Page 27 of Peril in Piccadilly
“Christopher, do you mean?” It wasn’t likely that Francis would be here. He doesn’t much like London these days, not since he stopped coming up here to carouse with his friends from the trenches. These days, he prefers to stay sober, and to stay in Wiltshire with Constance, and with Uncle Herbert and Aunt Roz.
“The young popinjay with the motorcar,” Wolfgang said and sat back on his chair.
“Crispin? He’s not my cousin. And he wouldn’t be here. He and Laetitia headed back to Dorset this morning. They must be there by now.”
Wolfgang threw a doubtful glance at the door. “Are you certain? I could have sworn…”
Well, it certainly wouldn’t be the first time that Crispin lurked in the lobby while I was enjoying a meal with Wolfgang—and after Christopher’s revelation this morning, suddenly a lot of small things like that took on a new significance in my mind. But he had sounded fairly serious about taking Laetitia home. She had sounded rather serious about wanting to go. He wouldn’t have had time to motor to Dorset and back, although I supposed it was possible that they had changed their minds and were still at Sutherland House.
I glanced again at the door, doubtful now too. “I wouldn’t think so, although I suppose it isn’t impossible. I don’t see anyone who looks like him, at any rate.”
Wolfgang shook his head. “Most likely just my imagination.”
“Certainly,” I said, although I wasn’t sure I believed it. He had seen Crispin enough times by now that he should be able to recognize him. If Wolfgang thought he had seen him, then I was inclined to believe he had done.
Unless Christopher had decided to check on me, of course. In the beginning, he had insisted on escorting me to the Savoy for my dates with Wolfgang himself, and on handing me over with a warning to behave. That had stopped after the first few times, once Christopher became more comfortable with Wolfgang and trusted that the latter wasn’t going to chloroform me and take me off to Limehouse (or to his room upstairs) to do unspeakable things to me. But my tumble down the stairs last night seemed to have brought Christopher’s latent protective instincts to the fore again, and perhaps he really had decided to loiter in the Savoy lobby to keep an eye on me. From a distance, he and Crispin look very much like one another, and under the artificial lights of the Savoy, Crispin’s platinum hair might very well look more like Christopher’s sunny blond, or vice versa.
Naturally I didn’t say anything about it. If Christopher was hanging about because he was afraid that Wolfgang was trying to murder me, it wasn’t a subject I wanted to broach with Wolfgang. Nothing good comes from telling a man that your family suspects him of trying to do away with you.
I turned back to him with a smile. “I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about. If something was wrong, someone would let me know. And if you truly did see Crispin, he’s most likely just escorting Laetitia somewhere. Just as last night.”
Wolfgang drew breath. “About last night…”
“Please, may we forget it? I’m sorry for becoming emotional.”
He blinked at me, and I added, “Won’t you tell me aboutSchlossNatterdorff? I should at least not reject the idea until I know what I am rejecting.”
He stared at me for a second, intently, as if he were trying to determine whether I was telling the truth or not. Just as it was getting uncomfortable, his expression melted into warm eyes and a wide smile. “Mein Schatz.”
He reached across the table. I lifted my hand to meet his. We were just about to clasp hands when my teacup upended with aclinkof porcelain on porcelain, and brown liquid soaked into the tablecloth and approached the edge of the table.
Instead of clasping Wolfgang’s hand, I pushed my chair back. I had destroyed one evening gown by tripping down the stairs to the underground yesterday. I wasn’t about to ruin my favorite afternoon frock by soaking it in hot tea.
Wolfgang jumped to his feet, too, of course, and the waiter as well as the maître d’ descended at a run. The waiter gathered up all the flatware and silverware, and the maître d’ whisked the tablecloth off and draped it over his arm before escorting us to another table. It was only a minute or two before the waiter had supplied another teapot, two more cups and saucers, and more cake and sandwiches. I poured again, and then sat back on my chair.
“That was exciting.”
Wolfgang nodded, looking around, but of course no one was uncouth enough to be watching us.
“Where were we?” I prompted, and he gave me a rueful smile. In case I haven’t mentioned it thus far, Wolfgang is exceptionally good-looking, with wavy, golden hair and midnight blue eyes. Even the Mensur scar that bisects one cheek isn’t enough to destroy the appeal.
“I believe I was about to attempt to take your hand,” he told me with self-depreciating humor. “I won’t make that mistake again.”
“I would hardly call it a mistake,” I demurred, since it hadn’t been my trying to get out of holding his hand that had caused the mishap. I wasn’t exactly sure what had happened, to be honest; I had just noticed the result. It may have been my hand that knocked the cup from the saucer. Then again, it might have been his. “Perhaps, for now, we ought to forego the hand-holding and instead focus on tea and cake while you tell me about Germany.”
He beamed, and while I dumped sugar and milk in my new cup of tea and transferred a fresh cucumber sandwich onto my plate, he proceeded to do just that.
“I don’t know how much you remember from being a child in Heidelberg?—”
“Not much,” I admitted. “And I remember less and less every day, I’m sorry to say. Although I was eleven when I left Germany, not a small child, so I do remember a few things.”
He nodded. “SchlossNatterdorff sits some thirty kilometers from Heidelberg. I don’t think you visited as a child.”
“I don’t imagine so,” I agreed. I’m sure I would have remembered, if so. A castle is the sort of thing that sticks with you. Instead, my memories were of the small flat we had lived in in Heidelberg, and the streets of the town, and the river.
“It sits on the outskirts of the village of Natterdorff,” Wolfgang said, and went on to describe something that, frankly, sounded a lot less like Mad Ludwig’s Neuschwanstein, and rather more like Sutherland Hall or Marsden Manor. Not a fairytale castle with towers and turrets against the picturesque backdrop of the Hessian highlands, but more like a manor-house in the style I had become used to.
Of course I didn’t show my disappointment, just kept him going with smiles and encouraging noises. We had moved from the orchard and stables past the number of bedrooms and baths, and he was describing the wallpaper in the formal ballroom when the maître d’ materialized beside the table.
