Fic: A Girl in Black (2/?)
Title: A Girl in Black (2/?)
Author: mrstater
Fandom: Downton Abbey
Characters & Pairings: Mary Crawley/Richard Carlisle, Rosamund Painswick
Chapter Word Count: 2658
Chapter Summary: Three months after she met Sir Richard, Mary returns to London to find an invitation waiting for her which she cannot refuse.
Author's Notes: At last, Tater puts the Progess in Work in Progress. ;) Many thanks to ju_dou for nagging encouraging me to continue this story, and to polkadotsnplaid for the lovely cover art.
Previous Chapters |
2. The Ritz
September, 1912
As Mary steps off the train at King's Cross, the very last person in the world whom she expects to see through a haze of brownish smoke, waiting on the platform, is Aunt Rosamund. Not the least bit surprising, however, is the sight of her swiping soot or dirt or some other railway station grime, real or imagined, off the shoulder of her fawn-coloured suit before she looks up again, arching her eyebrows as she spies Mary amid the other disembarking passengers.
"You never meet me at the station," Mary remarks as her aunt's lips brush her cheek in a cool kiss of greeting. "Has someone died back home while I was on the train and sent you to give me the bad news?"
"Is there someone you wish had died at home?" Rosamund draws back, lips quirked and cool blue eyes crackling like Granny's, though she would hate to hear the comparison made. "The new heir, perhaps?"
"Heavens, no. The next one will probably turn out to be a chimney sweep from Solihull."
"Which would be worse than a lawyer from Manchester."
Rosamund starts to say something else, but the hoot of a train whistle and a blast of steam drown out her voice, so she gestures for Mary to follow her through the terminus' shifting maze of passengers and people sending them off or welcoming them home, porters carrying bags and hatboxes or pushing trolleys piled high with suitcases and steamer trunks, including the man who'd collected Mary's own luggage, their conversations an unintelligible din that echoes off the high walls of brown brick and the vaulted glass roof crisscrossed with steel beams. The instant they've broken free of the throng at the ticket counters, however, Rosamund resumes their chat as if there has been no break in it.
"They are trying to talk you into marrying this Cousin Matthew, aren't they? That's why you've come to stay with me? To escape?"
"I'm your niece. Do you think I have to go to such dramatic lengths to get out of doing something I don't want to do?"
"So it really is that you can't bear to sit through another dinner in which Mister Crawley drinks the wrong wine with the wrong course?" Outside, they don't have to walk far to Rosamund's awaiting car; the chauffeur opens the door, but she lingers, pursing her lips at Mary across the open top of the motor. "How charming."
"Apparently it is charming. They've all fallen quite in love with him." She does not add, Especially Papa, because it is too painful to say, even to Aunt Rosamund.
"Then he hardly needs you to fall in love with him, does he?" says Rosamund, accepting the chauffeur's hand up into the car.
Mary slides onto the bench seat beside her aunt, the door shutting firmly behind her as the driver moves to help the porter load the bags. "Or another word said about him."
Mercifully, Rosamund restricts the conversation during the half-hour drive from King's Cross to Eaton Square to gossip about their mutual London acquaintance, which comes to Mary as a breath of fresh air when ordinarily the city odours make her long for the country. What she wants is another country, a world removed from estates and entails--and Cousin Matthew, and her traitor family--and London will do nicely.
She leans her head back against the seat, closing her eyes as she drinks it in, too relaxed for the first time since the Titanic sank to correct Rosamund when she notices Mary's demeanour and remarks that she must be weary from her journey from Yorkshire. At least not until they arrive at the house.
"A letter just arrived for you, m'lady," says the beanpole of a butler who, despite his lankiness, sweats profusely and reminds Mary of the Crawleys' man, holding a polished silver tray out to her before can take two steps into the front hall.
"Really, Wood," says Rosamund, "at least wait until the poor girl's had some tea. She has a frightful headache from all that lurching about on the train."
