“What’s a few more years when these words have been waiting for four hundred?” Ford reached across the cluttered table for the decanter, impressing Rand when he didn’t knock over any of the assorted paraphernalia. He filled Rand’s beaker for the third time.
Or maybe the fourth. Rand had lost count.
“So you’re in love, are you?” Ford said.
“Maybe. Probably not. I cannot be sure.” Rand paused for a sip, trying not to speculate on what chemical concoction the beaker might have held the day before. “I think so.”
Topping off his own beaker, Ford nodded. “You’re in love.”
“She won’t have me. It’s that sister of hers. Rose.” Rand took another sip—or rather a gulp that he’d intended to be a sip. “She keeps saying how Rose and I are more suited. Rose sings like I do. Rose can speak Italian.” He shook his head. “As though that’s what I’m looking for in a girl.” Then another thought occurred to him—one that made the brandy seem to sour in his stomach. “What if she’s only using Rose as an excuse? What if she’s not attracted to me?” He had been sporting that wretched mustache when they’d first met; perhaps it had put her off permanently. “Or what if she won’t have me because I’m only a professor? She lives in a mansion, after all, and I—”
“Lily’s not like that,” Ford rushed to interrupt. “She cares about her family. She cares about all people and animals. She does not care about living in a mansion.”
Rand nodded—slowly, to keep the room from blurring—as he tried to believe that. He nearly succeeded. “Then why does she keep bringing up Rose?”
“Guilt,” Ford said succinctly.
“Guilt?”
“Look, we all know Rose wants you—”
“Then why doesn’t Lily?” Rand interrupted plaintively.
“Guilt,” Ford repeated. Taking his time about it, he drained his beaker. “She doesn’t want to steal you from Rose.”
“Rose doesn’t have me. Therefore Lily cannot steal me from Rose.” Rand felt inordinately proud of that observation. “Those two statements make rational sense, don’t they? And I’m a professor of linguistics, not logic.”
“You’re brilliant,” Ford said dryly. “But you’re forgetting something.”
“What’s that?” Rand asked, marveling at the way the words sounded once they’d left his mouth. Whazzat. Had he said whazzat?
“The way women’s minds work. Or don’t, as the case may be. Would you care for some more brandy?”
Rand held out his beaker. “I think I need it.”
Ford refilled his own, too, then leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs out in front of him. “Listen,” he said, rolling the beaker between his palms, “it doesn’t matter whether Rose has you. The salient point here is that Lily knows Rose is interested in you, and she’s unwilling to hurt her sister by taking what Rose considers hers—never mind that you’re not and never will be—because Lily is putting her sister’s feelings before her own. She won’t allow herself to marry—”
“Who said anything about marriage?”
“Hold your tongue and listen. Lily won’t allow herself to marry before Rose, most especially to someone Rose wants for herself.”
Rand sipped more brandy as he attempted to absorb that convoluted line of reasoning. In his current state, it almost made some sort of sense. “How on earth do you know all that?”
“Violet told me. And she also said that Lily made Rose some harebrained promise to stay out of her way, which further complicates matters.”
“Did Violet suggest a solution?”
“She said it was hopeless. But that’s where she’s wrong.” Ford leaned forward, narrowing his eyes as he focused on Rand’s. “Listen, my man. It’s time for you to take your own advice.”
Rand sat up straighter and then waited until the world stopped spinning around him. “Advice? About love? I’m not even sure I believe in it. I’ve certainly never given advice—”
“When Violet didn’t want me, remember? You helped me devise a plan. And it worked.”
“I did?” He blinked, trying to recall. “I must have been gloriously drunk.”
“You were,” Ford assured him. “Now, listen, because I’m far too masculine to say this more than once”—Rand gave a snort of disagreement—“at least, not without the influence of brandy. You told me I had to show Violet that I loved her, not just tell her so. I think you must do the same with Lily. As I said, she cares deeply for the wellbeing of all living things—including you. If she sees your feelings are stronger than her sisters’, her sympathy for you will overcome her concern for Rose. And if she loves you back, she’ll be free to make the right choice.”
Rand ran his tongue around his teeth, considering the idea. “And how exactly do I show her?”
Shrugging, Ford tilted his head back and drained his glass, then smacked his lips. “That, my friend, is your problem.”
TWENTY
THE BURN OF overworked muscles. The sound of his own labored breath. The rhythm of his feet on the turf. All worked to clear Rand’s mind…but disturbing thoughts insisted on creeping in anyway.
He’d stayed indoors yesterday, fuzzy-brained and out of sorts, the pounding in his head quite enough without the jarring beat of a run. He hadn’t felt up to contemplating Ford’s advice, either. It had been quite a while since he’d indulged in drink like that—for good reason. This recent bout would serve to ensure he drank moderately for another few years at least.
Still, he’d managed to make progress on the translation—enough, in fact, that he and Ford had come to the sad conclusion that Secrets of the Emerald Tablet held no secrets to making gold. Over the past few weeks, Ford had tested every formula Rand could find, with results ranging from hopeful-but-disappointing to all-out laughable.
Now there were no more formulas. There was no point in laboring to decipher what little was left of the text.
“I’m sorry,” he’d told Ford when they’d closed the book last night.
“I always knew this was a possibility. Criminy, the mere idea of making gold was too good
