Silver. Ford’s hopes took an incautious leap. A book that mentioned silver might also mention gold. And Raymond Lully had lived in Italy for years.
Violet reached across him to lay a hand over her sister’s. ‘‘Are you sure? I never knew you could read Italian.’’
‘‘I’m sure.’’ A hot blush touched the girl’s lovely cheeks.
Rose resembled Violet, but her features had a glossy perfection missing from her sister’s. Tabitha had been like that, too. They were
too
perfect, Ford thought. Violet’s looks were friendlier, more comfortable.
He could touch her without worrying about messing her up.
‘‘I found an Italian book,’’ Rose explained, gesturing to the shelves that stretched to the high, geometric-patterned ceiling. ‘‘ ’Twas not too difficult to teach myself. The language shares much with Spanish.’’
Nodding, Violet sat back. Too bad—he’d rather enjoyed having her hang over his lap. She’d smelled like flowers. Probably violets, he imagined.
Rose looked back down to his book. ‘‘Of course, some languages share the same words with different meanings. For example, in French
four
means ‘oven,’
but in English ’tis a number. So just because
argento
means ‘silver’ in Italian doesn’t mean it couldn’t mean something else in another tongue.’’ Carefully, she flipped another page. Scanning it, she hummed under her breath.
‘‘What is it?’’ Violet asked.
‘‘ ’Tis odd, that is all. That one word appeared to be Italian, but others are not. There are letters here that are foreign to me, and here’’—she looked up—
‘‘look at this line, here.’’
Both Ford and Violet scooted closer, their chair legs rasping on the carpet. ‘‘Yes?’’ Ford prompted.
‘‘This line is written backward. Even the letters are backward, like in a mirror. And then this line here’’—
she drew one graceful finger along some text—‘‘has no strange letters at all.’’ In her enthusiasm, her voice had lost its deliberate seductive quality. ‘‘The writing is a bit faded and more than a bit smeared, but all readable, you see?’’
Violet shook her head. ‘‘I cannot read it.’’
‘‘You cannot comprehend it,’’ Rose corrected. ‘‘But you recognize the letters, do you not?’’
‘‘It may be a code,’’ Ford realized suddenly.
‘‘Different languages and patterns. You may be right.’’ She looked up at him, her dark eyes excited rather than coquettish. ‘‘Violet said this could be an important book. Was the book you’re looking for written in code?’’
‘‘I never considered it before, but it could have been.’’ The book had been rumored to be difficult to read. If Lully were recording priceless secrets, he’d be tempted to do so in code.
And he knew someone who was
very
good at cracking codes.
‘‘If it is a code,’’ Violet asked her sister, ‘‘do you think you could puzzle it out?’’
Rose shook her head regretfully. ‘‘No. There are few words I recognize.’’
‘‘And none in the title?’’ Violet pushed.
‘‘None.’’ Rose looked to Ford. ‘‘I’m sorry.’’
She looked sincere and intelligent, and although she didn’t interest him like her sister did, he liked her much more than he’d thought. ‘‘That is quite all right,’’ he told her, offering her a smile. ‘‘You’ve actually helped a lot—’’
‘‘Where is Jewel?’’ Rowan interrupted, running into the room.
‘‘At home,’’ Ford said. ‘‘With her new friend Harry.’’
‘‘
I’m
her new friend.’’ Jewel would positively preen if she saw Rowan’s pout. ‘‘Is she in your laboratory?’’
‘‘She’d better not be.’’
‘‘You said we could go into the laboratory today.
You promised.’’
‘‘Rowan—’’ Violet started.
‘‘He’s right,’’ Ford cut in.
He
had
promised. And at Lakefield, he might find an opportunity to get Violet alone.
He wondered if she would let him kiss her again.
Rising, he closed the small leather book and tucked it under one arm. ‘‘I did promise,’’ he reminded her.
‘‘And a Chase promise is not given lightly. You’ll come along, will you not?’’
Her hesitation wasn’t heartening.
‘‘Lord Lakefield . . .’’ Rose’s voice was back to its practiced purr. ‘‘What is your laboratory like?’’
‘‘Messy,’’ he said shortly. He knew she was angling for an invitation, but he wasn’t at all tempted to offer one. Then he noticed Violet scowl at her sister.
That was much more heartening.
He graced Rose with his famous smile, adding,
‘‘Perhaps sometime I’ll show you.’’
‘‘I’ll come along,’’ Violet blurted.
Very heartening, indeed.
‘‘ ’Tis up here, Violet.’’
