Louis trotted up from the discreet distance he’d maintained on the trek from Rye’s house. “Vulture.”
“Fat Louie.”
They grinned at each other, clearly prepared to engage in a battle of insults, which would probably escalate to shoving, profanity, and fisticuffs, though Rye hadn’t the time to indulge their good spirits.
“Vulture is late for his nooning, Louis. You will please take over for him while I call on my in-laws. Vulture might well be biding with us for a time, in which case I will need another sentry to keep watch from this post. I leave you gentlemen to discuss suitable resources for that office.”
Vulture shot Louis a puzzled glance.
“He means you have to pick a lad to take over watching and sweeping for when you aren’t here,” Louis said. “A reliable lad with sharp eyes.”
“Get something to eat,” Rye said. “And I do mean food, Vulture, not just drink, or you’ll end up in the sponging house, or worse.”
The boy trotted off, while Louis surveyed the street. “His pa isn’t in the sponging house, Colonel. His uncle set the watch on his pa for cursing the king. Half the Cock and Hen heard him.”
And taverns, being full of the crown’s spies, were stupid places to express honest sentiments regarding the monarchy’s excesses.
“Vulture can bide with us for now. Please explain the rules to him, and he’ll need a name once he starts sleeping in the house.”
“Aye. His name’s Victor. He don’t use it much.”
“Doesn’t. Set a good example for him, Louis. I shouldn’t be long.”
Even if Rye spent only fifteen minutes in his sister’s household, the time would be long. He crossed the street and rapped the knocker stoutly anyway. To his eternal frustration, Jeanette’s husband opened the door—Sycamore Dorning’s grasp of protocol was sadly lacking—and Rye thus found himself behind enemy lines without allies.
A daunting if familiar place to be.
“Colonel, good day.” Dorning’s tone was anything but welcoming. “Jeanette is napping, and not even for you will I wake her. She will interrogate me regarding the purpose of your call, so prepare to endure my company, and do not think to blow retreat. We are family now, and Jeanette will expect us to act like it.”
He grabbed Rye by the sleeve and yanked him into the house.
Chapter Five
“Ann came around again?” The brigadier posed the question mildly over his luncheon soup, but then, his manner with Meli was invariably courteous.
“Ann makes her weekly call early enough in the day to not be seen,” Meli replied. “Does this bisque need salt?” Of course it did not. Ann’s recipes were, without exception, delicious. She quantified every ingredient, in so far as one could, and left no steps to the cook’s imagination.
“The soup is fine. My compliments to the kitchen.” The brigadier patted his lips with his table napkin and put his empty bowl aside. “You always set such a fine table, my love, and I hesitate to broach any topic that implies remote criticism of your choices, but is it necessary to see Ann so frequently?”
Well, yes, it was, if Meli was to continue collecting the recipes that gained her increasing cachet in all the right circles.
“I am her only relation, my dear. She is young and without guidance.”
The brigadier flicked a glance at the footman collecting the soup bowls. Thomas bowed and withdrew, closing the parlor door behind him. Meli’s husband would always have the subtle air of command, a trait she’d found dashing as a new bride. Now, Horace seemed a trifle rigid to her and in need of obedience in even small matters. The staff respected him. Meli was fairly certain they did not like him.
The brigadier’s hair was increasingly gray, and he kept threatening to grow a beard, which would be entirely gray.
“Ann is no longer a reckless, bereaved child,” he said, “intent on daring all for a London post. I indulged her in that regard because she presented us with a fait accompli, and war is uncertain. If anything had happened to me, Ann would have been at the mercy of courts and solicitors. A cook has a respectable trade, but I never envisioned…” He gazed down the length of the table at Meli.
“You never envisioned her serving out her apprenticeship and actually plying her trade.” Meli picked up her glass of wine and moved to the place at Horace’s right hand. “Neither did I, but she enjoys what she does, and she is of age.” Ann also had a modest fortune, which was hers to manage now that she had reached the antediluvian milestone of five-and-twenty.
“Can’t you find her a husband, Melisande? Sooner or later, somebody will learn that she spends her days chopping cabbage and plucking geese in a gaming hell. I dread the explanations we’ll have to make.”
Meli dreaded those explanations too. “What few people I mention Ann to believe her to be my retiring, rustic niece cantering toward spinsterdom at the family seat. You need not worry.” Meli patted his sleeve. “I have sent out the invitations to your autumn supper.”
“Have you now?”
Horace’s quarterly officers’ dinners were the high point of his social calendar, bringing together the best and brightest of his former comrades and direct reports. Wellington held such dinners, and Meli had had the inspired idea of taking up the tradition.
Though actually, Ann might have mentioned the notion to her first.
“I anticipate every single invitation will be accepted. Nothing save ill health or recent bereavement stops your men from paying their respects.”
Horace caught her hand. “They all long for another chance to flirt with you, my love.” He kissed her knuckles, exactly the sort of gallantry that had first brought him to Ann’s notice. “Do you ever miss being on campaign?”
Well, no. Not ever. Only a daft woman would miss death, dismemberment, camp rations, unrelenting illness, intrigues, constant fear for her husband… the whole business. Horace, in his delicate way, was asking about Philippe, a topic never raised between husband and wife overtly.
“A warrior is bored by peace,” Meli said. “A warrior’s wife thanks God nightly for the cessation of hostilities. You always made such a dashing figure riding before the troops, but I tell you honestly, Husband, I hated seeing you off to battle. The thought of losing you…” At her worst and most foolish, Meli had never wished anything but a contented old age for her spouse, which he—oddly—might find more trying than a battlefield death.
Horace studied her, her hand still in his. “I believe you mean that.”
“I most assuredly do. I am proud to be your wife, and that has always been true.”
Horace stroked his thumb over the back of her hand. He was a considerate and undemanding lover and only affectionate when private. Meli esteemed him for those courtesies, even if they did bore her a bit.
“Philippe is in London, Melisande. I thought you should know.”
Meli endured the inevitable welter of feelings that came with thoughts of a man she’d once regarded as the love of her life. Shame was predictable, for with Philippe, Meli had disgraced her marital vows. A current of longing nonetheless accompanied her guilt. If only there hadn’t been a war, a husband, a passel of generals intent on slaughter and spying…