to face something similar as he stepped past the hedges. “Good evening!” he said cheerily. “I’m just bound for Kelby Hall. The rest of the party are just behind me.” He hoped.
“You.”
“Yes, it is I,” Reyn agreed.
“Durant.”
Reyn knew who was before him. He slid the knife up his sleeve, walked forward, and resumed whistling.
David Kelby stood in the middle of the moon-drenched road. “Why, Mr. Kelby! I did not expect to see you again so soon. A lovely night, is it not?” Reyn deliberately slurred his words.
“You are drunk! I’m sure my uncle would not be best pleased.”
“Oh, don’t tell on me, I beg you. I’m afraid I have no head for spirits. But I was so b-bloody bored up at the big house. Can’t do a proper job when it’s dark and there isn’t a soul my equal to talk to me there.” That was certainly true.
It was preferable that Kelby think he was a pompous idiot rather than someone in thrall to the countess.
“What brings you out this evening?” Reyn asked.
“A walk,” Kelby said. “As you said, it’s a lovely night.”
Had he been meeting with his spy? Reyn was sorry he did not choose to wander about the garden. He might have bumped into them whispering and plotting, but knew he wouldn’t find out much by quizzing Kelby on the lane.
Squinting, Reyn noticed that Kelby’s cravat was askew, which made him think the spy they were looking for was not a John, but a Mary. Of course.
Kelby was a ladies’ man. If he’d managed to seduce sensible, virtuous Maris, he was likely to sweep some poor impressionable maid right off her feet.
Reyn tried to remember the girls that had brought him his meals and swept his hearth. They’d made no particular impression on him, but he’d open his eyes and work some of his own charm if he had any left to spare.
The next morning, Reyn was prepared to do his flirtatious best with a housemaid or two, but the breakfast tray did not come at the hour he’d arranged for it, nor was there a response when he tugged his bellpull after waiting rather patiently. Perhaps the bell system was broken, or they’d forgotten about the mad man in the attic.
He’d already washed and shaved with the tepid water on his dressing stand and was fully dressed. Would he be shot if he sought the breakfast room, breaking the earl’s fraternization rule?
Reyn decided he didn’t care. He needed food in his stomach after all the ale he’d consumed with Bob. It hadn’t been hard to play the drunk with Kelby. He didn’t have a head for spirits. He’d learned nothing of significance from his sacrifice, but at least he hadn’t been in his room mooning over Maris.
The house seemed unusually quiet. He noticed at once the absence of the human green wall. The footmen were not in place along the main floor corridor. He’d planned on asking for directions, but like a hound on the hunt, he thought his long nose would track the bacon and toasted bread.
He was wrong. Reyn stood in the cavernous entry hall, uncertain which way to turn.
He wished he’d pocketed that great houses of England guide. He thought there’d been a floor plan, not that he could read the cribbed print on the pages devoted to Kelby Hall. He only knew a few places in the Hall—the earl’s library, which he wouldn’t dare to enter, Maris’s sitting room, his own bedroom, and the attics.
It wasn’t the sort of day for walking outside. The bright blue sky of the past few days had faded to gray. A light rain spattered the sidelights surrounding the heavy oak front door. Strange that there wasn’t a footman on hand to open it even if he didn’t want to go out in the gloom. They were like jack-in-the-boxes, always popping up when you least expected them, only to perform a service you didn’t even know you needed.
Maybe they were all on a workers’ uprising, Reyn thought with a grin. Inspired by the French Revolution, rioting against injustice on Kelby’s sole street—although he hoped the earl and countess kept their heads.
Reyn felt the cold of the hall seep into his bones. It would be difficult to work upstairs. They’d have to light more candles, bring up more lamps, keep the fireplace tended. It would be cozy to lie with Maris on the chaise, listening to the rain on the roof. Perhaps they’d forgo the boxes altogether.
He decided to