‘‘I’m coming.’’ Violet followed her brother up the dark, square staircase and then up some more, the old wood creaking all the way to the attic. They walked through a corridor lined with books—not the handsome leather-bound volumes that filled the Ashcrofts’
impressive library, but books that were clearly well read, jumbled haphazardly on plain shelves. Science books, she assumed.
From what she had seen, which granted was only part of the ground floor and now this attic, it seemed Lakefield didn’t boast a proper library. If she were mistress here, she would remedy that.
But of course that was never to be. Just being in this place reminded her of how much money Ford needed to fix it. He was going to have to marry for money, and she would never let that happen to her.
At the end of the corridor, Rowan stepped into a room. As Jewel scampered in past him, he waved an expansive arm in a very grown-up way. ‘‘Look.’’
The single word was uttered in an awed tone. Entering the laboratory, Violet could see why.
Housed in a gigantic open space, Ford’s workroom was a boy’s dream come true. Beneath a steeply pitched ceiling of raw beams that exposed the stone-tiled roof above, a profusion of paraphernalia lived in charming confusion. Under the single shuttered window, a jumble of gears and other parts sat among an army of watches and clocks. Their ill-timed ticks filled the air, sounding like hundreds of scampering mice.
‘‘Incredible,’’ she said. There was no other word to describe it.
Ford opened a drawer and took out a shallow pan.
‘‘ ’Tis nothing compared to my laboratory at Cainewood. Or Charles’s laboratory—the man has at least six of everything.’’
She didn’t doubt it. King Charles was known to take his scientific pursuits very seriously and indeed had chartered the Royal Society. She’d heard he attended the regular meetings.
Just then, the clocks started chiming, as badly timed as their ticks, and she burst out laughing at the absurdity of it all. How anyone could accomplish anything in this chaos was beyond her comprehension.
‘‘Look at this,’’ Rowan said, pulling a heavy red book off a shelf. He shoved aside a mortar and pestle to set the book on a table, then opened it with great ceremony. Flipping several pages, he stopped on one and unfolded a large diagram.
She blinked. ‘‘What is that?’’
‘‘A spider,’’ he said gleefully. ‘‘Like the one we scared you with.’’
Jewel snickered and moved close.
Violet slanted her brother a dubious glance. ‘‘That doesn’t look like any spider I’ve ever seen.’’
‘‘ ’Tis as seen under a microscope.’’ He pointed to an instrument across the room, a handsome specimen of chased brass. ‘‘The book is called
Micrographia
.’’
Pronouncing the word carefully, he turned to a random page, and the children leaned over the sketches.
They all stared at the patterns of tiny squares and holes. Jewel scratched her head. ‘‘What is it?’’
‘‘ ‘Cork and other such frothy bodies,’ ’’ Violet read.
‘‘Fascinating, is it not?’’ Even more fascinating than the pictures was her brother’s animated face. He treated lessons as a chore; she’d never seen him so interested in anything academic.
‘‘Look at this,’’ he said, unfolding another large drawing. ‘‘Snowflakes.’’
‘‘No, they’re not,’’ she said, hiding a grin. ‘‘Read it.’’
He focused on the page. ‘‘ ‘Several observables,’ ’’
he enunciated slowly, ‘‘ ‘in the six-branched figures form’d on the surface of urine by freezing.’ ’’
‘‘Ewww.’’ Jewel made a face.
But Rowan was unruffled. ‘‘Can we buy one of these books, Violet? Please?’’
‘‘I have no idea where to get it.’’
‘‘London,’’ Ford said, polishing a small rectangle of mirror on his breeches. ‘‘Check the title page.’’
She turned to it and read. ‘‘ ‘Printed by Joseph Martyn and James Allestry, Printers to the Royal Society, and sold at their shop at the Bell in St. Paul’s Churchyard.’ Hmm.’’ She looked up at Rowan. ‘‘I’ll talk to Father about it when next we go to the City.’’
Ford ripped a piece of white paper from a page of scribbled notes. ‘‘When is that?’’
‘‘When Parliament is in session.’’
‘‘I’ll see if we can get one for him sooner.’’ He turned to his niece. ‘‘Would you and Rowan do me a favor? Run downstairs, will you, and ask Hilda for a pitcher of water.’’
While Jewel hurried Rowan from the room, sending a pendulum swinging as they went, Ford walked to the single window and threw the wooden shutters open wide. ‘‘Three o’clock on a clear and sunny day,’’
he said. ‘‘The sun should be just about right.’’
