A Kiss Across Time by Louise Allen

Author:Louise Allen [Allen, Louise]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Hilton & Haystaff
Published: 2018-05-31T16:00:00+00:00

We spent Saturday studiously avoiding anything that might stop Luc resting. He slept, ate like a horse and slept some more and by Sunday he was behaving as though nothing had happened. I couldn’t work out whether he was in agony but Georgian male pride simply wouldn’t allow him to admit it, or whether the tolerance of pain was higher in those days. I recalled reading about someone at Waterloo who was wounded, unhorsed, ridden over by two cavalry charges, used as a shooting platform by French troops, stuck by a lancer and who still survived and was very laid-back about the entire experience.

Garrick was full of admiration for the way the wound was healing cleanly and was a complete convert to the sterile theory, so at least I had some confidence that if any of them got hurt while I was back in my own time they would take the right precautions.

There was swelling of course, and a nasty line of stitches, but when Garrick cautiously washed Luc’s hair we found we could comb it to almost cover the damage. ‘That will do under a hat, provided we can pad the rim so it doesn’t chafe, but you can’t go to the ball in a hat,’ he said.

‘Egg white,’ I suggested. ‘Whip it up stiffly, then comb it in, position the hair and it will dry in place.’ They looked dubious, but I thought it would work.

Garrick and I spent an hour on Sunday morning sorting out my gowns for the garden party and for the ball in the evening, then I sat down with the Annual Kalendar and cross-referenced the employees of the Home Office against the names Garrick had extracted from the porters.

‘There are names that match,’ I said. ‘The porters recognised a Mr Potter and a Mr Albright who came in together and there are two clerks listed – Mr J. Potter and Mr A. Albright. And they saw a Mr Reece – could that be Sir Thomas’s nephew Elliott?’

‘Damn, I should have noticed the name,’ Garrick said. ‘I’m sorry, Miss Lawrence, my language – ’

‘No problem. And you had a lot on your mind at the time.’

‘I will go and find out now before they have the chance to forget any more than they probably have already. I should have thought to check those names yesterday.’

James looked up from where he was trying his hand at the coded ledgers. From the muttering and scattered paper he was having no luck with them either. ‘Did you say Albright?’

‘The porters saw a Mr Albright and an A. Albright is a Home Office Clerk.’

‘Augustus Albright. I saw him with George Coates once or twice in gaming clubs. Keen card player.’

‘And not the marrying kind?’ Luc asked.

‘No, definitely not. He was never seriously involved with George that I know of, simply as a partner at cards.’

‘But he was here around the time I was attacked, he knew Coates socially and at the Home Office, he was equally vulnerable to blackmail and he might have gambling debts.

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