They had not taken many steps when a hoarse voice spoke in his ear. “So, the rumors are true, Gabriel.”
He would have recognized the voice anywhere, even without the troublingly familiar use of his given name. “And what rumors are those, Uncle Finch?” he asked without turning to look at his interlocutor.
“For one, the rumor that you have crawled out from under the rock where you have been lurking these many years.”
Gabriel squinted into a gray sky pierced here and there with the promise of blue. “I suppose you hoped I would shrivel and die in the sunlight.” He dropped his gaze and met his uncle’s sneer with one of his own. “So sorry to disappoint.”
More than a year had passed since Gabriel had seen his uncle last. Automatically, he steeled himself against the discomfort that always slithered down his spine when he was forced to confront that face—his father’s face, but attached to another man entirely. He recalled having once felt the briefest glimmer of hope that the two men would resemble one another in more than the physical, a spark that had flared and been stamped out long ago.
“Make no mistake, Gabriel. I am disappointed—”
“Lord Sebastian Finch.” Fox’s calm tones cut across their more heated voices as he gave a slight bow.
“This doesn’t concern you, Mr. Fox,” Uncle Finch declared. “I can’t think why you continue to associate with my nephew, under the circumstances. ‘He that toucheth pitch shall be defiled therewith,’” he quoted piously. “A man of God should surround himself with more fitting acquaintances.”
Gabriel very nearly nodded his agreement.
“Sage advice,” Fox replied, unperturbed. He folded his arms across his chest and rocked back on his heels. “Fortunately for us sinners, our Lord and Savior did not see fit to take it, either.”
“Was there something you wanted of me?” Gabriel asked, forcing himself to study his uncle’s pallid face; the man’s health had always been poor, but appeared now to be failing at a rapid pace.
“Certainly not.” The mere suggestion that he had sought Gabriel out seemed to horrify him. “I was on my way to my club to discuss the news of the day. You have heard, of course, about the attempt on His Highness’s life? Terrible, terrible. But one can hardly claim to be surprised, when we welcome these Frenchmen—and women—into our country and believe their sad tales of persecution, their claims of opposition to that republican monstrosity they’re concocting across the Channel.” As he spoke, he watched Gabriel closely.
A certain sly uplift in his uncle’s brows, as if he anticipated some reaction to his words, prompted Fox to ask, “What has any of that to do with Ash?”
The old man gulped an anticipatory breath so sharp it sent his lungs into a paroxysm of shock. When the coughing fit had passed, he rasped out, “Ash? How—how dare—you—?”
Gabriel watched him struggle to breathe, impassive. “I cannot see that my title is any particular concern of yours, Uncle Finch,” he said, lifting one hand to stay the tide of vitriol. “As to the other, Foxy, I would not be surprised if my dear uncle intends to suggest I am in league with a den of French spies. Killing a king is of a piece with my past crimes against the nobility, I dare say.”
Uncle Finch favored him with a bitter stare that he managed, after a moment, to twist into a condescending smile. “If the shoe fits, Gabriel. Alas,” he said, crossing his hands over the knob of his walking stick, “the charges I have heard laid at your door are not quite so damning. Rumor has it you were vulgar enough to seek admittance to Lady Montlake’s ballroom without an invitation. And there are those who claim you intend to offer for some poor innocent girl, merely in hopes of depriving Julian of his rightful inheritance.” Between each accusation, his uncle paused to wheeze out one useless breath and replace it with another.
“Rightful—?” Fox sputtered. Gabriel gave an almost imperceptible shake of the head to silence him.
“It would seem the girl’s family has forgotten your…history.”
“Forgotten?” Gabriel brushed an imaginary speck of lint from his sleeve. Given the frequency with which his uncle had denounced him as a murderer over the last twenty years, the charge ought to have lost its sting. But it had not. “I very much doubt it can have escaped anyone’s recollection, given how you persist in bringing it up.”
His uncle shrugged. “Society has a regrettably short memory. Someone must refresh it from time to time. Although really,” he added, “all my efforts seem to have been perfectly unnecessary. You have always been determined to prove me right about you.”
Gabriel could feel his anger rising, and Fox must have sensed it. “Let’s go, Ash. I cannot think you will wish to be seen engaging in a family squabble in full view of every shop on Oxford Street.”
With a cold bow to his uncle, Gabriel agreed. “Yes. Unless you’ve something more original and interesting, Uncle Finch, I’ll be on my way.”
Before his uncle could gather the strength to rasp out a reply, Gabriel began to walk in the direction of St. James’s. Footsteps scuffed behind him—one set, and by the lightness of their tread, they belonged to Fox. Still, he did not slow his stride. In another moment, he would have done the thing he had been longing to do since he was ten years old: smash his fist into his uncle’s face.
When he reached his rooms, Gabriel opened the door himself, swinging it inward with such force that it struck the wall behind and shuddered almost closed again. Remington stopped its motion with one hand and studied the mark
