Page 4 of The Lost Lord
Richard leaned backward against a railing as they waited for the deck to be cleared to receive new cargo. Warm spring sun fell on his face and neck. His tattered linen shirtsleeves were damp with sweat. His lips tasted of salt when he licked them.
“Yes,” Richard affirmed without opening his eyes.
“She’s why you’re here today, toiling like a deck hand, Lord Rich?” Howard teased.
“Of course.” Richard opened his eyes long enough to glare at his one true friend.
“She’s bad for business. I wish you’d drop the…” Howard’s mouth screwed into a hard line before he spoke the curse.
“We’ve had this discussion. Meeting Lizzie led me to better contacts in New York. The only person she harms with her behavior is herself.”
Howard eyed him, not kindly. “You only say that because she hasn’t hurt you, yet.”
Possibly. Richard didn’t think there was much left of him for Lizzie to cause pain. A dead heart couldn’t be wounded by pulling out his chest hair.
The dock hands ate a rudimentary midday meal of pickled fish and bread with an apple. Then, they went back to work, tugging, lifting, hauling and loading new crates onto the ship in place of the old. The boxes that had been unloaded that morning would be opened, inspected, and inventoried before Howard released them to the carts that carried them uptown to shops and the fancy homes north of the former Collect Pond. No one went near the sinking morass if they could avoid it. The homes built there disintegrated day by day on the unsteady, reeking landfill. Wealthier families had fled uptown.
“You’re wrong about Lizzie,” Richard said without preamble, hours later, when his shoulders and back ached from exertion. Conversations with Howard often lasted for days, even weeks. Or maybe they never started and stopped the way ordinary people’s did.
“Am I?” Howard asked, in a way that made Richard feel stupid and naive. Affronted pride prickled down his back like a porcupine’s quills.
“She’s an unhappily married woman. It’s not my fault the woman cuckolds her husband. I am merely the mechanism for doing it.”
His friend’s brow furrowed. “Why doesn’t she keep faith with him?”
“I have no idea.” Richard replied through gritted teeth. Usually by this point in a conversation, Howard turned his back or became distracted by the quotidian business of running his warehouses and shipping line. His friend rarely pressed a topic the way he was doing now.
“She’s never confided in you?” Howard asked.
“Why should she? Lizzie comes to my apartments when she wishes, takes what she wants from me, and mostly leaves me in peace. It’s a physical arrangement.”
Howard’s gaze scanned his face. Richard endured the man’s inspection with a tense jaw.
“I don’t run in your circles, but I’d be a fool not to keep my ear to the ground. Arthur Van Buren has filed for an annulment.”
Cold washed over Richard as if he’d fallen overboard into the Hudson river at winter time. “Of their marriage,” he echoed, seeking clarification.
“Aye. He says she never visits his bed, though that’s not the grounds for his suit.” Howard’s voice was pure sympathy.
“There’s truth to that,” Richard scoffed. “Lizzie has a veritable treasure trove of nicknames for her husband none of them fluttering. Pickle cock, shrinking violet, the shy turtle…”
“She does confide in you, then.” Howard smirked. It took a moment for Richard to recognize his friend’s anger. He’d never seen Howard’s geode eyes narrow at the corners like this before.
“No, she only calls her husband abhorrent names,” Richard replied tersely.
“I want you to drop the redhead’s company and come join my company. Be a full partner, like.” Howard’s anger banked instantly.
“No.”
Richard didn’t need to consider it, not even for moment. He knew he possessed no more honor than your average raccoon, but he had no intention of taking away from the hard-won shipping and warehousing enterprise his friend had built.
“Think on it. I can do much more with you as my partner. I’d like to expand overseas. I expect there’s good trade to be had with London and Paris.”
Howard’s brevity could be hard to parse at times. Had Richard not spent days listening to his friend’s peculiar verbal cadence, he would have understood what Howard was asking of him now.
“You want me to make contacts for you in London and in Paris?” Richard asked.
“Yes, of course. It’s the same principle as extending my business between Maine and Charleston, only across an ocean. But I need you to help me find investors. You can talk people. I can’t. You’re the only one I ever talk to.” Embarrassment crossed Howard’s rough-hewn features. “You’re the best business decision I ever made, Lord Northcote.”