Wood makes a bobbing sort of bow as he stammers apologies. A sweaty bird, Mary thinks, as she slices open the envelope, watching him trundle off on the long legs which seem hardly to have knees.
"Don't trouble with the tea, Wood," she calls, after she has perused the contents. "My head is fine."
"Well I should like a cup," Rosamund says, and Wood spins about on his heel, his head bobbing again on his swan's neck as he glances from his mistress to her houseguest, perplexed by the conflicting instructions.
"You'll have one," Mary replies, folding her letter and sliding it back into the envelope. "At four o'clock this afternoon, at the Ritz Hotel."
Rosamund's eyebrows arch high on her forehead as she cocks her head to one side. "The Ritz Hotel? Today?"
"Sir Richard Carlisle's invited us." Mary doesn't wait for her aunt's response before she addresses Wood, who's still bobbing in the hall at a loss as to what his errand is. "If you'll just send Grace up with my things, I'll change before tea."
"Very good, m'lady."
"Sir Richard Carlisle?" Rosamund says, at Mary's heels as she ascends the staircase to the guest quarters. "The newspaper publisher?"
"No, Sir Richard Carlisle the milkman. I met him at Agnes Belcher's engagement ball last summer."
And hasn't given him another thought until this moment, except to gloat to Granny--and Edith--as she'd promised him she would--that the newly-moneyed, newly-titled Sir Richard Carlisle ignorantly asked a girl in black for a dance. Which hardly accounts for the racing of her pulse now. She runs her hand over the glossy mahogany banister, maintaining a steady climb so as not to belie her internal state.
"But you didn't dance with him, surely? You were in mourning for Patrick."
Mary glances over her shoulder, rolling her eyes. "Sir Richard's the one with no breeding, not me."
"You must have been intimate enough with him to be in contact since."
"We haven't written."
Mary doesn't need to look back at Aunt Rosamund to see the expression on her face--so like Granny's had been when she told her about the encounter at the ball--fairly salivating over the juicy bit of near-scandal even as she tries to school her features into a more properly distasteful twist of her lips.
"Then how did he know you were in town before you had even arrived?"
That is the question, though it won't do to reveal a shred of uncertainty to Rosamund, who, as Mary's chaperone, might forbid her to see Sir Richard. Or write to Papa, who certainly will.
"One of the tricks of his trade, I suppose," Mary says with a slight shrug of her shoulders, glad her back is to Rosamund as her mouth involuntarily twists in distaste at the word trade. Not that Rosamund, widow of a banker, should balk.
And if one must have a trade, better a newspaper magnate than a country solicitor. Especially a newspaper magnate who isn't stealing her inheritance or being thrust at her as a most unwanted suitor.
Rosamund does not balk; her eyes meet Mary's conspiratorially in the mirror as she sweeps into the tranquil blue room that is always hers on her visits, so much less oppressive than the red wallpaper in her own bedroom back home, seemingly larger though it is less than half the size, and seats herself at the dressing table and begins removing her hat pins.
"Somehow you made quite the impression, without a dance."
"I hardly remember what we said to each other," Mary replies, even as their conversation rushes back to her as clearly as if it were being played back to her on a phonograph. "I think I may have been rather insulting."
"Oh my dear--it is time you escaped the country. Or don't you realise that in Sir Richard's world, insults are the sincerest form of flirtation?"
~*~
Mary swirls her spoon in her teacup, adding yet another voice to the chorus of silver tinkling against china in the Ritz Hotel's full tea room. Well--she amends, putting her cup to her lips--nearly full; the third chair at her table, between hers and Aunt Rosamund's, stands vacant.
"I thought you said insults were the sincerest form of flirtation in Sir Richard's world," Mary says, eying the tiered tray of sandwiches they have, with more courtesy toward their host than he has thus far shown them, left untouched. "Ought I to feel very flattered that Sir Richard is half an hour late?"
"I imagine vengeance is a common attitude in his world, too," Rosamund replies. "Just how insulting were you at Agnes Belcher's ball?"
