“Mind you don’t get obstreperous, Fournier.” Sycamore Dorning peered up at the staid façade of Belcher and Sons. A discreet brass plaque near the door was the only hint that the premises housed a solicitors’ office. “Lawyers gossip, despite their much-vaunted discretion.”
“I am counting on them gossiping, which is why you have accompanied me. The point of the errand is not only to see Miss Fairchild’s execrable butler sacked, but also to send a message to the lawyers. She has allies.”
“She certainly has a champion in you,” Dorning muttered. “One hears that you take an interest in the occasional impecunious émigré, but why her, Fournier?”
Because Dorning himself had asked it of him? “I am nobody’s champion. I am merely seeing a note delivered.” And yet, Dorning, with his usual ability to sniff currents in the wind, had sensed a truth. Catherine Fairchild’s situation had piqued Xavier’s protective instincts, and that was a very bad thing indeed.
“A note that will result in a respected retainer being turned out on his ear. Why did you take old Deems into such dislike?”
To appearances, they were two gentlemen stopping to pass the time on an overcast spring day. The sky had that undecided look, as if making up its mind whether to rain in the next fifteen minutes or this afternoon, or both—this was London—but rain, it would.
Xavier, however, was using the moment to assess the surrounds. No potted heartsease on the stoop, no daffodils blooming in the small patch beneath the lamppost. The brass plate was shiny, the door freshly painted an uninspired dark green. The bricks of the façade could use a new coat of whitewash. The shutters were overdue for blacking. The railing along the steps was spindly and also in want of paint.
Not shabby, exactly, but… stingy. Penny-pinching. Was that a good quality or a bad quality in a wealthy young lady’s attorneys?
“Old Deems, as you call him, is disrespectful toward his employer. He brought weak tea up from the kitchen and tried to keep me from seeing Miss Fairchild. She was loath to close the parlor door on a chilly day, a simple act of pragmatism that should not earn the censure of a lady’s staff. She cannot trust her butler, and he all but manages the household.”
Dorning made a face. “How do you know she does not trust him?”
An older woman, companion in tow, exited the premises. She was well dressed—brown velvet carriage dress, fashionable bonnet, embroidered lace parasol despite the gloomy day. Her companion was also well attired, if modestly so, and the companion’s boots were either new or had new heels.
Belcher had some wellborn clients, then, though attorneys would discreetly call on clients who were true aristocrats. Across the street, Lord Fortescue Armbruster was chatting up some dandified sprig, and the passing traffic included more than a few crested carriages.
“What is a butler’s first duty, Dorning?”
Dorning tipped his hat to the ladies as they passed. “In the old-fashioned sense, a butler handles the bottles. He decides when to decant wine purchased in casks, if his employer doesn’t express an opinion. He oversees the cellars and the drinks pantry and chooses which bottles to send up based on the menus devised by the lady of the house. In these modern times, he also manages the male staff and can serve as house steward in smaller establishments.”
“And yet,” Xavier said, advancing to the door, “Miss Fairchild came to buy her own wine, without her butler, without a footman who answers to that butler, and without troubling the coachman or grooms who might receive their wages from that butler. She did not consult that butler regarding the selection of a hearty red meant to accompany a beef dinner.”
Dorning paused outside the door. The knocker was small, a brass lion with a ring in its mouth, though one did not knock at a commercial establishment.
“If an English butler knows one class of wines in particular,” Dorning said, “it’s the clarets that go well with good British beef. I concede you might have a point.”
“Such flattery from one I so highly esteem will give me palpitations du coeur.”
“You speak Frog when you want to avoid honest feelings,” Dorning said, hand on the door latch. “Rather like I signal an intent to attack by looking left.” He sailed over the threshold on that observation and did what Xavier had brought him along to do and what he did so well—played the charming lordling while setting all about him aflutter.
Within five minutes, clerks had taken hats, coats, and walking sticks, despite the lack of an appointment. Xavier and his escort were shown to a fussy little parlor overstuffed with old tomes and a few disintegrating editions of La Belle Assemblée. A tea tray arrived a few moments later, followed by no less personage than Frampton Belcher, senior partner, who offered bows all around.
Belcher’s pale blue eyes held speculation where Xavier was concerned. His manner through the introductions was that blend of bluff good cheer, deference, and self-importance that characterized successful shopkeepers.
