Page 24 of Twice Upon a Midnight

Martin tossed away that comment with a wave of his hand. “She wants to see you again, so make it happen,” he ordered. “Time and tide wait for no man!”

“For no printer and common laborer, you mean,” Spenser corrected. “It seems to stop all the time for the aristocracy.”

“Then make it stop for you. And for her.” He placed a fatherly hand on Spenser’s shoulder. “Look around you. You’re far from being a common laborer. Besides, you owe her an explanation, and she deserves to have you meet her in person to deliver it.”

Spenser nodded, his gaze fixed on the rain-wet street. Martin was right. He did owe her that. So he would find a way to meet with her and explain.

And then never see her again.

CHAPTER TWELVE

E

lla looked out the window of the town coach as it stopped in front of the grand Piccadilly house known as Albany and stared up at the façade. Seven bays wide in formal Palladian style, complete with Greco-Roman columns, pediments, and symmetry so perfect it was painful, the house had been turned into one of the most prestigious addresses in London.Albany.So famous—or was thatinfamous?—that it didn’t even require an article to introduce it. Just Albany…like the eponymous duchy of the royal duke who had once owned it. She only hoped the building’s foundation was far less damaged than the reputation of the duke it was named after.

In recent years, the building had been divided into rentable sets of rooms, most of which were let to society bachelors. Well, best to corral them all into one place, Ella supposed, then to let them roam unrestricted in the wild like packs of roving dogs.

“Or shoot them,” she muttered beneath her breath.

“Pardon?” her mother asked, distracted as she pulled her delicate kid gloves into place and checked the tiny pearl buttons at her wrists.

“I said…what a grand building,” Ella lied, knowing even as she said the words that the two utterances sounded nothing alike.

But if her mother noticed, she didn’t comment. Instead, Mama warned, “Remember, if anyone asks, we are here only upon your father’s bidding, conducting business on his behalf.”

“What kind of business?”

“Oh, who knows? Ladies aren’t expected to know the details of such things that exit in the provenance of men, just as men should know little to nothing about corsets.”

Ella bit her lip to keep from laughing. At least her mother’s unwitting sense of humor had brought Ella her first moment of distraction since leaving the print shop. But then her smile faded when she remembered why they were here.

The last man on their list resided in Albany.

They’d just left the next-to-last man—Mr. St John Radner who lived in a small but pretty terrace house near Hanover Square. Of course, she knew at first glance he wasn’t her Spenser. He was about a foot too short and as round as an apple, and instead of the dark brown hair she itched to run her fingers through, Mr. Radner was completely bald. If that wasn’t enough to prove he wasn’t her masked man, he was also happily married and promptly introduced Ella and her mother to his wife. They shared a pleasant conversation and a cream tea, and Ella would have enjoyed herself if in the back of her mind wasn’t the persistent knowledge that only one name remained.

The last manhadto be her Spenser, or she would be lost. She simply couldn’t tolerate the uncertainty that her future happiness might very well rest on an unaddressed letter left in a print shop, trusting it would arrive to the right man. She’d never been that lucky.

Her mother knocked lightly on the wall of the coach. The tiger opened the door and held out his hand to help them down. Ella took a steadying breath and followed her mother to the front door, where a uniformed footman blocked their way.

“Elizabeth, Duchess of Durham, and Lady Elenora Darby,” her mother told the man with an imperial air Ella doubted she would ever possess herself. “We are here to call on Simon Radcliff, Lord Walmesley”—then Mama’s imperiousness faltered—“regarding parliamentary business on behalf of the Duke of Durham. Would you be so kind as to inquire if the marquess is accepting callers?”

The footman blinked. Obviously, this was the first time a duchess and her daughter had called on anyone at the house. Nor would they have done so today if not for love and desperation…the two always seeming to go together. The poor footman didn’t know what to do except gape.

“Is there somewhere we can wait while you go up to his rooms to inquire if he’s at home?” Mama prompted when the man seemed at a complete loss at what to do.

“Oh yes, Your Grace! Of course.” The tips of his ears turned red as he opened the door and stepped aside to let them pass. “If you would, please wait right here in the entrance hall.”

Her mother smiled graciously. “Thank you.”

The man hurried away, down the hall and up the flight of stairs at the far end, disappearing into the grand building above.

The two women waited patiently in the elegant entry hall with its checkerboard marble floor and finely crafted woodwork, where a small gold and crystal chandelier dangled from the ceiling whose plasterwork was clearly inspired by Robert Adam. The fanlight above the door and tall windows in the twin stairways brightened the wide space even on today’s gray day. Ella immediately understood why the most notable unmarried members of thetonchose to live here—the entire building radiated luxury and exclusivity.

When Ella went to sit down on a velvet settee just inside the front door, her mother stopped her.

“No, dear,” Mama explained in a low voice. “For us to be here is borderline scandalous as it is—an unmarried miss should never call upon a bachelor in his rented rooms.” She shook her head at the settee. “Theverylastthing we should do is settle in as if we belong here.”

“But we called upon all the other men on our list without worrying about scandal.”