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The front door opened with a prolonged groan. Caty took a deep breath and prepared to plunge forward, but before she could another pair of footsteps slapped sharply across the floor.

“Ah, Elias,” said Mr. Croucher. “One would begin to think you were avoiding me.”

Elias stopped short. Caty could hear his labored breath through the crack in the bedroom door—another thing Elias had failed to fix.

“I don’t want to talk to thee,” Elias muttered, and Caty felt a surge of relief. Maybe, just this once, Elias had heeded her words and had realized that entering into a business with Mr. Croucher would bring nothing but trouble and debts. “Why won’t thee leave me be?”

“Why, Elias,” chided Mr. Croucher. “You know why.”

“Isn’t it enough?” The anguish in Elias’s voice pierced the warped wood of the door. “I’ve done as thee said. I’ve forsworn myself again and again.”

“Hardly.” Mr. Croucher sounded amused. “How can you forswear yourself when your creed forbids you to swear? Besides, none of it is outright lies. You’ve only . . . implied.”

“I told the lawyer I heard Elma at it.” Elias was whispering, but he was as bad at whispering as he was at running a dry goods store; Caty could hear him as clearly as if he’d shouted. “I told him I found her clothes lying in the room on the second floor when there was no one in the house but her and me and Levi.”

Caty fitted her eye against the crack. She could see Mr. Croucher’s hand on Elias’s arm, a red stone shining dully in the ring on his finger. “You told perfect truth. You did hear her—and you did see her clothes lying where they’d been pulled off her. You simply neglected to add that it was you there with her yourself—enjoying her favors.”

The wood of the door scraped Caty’s cheek. No. She couldn’t have heard what she thought she’d heard. She’d misunderstood. The idea of Elias—with Elma—no. It wasn’t possible. Mr. Croucher—he was worldly, a sinner, he judged everyone by his own standards. He might have seen—oh, Elias talking to Elma, as a good brother should.

Only as a brother! Yes, Elma had a taking way about her, and, yes, Elias enjoyed her sallies, but it was no more than he might have exchanged with Hope. It was just high spirits on Elma’s part and indulgence on Elias’s.

“Must thee needs remind me?” Elias hissed.

“I wouldn’t have you forget yourself—or what you owe me. But for me, they’d be on you now, you know. It would be all over the city, what you did—with her. You might have remembered to close the door. Or were you that eager to tup her that you forgot?”

“I would I’d never been born.”

Croucher clapped Elias on the back. “Come, it was a bit of sport. It’s what they’re made for, the pretty jades. Without women, hell would be like a lord’s great kitchen with no fire in it. You’d be a fool not to warm yourself by the blaze when it’s offered.”

Elias made a strangled noise.

Caty felt like her own throat was frozen, all of her was frozen, turned to a pillar of salt, like Lot’s wife. What was Sodom and Gomorrah to this? Her own husband . . . her own cousin! No. It was lies. It had to be lies.

Croucher went on, persuasively, “How were you to know the girl would get herself murdered by a jealous lover? No one need have known—and no one need know so long as you’re careful. I’ll see to it for you. If you abide by the terms we agreed.”

“I’ll do as thee says.” Elias’s voice was so low, Caty could hardly hear him. “What other choice have I?”

“None,” agreed Croucher genially. “You could tell the truth and shame the devil—but I don’t think they’d take well to that sort of thing in your meeting, do you?”

The stairs creaked beneath his tread as he ascended, whistling.

Elias yanked open the door to the bedroom and saw Caty standing there, white-faced. An expression of sheer panic crossed his face, so familiar and so strange. She had cupped that jaw. She had kissed those lips. She had stroked that hair.

And so had Elma.

Caty could scarcely force her lips to move. “Is it true?”

Elias pushed past her, making for the hook to hang up his cloak. “I have no idea what thee mean.”

“Elma—thee—” Caty couldn’t make herself say any more. It was too vile for words. Lies—it had to be lies.

But then why hadn’t Elias said so? Why hadn’t he fought back?

A hundred unbidden memories rushed in on her from the past three years. Elma, laughing up at Elias. Elma, lifting her skirt to show the steps of a dance and a good flash of ankle besides. Elma, asking Elias to help her tie the ribbon of one of the hats she’d trimmed so she might show it to them, and Elias chucking Elma under the chin and saying he hoped the face it adorned would be half so pretty as hers.

It had made her uneasy, but there’d been nothing in it, Caty was sure of it. How could there be? It was just Elma’s way, and the sooner she was safely married the better. And if she’d half wondered, there’d been nothing to give her pause when she came back to town. If anything, Elma had avoided Elias, leaving the front room as soon as he entered, stepping behind the curtain of the bed when she heard his step on the stair.

Elma—skulking out of her way. Caty had thought it was because she’d scolded her for the state the house was in.