And successful swindlers. The luxurious appointments in Belcher’s private office suggested he might be a bit of both.
“Our call is an occasion for some delicacy,” Dorning said, assuming a wing chair before it had been offered. “We bring you tidings from Miss Catherine Fairchild.”
Dorning had chosen the grouping before the hearth—which held only a dying gesture in the direction of a fire—rather than allow Belcher the advantage of sitting behind his desk. Belcher thus had no choice but to gesture Xavier into a chair before assuming one himself.
“Miss Fairchild’s bereavement is much to be pitied,” Belcher said. “Her parents loved her dearly.”
Platitudes that did not even admit Miss Fairchild was a client. Dorning withdrew her note from his breast pocket and passed it over to Belcher.
“We come as her emissaries,” Dorning said. “You are to establish a pension for her butler, Deems, payable directly to him at the address of his choosing for the rest of his natural days, effective immediately. Miss Fairchild has chosen the Wentworth bank for this transaction and asks you to have an appropriate principal sum moved for that purpose.”
Belcher’s expression did not change, but his gaze narrowed as he read Miss Fairchild’s missive. “This will take some time. I must meet with Miss Fairchild, authenticate her direction, consult with her present bankers…”
Dorning affected puzzlement. “You do not recognize your client’s signature, Mr. Belcher? In recent months, you have had to handle not one but two estates on the family’s behalf, and even I know that requires a great deal of signed paperwork from the beneficiary. Then too, Miss Fairchild inherited significant sums from her uncle, and that would also necessitate that you become familiar with her signature—or do I mistake the matter?”
Calculation, or recalculation, filled the ensuing silence.
“I recognize this as her signature,” Belcher said, visually dismissing Xavier as the lackey brought along to serve as a witness. “I do not encourage my clients to act in haste following a bereavement, Mr. Dorning. One’s judgment at such a time—”
“Miss Fairchild’s guidance is quite clear,” Dorning said. “Deems has served long and loyally and has earned his recompense. With the death of Lord Fairchild, the butler should all but expect to be granted retirement. That you have not suggested pensioning him surprises me. Good help becomes much more difficult to hire as the Season advances.”
Xavier had had to point that out to Dorning, who probably thought trustworthy butlers sprang from the head of Zeus on command.
“I will send to the agencies,” Belcher said on a sigh. “When we have a replacement in hand who can meet the standard Deems has—”
“Deems will be given the happy news tomorrow morning,” Dorning said, rising, “and he will be free to quit the metropolis by sundown. You will deal with the bankers this afternoon, and Miss Fairchild has already chosen Deems’s replacement. Thank you for giving this matter your utmost attention, Belcher. I will be sure to remark your attentiveness when next I am in conversation with my brothers. Miss Fairchild is available should the bankers need any signatures from her, though of course they will have to call on her privately, given the circumstances.”
Dorning beamed lordly benevolence at the solicitor and gave Xavier a moment to bow as well. Xavier adopted the demeanor of a well-mannered aide-de-camp embarrassed by his superior officer’s high-handedness and left the interview without having uttered a single word.
“That went well,” Dorning said. “You are correct, though, that something doesn’t smell right. Why would Belcher drag his feet implementing a predictable decision on Catherine’s part when she’s in a position to sack him?”
That had not occurred to Xavier. “With two estates to settle, she’d sack her solicitors?”
Dorning rested his walking stick against his shoulder. “Lady Fairchild’s late brother is the source of most of Catherine’s wealth. Using her maternal family’s solicitors for the estate matters makes more sense than sticking with Lord Fairchild’s firm.”
“Because Catherine is illegitimate?” Xavier asked.
“Because the money comes from the maternal side of the family,” Dorning said. “Those solicitors are already familiar with the investments, the real property, the contractual obligations. Belcher has no grasp of those factors, and why should Catherine pay for his education?”
“She should not. Do you know which firm her uncle used?”
“I can find out, or you could simply ask her.”
On the far walkway, Lord Fortescue parted from his companion and dodged vehicles to cross the street. He nodded to Dorning, passed an indifferent glance over Xavier, and let himself into Belcher’s office.
“You don’t care for Lord Fortescue?” Dorning asked.
