The Gilded Scarab (31 page)

Will took a swig of beer. “Lovely.”

I smiled, feeling a great deal better. Will was a remarkably tolerant man, and he couldn’t have given me a better present. “It’s fascinating stuff. I wonder if I can persuade Ned to demonstrate the technique on Daniel?”

Chapter 20

W
HEN
I
climbed back over the wall between Will’s tiny backyard and mine and got back to the coffeehouse, Ned was there.

I was very casual and calm about it. If I felt that familiar burst of warmth in the chest again, I don’t think anything showed on the outside.

“Good evening,” I said, casually, when I reached the table.

Ned smiled. Hawkins grunted.

“Where did you pop up from?” asked Ned.

“I own the place. If I want to use the back door, who’s going to stop me?”

Hawkins looked as if he might take on the challenge, but didn’t get the chance to speak. Ned caught my wrist and drew me into the chair next to his. “Rafe, I wanted to see you, to apologize—”

“No. You don’t have to apologize. I’m the one who’s sorry. I really shouldn’t have stirred Daniel up. It wasn’t well done of me.”

Ned hesitated and shrugged. “I was stupid to allow him to persuade me to come here with him. I should have known better. He doesn’t like letting go.”

The burst of warmth under my rib cage was neither pain nor pleasure. Anticipation, perhaps. Potential. Something like that. “He doesn’t share well, you mean?”

Ned made a little grimace and nodded. “I really do want to talk. Look, why don’t you come back with me and have supper?”

“Back?”

He looked a little self-conscious. “To my house, I mean. The boys are at my parents’ home tonight, and we can have a quiet meal and a talk.”

It’s a sad reflection on my state of mind that the prospect of dining alone with Ned was more than enough glory and pleasure to sate me for a while. “I’d be delighted, but I need to make arrangements for Hugh. I can’t desert him.”

But Hugh, bless him, said that he could not only cope with closing up, he’d welcome the chance to nip down the road to the Plough, the pub on the corner with Little Russell Street, for a game of dominoes with the landlord, Clayton. “Clayton’s gagging for a return match, sir. He beat me last time.”

“I wouldn’t play either of you. You’re too fierce for my thin blood, and I keep expecting the casualty lists to rival those of the South African War. Are you sure, Hugh?”

“I can cope, sir. You go and enjoy yourself.” Hugh glanced at the chronometer on the wall above the fire. “It’s been a slow evening anyway, and I might close up early.”

I tutted at this lack of subtlety. “You’re not doing that right. The oppressed worker mice are supposed to play when the bloated plutocrat cat is away, not warn him beforehand they intend to shut up shop.”

“I’m still in training, sir.” Hugh was solemn as a church full of choirboys, and about as trustworthy. “I’ll do better next time. Enjoy your evening, sir.”

“You just can’t get the staff, these days. I know what
The Lady
means when they publish anguished articles on the servant problem.” But my heartfelt complaint was met with derision and Hugh’s widest grin, dammit.

Hawkins had summoned Ned’s autophaeton, so I didn’t have time to do other than grip my defaulting batman’s hand in thanks, wish him a good evening, and exhort him to go and annihilate the enemy. The autophaeton was already at the door. I really didn’t know why Westminster parish council had bothered designating Museum Street as a pedestrians-only thoroughfare. It was not a law Hawkins acknowledged.

“
Pfft
,” said Hawkins, when I remarked on this. He helped me into the phaeton with a hefty shove to the small of my back.

Ned lived in Belgravia, in a very swish house in Grosvenor Crescent. Behind the faint shimmer of a security field, it was six floors from the kitchens in the basement to servants’ rooms in the attics. I wasn’t intimidated by it, exactly, but it put Stravaigor House in the shade when it came to sheer luxury, and my poor little flat looked very meager in comparison.

