Cynthia Bailey Pratt by Gentlemans Folly

party, Joss, old thing. I’m sorry I was out, or I would have come earlier.”
    “Arnold,” Mr. Fletcher said sharply, recalling his duty and making a fierce face in the boy’s direction. “Don’t tease your cousin. Call her by her proper name.”
    “Oh,” Arnold said with an expression of such innocence even Jocelyn was fooled for an instant. “She likes it. Don’t you, Joss?”
    Murdering her cousin immediately was out of the question. There were too many witnesses. Mrs. Alastair Swann stared at Arnold with the same horror she would have shown the boot-eating bear.
    “Don’t eat there. You’ll bring the mice. Come down to the kitchen, and I’ll give you some milk.” Jocelyn stood up, saying, “Excuse me for one moment,” and went out. Arnold followed her, brushing crumbs off himself onto the carpet. Jocelyn looked back, smiled, and shut the salon door.
    Helena glanced at Mr. Fletcher, her raised eyebrows and his sending the same message. “Well,” she said brightly, rising to cross to Jocelyn’s now vacated position. “I hope she hurries Granville along with more tea.”
    Silence met this essay. Helena felt the eyes of the vicar upon her, and her head emptied of new topics. Then Miriam Swann, with real inspiration, began to chatter of how the new fashions were to be made. The older woman found it impossible to keep aloof while her daughter-in-law made so many errors. Eventually even Helena forgot her brother’s dampening presence long enough to take an active part in the conversation.
    Mr. Fletcher was torn between his duty to discover Arnold’s latest malfeasance and remaining in a room where he could hear Miss Fain’s voice, even if none of her words were addressed to him. He nodded at each of the ladies in turn, though he understood nothing of what they said.
    Mr. Fain sat perfectly still and perfectly silent.
     

Chapter Six
     
    The prickle of excitement beneath the skin was the same whether infiltrating into the heart of a foreign government or burglarizing a house. Hammond waited for the good-looking boy to leave the kitchen. The old man stooping over in the garden never looked up while Hammond stood in the shadows at the corner of the house peeking inside through the shutter. At last the blond boy, older than Arnold, put a teapot on a tray and carried it out of sight.
    Hammond went in. He looked under the cloth lying on a basket, but found it empty. He began to look behind the narrow door beside the fireplace when he knew he was no longer alone.
    A girl stood on the top step, one hand against the wall. After a moment he realized she was the girl he’d noticed in the church, the one Mrs. Gleason has spoken of so disparagingly. He could see why. Her beauty was such that no other woman could create it or copy it, for it had nothing to do with her clothes or hair. She met his eyes boldly but with no hint of the coquette. Her smile was friendly and welcoming.
    She stepped down into the kitchen. The light from the open door behind him fell on her rounded contours and glowing skin. He knew he stared. He hadn’t expected a girl. His manner and voice were gruff. “I want to see Joss,” he demanded. “The other boy said he’d send him down. I’m not going to hurt him. I just want to ask him a question.” She was smiling at him as though she’d received a gift she’d always wanted. “Who are you—Joss’s sister?”
    As if he were looking through a distorting glass, he saw the face of the boy he remembered. He blinked again to shift the illusion. But the eyes were the same as his and so was the curling hair, despite the scarf twisted through it. What a damnable complication!
    “Oh, hell,” he said tiredly and sat down on the edge of the table. “Please tell me you have a twin brother.”
    “No, sir. I’m sorry.”
    And her voice was the same. Hammond sighed like a defeated man. “I must have been more ill than I realized.”
    Looking at her, the gentle light burnishing her clear skin,