Page 32 of His Unforgettable Bride
“My worries aren’t important.” Delicious scents rose from the kitchen, and she drew a hefty whiff. “But maybe you all should eat first? Icala’s wonderful roasted beef and fixings smell heavenly.”
“It will keep.” Livy rattled off the names of every item on Juliet’s end of the table, starting at the upper left corner. When she finished, she smiled much too cheerfully at her. “Show me the tea knife.”
The temptation to roll her eyes struck hard, yet Juliet refrained. Tea knife. Was the question a trick? “A knife for tea don’t make no sense.”
“Any sense,” the sisters’ voices chimed together.
Gray caught her eye and motioned toward his right, where only one knife sat on that side of the table.
Juliet swiped up the utensil. “Here it is!”
Livy clapped daintily. “Hurrah.”
Tabitha was busy surveying her place setting. “Show us the dessert spoon.”
Gray reached for his water glass but, before doing so, touched a spoon that sat above the plate.
Juliet grabbed a matching utensil in front of her. “Here.”
“I’m such a good teacher.” Livy practically preened.
When Gray’s lips quirked into the beginning of a smile, Juliet couldn’t resist a grin of her own. Maybe learning to be ladylike would be easier than she suspected. Especially if he became an ally.
Ten
Avoid loud talking and laughing, and still more carefully avoid any action or gesture that may attract attention and make you conspicuous.
Not for a minute had Gray expected to find himself in the middle of such a pleasant evening.
The group had gathered in the drawing room. Livy delivered a thick knitted blanket of blue wool to where he sat in a comfortable, well-stuffed chair. “We can’t have you catching a chill.”
He raised his brow, not cold in the least. The pain in his temple mainly had subsided, and his strength had rallied. First thing tomorrow, he hoped to speak with the constable, then venture to the dock to investigate which ships had arrived in port recently. Hopefully, the name of a steamer, a city, or a person on a sailing log would trigger his memory.
Lord willing, something would register soon.
Juliet sat beside him in a rosewood chair, her ankles crossed. Had he been wicked to have helped her cheat with her dining room lesson before dinner? He wanted to think of himself as a hero who had come to her rescue, but something about the exchange told him he had once been a bit of a rogue…and perhaps still was.
He had recognized every item on the table, another reason to believe he was raised in a well-to-do home. Or else he had an unusually keen interest in dishware.
The sisters had invited Juliet to stay at the table for the evening meal. But she declined and insisted on eating her nourishment alone in the kitchen. Although he had enjoyed the supper with the sisters, he could admit he would have liked it more with Juliet present.
Thankfully, she’d rejoined them now in the drawing room. Tabitha had stepped out to retrieve a photograph of her brother and his wife. Livy continued to flit around, striding past another grouping of chairs at the far end, including a deacon’s black settee, large enough for three or four people. She paused beside the piano near the entrance and Peaches’s cage. “Where is my etiquette manual, my pretty bird? It seems I’ve misplaced it again.”
The delicate creature whistled in reply.
Gray studied Juliet, who now pumped her toe. Was she growing restless? He did not want her to leave when the evening was still spread before them. “Do you care to play chess or perhaps checkers?” Both games were set up on small side-by-side tables near where they lounged.
Before Juliet could reply, Tabitha entered the room with her posture perfectly erect and holding a picture frame. He had not recognized himself in a mirror. Would viewing the faces of anyone else lead to a different outcome?
Tabitha handed him the silver-framed images. “This was taken the day Nolan and Katherine sailed back to England.”
Slowly, Gray turned over the picture and stared at the grainy photograph, longing for an emotion, anything other than disappointment.
The lady’s large hat shadowed her eyes. But most of her small, delicate face remained open to inspection. Compared to him, her chin was pointier, her nose was slimmer, and her round, puckered mouth resembled the button on his cuff. His did not.
A generous display of facial hair covered two-thirds of the man’s face, and his large forehead revealed a receding hairline. Gray patted the top of his head to ensure the strands sticking out of his bandages remained. To his relief, they did. A pair of deep-set eyes bore no resemblance to his either.
He desperately wished for a familiar chord to connect him with this couple, but that chord failed to strum.
