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In the close and empty darkness she made no reply.

* * * *

Harry was out of practice. He had not attended a polite dinner party in years. He had forgotten how admirably some women could maneuver to advantage in the terrain of a drawing room. He knew good tactics when he saw them. Miss Throckmorton was adept at it, while Lucy plainly had no sense of strategy. It was up to him in the last minutes of the evening as the guests moved toward the stairs to get close enough to speak a word in her ear.

“Miss Holbrook, I wonder if you would come for a drive with me in the afternoon tomorrow?”

She looked up with a ready smile and a glow of pleasure in those blue eyes. It was a mystery how a man like Iron Tom Holbrook with his dark hair and brows and a build as square and solid as the Norman tower of St. Botolph’s church had come to bear such a fair-haired, blue-eyed daughter. Harry was in danger of getting lost in those eyes.

“You’ll want a complete account of how our friend is getting on,” he told her, making good on his promise.

Her glance shifted away, her smile dimmed. “Thank you, Captain, that would be kind,” she said.

The business of leave-taking separated them again before he understood what he’d said to rob her of that first smile.

As the husband hunter dresses for an outing in London society, she fears that her lack of acquaintance in town dooms her to the sidelines of any gathering or conversation. At times it seems that everyone around her has been on the town forever and that allusions and asides have a meaning to the Londoner that she cannot fathom. At other times London ways seem odd. She is amused at the degree of importance attached to such trivialities as the cut of a gentleman’s lapel or the plumes in a lady’s hat. She fears that her inexperience and lack of familiarity with London ways will exclude her from good company. But she need not fear. A lively curiosity and an open mind are the only vouchers she needs to be admitted to the best company in London.

—The Husband Hunter’s Guide to London

Chapter 12

The captain, arriving in Brook Street at the fashionable hour for a drive in the park, met with Cassandra and Cordelia’s entire approval for his hat and caped driving coat and the look of his curricle and pair. With a quick survey of Lucy’s dove-gray pelisse, gloves, and bonnet, they hurried her out the door to see and be seen.

After he handed her into his carriage, he met her gaze and asked, “What’s so amusing?”

“Don’t look up,” she said. “I’m sure my dear friends are observing us from the window. They’re determined to snare me a husband and have given you their seal of approval as the ultimate fashionable accessory for a woman’s appearance in the park.”

“Accessory?”

“Exactly.” She gave him a quick scrutiny and found it was not enough. He was not handsome precisely, but compelling. She wanted to look at him far more than politeness permitted. “Apparently, my being seen in your company will draw the notice of other gentlemen.”

“Do you have any in mind?”

“It’s early days yet, Captain. Besides yourself and my old friends from our Back Bench Lending Library, I have met few eligible bachelors.”

“And you wouldn’t bet on a horse without seeing the field, is that it?”

“Exactly, the husband hunter must cast a wide net.” Lucy laughed. If he intended to flirt with her, he showed no sign of doing so.

The street was crowded with carriages like theirs headed for the park on an afternoon of warm sun and cool breezes. The trees made a swaying tracery against a bright blue and white sky. The captain handled his pair with ease. It was one more thing about him that drew her attention. When he’d got them through the traffic of Grosvenor Square and the park was in sight down the end of Brook Street, Lucy brought up the true reason for their drive.

“You wanted to tell me about Adam,” she said.

“He’s with a friend of mine,” he said, “a steady man, who keeps a shop with a back room and a small garden, quite concealed from notice. They get on well together.”

“Has Adam had any...episodes?”

“None. You’ve thought about why he has them, haven’t you?”

“When I was twelve, I made quite a study of his...frenzies. He had so much distress that summer, and I thought there must be a way to...help him if I could understand what brought on his...fits.”

“And did you figure anything out about their cause?” His gaze was on his horses, but he seemed intent on her answer.

“No. Papa made me stop. I wrote down all the things Adam said in those moments. I thought perhaps they made a story.”

He nodded, watching her with a narrowed gaze. “And you thought it would help him if you could unravel the story?”

“I did, but Papa convinced me that it would be a selfish experiment to push Adam to relive whatever happened. It might drive him to true madness.”