As Mary replaces her cup and saucer on the immaculate ivory linen tablecloth, she catches sight of a reflection behind her own in one of the mirrored wall panels of a tall, trim man hurrying up the white marble steps that lead into the raised Palm Court. Without waiting for the footman to assist him, he removes his hat and shrugs out of his greatcoat, though he continues to wear his scowl as he shunts them off to the young man dressed in hotel livery. Sir Richard Carlisle ignores the stares of inquisitive tea-takers who have noticed the latecomer, and appears oblivious to the maître d’hôtel who no doubt means to direct him to the table he reserved. Mary avoids his gaze as it rakes the room for her himself, sipping her tea as if it, and her surroundings, do not impress her; as if tea at the Ritz is passé for the Earl of Grantham's daughter, when in fact it is an extravagance to be afforded but once every season, and she's indulging the romantic notion that everything in the room--chandeliers, wall sconces set in carved panels, columns, statues, even the draperies and upholstery, and the borders of the table settings--is not merely gilt, but truly golden in the dim of the early autumn sunset.
Most especially she tries not to look impressed with him as he approaches the table with his proud stride, his irritation masked now by dimples and charm.
"Lady Mary," he says, taking her hand and making a slight bow. "I'm delighted to meet you again. And to make your acquaintance for the first time, Lady Painswick," he adds, turning to her aunt.
"Lady Rosamund," she corrects, her gaze touching Mary's briefly over the centrepiece of pink-tipped roses before she redirects her attention to their host.
Mary fancies two spots of colour appear on his cheekbones, which, along with his chin, appear suddenly as sharp as his voice as he addresses the waiter who has chosen that dire moment to pour Sir Richard a cup of tea. "Is there no champagne?"
He unfurls his napkin with a snap, and the waiter scurries off with a start as if he's felt the lash of a whip. Shaking his head, Sir Richard snatches a smoked salmon sandwich off the tray, which Mary watches him devour in two bites. Though she expects him to speak with his mouth full, he at least has the grace to swallow before he speaking again, and Mary catches herself following the roll of his throat into the starched white collar of his shirt.
"Ah, yes, Lady Rosamund. Your late husband was not Sir Marmaduke Painswick, to my recollection? He was a prominent banker, but never knighted for his success?"
"It would appear you've done your detective work," Rosamund replies as the waiter returns carrying a tray of champagne and three glasses. Sir Richard doesn't give him so much as a glance of acknowledgment as he pours first for the ladies; Aunt Rosamund holds up a hand to decline champagne, so he pours her a fresh cup of tea from the gleaming silver pot. "I doubt Sherlock Holmes himself would have discovered my niece's arrival in town so quickly."
Sir Richard smiles. "I imagine there are times when the newspaper business isn't greatly different to being a private investigator."
"My," says Mary. "You are quite the Renaissance man. I remember you also said it was a bit like being a politician and a murderer."
Her lips curve in a smirk around the rim of her champagne flute as, at the word murderer, the waiter startles and overfills Sir Richard's glass, earning a dark look.
"I'm most inclined to believe the latter," she goes on, "given your knowledge of my whereabouts. Are you Jack the Ripper?"
"If I am, then what does that make you?"
Across the table, Aunt Rosamund draws in a sharp breath, but Mary doesn't bat an eyelid.
"Any number of things, though a victim isn't one of them. I find it's not a style that suits me."
"No," replies Sir Richard. "That was evident when you attended a ball after your fiancé died aboard the Titanic."
The approval in his blue eyes as they regard her makes Mary's pulse quicken, and she looks away, steadying herself with a long drink of champagne. I'm not as sad as I should be, she repeats over to herself in her mind, and that's what makes me sad. She shouldn't want approval for that, shouldn't want approval from him.
"How long do you plan to grace London with your presence, Lady Mary?" Sir Richard interrupts her internal mantra.
"Why, that depends entirely on how long London can keep me entertained."
The dimples deepen beneath his cheekbones with his smile. "Perhaps I can help you with that. Would you--and your aunt, too, of course--" he adds, with a glance at Rosamund "--like a tour of my newspaper offices and the printing presses? See how the news is made?"
