacated chair.
"Wasn't it thrilling when that sheriff fellow intruded?" she said quietly. Sitting on Cyclops's other side, I could hear her perfectly. "You were so brave, Mr. Cyclops, and so strong. Just like a pirate."
He swallowed and signaled to Bristow to fill his wine glass.
I bit my lip to stop myself smiling. It felt good to find something to smile about this evening, although I doubted Cyclops would appreciate it. I looked up and caught Matt watching me, one eyebrow raised in question. I slid my eyes sideways to indicate that I smiled at Cyclops's predicament. He must have understood because he smirked too. Both Hope and Lady Abbington noticed our silent communication.
"What did the sheriff want?" Charity asked. "And what did he mean, Cousin Matthew needs his watch?"
"Who knows?" Cyclops said. "Your father's right; he's soft in the head."
I wondered if Matt was enduring similar questions down his end of the table. Hope appeared to carry much of the conversation, distracting Matt from Lady Abbington on his other side. She, however, couldn't keep her gaze off him and eventually managed to steal his attention away from Hope.
But not for long. "Hope, dear," Lady Rycroft said loudly from across the table. "Tell Matthew about Rycroft and how it looks so lovely in the summer. Oh, and tell him how many horses your father keeps in the stables."
The room fell silent.
Hope's eyes fluttered closed and she drew in a deep breath, as if fortifying herself. Then she began to tell Matt how the lake glistened in the sunshine and was perfect for picnics or boating.
"All of it will be Matthew's one day," Lady Rycroft said to Lady Abbington, again, loud enough for everyone to hear. "He's going to cast my poor girls out of their home unless he marries one of them."
"Mama," Hope said on a groan.
Patience dipped her head, but not before I saw her cheeks flush crimson.
"Don't be so dramatic, Beatrice," Miss Glass said with a shake of her head. To Lady Abbington, she added, "My sister-in-law likes to exaggerate. Patience is to be wed soon, and I'm quite sure offers will be made to Charity and Hope shortly too. Particularly Hope. Men seem to like her. And, of course, my nephew insists on marrying for love." The unspoken message that he hadn't fallen in love with his cousins hung in the air.
Lady Rycroft stared at Miss Glass as if she couldn't quite believe her own sister in law had publicly thwarted her. Then she appealed to her husband.
Lord Rycroft attacked his soup with vigor, slurping spoonful after spoonful so he couldn't talk.
"Matthew is quite the romantic," Miss Glass went on, seemingly oblivious to the tension she'd caused. "Where do you stand on the notion of marrying for love, Marianne?"
Lady Abbington seemed caught off guard for a brief moment, but quickly recovered. "I think it a very noble idea, and certainly romantic, but it's not always practical."
"Precisely," Lady Rycroft said. "Love may be well and good for the lower classes, but not us."
"I do think it possible on rare occasions," Lady Abbington went on. "Marrying for love works best where both halves of the union bring something equal to the marriage and no one benefits more than the other. That way neither husband nor wife feels as though they were taken advantage of, and love can run its course."
"Very wise, Marianne," Miss Glass said. "Don't you agree, Matthew?"
"Indeed," he said. "Speaking of marriage, tell us about your fiancé, Patience."
Patience spoke quietly yet enthusiastically about Lord Cox, and even more enthusiastically about his four children. It was clear that she adored them and was relishing becoming an instant mother upon her marriage to their father.
"There," Miss Glass said when she paused, "now that is a love match."
"Because it is equal," Lady Abbington noted. "Congratulations, Patience, you seem to have secured a rare opportunity. I hope your sisters are as fortunate. And you, Miss Steele, Miss Willie?"
"I ain't marrying," Willie declared. "I ain't going to be no man's slave, at his beck and call."
Charity snorted into her wine glass.
"Miss Steele?" Lady Abbington asked. "What do you think about marrying for love?"
"I agree with you," I said. "A happy marriage based on love can only succeed between equals, but not for the reasons you state, in my opinion. When two people are in love, neither will feel as though they were taken advantage of, because both did bring something equal to the union—love."
