When the supper was finished, the men and the women remained together rather than dividing, by common agreement, and they sat up for another hour or so, drinking brandy or iced wine, sitting in small clusters around Lady Jane’s drawing room. At last their energies began to flag. Edmund and Molly went home first, the two brothers making a plan to meet for lunch the next day at the Athenaeum Club, and shortly after them went Emily and George in separate carriages, and after that everyone decided that it was time, alas, for the evening to end.

When the last guests had gone Lenox closed the door behind him. “Are you awake?” he said to Jane, who was standing in the soft light of the front hall

“Just scarcely,” she said. She smiled sweetly and gave him a fond kiss on the cheek. “What a wonderful evening, Charles. Thank you.”

“No, thank you. Look, is this Dallington’s cloak, though? He’s forgotten it, the fool. I’ll run it out to him.”

Lenox opened the door and went onto into the cool evening. He hesitated on his steps, looking up and down across the spaced yellow pools of the gaslight. Then he saw that toward the right of the house two figures were standing very close together, holding hands. One of them laughed, the sound of it ringing in the empty street, and he realized with a shock that it was Dallington and Polly.

After a beat, he smiled, then stepped back into the house with the cloak. It could wait until the next day to find its way again to its owner. He closed the door behind him as quietly as he could—his heart filled with happiness.

Acknowledgments

My work begins and ends with my family, and I hope they know how dearly I love them: Emily, Lucy, Annabel, Mom, Dad, Rosie, Isabelle, John, Henry, Julia, Dennis, Linda.

Professionally, I keep thanking the same people only to find myself falling even deeper into their debt—yet again, I owe so much to April Osborn, Sarah Melnyk, Courtney Sanks, Melissa Hastings, Andy Martin, John Morrone, Paul Hochman, Esther Bochner, and everyone else in the irregularly shaped but warm confines of the Flatiron Building.

My agent, Elisabeth Weed, is fantastically intelligent and enterprising. I feel lucky to work with her. Many books to come!

Some of the best ideas for this story—character names, historical wrinkles—came from the funny and brilliant community of readers at facebook.com/charlesfinchauthor. If you ever want to get in touch, come join me there, or e-mail me at signedfinch@gmail.com. I can’t promise to reply to every message, but I always try.

Most important: this book wouldn’t be in your hands if it weren’t for the kindness, grace, and patience that Charlie Spicer showed me in unique circumstances last winter. Charlie, thank you for being such a steadfast friend.

Also by Charles Finch

The Last Enchantments

An Old Betrayal

A Death in the Small Hours

A Burial at Sea

A Stranger in Mayfair

The Fleet Street Murders

The September Society

A Beautiful Blue Death

About the Author

CHARLES FINCH is the author of the Charles Lenox mysteries. His first contemporary novel, The Last Enchantments, about a group of students at Oxford University, is available from St. Martin’s Press.

Find him online at www.facebook.com/charlesfinchauthor

and at www.twitter.com/CharlesFinch.

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