“I don’t mind,” Daniel said. “After spending all yesterday and last night in a carriage, I shall enjoy the brief walk.”

Nodding, Richard banged on the wall of the carriage. Moments later they were disembarking and making their way along the crowded walk toward the tailor’s.

“You’ll need a whole new wardrobe,” Daniel commented as they swerved closer to the road to avoid a small party of women walking the opposite way.

“Yes,” Richard agreed dryly. “Fashion is one of many things George and I did not have in common.”

“Did you have anything in common?” Daniel asked with amusement.

“Taste in women,” Richard answered promptly.

“Ah.” Daniel grinned. “I’ll take that to mean you are not displeased to have Christiana for a wife.”

“If Suzette is half the woman Christiana is, we can both count ourselves lucky men,” Richard assured him.

“Hmm. Suzette mentioned that Christiana had followed you upstairs, and I did notice a certain spring in your step when you found me in the parlor sometime later. I wonder what could have happened to cause that?”

“You can keep wondering,” Richard said dryly and led the way into the tailor’s.

As he’d hoped, his time with the tailor was short. The man was swift and efficient, taking Richard’s measurements and his order with a speed that spoke of the years of experience he had. Much to Richard’s relief, the man assured him he could have several of the items to him by week’s end. He also did have a couple of cutaway coats, a pair of trousers and a pair of breeches available right away. One of the coats was a perfect fit and could be taken at once, the other items needed a bit of tailoring, but the man promised to fix them up right away and send all four items along to the townhouse by the day’s end.

“Well that went well too,” Daniel commented as they stepped out of the tailor’s and started up the walk in the direction of the Radnor carriage. “Perhaps we shall be lucky and arrive back at the townhouse to find that everyone has had such a successful day, and the identities of the blackmailer and poisoner have been discovered so that we need only round them up.”

“We should be so lucky,” Richard said wryly.

“Was it not you who said just as we entered the tailor’s that we were both lucky men?” Daniel asked cheerfully.

Richard glanced around at Daniel ’s words and opened his mouth to respond, but froze as he spotted the carriage careening toward them. The first shout of warning went up then, but Richard was already grabbing Daniel ’s arm and throwing himself to the side, out of the way of the oncoming vehicle.

They crashed to the ground amid a cacophony of screams and shouts as the people around them noted the danger and tried to get out of the way, and then there was a moment when the only sound Richard could hear was that of the horses’ hooves and the trundle of the carriage’s wheels as it raced past, the breeze of its passing telling how close they’d come to being trampled.