"Inefficiently, it would seem, given your tardiness."
Sir Richard glowers at her over his champagne, though Mary pretends not to notice as she selects a sandwich.
Rosamund maintains no such charade. "I think what my niece means to say is that there certainly has been enough news in the past several months to give you more work than there are hours in the day."
"Ah, yes," says Sir Richard, his demeanour, Mary notes, brightened by the opportunity to talk about himself. "There's nothing like shipwrecks and government scandals for making people buy newspapers."
"Your paper was the first to break the Marconi Scandal, I think?"
"You think correctly."
"And how did you come by the information?"
"Haven't you been listening, Aunt Rosamund?" Mary interjects, tired of the conversation going on around her. "He's cleverer than Sherlock Holmes."
She looks to Sir Richard for his arrogant grin, but instead finds him frowning at his pocket watch.
"My apologies, Lady Mary, Lady Rosamund," he says, abruptly pushing back from the table and standing, "but I must be off again. I have a few loose ends to tie up before the evening edition goes to press. I'll settle the bill, but do, please, take your time enjoying your tea." As he leans across the table to take another sandwich, he catches Mary's eye. "Can I expect to see you tomorrow?"
It's probably folly, but she can't resist the way his strong features soften slightly with uncertainty.
"You can," she says, adding, when his grin starts its upward pull at the corner of his mouth, "Punctually, even, if you give us a time."
Either he's not giving her his full attention, or he does take her insults as flirtation, because this time, he doesn't glare at the tweak. "Half past eleven? I'll have luncheon arranged in my office, before your tour."
"Luncheon it is," says Rosamund.
He leaves in much the same fashion as he arrived, with everyone's eyes on him, but this time, Mary's included. Only when his hat has disappeared down the staircase does she avert her eyes to her aunt.
"Well? What did you make of that?"
"I think I have a new appreciation for why men like to watch bare-knuckle boxing between two well-matched opponents."
Read Chapter 3
Author: mrstater
Fandom: Downton Abbey
Characters & Pairings: Mary Crawley/Richard Carlisle, Rosamund Painswick
Chapter Word Count: 2658
Chapter Summary: Three months after she met Sir Richard, Mary returns to London to find an invitation waiting for her which she cannot refuse.
Author's Notes: At last, Tater puts the Progess in Work in Progress. ;) Many thanks to ju_dou for nagging encouraging me to continue this story, and to polkadotsnplaid for the lovely cover art.
Previous Chapters |
2. The Ritz
September, 1912
As Mary steps off the train at King's Cross, the very last person in the world whom she expects to see through a haze of brownish smoke, waiting on the platform, is Aunt Rosamund. Not the least bit surprising, however, is the sight of her swiping soot or dirt or some other railway station grime, real or imagined, off the shoulder of her fawn-coloured suit before she looks up again, arching her eyebrows as she spies Mary amid the other disembarking passengers.
"You never meet me at the station," Mary remarks as her aunt's lips brush her cheek in a cool kiss of greeting. "Has someone died back home while I was on the train and sent you to give me the bad news?"
"Is there someone you wish had died at home?" Rosamund draws back, lips quirked and cool blue eyes crackling like Granny's, though she would hate to hear the comparison made. "The new heir, perhaps?"
"Heavens, no. The next one will probably turn out to be a chimney sweep from Solihull."
"Which would be worse than a lawyer from Manchester."
Rosamund starts to say something else, but the hoot of a train whistle and a blast of steam drown out her voice, so she gestures for Mary to follow her through the terminus' shifting maze of passengers and people sending them off or welcoming them home, porters carrying bags and hatboxes or pushing trolleys piled high with suitcases and steamer trunks, including the man who'd collected Mary's own luggage, their conversations an unintelligible din that echoes off the high walls of brown brick and the vaulted glass roof crisscrossed with steel beams. The instant they've broken free of the throng at the ticket counters, however, Rosamund resumes their chat as if there has been no break in it.
