Gilroy’s gaze was challenging.

I told him, “Fine.”

We’d nearly reached the bottom of our jug of claret. As I tipped more out into my cup, I noticed Gilroy looking at the new-bought blade beside me.

“Where did you buy that?” he asked.

I could have told him. Had I wanted to, I could have told him everything I’d learned of Lily’s time within the Bell house, her struggles to adapt and settle through that less than settled time, and how she’d been betrayed and presumed drowned that day at Duddingston.

But none of that had any bearing whatsoever on our inquiry. It mattered not to him. She mattered not to him.

And so I only glanced toward the whinger and remarked, offhand, “I bought it in the Canongate, on my way back from dinner at the Earl of Seafield’s.”

“And what were you doing there?”

“He did invite me.” Pausing, I weighed how to best frame my words.

There were questions I wanted to ask that had troubled me since Robert Moray had first set me wondering why the committee had bothered itself at all with this inquiry instead of simply dismissing it for lack of evidence. Why, having made the choice to hold an inquiry, had they then passed it to Turnbull—to me—and not led it themselves? Why would the marriage of two ordinary people be of interest to two great men like the Earl of Seafield and Lord Grange? Had I been more sure of Gilroy I’d have talked about these questions with him, for they turned within my mind and I could find no answers.

But while I had no reason to think Gilroy was my enemy, the fact remained I did not know him. He was not my friend.

So in the end I took the middle ground. “The Earl of Seafield knows of our inquiry.”

“Does he?”

“Aye. I thought it interesting,” I told him. “When Lord Grange spoke of the matter he said only that it wanted some discretion, I expect since it involves a lady’s honor. But the Earl of Seafield told another dinner guest our work was secret.” Looking straight across at Gilroy, I asked in an imitation of his own blunt manner, “Why would he believe it to be secret?”

As we studied one another and I saw the workings of his mind, there was a fraction of a moment when I thought that he might answer—that the wine or something else had melted part of his reserve.

I was mistaken.

Gilroy said, “I’m sure I couldn’t tell you.”

Which, as answers went, left me completely in the dark.

* * *

She kept a candle in her window.

I had marked which window was her own when Gilroy and I had returned her to her lodging after we had come from meeting Robert Moray—had it been but yesterday? It seemed much longer. But then, all the times were lately tumbling in my head and it was difficult to hold them in their place.