Page 6 of Miss Desirable
As if English physicians were worth consulting. “And Catherine’s”—Xavier sorted through English vocabulary—“mother’s husband?”
“Lord Fairchild predeceased his wife by a year or two.”
That Dorning knew Catherine’s situation suggested he wasn’t entirely indifferent to her. “To lose both parents in close succession must be a considerable blow. Does the lady have other siblings?”
“Legitimate siblings?”
“One does not wish to offend needlessly, Dorning.” Though one regretted being so merciful in the fencing salon.
“No legitimate siblings,” Dorning said. “Cousins at some remove in Canada, and I know what you’re thinking.”
He could not possibly. “And that would be?”
“That we have neglected Catherine shamefully, except that’s not how it works.”
Fournier waited, because Dorning would surely explain how it worked,itbeing the self-serving and convoluted machinations of the British peerage.
“Jeanette and I will make a mourning call in a few weeks,” Dorning said. “Casriel will do likewise shortly thereafter. We will do the pretty, but we will not intrude. Catherine has been left quite well fixed, much to the shock of the matchmakers. When her period of mourning is over, she will be received with exquisite good manners anywhere she pleases to go. The money will keep doors open, while openly acknowledging our connection to her just now would… It’s complicated.”
“‘Complicated’ being another word for ‘stupid.’ Catherine is grieving a double loss, assuming her mother’s husband was kind to her. Now she will be besieged with the fawning scoundrels you call fortune hunters, as if penniless opportunists were intrepid denizens of the forest primeval. She has no one to safeguard her interests, and you keep your distance.”
“We must keep our distance for a time, up to a point, but apparently, you are concerned for her.”
Well, yes, and that was a problem. “A woman contemplating murder by poison is a woman in need of her family.”
“Explain.”
Fournier did as they navigated the wider and quieter streets on the fringes of Mayfair. “She did not take the wine with her, but she did not cancel her order either. If I pretend to have forgotten the transaction, she could easily walk into one of several other wineshops and purchase the same vintage.” Fournier would have a discreet word with the clerks in those shops before the sun had set.
“You are making leaps, Fournier. Just because a woman—”
“Where does Catherine dwell?”
“Number seventeen, Houseman Square.” Offered without hesitation, another indication that Dorning did, indeed, keep an eye on his sister.
“The address she gave me was on Delacourt Close. A fine lady does not typically dwell on a close, such as fill the eastern reaches of your noisome city. She would not give me her name, but she made the mistake of taking off her veil. That is the error of a smart woman for once not thinking clearly.”
Dorning paused at the foot of the Aurora Club’s steps. “Why would removing her veil indoors be a mistake?”
A fissure formed in the vast wall of patience Fournier had built while dwelling among the English.
“Because, idiot, her eyes give away her heritage to any person who has met a Dorning. All her life, she has been burdened in ways you cannot fathom, and now you keep your distance from her when she is most alone. I will never understand English honor.”
Dorning glanced up and down the street, then ascended the steps. “Let’s have lunch. A private dining room. I said the Dornings could not overtly take an interest in Catherine’s situation, but we do very much care for her wellbeing.”
Fournier climbed the steps, his sense of foreboding mounting as he approached the front door. “I have done my duty to the lady and informed her family that she is in difficulties. That is what my sense of honor requires of me.” That wasallhis sense of honor required, and far beyond what pragmatic instincts advised.
“But you said she contemplated dire measures,” Dorning replied as the door swung open from within. “If I doubled the claret order from The Coventry Club, would you consider having a closer look at her situation?”
“Do not insult me or the lady any more than you already have,imbécile anglais.”
“I do so envy you that French accent.” Dorning strolled through the door and nodded to the footman. “Makes every threat so much more convincing. Could have used that edge with my older brothers.”
“Perhaps the lady sought to poison you. Somebody certainly should.” Fournier had reviewed the entire encounter numerous times, and he could envisage no scenario by which Catherine Fairchild would have acquired a taste for the lowly Cahors.
Perhaps she was buying the wine for her lover, but what sort of lover put a lady up to such a purchase? And not once had Catherineexplicitlycontradicted Fournier’s theory that she was buying a vintage that would disguise the taste of poison.
Dorning passed his hat and walking stick to the footman. “We’ll need a private dining room, Jules, and warn the staff that Fournier is in a difficult mood. Only the very best vintages will do.”
