Page 48 of Cora
“It’s fading,” Violet said. “Tell us more. Please! We beg you.” Her eyes darted to his. “A boon. We must have an offering.”
Hawke slapped a gold sovereign on the table. Violet considered it for a moment as if she was about to ask for more, then decided against it. The faint glow in the orb winked out.
The mood changed in an instant, signaling the performance was over. A woman clad in a flowing white gown with long auburn hair flowing freely around her shoulders carried in a candle taper in a silver holder, her expression solemn.
“The spirits were trying to tell us where Bella is.” She placed the candle on the table, dropped a quick kiss on Violet’s lips and flipped the gas lighting switch mounted to the wall. Hawke winced at the sudden brightness.
“Those were impressive parlor tricks. I don’t know how you ladies pulled them off. I admit I was rattled. Literally, when the table shook.”
“They’re not tricks, Hawke. Violet really can commune with the dead.”
Violet nodded. The feather on her turban bounced. “Always been able to speak with spirits. Since I was a child. It’s only with Daisy drying up our business and Bella being away that I have had a chance to tap into my true gift.”
She was serious.
Violet and Azalea were two of Bella’s longstanding Flowers, and the former had always had a flair for theatrics. Azalea was clearly creating effects like the moving table. He wasn’t sure how, but Hawke did not believe in messages from beyond the grave. Especially since he felt certain that Bella was still in this world.
She had to be. There was too much unfinished business between them.
“Thank you for the entertainment.” He tossed a second guinea on the table. Azalea snatched it up. The fabric tablecloth tented. Both women gasped.
“Look!” Violet exclaimed.
“The curtains!” Azalea whirled. “Which direction does that window face?”
“Southwest,” Hawke answered. Hairs pricked up the back of his neck.
“What else lies to the southwest?” Azalea’s triumph lit her eyes.
“France.” Any fool could have figured that out and chosen this room to hold a séance in. Everyone in this house knew that Bella had gone to France right before the holidays. It was nothing to go on. Less than a clue. These were things he already knew.
And yet.
Bella was missing. She was in danger. He didn’t need to commune with ghosts to know that. He had given this a try because he wanted an answer: was going after her worth the sacrifice of a knighthood? Victoria would take a rejection of her gift poorly. He did not wish to throw a well-intentioned gift back in his friend’s face.
Violet pinned him with a stare.
“Well, Hawke? What are you waiting for? Go and bring back our girl.”
CHAPTERTWENTY-THREE
GIDEON
Instead of his wife, it was his mother who came to greet him when Gideon arrived home at the end of his workday. He had left the bank early for once. Eryx was, however begrudgingly, turning out to be a good business partner. The man had an enviable knack for spotting opportunities to make money, and Gideon found himself examining his own books more closely for possible ways to increase his own revenues.
“Where is your wife?” Martha demanded without preamble.
“How would I know, Mother?”
“She is yourwife,Gideon. You have not taken nearly a firm enough hand with her.”
No, he had not. But he was quite certain that he and his mother had very different views as to what constituted a firm hand.
“Cora probably went to visit Miss Caldwell.”
Martha’s mouth flattened. “She must drop that deplorable connection. At once.”
“Miss Caldwell is harmless. Her father might be elderly and on his third wife, while she has been rather forgotten in the passel of offspring, but that doesn’t make her any less a lady. Or her father any less a potential client we might want at Wentworth’s.”
