As Mum smiled and reached for it, he hustled Violet from the room, laughingly ignoring her protests. Rose and Lily exchanged frantic looks.
Their mother lifted the front cover.
“No!” Lily cried, her hand shooting out to slam the book shut. “Sorry, I…I just felt a bit of melancholy coming on, and, um, certain passages might be, you know, helpful. To reread. Some things are better the second time, you know. So, um, can I keep the book a little longer?”
“Of course.” To Lily’s great relief, her mother relinquished the book without a fight. “Judith, dear, would you please pass the sugar bowl?”
Judith obliged, and Mum spooned sugar into her coffee, humming a simple tune as she stirred.
It was only when she noticed Rose’s mouth hanging open that Lily realized the tune was “The Comical Dreamer.”
SIXTY
BY THE TIME Rand told the whole story, he and Kit had long since finished dinner and were nursing tankards of ale.
Last night’s rain had ceased, but the day had dawned depressingly gray. The dark paneling inside the King’s Arms made it dreary, and the crackling fire near their table did little to warm the room or lighten Rand’s mood.
“Of all the rotten things your father has ever done to you, this wins the prize.” Kit shook his head. “Margery. Is she all grown-up, then?”
“Very much so. She’s nearly twenty-one, and a beauty, too. But I cannot imagine myself married to her.”
“For all intents and purposes, she’s your little sister.” Looking thoughtful, Kit signaled for another round. “Margery was always very sweet.”
“I’d say you’re welcome to her, but I’m afraid Bennett Armstrong would have something to say about that. Especially considering she’s carrying his child.”
Kit blinked. “On top of everything else, she’s with child?”
“Yes, and she’s asked me to raise the babe as my own.”
“You will, of course, should it come to that.” Kit knew Rand inside out. “But we must find a way to fix this.” He paused, musing as he drained his tankard. “Skinny old Bennett, huh?”
Despite the gravity of his situation, a ghost of a grin materialized on Rand’s face. “He’s not skinny anymore. I wouldn’t challenge him were I you. Remember, he’s killed once already, even if it was in self-defense.”
“True, but I cannot bring myself to feel sorry that he did. Alban was…” Seemingly at a loss for words, Kit shook his head. A serving maid set down two fresh tankards, and he flipped her a coin. “I still remember that day Alban found us down by the river. He was angry at you for some reason—”
“I’d read his journal.”
“Ah, that was it. Anyway, I thought he was going to kill us both. I’ve never run so fast in my life.” He shuddered at the memory. “I say, do you suppose Alban may have kept journaling all these years?”
“Sweet mercy, I wish.” Rand took a deep swallow of ale. “That occurred to me, too—what better evidence of his intention to kill Armstrong than a confession in his own hand? But my brother stopped writing years ago, when he realized he’d never devise a cipher I couldn’t break.”
Kit snorted. “Trying to encode secrets in a house with Rand Nesbitt—madness. The fool should have found a better hiding place.”
“Pardon?”
“I said he should have—”
“—found a better hiding place,” Rand repeated slowly. He ran his tongue over his teeth. “What if that’s exactly what he did?”
Kit frowned. “I must’ve had one ale too many. What are you—oh!” He sat up straighter. “Perhaps he began hiding his journals instead of encoding them?”
“Perhaps. He did seem rather determined to record his…well, the journals called them ‘experiments,’ but I always thought of them as sins. I never understood his writing obsession. Though, in hindsight…” He grimaced.
“What?”
Tasting bile rising in his throat, Rand washed it down with more ale. “He always had certain entries marked—usually the worst ones—and those pages were faded and creased, as if he’d handled them more frequently. I didn’t think anything of it as a child, but now I wonder…I suspect he returned to them often, to reread them. Relive them.”
Kit’s only response to that was a generous swig from his tankard.
They both nursed their ales for a spell, lost in thought. Kit finally broke the silence. “If he was still journaling, where would his writings be hidden?”
“I have no idea. But finding them is the best hope I’ve got.” Rand drained his ale and stood. “I must collect some things, talk to some people. I’ll leave for Hawkridge at dawn.”
Kit rose, too. “I’m coming with you. Your house can wait.”
SIXTY-ONE
RAND SHOWED UP in Trentingham’s entry hall days before Lily thought he would, and the moment she saw his face, she knew he had a new plan. Even from the top of the stairs, she could see hope shining in his eyes.
Her heart leapt in response. Without a thought for her sister standing beside her, she lifted her skirts and ran down and into his arms. “You’ve thought of something, haven’t you?”
“I have, yes.” He kissed her enthusiastically before continuing. “There’s no guarantee, of course, that it will work out, or that even if it does, the evidence will convince the marquess, but—”
“I say,” Kit Martyn interrupted from the doorway, “spit it out already, man.”
“Yes,” Rose yelled down the stairs. “Go on, tell us.” She started down to meet them, moving much more daintily than Lily had. “I’m likely to die of curiosity. We’ve all been wracking our brains for a solution—my sisters and I and our friend Judith—and I want to hear what you’ve come up with that our superior female minds missed.”
Rand laughed. “It’s Alban’s journal.”
Lily’s brow crinkled. “I thought you told me he stopped writing?”
“I thought he had. But it’s possible he simply began using a very good hiding spot. If that’s the case, all I have to do is find it, and I’d wager his plans to kill Bennett Armstrong will