The butler let us in, and gave me a hard, assessing stare as I walked past him and the line of footmen. I would wager my last cup of espresso that the butler had a shoulder holster under his impeccably fitted morning suit and was a crack shot with a laser pistol, and that every footman was an ex-soldier and armed. The Gallowglass would spare no pains to guard his First Heir.

Ned took me to his library first for a quick aperitif while the staff put the last touches to what he assured me would be an informal little meal. I sipped my scotch and soda and allowed Ned to take me on a tour of the artifacts he’d collected over the years. Unlike Daniel, he didn’t keep his mummified cat on the table. His lived on the desk. Aegyptologists, I decided, were an odd bunch.

“I told them to serve dinner in the small dining room,” Ned said, ushering me down to the ground floor. I’m glad he told me. The small dining room was larger than my sitting room. I would have hated to make the faux pas of assuming it was the grand eating room.

“No, that’s upstairs,” Ned said when I mentioned my relief at his consideration in sparing me social suicide. His mouth did that little twitch of amusement that had so attracted me at Margrethe’s, all those months ago. “I’d rather not dine in state, Rafe, if it’s all the same to you.”

“We’re not dressed for it.” The servants had set two places opposite each other at one end of the table. At least we weren’t seated at opposite ends and constrained to shout at each other down its length.

“It’s a relief not to be in a boiled-front shirt and hard collar,” said Ned, waving me into a seat and smiling at the hovering butler and the footmen.

He waited until we were served with the first course—a choice of
quiche au Roquefort et aux poireaux
or
grenouilles à la provencale
—before dismissing the butler and his acolytes with a smile and a genial “I’ll call you, Henderson, when we’re ready for the fish.”

The butler bowed and departed, and I was left looking at what Ned considered an informal supper. It appeared we were dining in some style. Well, it was better than the fried steak and potatoes that would have been my lot otherwise.

“You have a French chef?” The Roquefort tart was exquisite.

Ned nodded. “Sometimes I think it’s ridiculous, given I usually dine here alone.” He shrugged. “It’s expected, though. It’s far more fun when I’m on a dig and we’re all eating
koshari
after a hard day’s work and not worrying about napkins and which knife to use.”

“Oh, I don’t mind a little luxury.” I took a sip of my wine. Nectar! No. I didn’t mind at all. In fact, I was so taken with how little I minded that I let Ned take a couple of bites of his meal before reminding him he wanted to talk.

He took a hasty gulp of wine. “Yes, I did. I was merely trying to gather my thoughts.”

I forbore to comment, but I have no doubt my expression said it all, because he laughed briefly before sobering.

“First, I really am terribly sorry about Daniel today. Yes, I know you said it didn’t matter, but I should have known better.” He paused, toyed with his knife for a moment, frowning. “I wanted to explain. I told you, I think, I first met Daniel ten years ago, during my first season in Aegypt. I was very young and, really, not safe out on my own. Sam worked overtime keeping me from harm until I grew a little older and more sensible.”

“That might explain his protective streak,” I said dryly.

“You’ll never forgive him for that harquebus, will you? Anyhow, let’s leave it there. I was young and a little naive, and Daniel fascinated me from the first moment I met him. He swept me off my feet. He knew so much about Aegypt, and I knew so little—I respected him as a scholar. He was intelligent, experienced, clever, funny, charming… everything I wasn’t. I loved him dreadfully, Rafe.”

“Mmmmph,” I said, falling back on my noncommittal noise of choice. I was not comfortable listening to Ned tell me he loved Daniel. He could do so much better.

“The next year, though, we were back here in Londinium, and my father arranged my marriage to Laeticia Abercrombie, the Huissher’s daughter. Daniel never could understand why I didn’t fight it.”

Well, that was stupid. Ned was First Heir. His duty was to secure the succession. I could see that and so must have Daniel.

