Page 87 of From the Ashes
Mrs. Overton eyeed me warily. "She doesn't have a Cornish accent."
"That's because she also has cousins up north," Lady Vickers said, "and in the east. Not the west, though, thank God. Her accent has been smoothed out with all the to-ing and fro-ing, going between cousins. It was no life for her, so when my own dear cousin told me of her plight, I decided to have her sent to Lichfield where I knew Seth would see that she settled."
Miss Yardly sniggered into her wine glass. One of the other girls colored. No doubt they were imagining all the ways Seth had helped me settle.
"She became my ward," Lincoln told them, his cold-as-ice voice stopping all giggles and blushes. "Seth asked me to take her in, so I did. If anyone thinks there's anything unseemly in that arrangement, feel free to discuss it with me outside."
Oh, Lincoln, resolving things with brute force again. To be fair, there was no way to avoid scandal. I was steeped in it. We all were. Lady Vickers was a fool to believe she could steer us clear of it. I hoped she wasn't too upset with how the evening was turning out. Seth had a female admirer on either side of him, and he seemed to be enjoying himself. She might salvage something from the disaster after all.
"What a curiosity you are," Seacombe said, leaning much closer than necessary or polite. The smoldering gaze and slick smile told me precisely why he'd deigned to speak to me again. "I find you intriguing, Miss Holloway. Very much so. Perhaps I'll be permitted to call on you soon at your home."
"Yes, of course, but you'll need to confer with both Lady Vickers and Mr. Fitzroy first. I must do as they both wish."
He eyed Lincoln. Lincoln stared back, a wicked curl to his top lip.
Seacombe gulped. "I'll check with my assistant to see when I'm free. I've got a busy schedule ahead."
"I don't doubt it. You must be in demand to speak about your African adventures."
That set him off again and he spent the rest of the dinner regaling me, and the woman on his other side, with stories.
Dinner seemed to last an interminably long time. I was glad when the gentlemen and ladies finally separated, and hoped we could leave as soon as the gentlemen rejoined us in the drawing room. Unfortunately we did not. Lady Vickers appeared keen to stay and Lincoln made no motion to go. Even worse, Andrew Buchanan cornered me.
"Wheredidyou go while you were away?" He sprawled in the spindly-legged chair beside me, a glass at his lips. He looked as if he didn't have a care in the world, yet mere months ago, he'd needed rescuing from Bedlam. He'd been appreciative then. I preferred that fellow to this cocky bore.
"North," I said.
"Where, precisely?"
"That is none of your affair, Mr. Buchanan."
He grunted into his glass. "Very well, keep your secret. May I say what a pleasure it is to see you again. I hope you've resettled back at Lichfield."
"I have, thank you." I looked around for a conversation to escape to, but Seth was talking to Seacombe, and Lincoln had been accosted by the Overtons. Buchanan seemed like the lesser of three evils.
"There was quite a to-do while you were away," he went on. "The circus murder, for one thing. Do you know, Fitzroy thoughtIkilled the strongman? Me! I haven't got a violent bone in my body."
"He must have had his reasons." Lincoln had told me about the arrangement between Buchanan and the circus dancer who'd also been in a relationship with the murdered strongman. I would have suspected Buchanan too, given that knowledge.
"It wasn't only that fellow's murder that set my household on edge. Julia has been dealt quite a blow too.
"So I read. Lady Vickers pointed out the article in the newspaper. I imagine it's upsetting to be the object of gossip."
"Devastating. You'd think the world was coming to an end any day now."
"I suppose it is, in a way. Her world, that is."
He sipped thoughtfully. I expected him to mock his stepmother's situation, to take the opportunity to grind his heel in now that she was laid low. This pensive quietness was unlike Buchanan, and certainly out of character for their relationship. They'd always been so bitter toward one another in my presence, as if they were locked in some kind of battle. Yet he seemed almost sympathetic.
"It's interesting," he said to his glass.
"What is?"
"The change in her."
I wasn't sure interesting was the word I'd use.
"It's good for her to be reminded of where she came from," he went on. "Her horse had become a little too high. I warned her that she'd be thrown off it one day, and now that day has finally arrived." He drank the contents of his glass in a single gulp. "Definitely interesting."