‘‘For what?’’
‘‘Our experiment. Did I not promise you a rainbow?’’
Baffled, she decided to take a wait-and-see attitude.
‘‘I’m sorry Rose couldn’t help you,’’ she said.
‘‘But she did. Without her observations, I may never have realized the book might be in code. Or in a language so old ’tis obsolete.’’ He set the paper by the mirror and pan. ‘‘I have an old friend from my Oxford days, now an expert in ancient linguistics. And codes.’’
He laughed at some age-old memory. ‘‘Rand used to infuriate his brother by deciphering his secret journals.
I’m going to send for him tomorrow.’’
‘‘So you do have a friend.’’
A faint glint of humor lit his eyes. ‘‘I have many friends.’’
‘‘I’m sure you do.’’ More than she had, she’d wager.
‘‘I just meant I’d thought you’d invented that friend as a story to tell Mr. Young. The bookseller.’’
‘‘Well, I didn’t buy the book for Rand, so that much was a falsity. But he does exist. And I trust him implicitly. I’ll admit that I hesitate to let that book out of my sight.’’ His half-smile was one of self-amusement.
‘‘I expect that’s why I didn’t think to call on Rand in the first place. Foolish of me—if I’d summoned him yesterday, I might know what I have already. But it never even occurred to me until Rose brought up the inconsistencies.’’
‘‘You’re just focused,’’ she said. ‘‘On other things.’’
‘‘You’re right, you know.’’ He moved closer. Very close. ‘‘I’ve always had that annoying trait. When I concentrate on one thing, I cannot think of another.’’
Finding herself backed into a table, she put her hands behind her and knocked over a flask. She whirled to right it. ‘‘My father is like that,’’ she said while still turned away. ‘‘He focuses on his flowers.’’
‘‘My problem is,’’ Ford said softly, ‘‘I’ve been focusing on
you
.’’ He settled his hands on her shoulders and gently maneuvered her to face him. ‘‘Thank you,’’
he said, more softly still.
‘‘F-for what?’’ Even through her gown, her skin tingled under his fingers. Her senses whirled and skidded—she couldn’t think straight when he was so close.
When he was touching her. When she could smell him; when she could feel his warm breath on her face.
This wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. He wanted her for all the wrong reasons, but she wanted him anyway.
His voice deepened as his eyes burned into hers.
‘‘For forgiving me for whatever thickheaded thing I said yesterday.’’
Yesterday rushed back, those heady moments by the river when she’d thought he’d understood, and then his words:
Most pretty ladies have better things to
do with their money.
Most ladies would use their money to buy a husband.
She swallowed hard, hurt anew at the reminder that she was not like most ladies. That she was not pretty enough for a man to want her only for herself.
But his hands smoothed up her neck until they cupped the sides of her face, and those doubts fled.
Her heartbeat suddenly seemed louder than the dozens of ticking clocks.
She wondered if he could hear it.
With his index fingers, he drew her spectacles forward and off. A little
click
sounded when he set them on the table behind her. Then he lowered his head, capturing her lips with his, and she was no longer wondering anything at all.
Her thoughts were lost in the rush of feeling. The blood seemed to heat in her veins, her knees weakened, and when his lips parted hers, the tip of his tongue hot and carnal and exciting in her mouth, she felt as though she’d been waiting for this all of her life. Without thought, she raised her arms and twined them around his neck, pressing against him, savoring his warmth.
His arms tightened around her, pulling her even closer, until every curve of her body felt like it had been formed to match his. She’d thought she was finished with this, finished with him. But nothing could be further from the truth.
Loud, childish voices came drifting down the corridor, and they pulled away simultaneously. Her cheeks burning, Violet smoothed her skirts as the youngsters came in, chatting happily. She blinked at their blurry faces, then spun around to the table and grabbed her spectacles, shoving them back onto her face.
‘‘Here, Uncle Ford.’’ Jewel held out the pitcher.
Ford took it and filled the pan with water. Nonchalantly. Like nothing had ever happened.
Well, she told herself sternly, to him a kiss probably
was
nothing. Especially a kiss with her. He was obviously proceeding with the experiment perfectly calmly.
She shook her head to clear it, determined to pay attention.
With a forearm, he swept aside springs and gears to set the pan on his work surface. Bright sunlight streamed through the window and glinted off the water.
He handed Jewel the small rectangle of mirror. ‘‘Put this in,’’ he instructed, ‘‘so one end is in the water and the other end is resting on the side of the pan.’’