“How could I, Rafe? If it had just been about me, I may have done, stood firm and told Papa I wasn’t going to marry anyone. But it wasn’t just about me. It’s about Gallowglass, the whole House, and all the Houses allied to us. I couldn’t destabilize everything like that. There were too many apple carts there, too many families dependent on Gallowglass’s success and well-being, for me to risk making us vulnerable to the other Convocation Houses. Marrying Laeticia strengthened us, consolidated our alliance with the Huissher. He has a stake in Gallowglass now. He won’t move against us when it would mean destroying his own grandsons.”

I nodded. “But of course. It makes perfect sense.”

“You see that I had no choice? I wish Daniel agreed. He was very angry and hurt when I agreed to marry Laeticia and beyond angry because I wouldn’t break the vows I made to her. He said he recognized I had little choice in the marriage, but that was only words. He hoped, I think, that we could carry on as if nothing had changed, that I’d continue to meet him at his lodgings or for a night at Margrethe’s. And of course I couldn’t.” His mouth turned down at the corners. “I was already cheating her of everything she had the right to expect from marriage with a man who loved her for herself, rather than the political alliance she embodied. I didn’t love her then, although I came to. I could not add to my offense by being unfaithful with Daniel or anyone else. I owed it to her.”

Somehow it didn’t surprise me that Ned would take his marriage vows seriously. I’d already had a few hints that he took responsibility as a trust, not an obligation. So I nodded again and wondered if I wanted to try the grenouilles.

“Daniel is a little bitter about it, still. As you said, he doesn’t share well. And after Laeticia died in the accident, perhaps he hoped then… but it wasn’t him I was with at Margrethe’s.”

I looked up sharply.

Ned smiled. “I hadn’t been back except for business meetings since I married. I certainly hadn’t been back there to meet anyone. Until last November.”

Well now. Perhaps this wasn’t to be all about Daniel after all.

“You were the first, once I was free again to choose the life I wanted. The only man other than Daniel, actually.” Ned’s smile widened. “I thought about that a lot in Aegypt last winter.”

“The memory of it may have crossed my mind once or twice,” I said, and matched him, smile for smile.

“It was a good night.” Ned picked up his fork and speared a fragment of leek with it. “And that’s really what I wanted to talk to you about.”

And then, damn him, he stopped and hesitated again.

“Rafe, I rushed headlong into the relationship with Daniel. I was dazzled and in love, and I didn’t think about it. I didn’t know him. I didn’t know what was in here.” He touched his chest, above the heart. “I didn’t know what moved him, what was important to him, what principles he lived by, and what moral lines he would or wouldn’t cross. I didn’t care. I wanted him and nothing else mattered. In the same way, I went blindly into marriage with Laeticia without really knowing her and what she wanted out of life. Both could have been disastrous. With Daniel… well, I think I avoided disaster by the skin of my teeth, to be honest, and only Laeticia’s sweetness and patience saved me from ruining everything with her.”

That sounded ominous. Not what I was hoping to hear. My chest and gut clenched. I wasn’t in the least hungry anymore. I put down my fork and decided against the grenouilles. The way everything was tensing up, I thought I might not be quite well enough for frog’s legs.

“I don’t want to rush headlong into anything with you. I want to give everything its due consideration, to savor it. I want to let it grow and flower in its own time, not forced along like some hothouse bloom because going back to Margrethe’s is more important than anything else. This time, I do care to find out what’s important to you, what principles you live by, where your moral lines are. I care about that passionately.” Ned looked at me then, and the smile he gave me was sweet. Again he touched his heart. “I want to know what’s in here. What makes Rafe Lancaster the man he is. What you are and what you believe, and when I know that, then I’ll know how we two fit together.”

I frowned at him. What did he mean? “So,” I said, drawing it out a little as I thought through Ned’s words. “Does this mean you want to be friends now in the hope it will grow into something more? Something more than mere sex and physical pleasure, I mean, but a real….” I stopped and frowned. There wasn’t a word in the lexicon that meant what I was trying to convey, not when it came to relations between two men. “A real passionate friendship? A real
amour
? Ned, you’re talking about something far more significant and lasting than I’ve ever considered. I’ve never thought…. And you want this with
me
?”