Page 162 of Faceless

“It was not pleasant. Your uncle was as decent as a man of his rank could be in the asking. Pemberton was decent in his own way later. I bore both of them. They were the right questions, and someone had to ask them.”

He sighed. “Of course. I have known Pemberton’s work for years. He is the most exact counsel in London on this kind of matter, and a man Sterling has had occasion to dislike before. My uncle did well to retain him.”

“He said he had owed your uncle a favour since 1809.”

“He probably had. My uncle is a careful collector of such things.”

He almost smiled. It did not get further than the corner of his mouth, but she saw it begin, and saw him master it because the gaoler was at the wall, and the smile did not belong to a man under treason charge in the visiting room of the Tower. Then he looked at her again, and the smile, what there had been of it, was gone.

“Thank you for bearing… all of it.”

She did not answer that. She turned her hand under his and held it back, and they sat a moment in the quiet.

Darcy looked at her with that long, grave attention which had undone her first in darkness and would, she suspected, continue to undo her under any variety of legal circumstance the Crown might devise. “Elizabeth, this recent petition… it is a distraction, no more. The real danger — good God, I can hardly bear speaking it out loud. If the court finds against me —”

“They will not.”

He attempted a smile, but his face would not cooperate. “You are very certain.”

“No. I am very stubborn. The distinction is useful, and I recommend it to your notice.”

This time, the change in his expression was unmistakable. Not a smile; that would have been too easy, and they had not yet been given ease. But something in him reached towards her and stopped only because the room forbade the completion.

His thumb stroked the back of her hand. “You look tired.”

Of all the things he might have said, that was the most dangerous. She ought to have answered with some light contempt.

She heard herself say instead, “So do you.”

They held each other’s eyes over the table while the gaoler, who had the tact of a brick wall and perhaps more kindness than his office allowed him to display, examined nothing at the far side of the room.

“How are you kept? Your uncle commanded me explicitly to ask. I think he is looking for a chance to be offended by the court.”

“Better than I deserve, according to the newspapers, and worse than you would like, according to your face.” He glanced at the gaoler again. “I have books. Paper in limited quantities. A window. The society is poor but intermittent.”

“You omit to mention the view.”

“I was trying to spare you disappointment. It is chiefly stone and other men’s confinement.”

“Then London resembles itself more closely within the walls than without them.”

“It does. Without the better light.”

“You have candles, I hope?”

“Several more than I require, since my uncle’s solicitor sent in a stock that would furnish a small church.”

“Then you are better off than you were in November.”

He met her eyes, and the corner of his mouth lifted. “In November, I had a chamber, a fire that drew well, an agreeable supper companion, and a very soft bed. I shall not pretend to have improved my circumstances.”

Her fingers tightened in his. “Nor I. Matlock House, it turns out, is somewhat less appealing than a dark tower room in Scotland. But I expect we shall manage for the present.”

“You will manage. I cannot remember a single night I slept well in the bed in the mural chamber, and shall have none in any successor that is also six inches too short.”

“Then we are both wretchedly situated. Yours has a fireplace and a gaoler. Mine has the Countess’s lady’s-maid, who has formed strong views on the manner in which I wear my hair and is conducting the necessary corrections with a patience I find more frightening than any threat Sterling has yet produced.”

His face warmed a little. “Is that so?”