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“I saw that you had written some of your correspondence on carbon paper,” Norman remarked, “to keep copies for your records. Some clerks would simply paste those into the letter book, but that’s no good. Carbon copies smudge and fade. In a few years, you won’t be able to read a word of those. So I copied those letters by hand into the letter book.”

Reina leafed through the letter book, amazed by the pages of beautiful penmanship. “This is all so meticulous. How did you manage to accomplish so much in just a few days?”

“I enjoyed it, ma’am. I spent most of my life around ink and paper. Why, if I cut myself, I’d probably bleed Higgins’ Waterproof Black.”

Reina laughed. She reached for the lid of a polished wood documents box on the table. “What are we keeping in here?”

“That’s where I’ve put all the important papers I found so far,” Norman said. “Legal contracts and financial securities and such. The box should be locked, but I couldn’t find a key.”

“It disappeared months ago. The house ate it. I keep forgetting to take the box to a locksmith to have a new key made.”

“The maker’s mark is on the bottom of the box. If you wish, ma’am, I could write to the company on your behalf and request a replacement key.”

“Would you?”

“I also thought I might suggest . . . with your permission, ma’am . . . I could take a correspondence course in Pitman shorthand. I’m sure I would learn it very quickly. Then you could dictate letters and articles to me.”

A smile spread across her face. “I’d like that very much. I’ve needed a private secretary for a long time. It seems to me that you’re far more suited for this kind of work than being a footman. If it’s what you want, I’ll speak to Pembroke.”

“Thank you, ma’am. I would be grateful.”

While Norman resumed pasting labels on folders, Reina continued to page through the letter book, admiring the fine Copperplate script. “Did you like working in your family’s sign-painting business?” she asked.

“Very much, ma’am.”

“May I ask why you left it?”

“I . . .” Norman set down the little bottle of gum arabic, with its tiny brush cap.

“I didn’t mean to pry,” Reina said hastily, as she saw his shadowed expression.

“It’s quite all right, ma’am. I’ve always lied whenever someone asked me that question, but I don’t want to lie to you. The truth is, I was cut off by my family. Parents and siblings, aunts, uncles, my grandfather . . . all of them.”

“I’m so sorry. Was it the forgery?”

“No, ma’am, it happened long before that. It was . . . you see, I . . . fell in love with the wrong person.”

Reina gave a baffled shake of her head. “How very harsh of them. How could that turn your entire family against you?”

It seemed to cost Norman something to look at her. He cleared his throat softly before saying, “The wrong kind of person.”

Then Reina understood. She gave him a long, sorrowful look, having no idea what to say. Any words that came to mind were somehow too much and yet not enough. Finally she brought herself to ask, “Is there a wrong kind of person to love?”

And Norman smiled slightly, as if comforted.

Chapter Nineteen

A Bridge Too Far

Are you sure you can spare Norman?” Reina asked the next day, as she and Pembroke rode through Stanhope Gate, the Mayfair access to Hyde Park. “I hate to burden you and the rest of the staff with his household duties while he works as my secretary.”

“Believe me, no one will notice. Norman hasn’t exactly been a whirlwind of activity.”

“He is now,” she said with a touch of smugness. “He doesn’t even like to stop for teatime. And after he finishes the Pitman shorthand course, he said he’d like to learn how to operate a typewriter. The timing couldn’t be better in light of all the work I’ll be doing for the women’s bank.”

They entered the park, where another world opened before them, a misty countryside girdled with broad, tree-lined paths. Expanses of open lawn were still recovering from winter, with patches of tender green bristle beginning to emerge. A cloud of redwings undulated over plane trees whose bare branches glittered with rime.

The air was alive with the perfume of a London spring. Frost had drawn a figlike sweetness from the plane leaves. Smells of wet gravel and black earth, the raw green slickness of moss, the mustiness of brown oak leaves and bird feathers, the pungent whiff of manure, the acrid bites of coal smoke and burnt wood, and the balmy softness of the nearby Serpentine, all mingled in an invigorating warlock’s broth.