Chapter 20
Twenty
Phillip arrived at Sommerleigh with no warning. He was accompanied by two strangers. The man was in his forties with graying temples and a ready smile. The woman was redheaded, handsome, and of an age somewhere between Thomas and Harry.
Thomas saw their arrival by carriage through one of the front windows as he searched the drawing room for an old newspaper. He retreated to the library and asked Whitson to bring Phillip to him.
“What is this, Phillip? You’ve never brought unannounced visitors here before.”
Phillip put his hands behind his back. “You’ve always told me to treat this house as my own, Uncle.”
“So I have. But now with your aunt here . . . you know, she hopes for a quiet life to do her work.”
Phillip laughed. “We won’t bother Harry. She’ll have no idea we’re here. And I thought you could do with a bit of livening up. We might have some whist.”
Whist. That did sound like fun. He enjoyed cards. He hadn’t played in—was it six months now? On his trips to London, he wasted no time on cards.
“And your studies? You aren’t missing too much by being here?”
“No, Uncle, stop your fuss. You’re turning into an old biddy.” Phillip smiled. “Come and meet our guests.”
The man and woman were Mr. and Mrs. Swinton. They were friends of Phillip. They had met—oh, how had they met? Oh, yes, Mr. Swinton and Phillip had met over cards at a gaming house.
As they sat in the drawing room, Thomas could sense the distant bustle of bedchambers being hastily prepared, Mrs. Haversham sending a footman by horse into the village for a larger joint, a bit of excitement stirring in the bowels of the house.
When Harry came out of her aerie that evening, Thomas was waiting for her. Since he usually only met her at the aerie door after a trip to London, she was perplexed. She had seen him at luncheon. Surely he had not gone to London this afternoon and returned? No, that would be impossible.
“Dr. Andrews will be here for dinner, Harry,” Thomas said. “Perhaps you might wish to change your dress.”
“Dr. Andrews? But I feel quite well. And he made no mention of coming to dinner yesterday when we walked.”
“Well,” Thomas said as they went down the stairs, “Phillip has come with some guests, and I thought Phillip and I and Mr. and Mrs. Swinton might play some whist after dinner. I know Dr. Andrews does not play cards and neither do you. Therefore, he might sit with you while we play.”
Harry thought this was inordinately complicated.
Surely, she could eat dinner on a tray and continue working in her aerie.
However, she was at a good stopping place, having determined that she should consider her non-exponent variables all to be coprimes.
And she always enjoyed talking to the doctor.
And Thomas must want her presence. That thought gave her the feeling in her stomach.
They now drew even with her bedchamber door, and Harry looked at her husband.
He looked well. By that, she meant, she supposed, that she liked how he looked.
His coat, as always, was cut to fit his chest and shoulders perfectly.
He was wearing the tight-fitting buff breeches he had worn to woo her stepmother.
She reached out and touched his leg, just above the knee.
A light brush against the muscle there. It was the same thigh she had put her head on, all those months ago.
She looked up towards his face. Those blue eyes.
The pulse visible in his neck, the shadow of dark stubble on his upper lip, under his chin, and on his jaw.
She knew Jackson would be shaving him before dinner, and then the stubble would be gone, the skin clean and smooth.
Until tomorrow morning. But she would not see him before he was shaved again in the morning.
Oh, to see the morning stubble before it was taken away. To stay the hand of the razor-wielding, ever-vigilant Jackson, for once.
“Yes, my lord.”
She went into her bedchamber where Smythe was waiting for her with one of her new gowns, a daring red one, which Harry objected to as being far too insubstantial in the sleeves and the bodice. Still, she might wear it if Smythe thought Thomas would like it.
Dinner was tolerable. Mr. Swinton and Mrs. Swinton made themselves ideal guests, full of interesting stories about their travels in the Mediterranean in the last year.
Dr. Andrews contributed some tales about his time as a physician in the Royal Navy, including a humorous encounter with a whale in the Straits of Moyle.
The wine flowed. Laughter rose to the top and bubbled over.
Harry looked down the table at Thomas. He was laughing at a quip of Mrs. Swinton’s. Harry caught his eye. She picked up her glass of wine and raised it just a few inches to him.
Thomas grinned at her.
