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Bree was waiting for me when I reached our bedchamber. Though I’d thought I’d done well to conceal my headache and fatigue, she took one look at me and pronounced, “Aye, ye look fagged tae death, m’lady. Come. Let’s get ye oot o’ this gown and intae somethin’ more comfortable.”

She made quick work of the shawl and necklace, setting them on the dressing table, before unfastening my overskirt and draping it over a chair. “Ye’ve a megrim, havena ye?” she asked as she began on the small buttons which marched down the back of my bodice.

I paused in removing my gloves, startled she’d noticed, though I should have known better. Bree noticed everything.

“Ye’ve a little furrow between yer brows,” she explained. “Gets that way when a headache’s brewin’.”

Thus far she’d shown remarkable restraint in not reminding me that she’d warned me just such a thing would happen if I didn’t rest earlier that afternoon. However, I didn’t expect that to last. Not unless I diverted her.

“Yes, well, I suppose I also get that little furrow when my husband does something to vex me,” I pronounced, tossing my gloves down next to the shawl.

“What’s he done noo?” Her tone was wry, and her concentration fixed on my buttons, so I couldn’t tell if she was merely humoring me. I plowed on regardless, with my hands propped on my hips.

“Oh, Anderley was waiting for him when we returned, and they’ve gone off somewhere to speak to someone.”

Bree’s hands stilled, and I suddenly realized that in my annoyance I’d not considered how this statement might affect her, too.

“He didna tell ye where?”

“No,” I replied more calmly.

“I’d ken he’d gone oot earlier, but no’ that he’d returned.” She resumed her work on the buttons. “I s’pose at least they’re together.” She harrumphed. “That’s somethin’.”

My bodice loosened, she helped me remove it and the sleeve supports before turning her attention to my underskirt and petticoats.

“Perhaps they’ll return with answers that will resolve this inquiry,” I ventured. “Then neither of them will need to take further risks.”

“Until the next inquiry.”

Her words were like a bucket of ice water, for she was right.

There was always another investigation, always someone with a problem to be solved, be it theft or blackmail or murder.

I’d known that when I wed Gage. I’d even relished it—the ability to help people.

To put to good use the knowledge I’d reluctantly accrued during the darkest period of my life.

Yet I also had my art. If another inquiry never came our way, I could be quite content without it.

However, Gage was not the same. His restlessness and agitation over the last four months, not to mention the incident with him hanging out the nursery window, had made that clear.

The normal occupations of a gentleman simply weren’t enough for him.

And while I knew he loved us, I wasn’t na?ve enough to think that Emma and I and whatever other children we might be blessed with could fill his every need, just as they couldn’t fill mine.

It would be flippant to suggest he simply find another occupation—a safe and normal one—politics or business investments or patronage of the arts.

For it wasn’t just about a means to pass the time.

Gage needed to feel purposeful, and he enjoyed the challenge.

I’d accepted that, and even embraced it.

But I would be lying if I didn’t admit there were times now when I wondered if it could be different.

Wondered what a life without fraught investigations and death and danger might look like.

Wondered whether we gave enough consideration to the way the life we’d chosen to lead affected those around us.

For as long as Gage continued conducting inquiries, Anderley would insist on working alongside him.

His valet was nothing if not loyal, and just as engrossed in the purpose and challenge of their investigations.

Yet, if his fidelity was forever to Gage, could it ever be fully given to Bree?

But on the flip side, did Bree have the right to ask him to change, to give up the role he so relished and found meaningful in order to appease her fears?

I didn’t have the answers to these questions. I didn’t know how to resolve this conflict between Bree and Anderley. Nor did I know how to reassure her when Anderley took these risks at our impetus.

And what of her own? I knew that Bree also enjoyed helping us with our inquiries.

That she’d taken risks as well, though not as often as Anderley.

How was it possible to define which risks were acceptable and which were not?

Where was the line when so often we had little control or even awareness of the danger until it was too late?

