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The innkeeper had no recollection of two ladies traveling together, and his guest ledger confirmed this.
Longmore moved away, to talk to Sophy. “We might as well stop,” he told her. “There’s little we can do at this hour.”
“But you said the sun would be up soon, near four o’clock,” she said. She took up the pocket watch that dangled from the belt of her carriage dress. “It’s only half past two.”
“And you look like the very devil,” he said. “You need to sleep.”
“I slept in the carriage,” she said.
She’d slept against his shoulder, her hat’s absurd decorations tickling his chin now and again. She’d sink lower and lower, then, at a certain point, she’d wake with a start.
He thought it was adorable—an odd thought to have about Sophy, but there it was. She was a complicated girl. That was what made her so interesting. That and the delicious mouth and smell and perfect figure.
“It wasn’t proper sleep,” he said. “The fact remains, you look like the devil.” Ignoring her protests, he hired a room for her and ordered a meal as well. And a maid. Someone needed to get her out of her clothes and into bed. It had better not be him, or no one would get any rest.
Sophy had only the dimmest memory of what had happened after they reached the inn. Weariness had welled up, a massive wave, which must have been building for weeks. It had simply swamped her. She could barely keep her eyes open, let alone continue arguing with Longmore.
She did remember his fussing over her and ordering everybody about. He’d insisted on a maid for her, and she dimly recalled the maid chattering at her as they went up the stairs to the room he’d hired. He’d had a light meal sent up and Sophy had eaten it, surprised at how hungry she was. She’d washed and undressed with—considering the hour—the maid’s extremely cheerful and patient help. Longmore must have given the girl a large gratuity.
Tired as she was, Sophy hadn’t expected to sleep. The longer they’d searched, the more anxious she’d become about Lady Clara. She’d persuaded Longmore that his sister was safe with Davis watching out for her, but Sophy hadn’t persuaded herself.
Yet sleep she must have done, since the noise woke her. She was so groggy that it took a moment to realize someone was beating on the door.
She bolted upright, heart pounding, to see early-morning sunlight streaming in through the window. How long had she slept?
She stumbled out of bed, found her dressing gown on the chair nearby, and was pulling it on when she heard Longmore’s voice. “Where’s the confounded maid?”
Sophy ran to the door and flung it open.
Longmore stood in the corridor, fully dressed in the same clothes he’d been wearing when they arrived. Had he not slept? He hadn’t shaved, certainly. The shadow along his jaw made him look more dangerous than ever.
“Clara’s here,” he said.
“Here? In the inn?”
“No,” he said. “That is, if she has, nobody’s told me. But she hasn’t left Portsmouth yet. I shouldn’t have wakened you—”
“You shouldn’t have let me sleep,” she said.
“Never mind that. I need your help. People get suspicious when a man seems to be hunting a young woman. They become less than candid. Fenwick lacks your charming methods of extracting information from the unwilling, and I’m having trouble holding onto my temper.”
“You’ve been searching, without me,” she said reproachfully.
He stepped over the threshold and she took two steps back. He looked down at her feet. She did, too. They were bare.
“Where are your slippers?” he said.
Without waiting for an answer, he strode to the bed, found the slippers, and gestured at a chair. She sat. “I can put on my own—”
“You’re not even awake.” He knelt and took her foot and slid it into the slipper. He paused, his hand still on her foot, and stared for what seemed a very long time.
“I’m awake,” she said. “I can do that.”
He came out of his trance and put the other slipper on, then stood. “You shouldn’t run about barefoot in public hostelries,” he said.
“I wasn’t running about—and you shouldn’t have been searching without me.”
“You needed sleep,” he said. “You’ve needed it this age, I’ll wager anything. You keep ridiculous hours.”
“I’m a working woman,” she said.
“You ought to give it up.”
“What?”
“The whole thing’s absurd,” he said. “Your sister married a duke. I told Clevedon . . .” he trailed off.
“What did you tell him?”
“Never mind that now,” he said.
“I certainly will mind it now,” she said.
“Do you want to find Clara or do you want to quarrel?” he said.
“Preferably both,” she said.
“Don’t aggravate me,” he said. “I haven’t time to throttle you. Fenwick and I were up at dawn’s crack—”
“Without me.”
“Without you,” he said. “Some infernal gun went off. I’m informed that it does so twice a day, sunrise and sunset. After that I saw no point in trying to sleep. I took Fenwick to the docks. It took a while for me to find the area we wanted, but we did eventually. We found out which passenger ships had left since the earliest time Clara could have arrived. We’re reasonably sure she wasn’t aboard any of them. But I can explain all that later. I only came to tell you to make haste.”
“Very well.”
She rose from the chair and stumbled to the washstand. In spite of the abrupt awakening, she was still muddle-headed. She filled the bowl with water and washed her face. That improved matters. She was drying her face when she saw his, behind her, in the mirror.
“Can’t you go any faster?” he said.
“It will take me at least half an hour without a maid’s help,” she said.
“I don’t know where she went or what she’s doing,” he said. “All I know is that when I asked for one a moment ago, I was told, ‘Straightaway.’ That could mean hours from now. The place is a madho
use. Most of the servants seem to be in the dining room, running frantically hither and yon, serving breakfast.”
He waved at the carriage dress she’d worn yesterday, which the maid had hung carefully over a chair. “Just throw it on, can’t you? We’re not going to a fashion parade.”
“I can’t just throw it on! How can you be so obtuse?”
“Easily,” he said. “It wants no effort at all.”
Later, when she had time, when she could see straight, she was going to hit him with something bigger than a brick.
She found her chemise and petticoats and corset, and laid them out on the bed. Tired and cross—and maybe because she was who she was and couldn’t resist playing with fire—she pulled off her dressing gown, then the nightdress.
She would have done the same thing had she been with her sisters and in a great hurry to be gone from somewhere. She was well aware she wasn’t with her sisters.
“Damnation!”
She glanced back at him as she pulled on her chemise. He’d turned his back on her nakedness.
That was funny. Her mood lightened a degree. “You could try sending for the maid,” she said.
“Not for worlds,” he said.
“Then look,” she said. “I don’t care. I’m not modest.”
That was no lie. Merely because she made clothes for a living didn’t mean she was shy about being unclothed. Even in front of him. Or, rather, especially in front of him. She was a Noirot, after all.
“I’m not looking,” he said. “I’m not modest either, but I need to keep my wits about me. By Jupiter, you’re the very devil.”
She stepped into her drawers and tied the tapes at the waist. She donned the petticoat and tied it. She arranged the corset on the bed and started lacing it.
“What’s taking so long?” he said. He turned. “What in the name of Satan and all his minions are you doing?”
“It’s one of the new corsets Marcelline invented,” she said. “One can do it up oneself. But the maid didn’t understand how it worked, and I was too tired to explain clearly enough, it seems. She untied the lacing, and I need to—”