She conceded this point with a small shrug. Even that was elegantly effortless. "But?"
Matt set down his knife and fork and regarded me intently.
"But there are rarely just two people to consider in a marriage," I went on. "There are obligations, particularly for the party with the least to gain, and the futures of other family members must be taken into account."
"Quite so," Lady Rycroft said with an arched look at her sister-in-law.
I studiously avoided looking at Miss Glass. She would feel that I'd betrayed her. It was Matt, however, who spoke up.
"I disagree, India. One should not consider the opinions of family when it comes to marriage. That way leads to unhappiness for both parties."
"I'm not advocating that people who despise one another should marry," I said. "Not at all. But I do think love cannot last against external forces, not in the long term. It's too much pressure, particularly for the party whose station was raised by an advantageous marriage. She—or he—would feel guilt eventually, and that might poison the love felt in the beginning."
"Well said." Lady Abbington applauded lightly.
"I believe there must be a balance between feeling and obligation," I clarified.
"As do I. Mr. Glass? What do you say?"
Matt studied me with a brief yet intense gaze. Then he picked up his knife and fork. "I say we change the topic."
"I agree." Willie signaled to Bristow to fill her wine glass. "There ain't no such thing as love, anyway. It's something poets made up in the old days to get under ladies' skirts."
"Willimena!" Miss Glass scolded.
The grooves drooping from Lady Rycroft's mouth deepened, and she shook her head. "Close your ears to such crassness, girls."
Both Hope and Charity appeared to be trying not to laugh, but Patience's face flamed. Willie looked as if she would shoot back a retort, but I shook my head at her, and she closed her mouth again with a roll of her eyes.
Lord Rycroft saluted her with his glass. "Never thought I would agree with an American woman who dresses like a man and sounds like she just crawled out of the gutter, but I do."
"Well," Lady Rycroft said with forced cheerfulness. "We'll be traveling soon to Rycroft for the wedding, and I cannot wait to go home. I do miss my friends and neighbors there. So few come to London, nowadays. Have you found that, Marianne?"
Lady Abbington and Lady Rycroft fell into a discussion about the London social scene, leaving Hope to occupy Matt's attention. I was sure Lady Rycroft angled it that way on purpose.
The dinner seemed to last an age and then it felt like another age as we ladies waited in the drawing room for the men to rejoin us. Conversations were stilted, and to make matters worse, Willie had gone with the men. I had no ally. I got up to inspect the clock on the mantel. It ran perfectly on time, but perhaps I ought to check the mechanisms anyway. If nothing else, it was something to do.
The gentlemen and Willie rejoined us then, but only briefly. Miss Glass, who'd been perfectly fine all night, called Matt by his father's name, and begged him to stay home or their father would grow angry.
Charity snickered behind her hand.
"Stop it, Letitia," Lord Rycroft hissed at his sister. "You're making a fool of yourself."
She didn't seem to hear him.
"Come with me, Miss Glass," I said, taking her by the elbow. She leaned heavily o
n me, but she was so frail that I bore her weight easily. I helped her up the stairs then sent for her maid.
When Polly arrived, I went to my own room, not the drawing room. I wouldn't be missed and I found the entire evening so frustrating. My nerves needed to do something calming. I sat at my desk and opened the housing on my watch. It was working perfectly fine but tinkering with it made me feel a little better.
Someone knocked lightly on my door fifteen minutes later. I opened it to Matt, his hair disheveled as if he'd run his hands through it over and over. The whites of his eyes sported tiny red webs and his skin looked pale in the light of his lamp.
"They're gone," he said simply.
"All of them? Already?"
He nodded. "That was a trying evening. I don't blame you for not returning, but prepare for Willie's ire. She thinks you abandoned her."
That made me smile. "You sound as though you didn't enjoy yourself."
He simply tilted his head to the side.
"And it was all for you, too," I said. "You didn't enjoy Lady Abbington's company?"
He lifted one shoulder. "She seems pleasant."
