Page 28 of The Fortune Hunter’s Gamble

“The Holophusikon,” Rowden said, his chest tight. He remembered those days.

“Yes.” Giles’s face had pinkened with healthy color. “He had a Viking brooch that I wanted for myself and a great number of animals that Captain Cook discovered on his voyages. How I wish they hadn’t auctioned off everything and destroyed the house.”

“You have an affection for natural history, Mr. Rowden?” Lily asked prettily.

“Oh, you must call me Giles. He’s Rowden.” Giles waved a hand in his cousin’s direction. “I like anything clever. There is something called the Eidophusikon which lies next to the Panorama—we should take you to see it. Scenic pictures, with lights and sounds as accompaniment, and they move them about with mirrors and pulleys. It’s quite a contrivance. Rowden, we ought to take Soph and Lil—I mean to say, Miss Westall.”

“I might be Lily to you, if you are Giles to me,” Miss Westall said, her cheeks primrose.

She was perfect, dainty and intelligent and not a whit coy. Rowden ground his teeth together as Sophronia smiled upon the young pair. He caught the look she exchanged with Aunt Dobbs, a knowing gleam from the older woman and a satisfied smirk from Ro. Damn her for her meddling ways.

The barouche stopped in Leicester Place before Number 5, where a large rotunda rose above the narrow entryway and the sign announced “Barker’s Panorama.” Rowden handed his horse to Nate and stepped up to assist the ladies.

“You are being far too obvious,” he growled in Sophronia’s ear as he helped her down. “He’ll balk.”

“He needs encouragement,” she murmured back. “He’s far too shy around young women.”

She clenched his hand briefly, steadying herself, and Rowden fought the pleasurable heat that spread through his body at her touch.

“He’ll have opportunity to mingle,” Rowden said, “since I invited Miss Kemp to meet us.”

Soph’s chin lifted, and her eyes snapped fire as she looked him in the face. “Oh, how lovely. I look forward to meeting her.”

Miss Kemp and her chaperone were inside the Panorama already, standing at the rail of the central viewing platform. Rowden led Aunt Dobbs up the steps and spotted Gibbs standing to one side. His friend doffed his hat, his nod of acknowledgement transforming to a grin as he spotted Sophronia climbing the stairs. Giles led Miss Westall, trying to point out everything at once in the view of Brighthelmstone that wrapped the circular chamber, encasing them in the landscape of land and sky and sea. Above, a skylight in the dome shed natural light that softened the colors and added an intimate ambiance.

“Oh, this is delightful,” Sophronia breathed. “One feels one is actually there.” She gripped the viewing railing and laughed. “I do declare I might become seasick! Rowden, is this the young friend you spoke of? Introduce us, please.”

How like Sophronia to launch herself straight into the fray and begin her machinations at once. Having free rein over her husband for half a score of years had only fostered her managing instincts. Rowden tried his best to be genial.

“This is Miss Mary Kemp, daughter of Lord Dudley Kemp of Chiddingfold. Miss Kemp, this is Mrs. Hinton, lately of Hungerford, widow of⁠—”

Sophronia bowled over his last description by holding out her hands to Miss Kemp. “Yes, yes, inconsolable widow and all that,” she said, directing a beaming smile at the chaperone. “Miss Kemp, what a charming dress and adorable bonnet.”

Miss Kemp returned a timid smile. She was demurely done up in a gown with fitted sleeves daintily puffed at the shoulders, and a ruffled ribbon around her waist gave her bodice the impression of a small jacket. Every inch of her was covered up to her neck and down to her wrists, exposing only her piquant face.

“I must make you acquainted with Lily. Lily, dear!” Sophronia called. “Do come meet Miss Kemp. I am certain the two of you will be fast friends. Lily is the daughter of Colonel Westall of the Dragoons, and Miss Kemp, your father is a son of the Duke of Montrose, I believe? And your mother, Lady Evelyn, is the daughter of the Earl of Teviotdale.”

“I have that honor, mum,” Miss Kemp said, blushing deeply as Lily gave her a frank smile. Rowden ground his teeth together. Soph had somehow sussed out everything there was to know about Miss Kemp—no doubt Aunt Dobbs had been more than forthcoming—and she wasted no time in putting the two girls side by side for display.

Miss Kemp was a blue-eyed, porcelain blonde when doe-eyed brunettes like Lily Westall were in fashion. With all her fussy layers Miss Kemp looked like a doll on a shelf, not to be played with, while Lily’s softer gown and colored ribbons made her seem soft and touchable, the kind of girl a daring young man might slide his arm around in the dim light of an artistic exhibit.

Rowden’s basilisk stare had no effect on Sophronia. Once she would have read his look in an instant and had some answering communication. Now she simply ignored him.

He hated that she could ignore him when he burned with awareness of her.

“Giles, do come say hello to Miss Kemp,” Sophronia said, dispensing with any objection Rowden might make about her cutting Miss Kemp out of the picture. “And her lovely companion. I am Mrs. Hinton,” she said, holding out her hand with a charming smile. The chaperone, who looked the type to be hired for her position, fell prey immediately to the charm of this elegant and commanding lady.

Rowden was the only one who refused to fall victim. Gibbs drifted their way, clearly hoping to insinuate himself into the group, and devil take it, there was Keeling, climbing the stairs with an older woman on his arm who resembled him enough to be a relation. Good Lord, had Keeling brought his mother along to try to beguile Sophronia into looking kindly on him? What sins had Rowden committed that this hell had been unleashed to plague him?

“Quite a champion you have there, my friend.” Gibbs, left out of the female conversation for the moment, waited at Rowden’s elbow.

Aunt Dobbs immediately struck up an affinity with Miss Kemp’s chaperone and they fell into earnest conversation, their hats casting shadows on the heaps of sand that had been arranged along the edges of the painting to provide foreground elements for the buildings lining Brighthelmstone beach. Sophronia took Miss Kemp and circled the platform arm in arm, pointing out details in the scenery. This left Giles and Miss Westall to converse with one another, heads close together, Lily nodding and smiling with delight while Giles provided enlightenment on the prospect.

Of course she would somehow manage, even in a crowd, to leave Giles and Lily together. Cunning baggage.

“What can you mean? I have no champion.” Rowden could not take his eyes from Sophronia and the animation of her face. She hadn’t shown that liveliness with him; rather, she was shuttered and guarded in compare. Jealousy bit into his chest with its foxlike teeth.

“She did not tell you? She bought up all the prints of you that she could find in Meggett’s print shop. Copper plates, too.” Gibbs grinned. “Most admirers simply buy one or five, I’d wager.”