Page 43 of Murder on Black Swan Lane

Was he? Wrexford considered the statement carefully. His own concerns had dominated his thoughts, and his actions. He hadn’t paid any attention to how his demands had affected her life.

Granted, she was making money off his scandal, but it likely wasn’t that simple. Nothing was.

As he looked up, his glance caught a pile of books on the table. An elementary Latin textbook, a history of Great Britain, a primer on penmanship—with a start he recognized them as the same schoolbooks he had had as a boy.

“Lessons?” he murmured.

“Aye,” answered Hawk. “M’lady is sending us te a tutor once a week. We’re learning all about knights in armor.” He fixed him with a shy look. “D-D’you have a suit of armor, m’lord?”

This time his brother didn’t try to shush him.

“There are several at my country estate,” he answered. “As a lad I did attempt to try one on. It weighed more than a sack of stones and reeked of rust.” The memory provoked a wry grimace. “As I recall, I fell over when I tried to take a step and my brother had to fish me out of the dratted thing.”

Hawk giggled. Raven tried to hide a smile.

“Do you have swords?” pressed the younger boy.

“A whole wall of them,” answered the earl.

The boy’s eyes widened. “Great big ones with jewels on the handle, just like the one in the picture of Richard the Lionhearted?”

“Even bigger. There’s a Viking broadside nearly as tall as I am.”

Assuming a look of boredom, Raven had slipped back into a slouch. But talk of blades tested his resolve. “You’re bamming us. Nobody could lift a swordthatbig.”

“It has a double handle, made for two hands.” Wrexford went on to describe it in great detail.

“Cor,” Hawk exhaled an admiring sigh. “Mebbe some day I’ll get te see a sword like that.”

“Yeah, and mebbe someday we’ll take tea with the Prince Regent,” muttered Raven. But a wink at his brother took any sting out of the sarcasm.

Undeterred, Hawk asked. “Wot other weapons have ye got?”

Maces, battleaxes, pikes—what ruthless little savages! He had forgotten how bloodthirsty boys were at that age. Hawk peppered him with questions about the arsenal, and when talk turned to daggers and rapiers, Raven couldn’t resist joining in.

Blades, thought the earl wryly, appeared to have a particular appeal to him.

“And then there are the crossbows,” said Wrexford. “My brother and I were birched ’til our bums were scarlet for stealing one from the wall and taking it out to the fields to test its aim.” He paused, recalling the long-ago incident. “It was likely a good thing we were caught by one of the servants. Trying to shoot an apple off Tommy’s head probably wasn’t the wisest idea.”

“I’ll bet ye wacked swords wid each other when nobody was looking,” said Hawk.

Memories, memories.He had not thought about the bonds of brotherhood in a long while.

“Many a time,” he replied. “Though not with real ones.”

“Who won?” asked Hawk.

“I was older, so I had the advantage when we were boys.”

The boy darted a glance at Raven, then a hopeful look at the earl. “And now?”

“And now . . .” A pause. “And now Tommy is dead.” Strange how the pain was still like sharpened steel lancing through flesh and bone. He had thought that locking it away would have dulled its edge. “So all that larking about through the forests and fields with sticks as our sabers is long in the past.”

“Aye, well, people cock up their toes all the time. Even toffs,” said Raven, trying to sound tougher than his years. “Nothing much you can do about it.”

A glimmer of fear lit for an instant in Hawk’s eye, but he nodded gamely. “Aye.”

As silence settled over them, Wrexford regretted his words. Death seemed to have him on the defensive this morning.