“Ah, Titus.”
Titus turned towards the parlour, and saw Augustus.
His brother was older. Well, they both were. He was in his mid-forties now, had put on weight, was dressed as the very model of a prosperous country gentleman, and wore a smile that didn’t quite convince.
“Augustus,” Titus said blankly. “Was I expecting you?”
“It seems not, since you have not replied to my last two letters.”
This was true. He hadn’t even opened the last one. He’d had quite enough of nagging letters.
“I’m sorry about that,” Titus said. “Have you come to London for a reason?”
“To renew our acquaintance, naturally. You, fellow, have the baggage taken up,” Augustus ordered Mr. Thorpe over Titus’s shoulder. “You need not give me the master bedroom,” he added beneficently.
“Actually, Augustus—”
“This is not what I expected,” Augustus remarked, with a critical look around. “The proportions are not elegant and the location quite unfashionable. Mrs. Pilcrow will want a superior address, and I daresay so will the future Mrs. Titus.”
Titus could feel Mr. Thorpe bristling. “Yes, well, I’m sorry,but I have no space for you to stay here. There are only two spare rooms, and they are both in use.”
Augustus looked at him as though he were an imbecile. “Then have them cleared.”
“I would have, if I had known you were coming. I can’t now. I have an engagement tonight.”
“An engagement? When I have just arrived?”
“But how was I to know—?”
“I informed you by letter! You really must learn to handle your affairs better: These rag-manners are shameful. It will not do.”
He sounded exactly like their father: the exasperated, contemptuous tone, the dismissal. “I’m very sorry,” Titus said, the words compelled from him. “It is unfortunate I did not see your letter, but— Mr. Thorpe, could we put Augustus up at the Star and Garter? It is a very comfortable hotel just round the corner, and I believe they have a good table.”
Augustus swelled. “You seriously propose to consign me to a hotel? To dine alone on the fare of a public house on the first night of my visit? Good heavens, Titus!”
“But what do you propose I do? Throw out my guest? Cancel my dinner engagement an hour before I am due to arrive?”
“You should consider your priorities! What guest, what dinner is more important than your obligations to the head of your family?”
Augustus looked genuinely shocked, and he had a right to. It was horrifyingly inhospitable to make his eldest brother stay at a hotel, and appalling manners to leave a guest, even an unwanted and unexpected one, on his own while Titus went out to enjoy himself.
He frantically searched for alternatives. Give up his own room and stay in the Star and Garter himself while Augustustook the master bedroom? Ask Nico to stay in the hotel? Send his apologies to Vespasian at such little notice?
No, not that last. If he declined to come at this late stage, disregarding the effort and expense Vespasian and his wife had gone to because Augustus was more important, Vespasian would be deeply insulted and, worse, deeply hurt.
Nico wouldn’t care about being temporarily evicted. He would understand; probably he would laugh. But that would be putting him second to Augustus, and Titus simply did not want to do that. No, the only thing to do would be to give up the master bedroom, and leave his own house for the night. Augustus could dine here, seat himself at the head of Titus’s table, and criticise Mrs. Thorpe’s food…
He caught that thought. He looked at it. He imagined what Nico would say. Then he took a deep breath. “Of course you can stay here as long as you care to, but I cannot break my commitments to my host for dinner or to my current house guest, and so I cannot offer you a room tonight. I will put you up in the Star and Garter, and have a room cleared for you tomorrow, when I will be delighted to welcome you properly. That is the best I can do.”
“If you had read my letter—”
“I’m very sorry, and it is quite my fault, but there is nothing else I can do. Perhaps you will take a glass of sherry with me while Mr. Thorpe arranges your lodging in the Star and Garter, before I have to change for dinner?”
Augustus did not look mollified at all. “This is profoundly uncivil. I do not recognise you, Titus.”
“No,” Titus said. “These days, I often don’t either.”
Chapter Nineteen