“He just finished yaffling.”
Jasper worked as a bounty hunter and spent time with the thieves and rogues. He often lapsed into their cant, speaking it as fluently as if he’d been born in the rookeries rather than to one of the oldest noble families in England. At the mention of yaffling—the cant for eating—Ewan felt a pang of hunger in his belly. Was the club still serving or had he missed the meal and would now have to wait until supper?
Jasper slapped Ewan on the shoulder. “You always did have a wolf in the stomach, Protector. If the soup is gone, the cook will always serve you gallimaufry.”
Ewan pulled a face. He didn’t particularly want scraps and leftovers. The tracker patted his arm, then started back down the steps. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you only came here to grub.”
It wasn’t far from the truth. If the club hadn’t served meals, Ewan would have attended far less frequently.
He entered and Porter closed the door behind him. “Good to see you again, Mr. Mostyn,” the distinguished older gentleman said. “The dining room, sir?”
Ewan cocked his head in that direction.
“Very well. This way.”
Although he could have found the way with his eyes closed, Ewan followed Porter through the wood paneled vestibule lit with a large chandelier. A suit of armor stood on one wall and two Scottish broadswords on that opposite. The place looked like the sort of establishment Henry VIII would have frequented. But the object that always drew his attention also made him more than a little melancholy. It was a large shield mounted on the wall opposite the door. A big medieval sword cut the shield in half. The pommel of the sword had been fashioned into what Neil had once told him were fleur-de-lis. A skeleton stared at him from the cross guard. Around the shield were small fleur-de-lis that marked the fallen members of the Survivors—those who hadn’t made it back from the war. The shield reminded Ewan that his lost friends were here in spirit.
Still following Porter, who only had one leg, Ewan was forced to move slowly. Porter’s wooden peg thumped on the polished wood floors as he led Ewan past the winding staircase carpeted in royal blue and into a well-appointed dining room. Like the entryway, the dining room was paneled in wood. The ceiling was low and whitewashed, crossed by thick wooden beams. Sconces lined two walls and a fire burned in the mammoth hearth. Four round tables covered with white linen and set with silver had been placed throughout the room. At a fifth table, Neil Wraxall, a.k.a. the Warrior, sat with a glass of red wine centered before him. Neil liked order. He liked both giving orders and order in his life. He dined at the club four days a week precisely at noon. He always sat at the same table and in the same chair. No one else ever dared sit in that chair if there was a remote possibility Neil might drop by the club. And if he came unexpectedly, the man in the chair vacated it without being asked. They’d all served under Major Wraxall long enough to know that while he could be flexible when the situation called for it, he preferred routine and predictability.
Neil looked up when Ewan entered. Porter paused, waiting for a sign from the de facto leader of Draven’s troop. When Wraxall flicked his gaze to the empty chair at his right, Porter led Ewan to it and pulled it out. He sat.
“Wine, sir?” Porter asked.
Ewan nodded.
“And would you like dinner, Mr. Mostyn?”
He looked at the man as though he’d asked if Ewan wanted to be run through with a bayonet.
“Very good then. I will bring the first course. Mr. Wraxall, more wine?” Porter inquired.
The Warrior looked at Ewan. “Will I need it?”
Ewan shrugged. Neil shook his head. “No, thank you, Porter.”
Ewan wasn’t certain how much Neil drank away from the club, but he was always moderate in his consumption at their club. Once, Neil had told him he always kept a bottle of gin beside his bed to calm the tremors when he woke fighting a battle. Ewan had known what he meant. They all had nightmares about the terrors they’d seen during the war. It was the horrors they’d committed themselves that woke them up at night, a scream lodged in the throat.
For Ewan, life in London had gradually begun to seem more real than the memories of the violence and battle. But he suspected it was different for Neil. He suspected Neil was still fighting the battles nightly, hoping to change the outcomes.
For a long while, he and Neil sat with only the crackling of the fire to break the companionable silence. They’d spent many nights thus on the Continent during the war against Napoleon—a dozen or more men huddled around a campfire, knowing death would probably come in the morning and willing to make that sacrifice for king and country. If Ewan had to die, he’d wanted to die with Neil at his side. He trusted the man implicitly, and he respected him as much as he respected Draven. When they’d been in the army, they could always count on Rafe Beaumont to break long silences or tension with frivolous chatter. Now, Ewan wished he knew what to say to his friend to ease the pain, but Ewan was not good with words. At the moment, it seemed Neil could not find words either.
“Knocked any heads together lately?” the Warrior asked at last. It was more of a command than a question. The Warrior almost always spoke in commands and orders.
Ewan smiled, thinking of the pup last night.
“Good,” Wraxall said. “Keep in practice. Give me a report on Langley. I should pay him a visit.”
“He’d like that,” Ewan said.
Neil gave him a wry look. “I’m sure he would. I always lose at the tables. I’ll order Stratford to accompany me. Then I’ll have a chance.”
Stratford was another of Draven’s men and known for his skill with strategy. Ewan frowned, thinking of Langley’s losses. But Neil wouldn’t go to Langley’s. Neil didn’t want light and laughter.
Porter returned with a white soup for Ewan and refilled his glass of wine. Ewan’s belly rumbled again, but he remembered the card. He’d trusted Neil with his life on the Continent. He could trust Neil with whether or not to pay a call on Ridlington. Ewan slapped it on the table before lifting his spoon.
Wraxall picked the card up and turned it in his fingers. “The Duke of Ridlington? What does he want?”
Ewan sipped his wine and met Neil’s gaze. Why did anyone seek out the Protector?
Neil drummed his fingers on the table, probably forming a report in his head. “He’s a good man. I don’t know him well, but I’ve not heard anything said against him. Do you want me to ask the others to report what they know of him?”
Ewan held the spoon midway between bowl and mouth. Was that what he wanted? A sense of the man before he decided to hear the duke’s proposition? Ewan nodded.