“He buys good brandy and doesn’t pay for it,” Xavier said as a breeze scented with horse droppings wafted by. “Loses the invoices, swears he sent along payment, then orders more. I do not do business with him, and I warned Goddard not to do business with him. By mutual agreement, the colonel and I are both out of whatever vintage Lord Fortescue needs.”
“Don’t be too hard on the fellow,” Dorning said. “We younger sons don’t have it easy. For all that Armbruster’s a dashing blade turned out in the first stare now, his nickname at school was Lord Fartescue. Lord Fart for short.”
The English did have their endearing qualities. “What was your nickname?”
Dorning swung his walking stick. “Dimwitted Dorning. Don’t tell Jeanette. I was never much of one for the books. You’ll be at Angelo’s on Tuesday?”
“Depend upon it, and by the time I am done with you, you will be able to best all six of your brothers at once.”
“I already can,” Dorning said, assaying a roguish smile, “with my rapier wit and my signature charm. If I could beat Ash with foils from time to time, I’d be forever in your debt.”
Xavier bowed. “Consider it done, and my thanks for your assistance today.”
“You will explain the situation to Catherine?”
“Most assuredly.”
“Until Tuesday, then.” Dorning saluted with his walking stick as he would have with a foil and strode off.
Xavier turned his steps in the opposite direction. Lord Fart. He would pass that appellation on to Goddard, who had a former soldier’s fine, if irreverent, sense of humor.
Though why would a lordling who did not pay the trades number among Belcher’s callers? Xavier let that question drift to the back of his mind as he spied a footman out walking some nearby household’s pet canine.
A fine, sizable beast with a silky coat and waving tail. One of the Dorning brothers raised and trained dogs, then sold them for exorbitant sums to dandies and Corinthians, also to lonely dowagers and spinsters.
Xavier liked dogs, but then, he liked cats and horses too.
He also, somewhat to his dismay, liked Catherine Fairchild. On that thought, he crossed the street and took himself in the direction of Soho, where he was certain to find decent French cuisine and the music of his native language spoken in all its delightful variety.
“You have a caller.” Deems held the card tray out to Catherine, though his air of injured dignity spoke more articulately than the violet lettering on the linen stock. “I again reminded Monsieur that this is a house of mourning and further indicated that the hour is inappropriate for a condolence call. His reply was less than well-mannered.”
Good for Monsieur. “You will please show him in.”
Deems drew himself up, then left Catherine’s private parlor with a disparaging glance at the window she’d opened.
Le vieil âne. She’d found Fournier’s characterization of Deems fortifying. Monsieur’s presence in her parlor was a tonic of a different magnitude.
“If you please,” he said to Deems, “a tea tray is in order. You will be sure the kitchen uses a proper quantity of leaves this time and sends along a few sandwiches. The noon hour approaches, and Miss Fairchild’s appetite must not be neglected.”
Deems pokered up again. “Anything else, miss?”
“Thank you, no.”
The look Deems gave Fournier should have withered the ferns potted beneath the window. The butler withdrew on a single shallow bow aimed in Catherine’s direction.
“He was never this bad when my parents were alive,” she said, rising and offering Fournier her hand. “Papa said Deems lent the household consequence, so Mama and I put up with him.”
Catherine wasn’t wearing gloves, and too late, she realized Fournier wasn’t either. Such a warm grasp he had.
“You have not yet given Deems the happy news of his impending retirement. Wise of you. The element of surprise should never be surrendered lightly. I found this among the post at the front door.”
He passed over a sealed missive, no return address.
“You snoop through my mail now?”
“Somebody does, else why leave those letters lying on the sideboard hours after they arrive? This is from Mr. Belcher, I believe.”
Catherine looked more closely at the letter. “How can you tell?”
“That is a clerk’s fine hand on the direction. The paper is good quality, but not too good, and also clean, meaning it was delivered by messenger from somewhere in London. No franking, no postage due. Besides,”—one corner of his mouth kicked up—“I prevailed upon Mr. Sycamore Dorning to accompany me when I delivered your note to Belcher’s offices yesterday.”
Catherine resumed her seat. “Involving the Dornings was a very great presumption on your part, monsieur.” How did she feel about that? She knew Sycamore Dorning in passing, knew he was protective of his wife and family and that he ran a gaming hell doing business as a fancy supper club.
What did it say about Catherine’s life that her half-brother dwelled a few streets away, and her knowledge of him was limited to a handful of sentences?