"They are trying to talk you into marrying this Cousin Matthew, aren't they? That's why you've come to stay with me? To escape?"
"I'm your niece. Do you think I have to go to such dramatic lengths to get out of doing something I don't want to do?"
"So it really is that you can't bear to sit through another dinner in which Mister Crawley drinks the wrong wine with the wrong course?" Outside, they don't have to walk far to Rosamund's awaiting car; the chauffeur opens the door, but she lingers, pursing her lips at Mary across the open top of the motor. "How charming."
"Apparently it is charming. They've all fallen quite in love with him." She does not add, Especially Papa, because it is too painful to say, even to Aunt Rosamund.
"Then he hardly needs you to fall in love with him, does he?" says Rosamund, accepting the chauffeur's hand up into the car.
Mary slides onto the bench seat beside her aunt, the door shutting firmly behind her as the driver moves to help the porter load the bags. "Or another word said about him."
Mercifully, Rosamund restricts the conversation during the half-hour drive from King's Cross to Eaton Square to gossip about their mutual London acquaintance, which comes to Mary as a breath of fresh air when ordinarily the city odours make her long for the country. What she wants is another country, a world removed from estates and entails--and Cousin Matthew, and her traitor family--and London will do nicely.
She leans her head back against the seat, closing her eyes as she drinks it in, too relaxed for the first time since the Titanic sank to correct Rosamund when she notices Mary's demeanour and remarks that she must be weary from her journey from Yorkshire. At least not until they arrive at the house.
"A letter just arrived for you, m'lady," says the beanpole of a butler who, despite his lankiness, sweats profusely and reminds Mary of the Crawleys' man, holding a polished silver tray out to her before can take two steps into the front hall.
"Really, Wood," says Rosamund, "at least wait until the poor girl's had some tea. She has a frightful headache from all that lurching about on the train."
Wood makes a bobbing sort of bow as he stammers apologies. A sweaty bird, Mary thinks, as she slices open the envelope, watching him trundle off on the long legs which seem hardly to have knees.
"Don't trouble with the tea, Wood," she calls, after she has perused the contents. "My head is fine."
"Well I should like a cup," Rosamund says, and Wood spins about on his heel, his head bobbing again on his swan's neck as he glances from his mistress to her houseguest, perplexed by the conflicting instructions.
"You'll have one," Mary replies, folding her letter and sliding it back into the envelope. "At four o'clock this afternoon, at the Ritz Hotel."
Rosamund's eyebrows arch high on her forehead as she cocks her head to one side. "The Ritz Hotel? Today?"
"Sir Richard Carlisle's invited us." Mary doesn't wait for her aunt's response before she addresses Wood, who's still bobbing in the hall at a loss as to what his errand is. "If you'll just send Grace up with my things, I'll change before tea."
"Very good, m'lady."
"Sir Richard Carlisle?" Rosamund says, at Mary's heels as she ascends the staircase to the guest quarters. "The newspaper publisher?"
"No, Sir Richard Carlisle the milkman. I met him at Agnes Belcher's engagement ball last summer."
And hasn't given him another thought until this moment, except to gloat to Granny--and Edith--as she'd promised him she would--that the newly-moneyed, newly-titled Sir Richard Carlisle ignorantly asked a girl in black for a dance. Which hardly accounts for the racing of her pulse now. She runs her hand over the glossy mahogany banister, maintaining a steady climb so as not to belie her internal state.
"But you didn't dance with him, surely? You were in mourning for Patrick."
Mary glances over her shoulder, rolling her eyes. "Sir Richard's the one with no breeding, not me."
"You must have been intimate enough with him to be in contact since."
"We haven't written."
Mary doesn't need to look back at Aunt Rosamund to see the expression on her face--so like Granny's had been when she told her about the encounter at the ball--fairly salivating over the juicy bit of near-scandal even as she tries to school her features into a more properly distasteful twist of her lips.
"Then how did he know you were in town before you had even arrived?"