"Lady Rycroft will be happy to hear you describe her as merely pleasant. Her conniving worked."
"I think it was Charity's conniving to sit next to Cyclops that started the evening off on an…interesting note."
"How is he?"
"Recovering with a stiff drink in the drawing room. Want to join us? We were about to talk about Payne, but I thought you should be there."
I didn't want to leave my watch with its innards on my desk so I scooped them up, and the watch too, and followed him downstairs to the drawing room.
"O-ho!" Willie cried, hand on hip. "The prodigal daughter returns."
"Take her with you, next time," Duke begged me. "She grumbled the second you left and didn't let up until all the guests departed."
"How is Miss Glass?" Cyclops asked.
"I left her in Polly's hands. Hopefully a rest will do her good." I glanced at Matt and almost told him that a rest would do him good too, but I refrained. I didn't want to feel the heat of his glare.
"So what do you think Payne meant?" Duke asked as he poured brandy into glasses at the sideboard. "Do you think he knows?"
"Not about magic," I said, spreading the pieces of my watch out on my lap. "He couldn't possibly." I shook my head as Duke offered me a glass.
"I agree," Matt said quietly. "Even if he's spoken to Abercrombie and Hardacre about me, they don't know my watch is magical. No one does, except us."
"And Chronos," Cyclops said. "But Payne won't know about him."
"So he can't possibly know the particulars," I said. "All he does know is what he witnessed that day when you used your watch in the carriage."
"That holding my watch makes my veins turn purple," Matt finished.
"There. It's settled. He was bluffing. It's something you Americans are good at."
"It's all the poker," Willie said with a nod. "Damn it, I wish I had my gun on me when he burst in. I wouldn't have killed him," she protested when we all glared at her. "Just made it so the bullet grazed him."
Duke swirled his brandy around the glass. "And frightened the ladies half to death."
"Maybe it would have sent them away." She sounded as if she were storing up that piece of information for a future dinner party.
I bent into the lamplight and slotted the final spring back into place. "Payne seemed rattled enough without the need for your Colt, Willie." I looked up to see Matt watching me. Or, rather, watching what I was doing.
"He didn't like that Matt spoke to Munro about him," Cyclops said. "He probably wasn't expecting Munro to give Matt the benefit of the doubt."
"Because Payne doesn't know that Daniel Gibbons was Munro's son," Willie said. "Thank God for that."
Matt dug his forefinger and thumb into his eyes. I cleared my throat and his hand dropped away. I screwed the housing shut on the back of my watch and closed my fist around it then arched my brows at him.
He pulled his watch out of his inside pocket and tipped his head back. The watch glowed, pulsing as if it were alive, and purple light flowed along his veins, disappearing into his hair. A moment later, he returned the watch to his pocket and his veins stopped glowing. His gray pallor had been banished, but he still looked tired.
The others must have agreed because they all decided at once that it was time for bed. Duke finished his brandy and Willie bade everyone goodnight. I got up to follow her, but Matt grabbed my hand as I passed.
"Stay," he murmured.
Cyclops narrowed his gaze at me. "Just for a moment," I told both him and Matt. "I'm tired too tired to stay up long."
Cyclops shut the door, leaving Matt and I alone.
"Is everything all right?" I asked.
"I'm not sure." Matt stood and gently took my hand. He opened my fisted fingers to reveal my watch. "Is something wrong with it?"
"No."
He palmed my hand. My breath hitched and his warmth seeped through my skin. Magical warmth, I realized with a start. My magic was responding to the magic his watch injected into his body. "Then why did you pull it apart?" he asked.
"I don't really know. I simply felt like it. Tonight was…frustrating, and working on timepieces soothes me."
"I see."
I studied the watch on my palm. "I think it's the methodical and precise nature of the work. It occupies my mind as well as my hands. Although I know my watch so well now, I could probably do it without thinking." I forced myself to stop rambling. "Was there anything else you wanted to talk to me about?"
His thumb caressed mine, the stroke slow and languid. It was a motion that ought to soothe, but it sent my heart into a frenzy. I still could not look up at his face.