“May I?” Fournier gestured to the wing chair.
“Please do have a seat.”
“I did not presume so much as I exercised strategic deference to a man in a better position to gain Belcher’s attention. Dorning issued Belcher’s orders in a manner Belcher understood. That little letter should confirm that a pension account has been set up for Deems at the Wentworth bank, payments to be sent wherever Deems pleases. You have only to explain his good fortune to him, and he’s off to enjoy a well-earned reward.”
“And what am I to do for a butler until I can hire one from the agencies?”
“Do you need a butler?”
Not a question Catherine would have thought to ask. Many households made do without, particularly households having few social obligations.
“I have two footmen, an underfootman, a potboy, a gardener who doubles as our man-of-all-work, plus a groom, undergroom, and coachman. That is eight male staff who must look to somebody to settle their squabbles and hand out their pay packets. Somebody must count the silver and inventory the wine. Somebody must ensure the footmen apply themselves to their tasks rather than to dicing away the afternoon at The Boar’s Bride.”
“And you,” Monsieur said, “are itching to be that somebody.”
Catherine looked about the parlor, the one room in the house where she’d insisted on imposing her will. No crepe covered the mirrors, no black silk bands adorned the silhouettes of Mama and Papa hanging over the sideboard. The clock ticked along rather than remain frozen at the hour of anybody’s death, and a vase of daffodils graced the quarter shelves.
“When we lived on the Continent,” she said, “I grew accustomed to organizing my father’s household. A diplomat entertains a great deal, and we had to rely on what local staff were willing to work for an Englishman. Mama was sick for some time before she admitted anything was wrong—probably for years, now that I think back on it—and I took over her duties to the extent that I could.”
A tap sounded on the door.
“Come in,” Catherine called. The tea tray had been entrusted to Harry, the first footman. He was young, blond, and on the tall side. A credit to his livery, as Mama had said. He set the tray before Catherine without even looking at Fournier, though Fournier was doubtless taking in every detail of Harry’s person.
“Thank you, Harry, that will be all.”
He bowed and withdrew.
“That one is in love with you,” Fournier said.
“You shall cease making shocking declarations for the sheer deviltry of it. Harry can’t be but eighteen years old. He falls in love on the hour, to hear my housekeeper tell it.”
“Then your hour has come, and you might as well enjoy it. Shall I pour?”
“Please.” Enjoy a footman’s infatuation? Catherine was beyond such folly, though she did enjoy Fournier’s audacity. While he navigated the tea tray with careless grace, Catherine read Belcher’s letter.
“Sycamore made an impression,” she said, putting the letter aside. “I am reminded that in future I need only send along a note, and my devoted solicitors will deem it their greatest privilege to see to my needs.”
“Unctuous words,” Fournier replied. “How much honey do you prefer?
“Just a drop to smooth out the bitterness.”
He fixed her tea in silence and passed over the cup and saucer. Another brush of warmth, accompanied by a glance that took far too much notice of Catherine’s word choice.
“Are you bitter, Miss Fairchild? A double loss such as you’ve suffered could have that result.”
Oh yes, she was bitter, but her parents’ deaths had nothing to do with her grim outlook. She took a sip of her tea—good and strong—and thought about her reply. Fournier had a nose for falsehoods, so a version of the truth would have to serve.
Then too, she did not want to lie to him. She lied enough in the course of a normal day as it was.
“I took too long to realize Mama was ill. Papa knew, but he respected Mama’s wishes to say nothing. He was somewhat older than she and had lived a vigorous life. His death took me quite aback. I had assumed…”
Catherine took another sip of tea, the only dilatory tactic at hand.
“Yes?”
“Aren’t you having any tea, monsieur?”
He poured a second cup, the steam curling up through the midday sunshine. “You assumed you had a secure place as your Papa’s unpaid secretary, from which you could make a graceful transition into spinsterhood, non? Your mother apparently endorsed that plan, and I ask myself why. You are well educated, likely fluent in several languages. You have a fine grasp of world affairs. You are well-read and sensible. You are lovely—also wealthy now—and yet, your mother held out no wish for you to marry well. This puzzles me.”
