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“You’d better be careful,” Charlotte warned. “Cassie’s just acquired a lawyer!”
“What?”
“She has just acquired Daniel to argue for her, if she should need it,” Charlotte repeated.
“She is perfectly capable of arguing for herself!” Jemima replied. Then she turned to Daniel. “I’m sorry, but we are going to need your skills for someone less able. Patrick will tell you…after dinner.” She turned away and took Cassie’s hand, talking to her all the way up the stairs and round the corner, onto the landing.
Daniel stared at Charlotte, trying to gather how much she knew. It was a skill he had attempted all his life. He had never grown out of the feeling that she knew everything he did, and more. Did she still read him with such ease?
“Be careful,” she said quietly. “Jemima is a little…romantic.” He was about to ask her more, but she turned and led the way into the drawing room, where Pitt and Patrick were standing, staring at the last of the sun on the poplar trees, whose leaves were flickering. They were talking of the boats that had taken them past all the historic places, from Westminster Bridge, past the Tower of London, with Traitor’s Gate opening onto the water, Execution Dock where pirates had been drowned in olden times, the beautiful Queen Anne architecture of the Greenwich Naval College, and on down south toward the estuary, Gravesend, and ultimately the sea.
They greeted each other and Daniel continued listening to the account of their day. Then Jemima returned, and they all went to the dining room to eat.
The conversation returned to the day out on the river. Daniel was interested and amused by Jemima’s patriotic pride in the city of her birth, showing through her attempts to smother it and be sensitive to Patrick’s very clearly mixed emotions. Daniel was pleased to catch Patrick’s eye more than once and see the amusement in it. After all, Jemima had lived in America for four years, quite a bit of it in Washington, and Daniel profoundly hoped she had kept her comments about the merits of London to herself. She was more discreet now than she had been in the past. Was that marriage? Or perhaps it was also living in a new place where she was not well known, in a culture with which she was unfamiliar. She was definitely less critical, and Daniel liked that, but it was still a d
ifference from the Jemima he knew and was so comfortable with.
Daniel, whose mind had not been far from Philip Sidney and the Thorwoods since Patrick had first told him, realized he was holding his knife and fork so tightly that his knuckles were white. He caught his father’s eye and wondered what he was thinking, if he knew anything about Philip Sidney and the assault on Rebecca Thorwood. He held his gaze for several moments and still could not tell. He felt oddly isolated at the table, even though this was his family.
After dinner, Patrick excused himself to take a short walk in the garden. He glanced at Daniel, almost said something, then changed his mind.
There was an awkward moment. Jemima looked at Patrick, then at Daniel.
No one spoke.
Then Jemima seemed to make up her mind. She turned to Charlotte. “Mama, let me tell you about my house. I so much want you to be able to see it in your mind’s eye.” She smiled, as if it were important to her, then included Pitt almost nervously: “Papa? Would you be interested?”
Pitt saw her eagerness. “Of course I would. Before we visit one day.”
Daniel saw Jemima’s shoulders relax as she slipped her arm through her father’s. Was she really that excited about the house? Or to leave Daniel alone with Patrick? And did Charlotte and Pitt know that, which was why they had agreed so easily?
Patrick opened the French doors and stepped into the evening garden. Daniel went out after him, closing the doors firmly. He caught up with Patrick on the grass. The earth smelled rich from a sudden shower of rain earlier. Above them, a flock of starlings flew up from the hedge next door and scattered into the air.
Patrick watched them, the light in his face showing his pleasure at the beauty of it. Daniel wondered how often Jemima had told him about the garden, or about the climbing roses, now twelve or fourteen feet over the pergola.
It was a moment before he spoke, and Daniel waited.
“We’ve done it,” Patrick said simply. His voice was tight, emotional, but it was difficult to tell whether it was entirely triumphant. There was a strong note of anxiety as well.
Daniel noted that he had said “we” and not “I.” “Done it?” he asked.
“The police have arrested Sidney for embezzlement.”
Daniel could see in the half-light that Patrick was staring at him, waiting. “Embezzlement?” he asked with surprise. “From whom? He’s only been back for a couple of weeks! Embezzlement takes ages.”
“From the British Embassy in Washington,” Patrick replied. “That’s British territory…”
“Embezzlement,” Daniel repeated. “Then he must have been doing that when he was there! And somebody’s just discovered it now? A bit…convenient, isn’t it?”
“Not for Sidney,” Patrick replied wryly. “But if he was guilty all the time, it’s not so surprising if, when you discover one thing and look at it carefully, it leads to another, and maybe another after that!”
Daniel studied what he could see of Patrick’s face in the soft, almost diffused light of the setting sun, which was still well above the horizon and staining the air with color. Patrick was not elated, but there was hope in his face.
“You believe it?” Daniel asked. “Really? I know you want to have him tried over here, where he’s got no diplomatic immunity, and certainly nowhere to run to—I understand that. Most of me wants it, too…”
“Most?”
“Part of me wishes you could find Thorwood was wrong and it wasn’t Sidney at all.”