"India, what you said at dinner about marriage—"
I whipped my hand away and placed both behind my back. "Let's not discuss it. We'll just have to agree to disagree on this score."
"For now."
"What does that mean? You can't change my mind, and I can't change yours."
"We'll discuss it later, when the time is more relevant."
"Relevant to what?"
He strode to the door and opened it for me. "Goodnight, India."
"You can't refuse to answer me, Matt. That's not fair. Particularly when you asked me to stay behind."
"You're right. I actually wanted to tell you that I'm sorry how tonight turned out. Next time, with more warning, we'll both have a chance to make our excuses."
I laughed. "If you think your aunt will let you get out of it, you're sorely mistaken. I, however, am irrelevant to her purposes. I might enjoy a night out at the theater with the others instead. Something amusing, perhaps even bawdy. Willie would love that."
I walked off and he followed me, grabbing a lamp off the table. "You would not only abandon me to the ladies but you would take all my allies with you?"
I nodded and headed up the stairs. "That way you can get to know Lady Abbington properly. And Hope too, of course."
He pressed his lips together and remained silent until we arrived at my room. I reached for the doorknob but his hand beat mine. His face drew close. His eyes gleamed in the light from the lamp.
"I wish I knew what you thought about that, India," he murmured, his voice rich and low, "but I find myself at a loss to read your mind for once."
My throat went dry. I tried to swallow but it didn't help. "I'm so glad I'm not entirely predictable and dull," I quipped, hoping he couldn't see the heat in my cheeks and the desire in my eyes.
One side of his mouth kicked up. "You are anything but dull. I find you utterly fascinating."
Oh my. I tried to think of something witty to say but my mind went completely blank.
He opened the door, bringing his face even closer to mine. His breath ruffled my hair. "Goodnight, India."
"Goodnight, Matt. Sleep well."
Dr. Ritter refused to see us until Matt told him that his journalist
friend would write a negative piece on the hospital's negligence in their treatment of Mrs. Oakshot.
"The power of the newspapers," Matt whispered to me as a nurse led us through to Dr. Ritter's office.
The office was twice the size of Dr. Hale's. His bookshelves were covered with books and journals, rather than medicine bottles, and a portrait of the queen looked down upon his bald head as he sat behind his desk.
He did not shake Matt's hand or welcome us, but he stood to greet us with his knuckles pressed to the desk surface. "Mrs. Oakshot's death was an unfortunate mistake committed by Dr. Hale," he said in a loud voice. "It's not the hospital's fault, and your friend should not report otherwise. Do you hear?"
"We only want to ask questions," Matt said. "If you agreed to see us we wouldn't have needed to resort to desperate measures."
"Is it that Barratt fellow from The Weekly Gazette? It wouldn't surprise me. He writes some liberal nonsense."
"Why did you tell Mr. Oakshot that Dr. Hale gave Mrs. Oakshot the incorrect dose of morphine?"
Dr. Ritter straightened slowly, the bluster gone from his manner. "I didn't tell him anything."
"You implied, so Mr. Oakshot claims."
"That discussion was private and none of your affair." He sat and studied the papers laid out on his desk. "Please leave. I'm busy."
"You had no right to tell him that," I said. "He was a grieving man, looking for someone to blame."
"And he found someone. No harm was done, Miss Steele."
"No harm! He is a suspect in the murder of Dr. Hale, and if he is found guilty, it is your fault. Can you live with yourself if his children become orphans?"
"Get out," he snarled.
Matt caught my elbow. Perhaps he was afraid I would leap across the desk and slap Dr. Ritter, or perhaps he simply didn't want to leave yet. "The thing is, Dr. Ritter, you are a suspect too."
"I beg your pardon!" he spluttered.
"You had access to Dr. Hale's bottle of Cure-All, you're a doctor so have knowledge of medicines and poisons, and you argued with Dr. Hale before his death."
"I did not argue with him, I dismissed him from his position. He accepted my decision."
"Did he?" Matt said. "Or did he threaten you, and you realized you needed to silence him?"