That is the question, though it won't do to reveal a shred of uncertainty to Rosamund, who, as Mary's chaperone, might forbid her to see Sir Richard. Or write to Papa, who certainly will.
"One of the tricks of his trade, I suppose," Mary says with a slight shrug of her shoulders, glad her back is to Rosamund as her mouth involuntarily twists in distaste at the word trade. Not that Rosamund, widow of a banker, should balk.
And if one must have a trade, better a newspaper magnate than a country solicitor. Especially a newspaper magnate who isn't stealing her inheritance or being thrust at her as a most unwanted suitor.
Rosamund does not balk; her eyes meet Mary's conspiratorially in the mirror as she sweeps into the tranquil blue room that is always hers on her visits, so much less oppressive than the red wallpaper in her own bedroom back home, seemingly larger though it is less than half the size, and seats herself at the dressing table and begins removing her hat pins.
"Somehow you made quite the impression, without a dance."
"I hardly remember what we said to each other," Mary replies, even as their conversation rushes back to her as clearly as if it were being played back to her on a phonograph. "I think I may have been rather insulting."
"Oh my dear--it is time you escaped the country. Or don't you realise that in Sir Richard's world, insults are the sincerest form of flirtation?"
~*~
Mary swirls her spoon in her teacup, adding yet another voice to the chorus of silver tinkling against china in the Ritz Hotel's full tea room. Well--she amends, putting her cup to her lips--nearly full; the third chair at her table, between hers and Aunt Rosamund's, stands vacant.
"I thought you said insults were the sincerest form of flirtation in Sir Richard's world," Mary says, eying the tiered tray of sandwiches they have, with more courtesy toward their host than he has thus far shown them, left untouched. "Ought I to feel very flattered that Sir Richard is half an hour late?"
"I imagine vengeance is a common attitude in his world, too," Rosamund replies. "Just how insulting were you at Agnes Belcher's ball?"
As Mary replaces her cup and saucer on the immaculate ivory linen tablecloth, she catches sight of a reflection behind her own in one of the mirrored wall panels of a tall, trim man hurrying up the white marble steps that lead into the raised Palm Court. Without waiting for the footman to assist him, he removes his hat and shrugs out of his greatcoat, though he continues to wear his scowl as he shunts them off to the young man dressed in hotel livery. Sir Richard Carlisle ignores the stares of inquisitive tea-takers who have noticed the latecomer, and appears oblivious to the maître d’hôtel who no doubt means to direct him to the table he reserved. Mary avoids his gaze as it rakes the room for her himself, sipping her tea as if it, and her surroundings, do not impress her; as if tea at the Ritz is passé for the Earl of Grantham's daughter, when in fact it is an extravagance to be afforded but once every season, and she's indulging the romantic notion that everything in the room--chandeliers, wall sconces set in carved panels, columns, statues, even the draperies and upholstery, and the borders of the table settings--is not merely gilt, but truly golden in the dim of the early autumn sunset.
Most especially she tries not to look impressed with him as he approaches the table with his proud stride, his irritation masked now by dimples and charm.
"Lady Mary," he says, taking her hand and making a slight bow. "I'm delighted to meet you again. And to make your acquaintance for the first time, Lady Painswick," he adds, turning to her aunt.
"Lady Rosamund," she corrects, her gaze touching Mary's briefly over the centrepiece of pink-tipped roses before she redirects her attention to their host.
Mary fancies two spots of colour appear on his cheekbones, which, along with his chin, appear suddenly as sharp as his voice as he addresses the waiter who has chosen that dire moment to pour Sir Richard a cup of tea. "Is there no champagne?"
He unfurls his napkin with a snap, and the waiter scurries off with a start as if he's felt the lash of a whip. Shaking his head, Sir Richard snatches a smoked salmon sandwich off the tray, which Mary watches him devour in two bites. Though she expects him to speak with his mouth full, he at least has the grace to swallow before he speaking again, and Mary catches herself following the roll of his throat into the starched white collar of his shirt.
