‘Come here,’ he said, indicating the place beside him, and remembering his uncertainty the first time he had kissed her, the very first day he had come here to visit her—for nothing had been spoken between them and his offer of assistance, his setting her up in a place of residence and paying for the first six months’ lease on the place, might have been merely the generous gifts of a gentleman moved to help a young lady in distress and with nothing expected in return. But it had not been the generous gifts of a gentleman, it had most certainly been the price to pay for something that was very much expected. And the fact that he had never done such a thing before and he was fairly certain she hadn’t either only made it all the more open to speculation and misunderstanding. But he had kissed her on that first day and it had very soon become evident that the nature of their association was clear to them both and that there need be no more speculation nor misunderstanding between them.

Verity got up now from her chair and came over and sat beside him on the settee and he kissed her, which was what he had wanted to do since she had opened the door to him, since he had sat in the hansom cab, since he had sat at breakfast reading the newspaper. He kissed her and he took her in his arms to show he forgave her the secret appointment, her less than satisfactory greeting and the job at the bookshop.

But it had never quite left him, that uncertainty he had felt the first time he kissed her.

CHAPTER NINE: TRAVERSING THE DOMAIN

CHAPTER NINE

TRAVERSING THE DOMAIN

A steamer recently arrived from the Clarence River was docked at the wharf and the shouts of the men as they unloaded her carried across the air. Otherwise, the street was utterly still and silent, not a curtain stirred nor a door or window opened. It seemed to Eleanor, seated in a stationary hansom cab halfway along the street, that the great and important business of the colony was being attended to, earnestly and with enthusiasm, but it was happening elsewhere. In this street, the arrival of a tradesman with a delivery would shatter the stillness; might, indeed, cause a number of the older establishments to quake on their flimsy foundations.

She leaned forward. No tradesman arrived but a gentleman had just emerged from one of the houses.