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If he were to let fly his imagination, the fact that she’d abandoned the novel bolstered a theory that she had been passing time while waiting for someone.

A secret lover? That seemed more plausible than that she had lost track of time reading.

He wondered if she had been frantically wishing him away.

How embarrassing if he had ruined her tryst by intruding.

Hmmph. Now he was curious. He should have followed the hackney cab to see if she circled back to the shop.

He thumbed the pages, then set the volume down. He was being absurd, of course. And unjustly suspicious of an innocent young lady. He should pay another call on Colonel Harrington. If he was bored to distraction, Colonel Harrington must be half out of his mind.

*

Feeling both impatient and lazy, he rode Bolt, one of Jasper’s better mounts, rather than walking to the hospital or disturbing Mercury’s rest. He left Bolt in care of an eager urchin in the drive.

He was wearing his redcoat, and the clerk at the entrance saluted before waving him on.

He was halfway down the hall when a short, heavyset man with light golden-brown skin and dark-brown hair stepped out of one of the rooms, a frown on his very familiar face.

“Adam!” Crispin called.

The man looked up. “Ah. Lieutenant.” Crispin drew near and Adam said, “You are well, I can see.”

Crispin nodded. “I’ve been well. And with largely you to thank.”

“Your gratitude cannot compare to mine.”

That must be true. Nearly two years earlier, in Portugal, Crispin’s regiment had come across an abandoned contingent of wounded French soldiers.

They were being tended to by one harried civilian, a Greek with some medical training, who had no business being there since he was not a French army surgeon.

Harrington had been in a particularly poor mood that day.

He decided, without evidence, that Adam Diakos was a spy.

The only way Crispin could talk him out of executing Adam was by guaranteeing the prisoner himself.

He made a poor jailor, but, thankfully, Adam was a trustworthy sort.

He was also curious and driven. Before Crispin knew it, the man had ferreted out the details of his irregular health, diagnosed him as having “an intolerance for many common foods,” and set out to cure him.

He wasn’t cured, but he was vastly improved.

As long as he avoided most everything that everyone else ate with abandon.

“How did you end up here?” he asked. The last he had seen of Adam, he’d been released from parole. Crispin had expected him to hightail it back to Greece.

“I needed work.” Adam cast a glance down the hallway, both directions, then dropped his voice. “Why are you here? You should leave.”

“What? Why?”

Adam took a step closer and lowered his voice even more. “There is contagion. A pox of some kind. On the third floor. It’s very bad.”

Crispin felt the blood rush down to his feet. “Are you leaving?”

“I believe I have had it.” He pointed to a small pockmark on his cheek. “I told the physicians I would work with the sick, but I should stay on the third floor. They thought otherwise. They think if I survived, I cannot spread it.”

“But you think you might?”

Adam shrugged. “It does not matter what I think. And it will spread regardless. You should leave.”

The devil. Colonel Harrington might prefer a quick death, but he should not be condemned to it. And there was Miss Harrington to think of. If she was going to take Old Harry back home to Tonbridge, she should do it now, before she caught this pox.

“I’m here to see Colonel Harrington. What is the process for discharge?”

“No one will stop him from going. But Miss Harrington cannot remove him by herself. He cannot walk.”

“She said she was hiring a manservant.” Unfortunately, it was not likely to be Adam. Harrington did not like to admit it when he’d been wrong.

“Mr. Cooper, I think,” Adam said, scratching his chin. “But he will not leave London until his sister is married.”

“When will that be?”

“I don’t know. Not today. Not soon enough.”

“Damn.” If it were not Adam speaking, Crispin would dismiss the warnings as alarmist. But he had never trusted any physician the way he did this Greek. “I’ll speak with Miss Harrington.”

“Yes, but not—” He hesitated, frowning. “Privately. You must tell her privately. We do not want panic. Most of these men have nowhere else to go.”

Crispin’s skin crawled at the thought of all these doubly cursed soldiers. “Yes, all right. I understand.”

Adam nodded. “She is on the terrace with Colonel Harrington.” He gestured to the next doorway. “I must…”

“Yes. Of course. And thank you for the warning.”

“Try to convince Miss Harrington to stay away until the danger is past.” With that, Adam stepped into the room to do whatever it was that he did.

Stay away? As if a woman who’d defended her brother against a careless attendant would abandon him to a pox.

So, here was a problem to solve. Crispin felt a familiar and welcome firing of his blood. This Cooper fellow could not be relied upon. He would have to rescue Old Harry.

He had to move fast. From recent experience, he knew Miss Harrington was independent-minded and reluctant to accept help. Fortunately, he could be very persuasive. He shouldn’t be smiling, but…he was looking forward to the tussle, bored blackguard that he was.