Page 47 of Better Off Wed

“The bindings were old, I’ll grant. But the value of a cookbook is in its use, and that one obviously was no favorite.” A puzzled frown notched the space between his brows. “The pages were pristine,” she explained.

“The pages?” His frown deepened. “But—”

A tap at the door presaged Dinah’s entry with the breakfast tray. Jeremy leaped to his feet to help her with it. “Thank you, milord,” she said, wide-eyed.

“I spoke gruffly to you earlier, and I had no cause. I’m sorry.”

That apology rendered the maid speechless. Laura could well imagine she did not often hear the like in Thornton Hall. “I was just trying to explain something to Lord Sterling,” Laura said, pulling the girl’s startled gaze to herself. “Tell me, does the cook here rely much on a cookbook?”

“A book o’ receipts, like, you mean? Oh, aye. Her ladyship’s most partic’lar.”

“Does the cook have a favorite?”

“Aye, milady.” She glanced uncertainly toward Jeremy, who was pouring himself a cup of coffee, and seemed to debate where her duty lay: tending to the breakfast tray for his lordship or answering her ladyship’s odd questions. “One or two.”

“And what do the pages of those books look like?”

Dinah’s expression was now nearly as puzzled as Jeremy’s. “Look like, milady? How do you mean?”

“The paper itself. Is it clean?”

“Oh, gracious no. Why, some of the pages are so spattered with grease you could use ’em for windows. An’ flour, an’ meal, an’ bits o’ this an’ that stuck here an’ there. You must know how it is, milady, or you wouldn’t have asked.”

“I do.”

Jeremy approached and handed the cup and saucer to her. “I thought you said you weren’t skilled in the domestic arts,” he said in an undertone.

She accepted the cup and took a sip before replying in an equally low voice. “But I like to eat. And over the years, Lady Sterling has befriended a number of cooks.”

“Tell me,” he said, turning back toward the tray and toward Dinah, “does the cook ever prepare dishes in the French style?”

“I couldn’t say, milord. I don’t wait at table, an’ we wouldn’t have such in the servants’ hall. Was there somethin’ in particular you fancied, sir?”

“No. I was only thinking…no matter,” he said, with a little shake of his head, as if to cast off his distraction. “Thank you, and thank the cook, for the tray. We’ll manage from here.”

“Aye, milord,” Dinah replied with a curtsy and was gone.

Absently, Jeremy poured a second cup of coffee, stirred it vigorously though he had not added either milk or sugar, and then wandered back to his chair. As Laura eyed the remaining contents of the tray, stacks of buttered toast and a plate of coddled eggs with the steam still rising from it, her stomach rumbled. Jeremy seemed not to hear.

“Of course,” he cried a moment later, and set aside the cup of coffee, untasted.

“‘Of course’ what?”

His only answer was to leap to his feet and begin to pace before the fire as he had on the evening of their arrival, though now the hearth was empty and he was wearing his boots, polished to a mirror shine. The length of the mantel could be measured in three long-legged strides and a turn. She watched him repeat the process in each direction: one, two, three, turn.

Today’s breeches were considerably more well-fitting than last night’s.

Finally, on his fourth pass, he did not pause and turn back, but instead skirted the breakfast table and came to sit beside her on the sofa. “Don’t you see?” he demanded, and in the morning light, his eyes were dazzling. “A real cookbook would look considerably more like the ones Dinah described.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “That’s precisely why I doubted it was of much val—”

“It’s a copy,” he spoke across her, unable to contain his enthusiasm. “With some slight changes to the original. The quantity of an ingredient, for instance. Just like—”

With one fingertip, she unfolded the notes lying in her lap. “The moves in The Noble Game of Chess.”

“Precisely. And if the genuine article is as common as Stamma’s guide, I will be able to find the real cookbook, compare them, sort out the differences, and perhaps with a more complete picture, I’ll—”

“You’ll know the cypher.” He nodded eagerly. “Last night,” she ventured after a moment, “you were surprised by the number of ordinary books in Thornton’s study. Do you suppose—?”