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consumption of sliced beef long enough to shoot Heath a reproving look.
    “Today is not the day to air those worries.” Jeffries and Heath bore a slight resemblance—cousins, or possibly half brothers. These things happened.
    “Death turns a household upside down,” Mrs. Jensen observed. “And such a death as this…”
    “Quite so,” Ambers said, rubbing his thumb over a signet ring on his smallest finger. “A tragedy for all concerned.”
    The staff clearly knew the colonel had been murdered. Mr. Belmont had said nothing to the Candlewick servants, of course. Suicide was a bad, awful business, wreaking havoc with the inheritances and denying the deceased an honorable burial. A ruling of suicide would not require the magistrate—whose first love was the solitude of his glass houses—to spend hours interviewing servants, peering into desk drawers, and otherwise poking about.
    Himself had grumbled about the burdens of his official duties the last time he’d invaded the Candlewick kitchen in search of sustenance, a transgression of which he was regularly guilty, much to Cook’s feigned horror.
    “I’m sure madam would write characters for any seeking other prospects,” Shreve said, pulling on his gloves.
    Nobody looked relieved.
    “Mrs. Stoneleigh needs to know she can rely on us now,” Mrs. Jensen said, rising from her wingchair. “We’re worried about ourselves, when we all know the lady of house hasn’t been faring well lately, and now this.” She surveyed the various footmen and maids taking advantage of the generous fare.
    Ambers was gazing out the window, holding himself slightly apart from the house staff, as usual. Whether he did this out of deference to the usual servant hierarchy—house servants being above ground servants—or because he considered himself superior to them all, Hennessey neither knew nor cared.
    Ambers had once tried to
demand
kisses from her—more fool he. He’d made quite a fetching picture, writhing on the ground in his London finery.
    Hennessey glanced at the clock. In fifteen minutes, she’d file out the servants’ entrance with the rest of the Candlewick employees paying their respects, and wedge herself into the Belmont traveling coach for the short journey home.
    Mr. Belmont had declared that his staff was not to tromp the lanes in frigid weather when reasonable people availed themselves of coaches on such a solemn occasion. The professor was a great one for declarations, treatises, lectures, and general grumbling.
    Hennessey wished him the joy of his investigation. If she’d concluded anything in more than an hour of sitting on a hard chair and avoiding Heath’s hopeful glances and Jeffries’s subtle ones, it was that the servants were keeping secrets.
    Servants did that. Their discretion was bought and paid for, also a matter of honor. This group might quietly admit Mrs. Stoneleigh wasn’t faring well, but never go so far as to worry aloud that the widow looked positively sickly, and had lost too much flesh in recent months.
    Heath was right to worry, and Mr. Belmont was right to investigate, alas for his roses, lectures, and much-respected treatises.

 
    Chapter Three
    A xel Belmont returned to Stoneleigh Manor for the reading of the will, which to Abby’s relief, did indeed, leave her the entirety of the landed estate. Gervaise inherited the London-based import business—another relief—and Lavinia received a trust to be administered by her solicitor husband.
    All in order, all quite equitable.
    Gervaise went trotting back to Oxford along with Gregory’s solicitor immediately after the reading, Lavinia’s coach following in their wake.
    “I’m glad you have some family in the area,” Mr. Belmont said, peering out the formal parlor window as if to ensure that family had in fact gone haring back to town. “Even if they’re staying elsewhere and only for a few days.”
    “Lavinia is dear.” Lavinia was particularly dear in small doses, and she was a