I didn’t sleep well that night, and the fault for my restlessness did not lie with my aunt. For despite the short notice and the house overflowing with guests, she had still managed to provide me with a lovely little room facing the gardens. No, the fault lay in me. I had never slumbered easily, but my insomnia had only grown worse in the months since Will’s passing. My mind simply would not allow me the undemanding peace of a deep sleep. It was always on guard. And this night’s new worries over Dodd’s murder and the eleventh Earl of Buchan’s missing bones, coupled with my anxiety over Gage’s pending arrival, only added to the burden.
Consequently, I was up almost with the sun and down to the breakfast parlor before I expected to see any of the other guests. But I was wrong. Two young men sat conferring with one another in hushed voices at one end of the table. The tone of their voices would have seemed suspicious but for the fact that one of them was very clearly nursing a thick head from a long night of drinking. It was he who jerked upright at the sound of my approach from where he had been draped over the table and then winced, brackets of pain forming around his mouth and eyes. I recognized Lord Shellingham at once and waved him down, lest he try to rise and cast up his accounts. I couldn’t imagine why on earth he would be out of bed at this hour in his condition.
My gaze swung to take in the man beside him, who was eyeing me with some misgiving, though I couldn’t think why. Unless, having heard the rumors concerning me, he thought I was about to lure him to his death before selling his body for dissection. If that was the case, the man must not be very bright.
“Good morning,” I murmured, moving to the sideboard. A yawning footman stood to the side, ready to assist, and I smiled at him in sympathy. A servant’s duties were never done, even the morning after a ceilidh.
I settled across from the two men, observing that Lord Shellingham had nothing more than a cup of black coffee before him, while the other man’s plate of food had barely been touched. I sipped my tea and eyed him curiously. In my experience, young men of his age practically inhaled their food. He didn’t appear to be suffering the ill-effects of a night of overindulgence, but I supposed he could simply be hiding it better.
“Forgive me. I’ve forgotten your name,” I said. Trevor had introduced us the previous evening, but though Lord Shellingham’s name had stuck, thanks to his friends’ manner of calling him Shelly for short, this fellow’s had not. “Remind me.”
He cleared his throat. “Archibald Young, my lady.”
I nodded. Now I remembered. Though only two or three years younger than I, thanks to his rather puppy-doggish looks, he seemed younger still. Even now he was staring at me with his big brown eyes like I was about to scold him for piddling on the carpet.
Lord Shellingham, on the other hand, was quite the fop—his clothes and hair arranged just so. Although this morning that was definitely not the case. I found him to be handsomer without the artifice. If you looked beyond the green cast to his true complexion, that is.
If I remembered correctly, the pair were cousins, and I thought I could see a shared familial trait in the strength of the jaw and the shape of the eyes, though there the similarities ended.
“Are you off early?” I inquired, taking in their riding attire.
“Er, yes,” Mr. Young stammered, darting a glance at his companion. “We’re due back in Edinburgh for a dinner.”
“Blasted dinner,” I heard Lord Shellingham mutter as I took a bite of toast, and bent my head to hide my answering smile.
“And you?” Mr. Young asked politely.
I shrugged one shoulder. “I’m up early most mornings, regardless of how late I retired.”
I studied Mr. Young as he picked at the food on his plate and Lord Shellingham as he cradled his head in his hands, and decided they were as good a place to start as any.
“So what are your impressions of what happened last night? Quite an odd way to begin the new year, don’t you think?”
Mr. Young darted another nervous glance at his cousin, who merely parted his fingers to look at me through them.
Neither man spoke, so I clarified. “The interruption of the first-footer.”
“Oh, yes.” Mr. Young gasped, almost seeming relieved.
What else had he thought I referred to?
“That was odd,” he confirmed.
Clearly interpreting my probing gaze, Lord Shellingham added, “We both got a little more foxed than we intended, Lady Darby. I think Archie, here, has been worried he might have gotten into some trouble he shouldn’t have.”
“I see,” I replied neutrally, not at all sure there wasn’t more to it than that. But before I had a chance to question them further, another guest entered the room.
“Good morning,” he announced loudly with good cheer.
Lord Shellingham winced so sharply I thought he might collapse under the table.
I turned to smile at the newcomer, a gentleman about my uncle’s age with a wisp of very fair, thinning hair. “Good morning.”
He halted at the edge of the table rather abruptly and, after examining my features quite thoroughly, offered me a dazzling smile. I began to worry there was some smudge on my face or that my hair, which was never really tamed, had already fallen from its pins. But he quickly disavowed me of my fears.