What Happens in London

At least not on purpose.

Thoughts of Lady Olivia firmly behind him, Harry got back to work later that morning, and by afternoon was lost in a sea of Russian idioms.

Kogda rak na goryeh svistnyet = When the crawfish whistles on a mountain = When pigs fly.

Sdelatz slona iz mukha = Make an elephant out of a fly = Make a mountain out of a molehill.

S dokhlogo kozla i shersti klok = Even from the dead goat, even a piece of wool is worth something =

Equals…

Equals…

He pondered this for several minutes, idly tapping his pen against his blotter, and was just about to give up and move on when he heard a knock at the door.

“Enter.” He didn’t look up. It had been so long since he’d been able to maintain his focus for an entire paragraph; he wasn’t going to break the rhythm now.

“Harry.”

Harry’s pen stilled. He’d been expecting the butler with the afternoon’s post, but this voice belonged to his younger brother. “Edward,” he said, making sure he knew exactly where he’d left off before looking up. “This is a pleasant surprise.”

“This came for you.” Edward crossed the room and placed an envelope on his desk. “It came by courier.”

The outside of the envelope did not indicate the sender, but the markings were familiar. It was from the War Office, and it was almost certainly of some importance; they rarely sent communication of this sort directly to his home. Harry set it aside, intending to read it when he was alone. Edward knew that he translated documents, but he did not know for whom. Thus far Harry had not seen any indication that he could be trusted with the knowledge.

The missive could wait a few minutes, however. Right now Harry was curious as to his brother’s presence in his office. It was not Edward’s habit to deliver items about the house. Even if he had been the one to receive the letter, he most likely would have tossed it on the tray in the front hall for the butler to deal with.

Edward did not interact with Harry unless forced to do so, by outside influence or by necessity. Necessity usually being of the financial variety.

“How are you today, Edward?”

Edward shrugged. He looked tired, his eyes red and puffy. Harry wondered how late he’d been out the night before.

“Sebastian will be joining us for supper this evening,” Harry said. Edward rarely ate at home, but Harry thought he might, if he knew Seb would be there.

“I have plans,” Edward said, but then he added, “but perhaps I could delay them.”

“I would appreciate that.”

Edward stood in the center of the office, the very image of a sulky, sullen boy. He was two and twenty now, and Harry supposed he thought himself a man, but his bearing was callow and his eyes still young.

Young, but not youthful. Harry was disturbed by how haggard his brother appeared. Edward drank too much, and probably slept too little. He was not like their father, though. Harry couldn’t quite put his finger on the difference, except that Sir Lionel had always been jolly.

Except when he was sad and apologetic. But he generally forgot about that by the next morning.

But Edward was different. Overindulgence did not make him effusive. Harry could not imagine him getting up on a chair and waxing poetic about the thplendidneth of a thchool. Edward did not attempt to be charming and debonair during the rare occasions that they shared a meal. Instead, he sat in stony silence, answering nothing but direct queries, and then with only the bare minimum of words.

Harry was painfully aware that he did not know his brother, knew nothing of his thoughts or interests. He had been gone the bulk of Edward’s formative years, off on the Continent, fighting alongside Seb in the 18th Hussars. When he returned, he’d tried to rekindle the relationship, but Edward had wanted nothing to do with him. He was only here, in Harry’s home, because he could not afford rooms of his own. He was the quintessential younger brother, with no inheritance to speak of, and no apparent skills. He’d scoffed at Harry’s suggestion that he, too, join the military, accusing him of wanting only to be rid of him.

Harry hadn’t bothered to suggest the clergy. It was difficult to imagine Edward leading anyone toward moral rectitude, and besides that, Harry didn’t want to be rid of him.

“I received a letter from Anne earlier in the week,” Harry mentioned. Their sister, who had married William Forbush at the age of seventeen and never looked back, had ended up in Cornwall, of all places. She sent Harry a letter each month, filled with news of her brood. Harry wrote back in Russian, insisting that if she did not use the language, she’d lose it altogether.

Anne’s reply had been his warning, clipped from his letter and pasted onto a new sheet of paper, followed by, in English: “That is my intention, dear brother.”

Harry had laughed, but he hadn’t stopped with the Russian. And she must have taken the time to read and translate, because when she replied, she often had questions about the things he’d written.

It was an entertaining correspondence; Harry always looked forward to her letters.

She did not write to Edward. She used to, but she’d stopped when she realized that he would never return the gesture.

“The children are well,” Harry continued. Anne had five of them, all boys save the last. Harry wondered what she looked like now. He hadn’t seen her since he left for the army.

Harry sat back in his chair, waiting. For anything. For Edward to speak, to move, to kick the wall. Most of all, he was waiting for him to ask for an advance on his allowance, for surely that was the reason for his appearance. But Edward said nothing, just stubbed his toe along the floor, catching the edge of the dark-hued carpet and flipping it over before kicking it back down with his heel.

“Edward?”

“You’d best read the letter,” Edward said gruffly as he moved to leave. “They said it was important.”

Harry waited for him to depart, then picked up the directive from the War Office. It was unusual for them to contact him in this manner; they usually just sent over someone with documents in hand. He flipped over the note, used his forefinger to break the seal, and then opened it.

It was short, just two sentences long, but it was clear. Harry was to report to the offices at Horse Guards in Whitehall immediately.

He groaned. Anything that required his actual presence could not be good. The last time they’d hauled him in, it was to order him to play nursemaid to an elderly Russian countess. He’d had to remain glued to her side for three weeks. She’d complained about the heat, the food, the music…The only thing she hadn’t complained about was the vodka, and that was because she’d brought her own.

She’d insisted on sharing, too. Anyone who spoke Russian as well as Harry did could not drink British swill, she’d announced. She actually reminded him a bit of his grandmother for that.

But Harry did not drink, not even a drop, and he spent night after night dumping his glass into a potted plant.

Strangely, the plant had thrived. Quite possibly, the finest moment of the assignment was when the butler frowned down at the botanical wonder and said, “I didn’t think that made flowers.”

Still, Harry had no desire to repeat the experience. Unfortunately, he was rarely given the luxury of refusing. Funny, that. They needed him, as Russian translators weren’t exactly thick on the ground. And yet he was expected to jump to their bidding.

Harry briefly considered finishing the page he was working on before departing, then decided against it. Best to get it over with.

And besides, the countess was back in St. Petersburg, presumably complaining about the cold, the sun, and the lack of English gentlemen forced to wait on her hand and foot.

Whatever it was they wanted of him, it couldn’t be as bad as that, could it?