A Lily Among Thorns (26 page)

“Yes, and your father never got another tutoring job, I promise you!” Hathaway said sharply.

Solomon knew that already. He knew that his father had lost his job. He knew that Uncle Hathaway had supported the young couple until his father finished divinity school and a small living was found for him back in Shropshire by a patron of the family—a much more modest living in a much smaller parish than William Hathaway’s brilliant academic career had foreshadowed. He knew, too, that Uncle Hathaway did not quite approve of their mother. Uncle Hathaway had always tried to hide it, but over twenty-six years, things slipped out.

In the past, Solomon had always shrugged and ignored it. His mother had explained once that Uncle Hathaway just didn’t like the gentry, because he dealt with them so much in his shop. Suddenly, Solomon wasn’t sure that was the reason. And if it would make things easier for Serena, he wanted to know what the reason was.

“Father likes being a pastor,” he said neutrally. It was true. His father had never seemed anything but content living on three-hundred pounds per annum in their little house—anything but completely happy with his titled wife and his three half-breed children.

“Your father could have done anything, Sol,” Uncle Hathaway said wearily. “Everyone said he was brilliant, an orator, destined for great things. The whole family was sure he would make something of himself. I always knew I would be nothing but a tailor, but Will—there was talk of his one day going into
Parliament. And after he eloped with your mother and the Dewingtons wouldn’t receive them, it was all over. His fine patrons dropped him like a hot potato.”

“But—what does that have to do with Serena?”

“Don’t be dense, Sol,” Elijah said, an edge in his voice that Solomon didn’t understand. “He means you’re the family’s hope for greatness now.”

“Me?”

“You’re just like him,” Uncle Hathaway said. “Always such a clever boy. Your uncle gave you an education. You could invent great things, be a famous scientist, lecture all over the world to admiring crowds. But you never will if you attach yourself to a scandal like that.”

Solomon’s jaw dropped. After he got over how unlikely a portrait of himself it was, however, many things were suddenly very clear. He said the most important thing first. “My uncle did give me an education.
You
did, here at Hathaway’s Fine Tailoring. You taught me everything. Uncle Dewington just paid for me to learn about chemistry.”

Uncle Hathaway pressed his lips together. “You could do so much better.”

“There is no better. Not for me. I always wanted to be just like you.” He had always thought his uncle was the interesting brother. Uncle Hathaway lived in London and could add a row of figures in his head. He threw Hannah More in the fire.

But now it appeared that Solomon was more like Uncle Hathaway than he had supposed, and it made him rather uncomfortable. However touching it was that his uncle had somehow decided that he, and not Elijah, was the brilliant one, he hoped that in thirty years he would not be making an idiotic speech like this to Elijah’s son.

“He did,” Elijah confirmed. “He asked for half-spectacles for his seventh birthday.”

Uncle Hathaway laughed at that.

“How long have I been working here, anyway?” Solomon asked.

“Sixteen years,” Uncle Hathaway said promptly. “Every summer since you were ten, and full time for four years.”

“With you fighting him every step of the way,” Elijah said.

“Do you want me to leave?” Solomon knew the answer, but even so he held his breath.

“Oh, Sol, I don’t know what we’d do without you,” Uncle Hathaway said. “But you’re throwing yourself away here.”

“Don’t you
like
being a tailor?” Solomon asked, exasperated.

“Of course I do,” Uncle Hathaway said. “But the people who come through that door—they ought to look at
you
with respect.”

Solomon laughed at the absurdity of it. “Well, I like it too. And I don’t care about the respect of people like our customers. So go easy on Serena, all right? I don’t know where things are going with her, but if we do—what’s more natural than a tailor and an innkeeper?”

It probably wasn’t over, but Uncle Hathaway looked like he’d think about it. Apparently standing your ground really worked. Solomon decided that next week, he’d ask for a few shifts behind the counter.