Catherine set down her tea cup rather than fling it at Monsieur’s handsome, puzzled head. “I am not lovely. I am too tall and too”—she waved her hand over her person—“not-willowy, and my eyes are the wrong color. I do not wish to take a husband, monsieur. If your interest in my situation is motivated by matrimonial ambitions, you may leave now.”
Fournier did a better job of dithering over a sip of tea than Catherine had. She watched while he silently rearranged arguments, chose tactics, and formed a battle plan all in the time it took him to drink, study the flowers on the porcelain saucer, and set his cup aside.
“France has been a mess for decades,” he said. “Before the revolution, for most of Louis’s reign, we were in a state of upheaval. Bad harvests, corrupt government, a king who turned up practical, to the frustration of his nobles, and fanciful, to the frustration of his subjects. Then the Reign of Terror, then the first White Terror. Bonaparte’s greatest attribute was that he drew us out of chaos for a time, though now chaos has descended again.”
“That chaos touched you.” It had to have, and in a personal way. The French ultraroyalists were determined to wipe out any legacy of the revolution and the empire, but even they could not turn the clock back thirty years for an entire country.
Fournier rose and went to the window, standing so that he could see into the garden while Catherine could yet study his face.
“Napoleon understood that the wineries had value,” Fournier said, “so my family fared better than most. We did what we could, but it was never enough, and sometimes… On a des regrets.”
One has regrets.
Yes, one did, and those regrets could make a woman churlish and ungracious.
“Finish your tea,” Catherine said. “Have a sandwich, or the kitchen will mutter about presuming Frenchmen and food going to waste.”
He lingered by the window, probably for form’s sake. One did not tell Xavier Fournier what to do, a quality Catherine both understood and approved of.
“You should trust me,” he said, resuming his seat. “Jousting with you is enjoyable, and I do respect your caution, mademoiselle. Nonetheless, you may be assured that, like you, I have no interest in matrimony. Like you, I have sufficient means that I look askance at anybody who seeks to curry my favor. Like you, I cannot tolerate the company of fools. I have nothing to gain by taking an interest in your situation, and besides,”—he passed Catherine a plate and held out the tray of sandwiches—“the Dornings would ruin me were I to serve you a bad turn.”
Catherine chose two sandwiches of watercress, butter, and soft cheese. Now that food was before her, she was hungry.
“They cannot call on me, but they can ruin you?”
“Most assuredly. Sycamore Dorning is married to the sister of one Colonel Orion Goddard. Goddard runs Dorning’s fancy club, and he also owns vineyards. Goddard is assisting me to learn the new technique for making champagne. His champagne sparkles, mine has bubbles. My English is not adequate to describe the difference, but his champagne is far superior to the eye, if not the palate. Should Goddard take me into dislike, I am finished as a London wine merchant. His clarets cannot compare to mine, but he is an English war hero connected by his sister’s marriage to a large and titled family. I am merely a homesick Frenchman.”
Catherine ate her sandwiches and considered that speech, which appeared to adhere to relevant facts.
“Are you truly homesick?”
He topped up her tea. “In the manner you miss your mother, I suppose. Her passing leaves a terrible void, but you would never have wished to prolong her suffering. I miss France, but I do my part here, building a London business that helps me rebuild what was lost in France.”
An interesting analogy. “Except that you can travel to France anytime you please.” Or could he? Royalists, republicans, and revolutionaries had each taken turns in and out of power in France, meaning everybody was somebody’s enemy.
Fournier rose. “Enough gloomy talk, mademoiselle. I brought along somebody I would like you to meet. He awaits us in the mews, and surely you trust me enough to stroll with me in your own garden on such a pretty day?”
Catherine had learned not to trust charming men who professed to offer friendship. Still, Fournier had spoken honestly—the Dornings could ruin him—and she was sick to her soul of her own house.
“Let me fetch a cloak and bonnet,” she said. “And you have my thanks for resolving the situation with Deems.”
“Thank him profusely for years of loyal service, pass him a bank draft, and tell him a room has been reserved for him at your expense at Whitaker’s Hotel.”
“Has it?”
“Of course, though I doubt he will tarry long in London. I will await you in the foyer, Miss Fairchild.” He bowed politely, while Catherine took another sandwich from the tray and used the back stairs to get up to her room. She did not trust Fournier, but she liked him.
She hadn’t ever thought to like an unmarried adult male again. How odd that it should be a somewhat arrogant, homesick Frenchman who challenged her assumption.