the temptation of a little rudeness. Just to see if she could make him blush again. “Solomon Hathaway. And the Earl of Dewington’s your uncle. Then—hmm. Your mother married beneath her, didn’t she?”
He focused on the conversation then, his hazel eyes going green and piercing. “No one with Lord Dewington in her family could possibly marry beneath her,” he snapped. Well, she agreed with him there.
Usually she liked to keep her desk between herself and visitors, but on impulse she came around and leaned back against the front edge. From up close, he looked even more tired, and thinner than she remembered. What had happened? Did it have anything to do with the help he wanted from her? “So, what is this heirloom you’re looking to recover?”
He gazed out the window behind her. “It’s the Stuart earrings. My grandfather’s great-grandfather, John Hathaway, let Charles the Second spend a couple of nights in his printing house when the king was fleeing one of Cromwell’s victories. Charles gave him the earrings as a reward. If you ask me, it’s a blot on the family escutcheon—not that we have one. I’d prefer a ‘death to tyrants!’ sort of forebear. But last week the earrings were being sent up to Shropshire by special courier for the wedding, and a highwayman robbed the coach. Susannah won’t get married without them.”
Ah yes, Susannah. If he was engaged, why was he running on as if he’d barely spoken to anyone in who knew how long? The amount of words convinced her that she was right and he wasn’t shy, only distracted or unhappy. Clearly Susannah wasn’t taking proper care of him.
Not taking proper care of him? she mocked herself. Who are you and what have you done with Serena? Next you’ll be making him calf’s-foot jelly. “The earrings are valuable, I take it?”
He shrugged. “The workmanship is excellent. Two goodsized rubies set in gold filigree with four tiny diamonds—very grand for a Hathaway, but nothing out of the common way for a Ravenshaw.”
Serena didn’t wear jewelry. Possibly he was realizing that, because he glanced up at her hands and neckline and then launched back into speech without ever meeting her eyes.
“But that isn’t it. It’s the family superstition. The king told John that they would bring him good fortune. There’s even a verse saying to give them to one’s wife for luck. And sure enough, the woman John loved was widowed in a tragic oven accident and they were able to marry. Since then all the Hathaway brides have worn the earrings. By now, that means that if one doesn’t wear them—”
“Bad luck, yes. But surely you, Solomon, are not so—unwise—as to be swayed by such things.”
He looked at her then. “A pun on my name, how original.” But he was smiling a little, which threw her off. “Susannah lacks the scientific temperament.”
She couldn’t help it: she leaned forward. “And yet you’re marrying her.”
He blinked. “What? Oh—Lord, no. Susannah’s my sister. It’s not my wedding.”
Relief flooded her throat; she swallowed it and took refuge in sarcasm. “My apologies. Susannah is lucky to have such a scientific gentleman for a brother.”
He stiffened. At first she thought he was taking exception to her tone, but then he said, sounding affronted, “I’m not a gentleman. I work for my living. My lady.”
She raised her eyebrows, startled. “I apologize if I’ve accidentally dampened your pretensions to being a member of the lower orders.” Of course, she worked for a living, and she had an aristocratic accent and dressed to the nines. But she was a special case. Wasn’t she?
He looked down at his clothes, and went faintly pink. “Oh. I—I borrowed these clothes from the shop. My uncle Dewington hates it when I visit him looking like a tradesman.” He gave her the edge of a crooked smile, as if waiting to see if she’d smile back. “You can’t see it, but there’s a hole in my stockings. Here.” He circled a spot on his breeches just above the knee. His kid-gloved index finger rubbed against the buckskin, only inches above the row of buttons stretching the leather tight around his calves, and Serena felt her temperature rising. She didn’t smile back. “And I gilded the watch-chain myself.”
“You did?” The chain looked brand-new and perfect. Why would he know how to do that?
“I’m a chemist,” he said proudly. “Well, I do some design and pitch in with the tailoring when Uncle Hathaway needs the help, but mostly I make all our