Down the lane, Mr. Dunkirk rode toward her, mounted on a black gelding that moved like a shadow under the golden trees. Jane imagined pulling wings out of the ether for the steed. As he neared, Mr. Dunkirk swung down. “Miss Ellsworth. How fortunate. I was on my way to see you.”

Jane blinked. “Me, sir? I confess you surprize me.”

Though attempting to be at his ease, Mr. Dunkirk’s face had a disturbed melancholy look. “Yes, well. May I accompany you for a short time? I would like a moment of your thoughts.”

“Of course. Though as I am headed to Robinsford Abbey, you have made a trip to see me in vain.”

“To see Beth?” He turned the horse around and began walking with Jane back the way he had come.

“Just so.” Jane walked beside him, waiting for him to convey whatever intelligence he had.

The leaves crunched under their feet, sending spicy scents of loam and bracken up to tickle her nose. In her mind, she wove the folds of glamour it would take to re-create such a scent, but even with that distraction, her skin was aware of how close Mr. Dunkirk stood to her.

Finally, he made a soft anguished cry. “I do not know how to broach this. I believe you to be an honourable woman, and so I cannot ask you to betray any confidence that my sister might have given you, and yet—” He broke off and Jane glanced at him. The mask of ease had swept away, and all his worry lay naked on his face. Jane’s heart seized in her chest, knowing with a certainty that he would ask her about Captain Livingston. She kept her features calm with effort.

Mr. Dunkirk twisted the reins in his hand and said, “It might be best if you heard Beth’s history, so that you would understand why I ask you to—why I ask what I will ask. You might remember that Beth had not learned glamour as part of her studies. It was my parents’ intent that she learn that as a matter of course, along with the other finer arts, and so they engaged a tutor. I doubt that you will remember this conversation, given everything else that happened the evening of Mr. Vincent’s collapse, but I made reference to Beth’s first tutor in glamour.”

“I do. Your discomfort made it stand out in my mind.”

He nodded and continued. “Mr. Gaffney came to us with excellent letters of reference. Though young, he was a man of great skill. My father had no reason to doubt his skills or his character. Ah! But how I wish he had doubted. Even the most cursory of inquiries . . . But I get ahead of myself.”

Mr. Dunkirk paused for a moment of reflection. Sighing a bit, he continued. “I was away at school, as was my brother, Richard. I like to think that I might have noticed if I had been home. She was always a dreamy child, given to romantic fantasies. Once, she sent me a story she had written in which a clockmaker created an automaton of a monkey as a means of winning the love of his fair lady. Such fancy! It was only natural that my father should want to engage an excellent tutor, believing that Beth would shew an aptitude in glamour. Mr. Gaffney settled in our house and was engaged to work with Beth daily to improve her skills beyond the schoolroom glamour which every girl learns. I believe that he did start in this manner. When I came home from Oxford for the holidays, Beth shewed me what she had been learning and I thought, even at the time . . .”