Page 14 of A Murder in Trinity Lane (Rosalynd and Steele Mysteries #2)

Chapter

Fourteen

THE BOTANIST’S TABLE

I dressed with care—not out of vanity. Observant dressing is what Mother had called it. The art of being present without drawing attention, of listening while others underestimated your silence.

Tilly had already laid out the gown I’d requested—a deep plum silk with velvet trim. Elegant but understated. It would allow me to disappear into the background and avoid notice.

Once she’d fastened the final hooks at my back, she moved to retrieve the hair combs. “The amethysts, milady?”

“Yes, please.” She always knew the right adornments to complement my gowns.

My hair was already pinned up, so it was only a matter of sliding the jeweled combs into place.

A modest necklace of amethysts strung with tiny seed pearls and a pair of matching drop earrings followed—nothing ostentatious, only refined.

The sort of jewelry that whispered wealth rather than shouted it.

Just enough to suggest taste without effort and attention to detail without vanity.

Tilly glanced toward the windows, where evening had begun to settle its weight across the panes. “Shall I fetch your shawl, milady? The drawing room can be quite chilly.”

“Yes,” I said with a faint smile. “Better a shawl than gooseflesh.”

She returned a moment later with a soft wool wrap in a dusky lavender hue that echoed the stones at my ears. As she draped it gently over my shoulders, I took one final glance in the mirror.

Not dramatic. Not dull. Elegant.

When I descended the stairs, the lamps were already lit, casting a soft golden glow through the entrance hall. Voices drifted out from the drawing room—Cosmos’s animated cadence and the cooler, more deliberate tone of someone unfamiliar.

I stepped into the room just as Cosmos was gesturing toward a decanter on the sideboard. He looked up and beamed when he saw me.

“Ah, here she is. Rosalynd, allow me to introduce Dr. Nathaniel Vale.”

The man beside him turned, setting his glass down with practiced ease.

He was tall—though not overly so—and impeccably dressed in evening clothes that spoke of quiet wealth and precise tailoring.

His dark hair was neatly combed. A pair of wire-rimmed spectacles rested lightly on the bridge of his nose.

“Lady Rosalynd,” he said, inclining his head. “A pleasure.”

His voice was smooth, with just enough gravity to suggest intellect without affectation. His eyes, a striking gray-green, held mine for a moment longer than necessary—assessing, perhaps. Or merely curious.

I dipped into a polite curtsy. “Dr. Vale. Welcome to Rosehaven.”

“You’re too kind,” he replied. “Your brother has already made me feel quite at home. We’ve just been debating the classification of a vine recently uncovered near the Adriatic coast.”

“Have you?” I said lightly, moving to the sideboard as a footman approached with a tray of sherry.

Cosmos chuckled. “Rosalynd tends to view botanical enthusiasm as a mild affliction. Be warned.”

“On the contrary,” I said, accepting a glass. “I find it endlessly useful. It allows me to judge when to nod thoughtfully and when to make a well-timed escape.”

Dr. Vale smiled at that—faint but unmistakable. Not warm. But interested.

“I shall take it as a challenge, then,” he said. “To be at least mildly diverting before the evening is out.”

“We shall see,” I replied.

Just then Chrissie entered, a breath behind schedule, her curls pinned up hastily, her cheeks flushed from hurrying.

“I apologize for being late,” she said breezily.

“No need to. I just arrived myself.”

Dr. Vale turned to her with a courteous bow. “You must be Lady Chrysanthemum.”

“I am,” Chrissie said, narrowing her eyes slightly. “And you must be Dr. Vale.”

“A pleasure,” he said, unruffled.

She offered him a faint smile—polite, if a touch skeptical. “Likewise.”

Perfectly timing his entrance, Honeycutt arrived with the supper announcement, forestalling any further conversation, inane or otherwise.

The dining room at Rosehaven was aglow with soft candlelight, each flame mirrored in the cut glass of decanters and polished silver. The long table gleamed beneath a crisp white cloth, while the scent of roast duck, winter vegetables, and warm bread clung to the air.

Dr. Vale was seated to my right. Cosmos had arranged the seating, naturally, ensuring his guest would be flanked by willing conversation and no escape.

Chrissie, seated on my left, looked faintly resigned as she reached for her wine glass.

Cosmos, naturally, was in high spirits, eager to showcase the guest he’d brought into our world.

We began with polite exchanges—the weather, the difficulties of maintaining a greenhouse in the English climate, and the recent lecture at the Royal Botanic Gardens.

Dr. Vale responded with quiet eloquence, offering insights without arrogance.

Still, there was a precision in his speech, a deliberateness that caught my attention.

After the soup had been cleared, I turned to Dr. Vale with polite curiosity. “And what area of study currently holds your focus?”

He dabbed at his mouth with his napkin and replied, “ Papaver somniferum . The opium poppy.”