Now my head was truly pounding, but fortunately, in short order, I found myself tucked in bed with Bree standing at the end of it, my undergarments and a petticoat with a small tear gathered in her arms for laundering and mending.

“I’ll return wi’ that headache powder,” she assured me.

“Just try tae rest. As ye should’ve this afternoon,” she added under her breath as she turned to go.

When the door closed behind her, all I could do was groan resignedly, for I’d known it was coming.

· · ·

Lord Moncrieff. Mr. George Thomson. Mr. James Macdonell, W.S. Mrs. Keay of Snaigo. Mr. Robert Dwear. Dr. Maclagan, George Street.

I sighed, continuing to read through the list of names the auctioneer had supplied of those who had received catalogs and invitations to the auction of Lord Eldin’s collection.

Most of the ones that caught my eye did so only because I’d read in the newspapers that they’d been injured—or in Mr. Alexander Smith’s case, killed—or else I’d interacted with them.

The rest were but a muddle of mostly Scottish and English surnames, some attached to people I’d met or heard of elsewhere, some I’d never encountered in my life.

In any case, I was nearing the end of the list and starting to think this had been an utter waste of time.

Not that anyone other than me was wasting it.

Gage had returned in the wee hours of the morning, still reeking of smoke and alcohol as he climbed into bed.

That, more than anything, had told me where he and Anderley had spent the remainder of their evening.

Though given the number of public houses scattered throughout Edinburgh, it didn’t narrow it down considerably.

I had been resting rather lightly when he joined me in bed and had considered ordering him to go take a cold hip bath.

But then he’d reached for me, speaking words of affection to me in a whisky-deepened voice as his clever mouth and fingers had found the places I was most sensitive.

He had always been difficult to resist, even in such a state.

Given the pleasant results and how deeply I’d slept afterward, I could hardly complain.

Though I was a little irked that he was still abed at nearly eleven while I was sitting here scouring this list.

Stifling another sigh, I flipped to the last page and began reading the names scrawled there in a relatively neat hand.

Once again, none of the names leapt out at me.

Yet I was left with a vague sense of uneasiness.

At first, I tried to brush it off as merely a consequence of my irritation, but as I lowered the page, the feeling lingered.

It was akin to the nagging sensation one felt when you were certain you’d forgotten something—something important—but couldn’t quite recall what.

I lifted the pages again, gently riffling through them, hoping something would jog my memory, but they were just names.

Names that, for the most part, were meaningless.

I stared up at the painting of Philipa and Earl Grey the cat hanging above the fireplace, searching for inspiration.

The house was mostly silent, but for the occasional creak.

Being at the back of the house in the library, I couldn’t hear the traffic passing in the street outside.

The servant quarters were two floors below, making the comfortable domestic sounds of them at work and chattering together all but undetectable.

Occasionally I heard Emma squeal or fuss and Mrs. Mackay’s answering chatter, but even they were mostly quiet.

I’d almost resolved to set the list aside as well as my conundrum when I heard the sound of the front door knocker.

Jeffers’s measured tread crossed the floor to answer the summons while I pondered who it might be.

At this hour, it was probably a close friend or relative, though there was also the possibility it was a delivery.

But those usually went to the tradesmen’s entrance.

The thought suddenly struck me as being profound, though I didn’t know why. I wrangled with it even as I could hear Jeffers had admitted a caller. A male one, from the sound of their voice.

Then, like a bolt of lightning, I realized what was troubling me. Gathering up the list, I flipped through it again more doggedly. So preoccupied was I that I barely spared my caller a glance as Jeffers opened the door to admit them.

“Lord Henry Kerr, my lady.”

“Henry,” I exclaimed. “Come look through this list for me. Tell me if I’ve missed my name.”

To Henry’s credit, he didn’t even bat an eyelash at this strange request but crossed the room to sit beside me on the sofa. He took up the pile I’d already discarded on the cushion as I continued to scour the other pages. “Just yours or Sebastian’s, too?”

“Either.”

“Tea, my lady?” Jeffers intoned, watching us shuffle papers.

“Yes, please,” I replied without looking up.