That night in Serena’s office, Elijah told them that Elbourn and Sir Nigel had both been arrested.
Like lambs to the slaughter
, Solomon thought rather triumphantly. But Serena and Elijah both looked so bleak he held his tongue. He had thought they would be pleased at their success—but of course in the end it wouldn’t make any difference. Things were moving so fast. The Pursleighs’ masquerade was tomorrow, and the Brendan breakfast the morning after, and then there’d be no one between Sacreval and the gallows.

“Did you discover anything useful at Sir Nigel’s house?” Serena asked.

“Nothing as useful as what my colleagues discovered when they interviewed the servants. Apparently the information was
hidden in the pack of cards Sacreval and Sir Nigel played with. A parlormaid said she’d seen him marking a deck, very carefully and thoroughly. Since Sacreval hasn’t been able to hold menu consultations with Brendan and Pursleigh as he used to, he may be using something similar with them.”

There was silence for a moment.

“When we’ve got them all,” Elijah said, “that will leave only Sacreval.” He looked at Serena. “Are you sure you don’t want to talk to any of my superiors about your marriage problem?”

Serena laughed bitterly. “I don’t think any of your superiors will be particularly eager to help me.”

“The regent is head of the Church of England, you know. I’m sure he has the influence to see the marriage annulled.”

“I’m sure he does. I’m also sure he’ll think the situation is a very great joke. I would prefer your superiors didn’t know the problem even exists until it is absolutely necessary.”

“You’re hoping it won’t become necessary, aren’t you?”

“Aren’t
you
?” Serena said sharply.

Elijah met Serena’s eyes with perfect understanding for an instant, then looked away. “I will do my best to see the enemies of England brought to justice.”

Solomon hoped for both their sakes that the marquis showed a little sense and fled the country. Maybe Solomon could suggest it if he proved reluctant. It certainly appeared the only way to make himself useful at present. Serena and Elijah did all the talking and planning, with their underworld experience and their cool demeanors and their dratted unspoken bond.

“Oh, and Elijah?” Serena said.

“Yes?”

“Do you have the schedule of payments René gave his contacts? I want to confirm that Brendan’s our man and this isn’t some ruse by his wife.”

“I think Varney at the Foreign Office might have that, but how will you get hold of Brendan’s financial information?”

Serena smiled enigmatically. “Leave that to me.” She could be so theatrical sometimes. Solomon hid a grin.

A knock came at the door. “Yes?” Serena called.

“It is I,
sirène.
”

The three looked at each other in momentary confusion. “Come,” Serena called.

Sacreval entered but stopped short at the sight of the three of them sitting there.

“We were just discussing the final bill for Serena’s order from Hathaway’s Fine Tailoring,” Solomon explained, “but if you need to speak to her, we can leave.”

The marquis relaxed. “No, no, don’t get up on my account. My request is this.
Sirène
, I am becoming extremely
ennuyé
merely lounging about waiting for you to make up your mind. I would like to make myself useful. Perhaps I might help you with the catering again.”

Solomon tried to look uninterested.

Serena frowned. “You aren’t part of this business anymore, René. I daresay you can wait another week to return to the delights of catering.”

“Really,
sirène
, I would consider it a personal favor.”

She stared at him. “Your gall is beyond anything, do you know that?” The marquis opened his mouth to respond, but she sighed and waved a hand wearily. “I suppose if you wish to work for free, I will hardly stop you. I just got a new order from Lady Brendan. I’ll give you the details first thing tomorrow morning.”

The marquis smiled in relief. “Thank you,
sirène
. I will be here to receive them.”

When he was gone, the three conspirators looked at one another in silence.

“Like a lamb to the slaughter,” Solomon said at last, and the other two flinched.

“Lady Serena and Uncle Hathaway,” Elijah said over supper that evening. “I would have liked to see that. Who won?”

“It was a draw,” Solomon said. “But he almost made her cry. He as good as said she was amusing herself among the lower orders and that I’d probably off myself when she jilted me.”

“Cry? Lady Serena?”

“Well, it wasn’t her best day.”

“And—
off
yourself?” Elijah shook his head. “He didn’t really say that, did he? It’s insulting. You’re not a damsel in a ballad.”

Oh, hell
, Solomon thought. He shrugged. “Who knows where the old man gets his ideas?” But he’d never been able to lie to Elijah.

