“Hmm, they seem more like they have been left by a woman. In the heat of passion, you see. She grabs on to the man’s arms and her fingers dig into his sinews.” He smiled at her. “Have you been taking advantage of me while I was mentally incapacitated, Lady Vere?”

She flushed. “It was you who wished it, sir.”

“Was it? My, could have been disastrous, you know. When a man is that drunk, sometimes he can’t get it up. And sometimes he can’t finish it off.”

She touched her throat. “Well, you didn’t have any problem on either account.”

He preened. “That is a testament to your charm, my lady. Although I must say, if we keep going at it like this, the family size will be increasing very soon.”

A thought that rather petrified him.

“Do you wish to increase the family size?” she asked, as if it were an afterthought.

“Well, of course, what man doesn’t? For God and country,” he said, as he scanned the letters that had come with his tea and toast.

When he looked up again, she wore the oddest expression. He immediately worried he’d said something that had given his act away, but he could not think what.

“Oh, look, Freddie invites us for tea this afternoon at the Savoy Hotel. Shall we go then?”

“Yes,” she said, with a smile he’d never quite seen before. “Do let us go.”

The terrace at the Savoy Hotel commanded a panoramic view of the Thames, with Cleopatra’s Needle thrusting skyward just beyond the hotel’s gardens. A steady traffic of steamships and barges traversed the water lanes. The sky was clear by London standards, but nevertheless seemed dirt-smudged to Elissande, who had yet to grow accustomed to the great metropolis’s perpetually tainted air.

Lord Frederick had brought along Mrs. Canaletto, a childhood chum of the brothers, both of whom called her by her Christian name. She was several years older than Elissande, worldly, not given to the same sort of limitless enthusiasm as Miss Kingsley and her companions, but nevertheless friendly and approachable.

“Have you been to the theater yet, Lady Vere?” asked Mrs. Canaletto.

“No, I’m afraid I’ve not had the pleasure.”

“Then you must have Penny take you to a performance at the Savoy Theatre right away.”

Elissande’s husband looked at Mrs. Canaletto expectantly, then said, “Only one recommendation, Angelica? You used to like to tell us how to do everything.”

Mrs. Canaletto chuckled. “That’s because I’ve known you since you were three, Penny. When I’ve known Lady Vere twenty-six years, rest assured I will tell her how to do everything too.”

Elissande asked Mrs. Canaletto whether she’d visited the Isle of Capri during her stay in Italy. Mrs. Canaletto had not, but both Lord Vere and Lord Frederick had, on a continental jaunt the two had taken together after Lord Frederick had finished his studies at Oxford.

Lord Vere talked about the sights they’d seen on the trip, with Mrs. Canaletto correcting him good-naturedly alongside: the fabled Neuschwanstein Castle in Bulgaria, built by the mad Count Siegfried (“It’s in Bavaria, Penny, built by King Ludwig II, who might or might not have been mad”); the Leaning Tower of Sienna (“Pisa”); and on Capri, the Purple Grotto (“The Black Grotto, Penny”).

“It was the Black Grotto, really?”

“Angelica is teasing you, Penny,” said Lord Frederick. “It’s the Blue Grotto.”

Undaunted, Elissande’s husband went on. As he held forth, he dropped his handkerchief into the jam pot, knocked the contents of a slender flower vase onto the crumpet plate, and had one of his biscuits leap ten feet to land amidst the pink ostrich feathers of someone’s extravagant hat.

Lord Frederick and Mrs. Canaletto seemed to think nothing of either Lord Vere’s loquaciousness or his clumsiness. But his words and actions seemed excessive to Elissande, as if he were trying to make up for the flash of incisive intelligence he’d displayed during their predawn encounter by making himself appear especially inane.

And inept. To dilute the memory of his absolute mastery over her body, perhaps?

He had come to within an inch of convincing her that it had been a fluke—within an inch. And then he’d gone too far and directly contradicted himself—probably because he sincerely did not remember recommending, strongly, that she take measures against just such a possibility as the expanding of their family.

The lady in the pink ostrich hat, after recovering the biscuit from the depth of her millinery plumage, approached their table. For a moment Elissande thought she might have harsh words for Lord Vere, but Lord Vere and Lord Frederick rose, and both men plus Mrs. Canaletto greeted her familiarly.

“Lady Vere, may I present the Countess of Bourkes,” said Lord Vere. “Countess, my wife.”

It was the beginning of a parade. The Season was over, but London was still an important hub for the upper crust traveling between Scotland, Cowes, and the therapeutic spas of the Continent. Elissande’s husband seemed to be acquainted with everyone who was anyone. And as Lady Avery must have lost no time in trumpeting her latest exposé, the whole world wanted to see what manner of woman had been caught with him in a most scandalous manner.

He introduced her with absurd pride. Lady Vere has devoted herself to the well-being of her aunt. Lady Vere is as knowledgeable of modern art as Freddie. Lady Vere is certain to be one of London’s great hostesses.

It took her a minute to align her reaction with his. She discarded the moderately warm smiles she had thought appropriate for the situation and went for the full teeth-and-dazzle.

Lord Vere shines a precise and all-encompassing light upon the current Anglo-Prussian relationship. Lord Vere discusses the architectural history of Europe with aplomb and flair. Lord Vere’s deep and detailed reading of Ovid has provided us with hours of enthralling conversation.

They made a stunning pair, in the most literal sense. People left their table agape, barely able to totter back to their own seats. Who’d have thought that the talents she’d honed to defend the integrity of her soul from her uncle would one day be put to such public theater? If it weren’t so bizarre she’d almost find it funny.

“I rather enjoyed eloping, on the whole. I should have done it sooner. But of course I did it as soon as I could with Lady Vere,” said her husband, once he was able to sit down again.

“Well, I do think we could have done it one day sooner,” Elissande said with a giggle.

“That is true,” he concurred. “I did not think of that. Why did I not think of that?”

“But that is quite all right. We are here and we are married and it couldn’t be more wonderful.”

Across from them, Lord Frederick and Mrs. Canaletto exchanged looks of good-natured incredulity, as if marveling that such a perfect match could and did exist for Lord Vere. Lord Vere leaned in for another slice of sultana cake and—what else?—overturned the creamer in the process.

Elissande was beginning to see an adroit choreography to his ungainliness, the carefully chosen angle of his arm, the precise path of his reach, the calculated sweep of the back of his hand.

There was no such thing as a man who was more lucid when drunk, only one who was less careful, and therefore less hidden. For him, who had expressed his potent displeasure only hours ago, to then take on the part of the dizzyingly happy husband—he was nothing if not a superb actor.

It took one to know one.

There was a note for Vere from Mr. Filbert when he arrived back at his town house—Mr. Filbert being one of Holbrook’s aliases. Vere changed into his evening clothes, told his wife he was going out to his club, met Holbrook and Lady Kingsley at the house behind Fitzroy Square, and worked feverishly. He did not return home again until nearly midnight.