“Thank you, Father. That is very comforting.”
Dinner that evening was a peculiarly quiet affair. Portia was a charming hostess and kept an admirable table. She was renowned for the quality of her food and wines as well as the excellence of the company. She knew the most interesting people and often invited them to little suppers arranged to show them to perfection, like gems in a thoughtful setting. But that night there were only ourselves—Portia, her beloved Jane, and me. We were all of us occupied with our own thoughts and said little, our silences punctuated with phlegmy snorts from Portia’s vile pet, Mr. Pugglesworth, asleep under the table.
After one particularly nasty interlude, I laid down my knife. “Portia, must you have that dog in the dining room? He is putting me quite off my food.”
She waved a fork at me. “Do not be peevish just because Bellmont took you to task today.”
“Puggy is rather foul,” Jane put in quietly. “I will remove him to the pantry.”
She rose and collected the animal, coaxing him out with a bit of stewed prune. Portia watched her, saying nothing. They were a study in contrasts, each lovely in her own way, but different as chalk and cheese. Portia had a fine-boned elegance, coupled with the classic March family colouring of dark hair faintly touched with red and wide green eyes. She dressed flamboyantly, in colours suited to the pale alabaster of her skin, always in a single hue from head to toe.
Jane, on the other hand, seemed determined to wear all the colours of the rainbow at once. She was an artist and scholar, and her face was modelled along those lines, with handsome bones that would serve her well into old age. Hers was a face of character, with a determined chin and a forthright gaze that never judged, never challenged. People frequently offered her the most extraordinary confidences on the basis of those eyes. Deep brown, touched with amber and warm with intelligence, they were her greatest beauty. Her hair, always untidy, was not. Dark red and coarse as a horse’s mane, it curled wildly until she grew tired of it and thrust it into a snood. It resisted all other confinement. More than once I had seen Portia, laughing, attempting to dress it, breaking combs in its heaviness.
But she was not laughing as she watched Jane remove Puggy to the pantry. She merely took another sip of her wine and motioned for the butler to fill her glass again.
“When do you think we ought to leave—” I began.
“Tomorrow. I have already consulted the timetable. If we leave very early, we ought to make Grimsgrave by nightfall. I have sent word to Valerius to meet us at the station.”
I blinked at her. “Portia, my things are not yet packed. I have made no arrangements.”
She looked down at the pale slices of pork on her plate. She poked at them listlessly with her fork, then signed for the butler. He removed the plate, but she kept hold of her wine.
“There are no arrangements for you to make. I have taken care of everything. Tell Morag to pack your trunk, and be ready at dawn tomorrow. That is all that is required of you.”
I signalled to the butler as well, surrendering my wine, and wishing Portia had done the same. She did not often drink to excess, and the extra glass had made her withdrawn, icy even.
“Portia, if you do not wish to go to Yorkshire, I can go alone with Valerius. I am offending propriety well enough as it is. I cannot think that travelling without you will make much of a difference.”
She stared into her wineglass, turning it slowly in her palms, edging the dark, blood-red liquid closer to the crystal rim.
“No, it is better that I should go. You will need someone to look after you, and who better than your elder sister?” she asked, her tone tinged with mockery.
I stared at her. Portia and I had had our share of quarrels, but we were extremely close. She had offered me the use of her townhouse when I was in London, and my stay had been a pleasant one. Jane had welcomed me warmly, and we had passed many cosy evenings by the fireside, reading poetry or abusing our friends with gossip. But every once in a while, like a flash of lightning, brief and sharp and hot, a flicker of something dangerous had struck between us. I was not certain why or how, but a new prickliness had arisen, and more than once I had been scratched on the thorns of it. A word too sharp, a glance too cold—so subtle I had almost thought I had imagined it. But there was no imagining the atmosphere in the dining room. I glanced at the door, but Jane did not return.
“Dearest,” I began patiently, “if you want to remain here with Jane, you ought to. I know Brisbane invited you, but he will understand if you decide to stay in London.”
Portia circled the glass again, the wine lapping at the edge. “To what purpose?”
I shrugged. “The season will be starting soon. You might organise a ball for Virgilia. Or give a dinner for young Orlando, introduce him to some of the gentlemen of influence you have cultivated. If he means to run for a seat in Parliament, he cannot begin too soon.”
Portia snorted and her hand jerked, nearly spilling the wine.
“Our niece’s mother would never permit me to throw a ball for her, as you well know. And the gentlemen of influence would have little interest in meeting our nephew at the dinner table, and I have little interest in meeting our nephew. He is a dull boy with no conversation.”
She was being far too hard on Orlando, but I knew that recrimination would only provoke her. “And you hope to find good conversation in Yorkshire?” I teased, hoping to jolly her out of her foul mood.
She stared into the glass, and for just a moment her expression softened, as though she were prey to some strong emotion. But she mastered it as swiftly as it had come, and her face hardened.
“Perhaps there is nothing to find,” she said softly. She tilted her hand and a single crimson drop splashed onto the tablecloth, staining the linen with the finality of blood.
“Portia, leave off. You will ruin that cloth,” I scolded. The butler moved forward to scatter salt over the spill.
Portia put her glass down carefully. “I think perhaps I have had too much to drink.” She rose slowly. “Julia, do enjoy dessert. I will retire now. I must supervise Minna whilst she packs. If I leave her to it, she will hurl everything into a bedsheet and knot it up and call it packed.”
I bade her a quiet good-night and told the butler I wanted nothing more except a strong cup of tea. He brought it scalding and sweet, and I sipped it slowly, wondering why the trip to Yorkshire, which had filled me with elation, should now cause me such apprehension. It was not just Portia’s antics that alarmed me. I knew very well that Brisbane had not invited me to Yorkshire. Moreover, I knew his uncertain temper and how scathing his anger could be. He was entirely capable of packing me onto the next train to London, my purpose unresolved. I knew also his stubbornness, his pride, his stupid, dogged persistence in blaming himself for my brush with death during our first investigation together. I had told him in the plainest terms that the idea was nonsense. If anything, Brisbane had saved my life and I had told him so.
Whether he had listened was another matter entirely. The whole of our acquaintance had been an intricate, twisting dance, two steps toward each other, three steps apart. I was tired of the uncertainty. Too many times I had abandoned myself to the exhilaration of his company, only to be thwarted by circumstance or his own stubborn pride. It seemed a very great folly to attempt to force a declaration from him, but it seemed a greater folly to let him go. If there was a single chance at happiness with him, I was determined to seize it.
But determination was not enough to silence my jangling nerves, and as I put the cup onto the saucer, I noticed my hand shook ever so slightly.