"Ah, yes, Lady Rosamund. Your late husband was not Sir Marmaduke Painswick, to my recollection? He was a prominent banker, but never knighted for his success?"
"It would appear you've done your detective work," Rosamund replies as the waiter returns carrying a tray of champagne and three glasses. Sir Richard doesn't give him so much as a glance of acknowledgment as he pours first for the ladies; Aunt Rosamund holds up a hand to decline champagne, so he pours her a fresh cup of tea from the gleaming silver pot. "I doubt Sherlock Holmes himself would have discovered my niece's arrival in town so quickly."
Sir Richard smiles. "I imagine there are times when the newspaper business isn't greatly different to being a private investigator."
"My," says Mary. "You are quite the Renaissance man. I remember you also said it was a bit like being a politician and a murderer."
Her lips curve in a smirk around the rim of her champagne flute as, at the word murderer, the waiter startles and overfills Sir Richard's glass, earning a dark look.
"I'm most inclined to believe the latter," she goes on, "given your knowledge of my whereabouts. Are you Jack the Ripper?"
"If I am, then what does that make you?"
Across the table, Aunt Rosamund draws in a sharp breath, but Mary doesn't bat an eyelid.
"Any number of things, though a victim isn't one of them. I find it's not a style that suits me."
"No," replies Sir Richard. "That was evident when you attended a ball after your fiancé died aboard the Titanic."
The approval in his blue eyes as they regard her makes Mary's pulse quicken, and she looks away, steadying herself with a long drink of champagne. I'm not as sad as I should be, she repeats over to herself in her mind, and that's what makes me sad. She shouldn't want approval for that, shouldn't want approval from him.
"How long do you plan to grace London with your presence, Lady Mary?" Sir Richard interrupts her internal mantra.
"Why, that depends entirely on how long London can keep me entertained."
The dimples deepen beneath his cheekbones with his smile. "Perhaps I can help you with that. Would you--and your aunt, too, of course--" he adds, with a glance at Rosamund "--like a tour of my newspaper offices and the printing presses? See how the news is made?"
"Inefficiently, it would seem, given your tardiness."
Sir Richard glowers at her over his champagne, though Mary pretends not to notice as she selects a sandwich.
Rosamund maintains no such charade. "I think what my niece means to say is that there certainly has been enough news in the past several months to give you more work than there are hours in the day."
"Ah, yes," says Sir Richard, his demeanour, Mary notes, brightened by the opportunity to talk about himself. "There's nothing like shipwrecks and government scandals for making people buy newspapers."
"Your paper was the first to break the Marconi Scandal, I think?"
"You think correctly."
"And how did you come by the information?"
"Haven't you been listening, Aunt Rosamund?" Mary interjects, tired of the conversation going on around her. "He's cleverer than Sherlock Holmes."
She looks to Sir Richard for his arrogant grin, but instead finds him frowning at his pocket watch.
"My apologies, Lady Mary, Lady Rosamund," he says, abruptly pushing back from the table and standing, "but I must be off again. I have a few loose ends to tie up before the evening edition goes to press. I'll settle the bill, but do, please, take your time enjoying your tea." As he leans across the table to take another sandwich, he catches Mary's eye. "Can I expect to see you tomorrow?"
It's probably folly, but she can't resist the way his strong features soften slightly with uncertainty.
"You can," she says, adding, when his grin starts its upward pull at the corner of his mouth, "Punctually, even, if you give us a time."
Either he's not giving her his full attention, or he does take her insults as flirtation, because this time, he doesn't glare at the tweak. "Half past eleven? I'll have luncheon arranged in my office, before your tour."
"Luncheon it is," says Rosamund.
He leaves in much the same fashion as he arrived, with everyone's eyes on him, but this time, Mary's included. Only when his hat has disappeared down the staircase does she avert her eyes to her aunt.
"Well? What did you make of that?"
"I think I have a new appreciation for why men like to watch bare-knuckle boxing between two well-matched opponents."
Read Chapter 3