In for the proverbial penny…She faced Elsmore squarely. “An earl hired my grandfather as a portraitist. Grandfather was—is—very good. He was so good that when the earl asked him to provide copies of a few famous paintings, purely for the earl’s private enjoyment, Grandfather easily obliged. He’d made a grand tour in his youth, he had sketchbooks upon sketchbooks filled with likenesses of the great works. Many wealthy families enjoy copies of famous paintings.”

“The earl sold the likenesses as the genuine articles.”

In one sentence, Elsmore summed up facts that had nearly seen Grandfather’s days ended on the gallows.

“Without Grandfather’s permission, without his knowledge. While Grandfather was delighted to have a supportive patron of such impressive rank, the earl was sending the paintings to the lesser capitals, claiming the artwork was for sale to discreet private collectors to liquidate the true owners’ debts. This went on for two years before anybody realized what was afoot. Back then, marching armies made travel more difficult, and those private collectors had been carefully chosen for reclusive qualities and obscure addresses.”

Elsmore stood right before her at the window. A month ago, Ellie would have worried about being seen with a man in her quarters after dark, but the street was empty, not even the chop shop had any customers.

And she was—truly—moving to France.

“What happened when the paintings were discovered to be copies?” Elsmore asked.

“The earl feigned dismay, but he declined to press charges. He made the purchasers whole—I gather two years had seen improvement in his finances—and the duped customers also declined to press charges rather than admit they’d been taken for fools. Grandfather never had another legitimate commission.”

The ensuing silence was awkward, though Ellie honestly could not say if she was more sad to share Grandpapa’s fate or angry that all these years later, Lord Winston’s wrongdoing still hadn’t been punished.

“You look pale,” Elsmore said, which had nothing to do with anything. “Shall I get us something to eat? Something hot from across the street?”

What mattered food when a family’s ruin was under discussion? “No, thank you. I suspect you have a problem at your bank, Your Grace, and that is a more pressing matter than my next bowl of soup.”

“Not to me it isn’t.”

Ellie closed her eyes. “Please don’t.”

“Don’t care about you? Even you, Eleanora, cannot audit genuine regard away from my heart. Shall I fetch us soup, or would you rather have some roast and potatoes?”

“Soup will do.” Ellie wasn’t hungry, but she needed food. She’d eaten little in the past few days, and still had no appetite.

The duke went to the door, bellowed for “Mr. Wentworth,” held a short conversation with somebody in the corridor, and came back to Ellie’s side.