In truth, Harry was not enjoying herself. But she was enjoying that Thomas was enjoying himself. And that must be enough, for now.
Harry noted how Thomas leaned towards Mrs. Swinton and made sure her glass was filled. How he glanced at her bosom. Thomas must like Mrs. Swinton. Perhaps because of her red hair. Or the size of her breasts. It was unclear which of the two was the more important variable.
After dinner, the Swintons and Phillip and Thomas settled to whist in one of the smaller drawing rooms. The Swintons were paired together against Phillip and Thomas.
Harry and Dr. Andrews sat on two sofas, a little apart from the card players.
Harry was explaining how consecutive residues might play a part in her proof.
Dr. Andrews, who said he had been up since three in the morning to deliver a set of twins to the baker’s wife, seemed happy to let her talk while he sipped on claret and dozed a bit with his eyes open.
Harry let the chatter of the card players flow over her as she thought about modular arithmetic. The first game went to Thomas and Phillip. Mr. Swinton shuffled the cards and proposed they have a friendly wager on the next game. A shilling a point.
“A shilling! Nay, at least half a crown for each point,” Phillip said.
Harry observed Mrs. Swinton’s hand on Thomas’ leg under the table.
The doctor was now fully asleep, sitting up, his eyes closed.
Harry decided this was a good time to pull up a stool to the table and sit between Thomas and Mrs. Swinton and observe the game more closely.
After all, in many ways, that was her leg.
And she should defend it in her own home.
Thomas had not been completely surprised to feel a hand on his leg under the table.
He had been groped before by women during card games, and, in many cases, those women had not been whores but wives of baronets and marquesses.
There had even been that time five years ago when Lady Rowe had caused him to spend with her hand.
He had lost that particular game—a large sum—but felt the thrill had been worth it.
The danger of being apprehended in the act, especially by her husband sitting next to him, had added a decadent glow to his pleasure.
However, he was relieved Mrs. Swinton’s hand was currently just squeezing his thigh.
It was the same thigh Harry had lightly touched in the passage upstairs.
What a contrast between that tantalizing caress and this firm kneading of Mrs. Swinton’s.
And then the grip of Mrs. Swinton’s hand disappeared as Harry, looking fetching in her red dress, drew up a stool and said, “I think I’ll watch. ”
Mrs. Swinton tittered. “Just as long as you don’t peek at my hand.”
Harry said evenly, “Yes, I recommend you keep your hand to yourself, Mrs. Swinton.”
Thomas had a moment when he thought Harry might have emphasized the word hand ever so slightly. But, no. Impossible. No one could accuse Harry of subtlety.
Thomas and Phillip lost the next game. Phillip proposed the stake be raised to a pound a point, and Mr. Swinton agreed.
Thomas had more claret brought as well as whisky for the gentlemen.
At the end of the very long evening, Thomas offered to settle the wager.
He would fetch some sovereigns from his purse.
He and Phillip owed the Swintons thirty-seven pounds.
“Oh, no.” Harry jumped up. “Surely, you will stay another evening, won’t you?
” She looked appealingly at the Swintons.
“You wouldn’t deprive us of your company so soon?
That would be most unfair! I must impose on you to extend your visit with us.
And you will play more whist, won’t you? It is a most entertaining game.”
Thomas now marveled at Catherine Lovelock’s mastery in the training of her stepdaughter. If he didn’t know Harry, he would have thought her a gay young bride, entranced by the card play and the high stakes, delighted with her guests, eager for more time with them.
But he thought he knew something of Harry, if anyone could ever know her, so he knew better. What was she playing at?
Of course, Mr. and Mrs. Swinton could be persuaded to stay.
“How wonderful!” Harry clapped her hands together in a fair simulation of glee.
At the sound of Harry’s clapping, the doctor woke. He must be off. He had some important reading and a long day in his surgery tomorrow. Oh, aye, if his horse could be saddled?
Thomas walked Harry to her bedchamber door before going to his own.
The Swintons were ensconced in the wing that contained visitors’ rooms. Phillip’s bedchamber was not far from Harry’s, and he had come up the stairs behind them.
He was turning the doorknob to his room, already loosening his cravat.
“Goodnight, Uncle Thomas, Lady Drake,” he said cheerily.