Chrissie froze mid-sip.

“Ah,” I said mildly, “not a topic one hears over dinner every day.”

“True,” he allowed. “But it’s one of the oldest cultivated plants in human history. Revered by the Greeks, traded by the Ottomans, and now, of course, heavily employed by our own chemists and apothecaries.”

Cosmos leaned in. “He’s just published a paper on its alkaloids. Morphine, codeine—remarkable compounds.”

“It’s remarkable,” Chrissie murmured, “that anyone survives childhood with what’s sold in London apothecaries. Laudanum, Godfrey’s Cordial, Mother Bailey’s Quieting Syrup—all laced with opium, and handed out like barley sugar, all administered to children without a second thought.”

Dr. Vale’s smile was faint but not without humor. “Laudanum, in particular, is a fascination of mine. Its formulation is as much alchemy as science—equal parts pain relief and dependence.”

I folded my hands on my lap. “Do you consider it a dangerous drug?”

“I consider it a powerful one,” he said. “Like all medicines, it can heal or harm depending on the hand that administers it. The real danger, Lady Rosalynd, lies in ignorance—patients who dose too freely, physicians who prescribe too carelessly, governments who profit too eagerly.”

His eyes found mine then. Cool, clear, and steady.

“Have you studied its social effects?” I asked, voice level. “Among the poor, the sick, the addicted?”

“Yes,” he said simply. “And among the aristocracy, who suffer no fewer vices—only better packaging.”

The room grew quiet.

Cosmos cleared his throat and attempted to steer the conversation toward botanical cultivation in China, but the mood had shifted.

I sipped my wine, never taking my eyes off Dr. Vale.

A man who knew the power of a plant to dull pain, cloud the mind, or control a body. And who chose to study that power with deliberate fascination.

The footman arrived with the next course, breaking the tension like a blade tapping crystal.

Once the meal was done, the gentlemen remained to linger over port. I excused myself and retreated to the drawing room, Chrissie trailing behind with a dramatic sigh of relief.

“He's not dreadful,” she said, sinking onto the settee. “But if he uses the word alkaloid one more time, I may fling myself into the fire.”

I smiled faintly. “He’s intelligent. Perhaps too intelligent.”

“He’s the sort of man who names all his houseplants in Latin.”

“Cosmos does that.”

“Yes, but we’re related to him. There’s no helping it.”

We both laughed softly, and the warmth of it smoothed the edges of the evening. Before long, the gentlemen joined us. Vale entered behind Cosmos, glass still in hand, eyes alert beneath the glint of his spectacles.

I rose as he approached me.

“Lady Rosalynd,” he said with a slight bow. “May I?” He gestured to the small grouping of chairs near the hearth. I nodded, and we settled—me with a fresh cup of tea, he with his port, angled just enough to suggest intimacy without presumption.

The firelight played against the polished wood of the mantel and caught in the facets of his signet ring as he adjusted his cuff.

“Your family’s home is charming,” he said after a moment, glancing about. “Warm. Lived in.”

“It is lived in,” I replied. “And loudly, at times.”

“I imagine it keeps you anchored.”

I studied him. “Do I appear otherwise?”

He didn’t answer immediately. “You seem . . . aware. Of the world’s unpleasant truths.”

“That’s a diplomatic way of calling someone sharp-tongued.”

“Not at all. I admire clarity. Especially in a woman who understands more than she lets on.”

I lifted my cup. “Careful, Dr. Vale. That sounds dangerously close to a compliment.”

He inclined his head. “Danger is only a matter of dosage, Lady Rosalynd.”

I let that hang between us a moment, then turned the conversation toward safer subjects—his time abroad, his earliest interest in botany, the politics of the Royal Society. He answered easily, but never idly. Always choosing words with care. Always observing.

By the time he stood to take his leave, I’d formed no conclusions about Dr. Vale—only that he was intelligent, well-mannered, and exceedingly comfortable in his expertise.

A man who knew how to command a conversation without ever raising his voice.

And someone who, more than likely, understood people just as well as he understood plants.

An expert in drugs that control pain—physical or otherwise. That sort of knowledge, applied well, could make one very powerful indeed.

As Chrissie and I climbed the stairs side by side, her voice dropped into a teasing lilt. “I do believe Dr. Vale took a shine to you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Then he’s bound to be disappointed.”

She laughed, a bright sound that lingered even as she turned down the hall to her room. “Goodnight, Rosalynd.”

“Goodnight, dear.”

After ringing for Tilly so she could help me undress, I loosened the combs from my hair, setting them gently on the vanity. The fire in the grate had burned low, casting long shadows across the floor. In the hush that followed, my thoughts were far from Dr. Vale.

What about Steele? Are you not interested in him?

The question came not from without but within—low, persistent, unwelcome.

I didn’t answer.

Because the truth would be too difficult to face.