Page 6 of The Wallflower Manifesto
Whatever it was, be it a missing dog or a wayward heir or a rival family attempting to foil prospects for a newly debuted daughter, Abe was here to help. It wasn’t the career he’d envisaged for himself, but hell, it kept the coffers full, and that was all that really mattered at the end of the day, wasn’t it?
He checked his appearance in the foyer mirror, smoothing down the wayward strands of sandy hair that had a tendency to stick out at all angles, and straightened his shoulders. Silently, he congratulated himself on the forethought he’d had to freshen the paint on the window, where it readMurphy Investigationsin bright, looping green letters next to the brass door knocker, and he took a breath, bracing himself to meet the first well-paying prospective client he’d had since thetonhad fled London last summer for greener, colder pastures in the country.
Bonanza!he thought, smiling widely at the lady standing on the opposite side of his threshold, whose blue silk reticule alone must have been worth at least three months’ rent.
She was of middle age, elegant and obviously monied, with pale hair piled into a fashionable roll atop her head. She had light blue eyes that were currently narrowed rather suspiciously upon Abe.
“Good morning, Madam,” he said, in his most polite voice. “How may I assist you?”
Rather than greeting him in the usual way, she tilted her head at him, her squint narrowing further, and observed, “You are not my son.”
“I … er.” He had to stifle a nervous chuckle. “I’m indeed not. Though I’m sure I’d be honored if I were. Do you perhaps have the wrong door?”
She frowned at him and took a step back, leaning to the left to examine the brass numbers nailed to the doorframe, and then returned to her rigid posture. “No, this is the correct address, I’m afraid.”
“Mother?” A very startled, very posh male voice came from the staircase behind them. “What the devil?”
Abe sighed.
“Ah,” said the woman, brushing past Abe as though he had never been there at all with a brisk sense of purpose. “Freddy.”
“Of course,” Abe muttered, swinging the door shut behind the woman and throwing his weight back against it to watch the touching reunion unfold. He crossed his arms across his chest, likely looking just as petulant as he felt. “Come right in.”
The woman cupped Freddy Hightower’s face with her slender hand, turning it one way, then the other, before dropping it, evidently satisfied with what she saw. “Well,” she said expectantly. “Aren’t you going to offer me some tea?”
“I …” Freddy croaked, alarm very clear in his face as he looked over the woman’s shoulder at Abe for help. “Yes?”
“Yes,” agreed Abe. “Settle yourselves. I’ll put the kettle on. Lady Bentley, I presume?”
“Mother, this is Mr. Murphy, my housemate,” Freddy spat out in a rather unnecessarily self-conscious staccato. “He is the investigator advertised on the door and a former Bow Street Runner.”
“Oh,” she said, remembering Abe’s existence as she turned over her shoulder. “How fascinating. I am certain the story of how the two of you came to be entangled is one I shall wish to hear at length when there is time. You must excuse my abruptness, Mr. Murphy, but I have urgent business with my son. I have only just learned of his whereabouts after several years of concern and confusion.”
“I’ll just”—Abe attempted to smile, giving wooden looks from one Hightower to the other—“I’ll put the tea on.” And he made his escape, stepping around them and listening with half an ear as they resumed conversation in sharp whispers and ascending footsteps back up to the apartments at the top of the building.
Mercifully, the offices had their own kitchen, and a kettle besides, for Abe to busy himself in while Freddy explained himself to what appeared to be the type of mother you did not simply disappear on without explanation.
But that was the flippant Lord Bentley for you. If Abe had learned anything about Frederick Octavius Hightower the Third in over a year as his reluctant housemate, it was that he was an expert at sidestepping responsibility, and of course, the easiest way to do that was to avoid confrontation altogether.
Though, while Abe was quick to pass harsh judgment on Freddy in most circumstances, in this one, he was able to dredge up a kernel of sympathy. He’d hidden from his own mother’s wrath enough times to understand the instinct, or at least the temptation. Abigail Winterville Murphy was not a woman to be trifled with, and Abe, sadly, had a terrible habit of trifling.
He frowned, arranging a spray of the good biscuits he had just bought for prospective clientele onto a tray as the kettle heated, alongside his painted teacup set. If anyone showed up now, he’d have to serve them mismatched china, wouldn’t he? But he couldn’t rightly give a dowager countess the standby crockery.
Freddy was always ruining things, whether he intended to or not. It was his natural talent.
Lady Bentley might have been putting on ironic airs when she expressed interest in how her son had come to share quarters with the likes of Abe, but as far as he was concerned, it was a story worth hearing. If anyone had come out on the lucky end of it, it wasn’t the respectable, business-owning Scotsman who was currently arranging tea for the layabout, disgraced earl who’d spent the last two years hiding from his mummy, thank youverymuch.
He grumbled to himself all the way up the stairs, taking care to prevent the steaming teacups from clattering against one another on their saucers, and kept an ear turned toward thefront door as he made his way to deliver the refreshment to Freddy and the dowager like a good little maid.
Their voices were no longer hushed. Perhaps they had forgotten he was coming.
“I’m all right, though, really,” Freddy was saying, sounding more exasperated than cowed. “She wants nothing to do with me.”
“Well, if you’d only let me help you,” his mother returned, in the way mothers do.
“No. You mustn’t get involved. Are you going to move into the dower house now that Claire has taken residence?”
“With Tommy?” the dowager scoffed. “I think not! I’d sooner move into the village pub.”