Harry put her arms around Thomas’ neck and pulled his head down. Her lips tickled his ear. “I’ll come to your room at midnight,” she whispered before disappearing into her own bedchamber.
Thomas swallowed. He turned to Phillip. “Good night, Phillip. I’ll see you on the morrow.”
“Yes, may we have better luck!”
“Yes.”
Thomas had a jumble of feelings. He got back to his room, closed the door behind him, and sat heavily on the edge of his bed. Harry had never come to his bedchamber.
Those arms around his neck, that whisper in his ear, that tickle, her face for a moment so close to his.
He looked at the clock in the room. It was barely eleven.
How would he pass the hour until she came?
There was some cold water in the pitcher.
Thomas poured it into his basin and took off his coat and waistcoat.
He loosened his cravat and washed his face, then untucked his shirt and splashed water under his arms. What else?
A book. That’s what Harry was always doing.
Reading. But he could find not a single book or even an old newspaper among the things in his bedchamber or dressing room.
He contemplated sneaking down to the library and nabbing a book, but then he worried he might miss Harry if she came early.
He just sat in a chair then, cracking his knuckles.
A few minutes before midnight, he realized he was still half-undressed and quickly put his waistcoat and coat back on.
He was just retying his cravat when he heard a knock.
Harry, still in her red dress, glided in as he opened the door. She looked around as if a bit curious. She sat on the bed and thumped the mattress.
“Well,” she said.
“Well,” Thomas said, sitting back down in his chair.
“The Swintons are cheats.”
“What? No. I have played cards for years, Harry. I know sleight of hand and how a man might arrange a deck, sneak cards. The Swintons do none of that.”
“Yet they’re still cheating. They’re quite good, very clever. I’m sure no one has ever caught them at it.”
Harry explained. The idle chatter of the Swintons was not idle at all.
Mrs. Swinton might address her husband by his Christian name, Rodney.
This indicated she was communicating to him about cards she held that were diamonds.
The number of words in that sentence told him what number she had.
Thirteen words in the sentence indicated king, twelve indicated queen, and so on.
When Mrs. Swinton gasped “Rodney, no!” that meant she had ace diamonds.
A remark addressed to Mr. Swinton, using his surname, was about hearts, one to Thomas was about spades, and one to Phillip was clubs.
Mr. Swinton had a similar code for communicating his cards to his wife.
Thomas shook his head in wonderment. “How did you come to puzzle this out?”
“I listened. I saw the cards that were played. I have a habit of counting everything. And the pattern appeared.”
“The damnable scoundrels!” Thomas stood. “I have half a mind to throw them out of the house this minute.”
“Hush,” Harry said. “Sit down.”
Thomas hushed. He sat down.
“You owe them thirty-seven pounds. That’s no small sum. Let’s win it back before you throw them out of the house.” Harry was a banker’s daughter, all right.
“Phillip needs to hear this.” Thomas moved to stand again, and Harry pushed on that same spot on his thigh where she had brushed him hours ago.
“Phillip knows,” she said. “He lost deliberately. For example, the third trick of the second-to-last hand, he played a knave of spades. Only after Mr. Swinton led a queen of spades. Yet, in the ninth and eleventh trick of the same hand he played a seven and a four of spades. Why didn’t he play a seven or a four on the third trick and save his knave? ”
“He made an error. He’s not clever, like you.”
“He made many, many poor plays. He wasn’t drunk. He didn’t seem nervous. Only when one knows all the tricks can one see he threw away a lot of good cards on tricks he already knew he couldn’t win.”
“Why would he do that?”
Harry shrugged.
“Perhaps,” Thomas said slowly, “he owes these people money. And bringing them here and having me lose to them is one way he has of paying them back. But why wouldn’t he ask me for the money? I would give it to him.”
Harry held still.
Thomas was even more furious now. “I can’t believe he would do this to me. I’m his uncle—like his brother.”
“I suggest we find a way to get Phillip out of the house tomorrow. He’ll know you’re angry about something.”
“Yes,” Thomas said glumly. “I’m a terrible actor.”
“Yes.” Harry looked into his eyes and smiled. “It’s one of your best qualities.”
Later, staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep, Thomas pondered on that look and that smile. He could not recount a time when Harry had done those two things together. At the same time. Smiled and looked at him and not at the sky or a window or a book. He wondered how he could make her do it again.