“Dot... who was that man?”
Dot glanced stealthily over her shoulder. “Lord Kirke.” She said it very quietly. “He arrived late this evening.”
Cat was stunned. “TheLord Kirke?”
Dot nodded slowly.
An eloquent look passed between them as Cat took the tray.
“Mr. Pike let him in,” Dot told her with a certain grim satisfaction, as if this explained everything.
Chapter Two
One night after feasting a little too enthusiastically on Helga’s apple tart, Dot had dreamed she was swimming in a vat of treacle. No matter how hard she’d tried, she’d never been able to move her limbs fast enough to get to the edge and climb out.
The moment she saw Mr. Pike, the footman, striding across the foyer to open the door was just like that.
She’d been at the top of the landing. And if she could have, she would have skipped the last three steps and hurdled the banister into the foyer, as she’d once seen Captain Hardy do. Or perhaps she might have yanked off her shoe and whipped it into Pike’s path, on the off chance he’d stumble over it. Or aimed it square for that place between his regrettably vast shoulders. She could be surprisingly fierce when it came to protecting things she loved, and of all her responsibilities at The Grand Palace on the Thames, opening the door was her very favorite. For her, it was emblematic of both the place itself, which she loved with all her heart, and her role in the world. She’d always been the first toeversee any potential guest who appeared.
But no matter what she did, she still wouldn’t get to the door in time.
So she was forced to watch Pike stride across the checked marble of the foyer.
Pass beneath their beloved chandelier...
Open the peep hatch...
Then, God help her, for the first time ever...
Open the door.
The man Pike had let in had stood perfectly still beneath the chandelier. He was at least as tall as Pike, but a good decade older, she’d warrant. He had black hair and black eyes and his face was composed of stern, handsome planes. He’d looked tired. He’d eyed her with baleful amusement, as if a maid hurtling down the stairs, cap askew, mouth and eyes perfect O’s of outrage, was only to be expected. He betrayed not one shred of surprise.
Dot knew Mrs. Hardy and Mrs. Durand wanted a large man to open the door at least at night, on the theory that nights were more dangerous than days. This was a fair assumption at the London Docks, a part of the city where one was just slightly more likely to be stabbed than other parts.
“It’s the full moon on a Wednesday, Dot,” Pike said, his voice lowered. “Remember? Just like you said in the kitchen when you knocked me down a few months ago.”
She didn’t reply. It wasveryungentlemanly of him to remind her of that moment in the kitchen. That episode had been at least half his fault. But she still felt truly terrible about it.
They stared each other down.
Pike was gray of eye, square of jaw, and sober of demeanor. Dot had both a fierce sense of propriety and a profound appreciation for handsome men—which Pike unfortunately was, by anyone’s definition—and these two qualities existed more or less harmoniously when the man in question wasn’tso frequently underfoot. When he was, the friction was like a pebble in her shoe. It was a test of character and made her feel somewhat martyred and, given that she was the heroine in her own story, she admittedly took a frisson of pleasure in her suffering. She understood how much Mrs. Hardy and Mrs. Durand valued and cared for her, which never ceased feeling like a lovely miracle. But Mr. Pike had been the result of a long, daunting, and often bizarre search for a footman willing to work at the docks for a modest salary while being willing to perform a variety of tasks in addition to the usual footman duties, such as repairing the roof, or thumping an intruder on the jaw, or firing a gun if necessary. He was after a fashion a prize, while Dot had more or less come along with Delilah when Delilah had been Lady Derring, like a valise.
Mr. Pike was always all that was proper and respectful to everyone, the maids included. His manners were impeccable. But the maids were all on their best behavior around him lest he be taken away from them.
“It is indeed the full moon, so it is,” she said cagily, precisely as if she’d remembered it and actually meant what she’d said at the time: that maybe she would allow him to open the door on that day. She hadn’t considered that he would remember it so specifically.
Pike had already taken the man’s greatcoat. She eyed it covetously. Before Pike, Dot had always taken away the coats and wraps of their guests, and their wraps told her so much about the person. She could see that this one had at least three capes. “And what you said in the kitchen that night? You’re right,” Pike said. “Ithoroughlyenjoyed opening the door. It’s likeopening a present, a gift, as you said. You never know who might be on the other side.”
He looked her square in the eye with a determined glint as he said it.
She had a feeling that now that he’d gotten a taste of it, he wasn’t going to give it up without a fight.
“I’ll talk to our new person and find out what he needs,” Dot said, on a low, fierce whisper, while their guest waited, gazing around the place, wearing a bemused expression now, as most guests did once they got a look at things. “And go and tell Mrs. Hardy and Mrs. Durand that he’s here. You can take his greatcoat away.”
There was a tense little pause.
“Very well,” Pike said pleasantly, with the air of a man who knows he’s won this round and intends to win many more.