He felt his lips curve, saw annoyance coalesce and intensify in her eyes. She really ought to have known just by looking that he wasn’t likely to fall victim to her charms.
Manifold and very real though they were.
“Thank you for your time, Mr. Caxton.” Her tone was cold, a shivery coolness, the most her soft brogue would allow. “I’ll inform my aunt that she’ll have to live with her questions unanswered.”
“I’m sorry to have to disappoint an old lady, however…” He shrugged lightly. “Rules are rules, and there for a good reason.”
He watched for her reaction, for some sign, however slight, of comprehension, but she merely raised her brows in patent disbelief and, with every indication of miffed disappointment, turned away.
“I’ll see you to the front door.” He went with her to the door of his room, opened it.
“No need.” Briefly, she met his eyes as she swept past him. “I’m sure I can find my way.”
“Nevertheless.” He followed her into the corridor.
The rigidity of her spine declared she was offended he hadn’t trusted her to go straight back to the front foyer if left to herself. But they both knew she wouldn’t have, that if he’d set her free she’d have roamed, trusting her beauty to extract her from any difficulty should she be caught where she shouldn’t be.
She didn’t look back when she reached the foyer and sailed on toward the front doors. “Good-bye, Mr. Caxton.”
The cool words drifted over her shoulder. Halting in the mouth of the corridor, he watched the doorman, still bedazzled, leap to swing open the door. She stepped through, disappearing into the bright sunshine; the doors swung shut, and he could see her no more.
He returned to his office to find Barnaby peering out of the corner window.
“Sweeping away in a regal snit.” Turning from the window, Barnaby took the chair she’d vacated. “What did you make of that?”
Dillon resumed his seat. “A very interesting performance. Or rather, a performance of great interest to me.”
“Indeed. But how did you read it? Do you think the Irishman sent her?”
Slumping back, his long legs stretched before him, fingers lightly drumming his desk, he considered it. “I don’t think so. For a start, she’s gentry at least, more likely aristocracy. That indefinable confidence was there. So I doubt she’s directly involved with the Irishman asking questions in hedge taverns. However, were you to ask me if the Irishman’s
“But why ask just to
Dillon met Barnaby’s gaze. “When she first encountered us and the doorman said one of us was Mr. Caxton, she hoped it was you. You saw her. How many males do you think would have remained immune to her persuasions, the persuasions she might have brought to bear?”
“I wasn’t swayed.”
“No, but you were on guard the instant you heard she was interested in the register, and even more once she’d spoken. But she, and whoever sent her, wouldn’t have expected that.”
Barnaby humphed; he regarded Dillon. “But you’re immune, impervious, and unimpressionable in that regard.” His lips quirked. “Having set eyes on you, hearing that you were Caxton, guardian of the register, must have been a most unwelcome shock.”
Dillon recalled the moment; a shock, yes, but unwelcome? In one respect, perhaps, but otherwise?
What he had detected in that first moment of strange and unexpected recognition had been an element of flaring curiosity. One that had affected him in precisely the same degree.
“But I take your point,” Barnaby went on. “After one peek, why not two? And after two, well, why not let the darling girl pore over the register for an hour or two. No harm if it’s in your office-and no great misery to have to watch her while she pores.”
“Indeed.” Dillon’s tone was dry. “I imagine that’s more or less how matters would have transpired had I been more susceptible.”
“Regardless, her advent now gives us two immediate avenues to pursue. The Irishman and the attempts to break in here, and the startlingly beautiful Miss Dalling.”
Energized, Barnaby looked at Dillon, then grimaced. “In light of the tendencies Miss Dalling has already displayed, I’d better play safe and leave you to investigate her. I’ll focus on the unknown Irishman and anyone who can tell me anything about people loitering after dark in this vicinity.”
Dillon nodded. “We can meet tomorrow afternoon and share what we’ve learned.”
Barnaby rose. Meeting his eyes, Dillon smiled wryly. “While trawling through the hedge taverns, you can console yourself with the thought that following Miss Dalling will almost certainly result in my attending precisely those social events I would prefer to avoid like the plague.”
Barnaby grinned. “Each to our own sacrifices.” He snapped off a jaunty salute, and left.
Seated behind his desk, his gaze on the now-empty chair, Dillon thought again of Miss Dalling, and all he now wanted to know.
2
I can’t see Rus anywhere.” Pris scanned the throng of horses and jockeys, trainers, strappers, and lads engaged in a practice session on Newmarket racetrack. A minor race meet was approaching; many stables took the opportunity of a practice session to trial their runners on the track itself, or so the ostler at the Crown & Quirt had informed her. Such practice sessions also helped whip up enthusiasm for the various runners.
That, Pris thought, explained the large number of the racing public who, like Adelaide and she, were standing behind the rails on the opposite side of the track, studying the horses. At least the milling crowd provided camouflage.
Adelaide squinted across the track. “Can you see anyone from Lord Cromarty’s stables?”
“No.” Pris examined the motley crew, jockeys circling on mounts eager to be off, raucous comments flying between them and the trainers and lads on the ground. “But I’m not sure I would recognize anyone other than Cromarty himself. He’s short, and as round as he’s tall-he’s definitely not there. I’ve seen his head stableman, Harkness, once. He’s big and dark, rather fearsome-looking. There are one or two similar over there, but I don’t think they’re him. Not dark enough-or fierce enough, come to that.”
She looked around. “Let’s walk. Perhaps Rus or Cromarty are on this side of the track, talking to others.”
Unfurling their parasols, deploying them to deflect the morning sun, they paraded along the sward, attracting not a little attention.
Pris was aware of the appraising glances thrown their way, but she’d long grown inured to such awestruck looks. Indeed, she tended to view those who stared, stunned and occasionally slavering, with dismissive contempt.
She and Adelaide tacked through the crowd, surreptitiously searching. Then, rounding a large group of genial gentlemen comparing notes on the various runners, she saw, standing some yards directly ahead, a tall, lean, dramatically dark figure.
Caxton’s dark gaze was fixed on her.
She quelled an impulse to take Adelaide’s arm, turn around, and head in the opposite direction. She wished she could do so, but the move would inflame Caxton’s unwelcome suspicions, quite aside from smacking of cowardice.
That he could and did affect her to the extent that beating a retreat was her preferred option irritated enough to have her elevating her nose as she and Adelaide approached him.
He waited until she halted before him, before allowing a slight smile to show. A smile that made her want to kick him-and herself. She should have halted some paces away and made him come to her.
At least he bowed and spoke first. “Good morning, Miss Dalling. Out surveying the field?”
“Indeed.” She refused to react to the subtle emphasis that suggested he wasn’t sure which field she was