There was a long silence. “Oh God,” Elijah said in a changed voice. “You—you didn’t—”

“No,” Solomon said firmly. “I didn’t. I don’t think I would have. I thought about it desultorily, is all. Don’t—don’t mention it to anyone, all right? I’m not actually sure Uncle Hathaway knew—I may have extrapolated a trifle.”

“I should never have taken this damn job,” Elijah said bitterly. “They told me it was my patriotic duty, and I was so bloody proud of my French, and—”

To Solomon’s complete astonishment, he began to cry—not all-out sobbing, but a sort of sniffling trickle that was somehow worse. “Oh God, Sol,” he said again, messily. “I’m sorry, this is embarrassing, but—if you had—because of
me
—”

Solomon gave him a handkerchief and a crooked smile. “Now you begin to faintly imagine how
I
felt, sapskull.”

Elijah blew his nose loudly. “And now—with René—I feel like such a Judas—”

Solomon sighed. “Serena does, too. Sometimes when she thinks no one’s looking I catch her watching him with this unreadable expression—”

Elijah half-laughed, half-snorted. “Does she have any other kind?”

They arrived two hours before the masquerade to take over the Pursleigh kitchens. There was to be a buffet table in the ballroom and a very light, very elegant supper served at half-past midnight. That was Lord Pursleigh’s plan, at any rate. Presumably, news of his arrest would persuade Lady Pursleigh to call off the proceedings. Solomon felt sorry for the diminutive blonde. She had gone on with her party in defiance of the rumors flying about London that Wellington was defeated and that the French army was already looting Brussels. An expectant pall hung over the entire city, but Jenny Pursleigh had filled her townhouse with a blaze of light and celebration.

The viscountess was young—he had gathered at the Elbourn ball that she had been at school with Serena—and very flirtatious and very charming in her costume: winged Victory. A laurel wreath nestled in her curls and tiny wings of gold foil sprouted from her shoulders. Her yellow gown had barely any sleeves and fastened at the shoulders with vaguely Roman clasps. Gold sandals peeped from beneath the hem.

He wondered what Lord Pursleigh thought of his wife’s patriotism. To drive the message home, she had amassed a small pile of papier-mâché broken Napoleonic eagles and a ripped and stained tricolor to stand in front of to receive her guests. It was all rather ridiculous and bound to be embarrassing when her husband was arrested for treason.

A sporting gentleman in his middle thirties, Lord Pursleigh was planning to dress as Richelieu in a combination of armor and red robes. Unfortunately, the possibilities for hiding a deck of cards in such an ensemble were nearly infinite, which boded
ill for their plan to arrest Pursleigh quickly and quietly before the masquerade even started, so that the marquis wouldn’t be sure enough of the connection to change his methods before Brendan could be taken the following morning.

But young Ravi Bhattacharya, whom Serena had hired the day after Elijah’s return, proved to have nearly as many useful acquaintances as Serena. His particular friend Harry Spratt worked for the Pursleighs, and for the sum of five pounds had somehow contrived not only to sprain the ankle of Lord Pursleigh’s trusted valet, but also to be appointed to dress Pursleigh in his place.

As soon as young Mr. Spratt identified the location of the infamous pack of cards, he was to alert Ravi, who would come straight to Elijah, who would ask Lord Pursleigh to step into the kitchens to confer about a problem. And when Lord Pursleigh stepped into the kitchen, he would be quietly arrested where only Serena’s people could see it. She had assigned to the masquerade the staff she was most sure of, either as patriots or as personally loyal to her, and told a few of them what to expect.

That, at any rate, was the plan. In the meantime Solomon and Elijah, along with a few kitchen maids and kitchen boys and an undercook, were working in the kitchen under Sacreval’s direction. Like Sacreval and the rest of the staff, the Hathaways were wearing the livery of the Arms—unrelieved white and black except for a pocket handkerchief lavishly embroidered with the Ravenshaw coat of arms in scarlet, black, and gold. Solomon thought he recognized the work as Serena’s.