Page 24

“Perhaps.” Elkins was a man with powerful connections, and Henry had courted him madly, counting his employment as a great coup. Bint did not appear as moved by the name as Henry had. His gaze drifted over Sophronia’s shoulder as she turned to leave.

She stood a moment looking pointedly at the small portrait of her still on display. He’d had a year to make the office his own, so the lingering of Henry’s personal effects seemed calculated. But why a picture of her?

Sophronia surveyed the smaller man, placing a hand on the back of the upholstered chair she had vacated, the one Henry had deliberately chosen to be low-slung so his patrons sat lower than he did.

“You have changed so little about my husband’s office, Mr. Bint. It is as if Henry might walk through the door at any moment.”

“I am sure we all could wish that were possible, Mrs. Hinton.” The dull red flesh above Bint’s cravat told her the answer to her unspoken question.

The man had coveted what Henry had. Everything.

She was in dudgeon already before she exited Hinton’s onto the busy artery of the Strand. The noisy traffic posed a sharp contrast to the stifled silence of the bank, and blood throbbed in her head when she recognized the hat on a gentleman across the way. Rowden in spurred boots and riding garb stood at his ease, holding Hercules by the reins as he conversed with another gentleman outside of the Grecian Coffee House.

She marched into the congestion, made worse as traffic skirting St. Clement’s Church was funneled through the arches of the Temple Bar. Holding the hem of her tabby wool riding skirt above the dirt of the street, she dodged one wagon, was nearly trampled by a hack carriage, and compelled the carriers of a sedan chair to pull up short and curse at her while she kept her eyes focused on her goal.

He turned, as if he sensed her glare, and watched her approach, his expression smooth and inscrutable. He’d clipped his sideburns so they narrowed toward his jaw in a way that accented the stern shape of that feature. His hair was tousled by the wind, and he was so dratted tall. She was furious with him.

“I am a grown woman. I do not require supervision, Rowden.”

“This street is notoriously infested with pickpockets. Anyone can fall victim to crime, Mrs. Hinton.”

“I do not recall anyone appointing you as my protector.” She lifted her chin. “Besides, Nate is with me.”

Rowden looked around with an insolent, careless air. “And where is the lad?”

Sophronia clenched her teeth. “Waiting in one of these courts with the carriage you insisted I take. Crown Court, I think.” Which lay behind her. She would have to cross the street again.

“If you wait here, I will fetch him for you.” Rowden turned to his companion. “Gibbs, might I trouble you⁠—”

“To keep company with a lovely lady? I believe I might bear the burden.” The stranger gave her a roguish grin.

Sophronia studied him. He was as dapperly dressed as Rowden in a broadcloth coat, nankeen breeches, and tall boots. He doffed his hat to show dark curls, gleaming with oil. She would guess some African roots in his ancestry.

She had been scolding Rowden like a fishwife before his friend, and all because Bint had put her in a temper. Where was the maturity of age? Where was the Sophronia seasoned by the long years of her marriage? It was as though she reverted to a rash young girl of seventeen in Rowden’s presence.

He was the path through her memory back to that girl she’d known. He was the link.

She shook her head to clear out the fanciful thoughts. “Forgive me, I have been intolerably rude. Rowden, introduce us, if you please.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “I have the dubious honor of presenting to you Mr. Christian Gibbs, formerly of the Dutch Republic. Gibbs, this is Mrs. Hinton, widow of Henry Hinton, who ran that bank.” He pointed to the building she had exited, a vast temple that rivaled the church for grandeur. Henry had overseen the renovations, feeling the edifice his grandfather established was not imposing enough.

“A pleasure, Mr. Gibbs.” Sophronia held out her hand.

“He’s a rake of the first order. Don’t let him cozen you, Mrs. Hinton. Gibbs, try not to seduce the lady in the short while I am absent. She is residing beneath my roof.”

“I know very well how to comport myself around rakes, rogues, and pickpockets. You might send Nate to me and be off.” Sophronia scowled at Rowden.

He scowled back, then made a brief incline of his head, not quite a bow. Unaccountably, she remembered that lion and the look on his face when he’d given it her. His satisfaction at her clear delight.

Sophronia turned to her companion. “So you are from the Dutch— I suppose we are to call it the Batavian Republic now? What brings you to London, Mr. Gibbs?”

“Rowden did, actually. We became acquainted when he visited the Republic last fall. I was recovering from a wound I sustained in the Battle of Camperdown, and he gave me his direction should I visit London. I came into a fortune and decided to travel, so I took him up on the offer.”

He held out an arm to shield her from being jostled as a large man erupted from the coffee house, brandishing a walking stick. Someone on his way to the Middle or Inner Temple, from the looks of him, and to all appearances late. Sophronia stepped down the street, away from the doorway, and wished that instead of her jaunty riding helmet she had worn a bonnet with a deep brim that might hide her face from the sun.

“And are you married, Mr. Gibbs?”

His eyes crinkled with his smile. “Because a man in possession of a fortune requires a wife? Are you on the hunt for another husband, Mrs. Hinton?”