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shared a joke. Abby was almost sure of it. She dropped her gaze, but not before she saw the flare of humor in his eyes. Next she might be tempted to flirt with him.
    Flirt?
    With
him
? She wouldn’t even know how.
    “I don’t know Gervaise well,” Abby said, preparing her own serving of tea. “He was already through with his terms when I married Gregory, and well established in London’s legal community. The import business will make a suitable inheritance for him, for he seldom leaves Town. It’s said he never represents a party unless he believes his client to be innocent.”
    Mr. Belmont stirred his tea slowly, deliberation apparently part of his nature. Abby knew from churchyard talk that he didn’t simply direct gardeners to see to his roses. He personally tended the plants in his glass houses, and published scholarly botanical treatises too.
    Axel Belmont was probably closer to his roses than Abby had been to her own husband.
    “Murder is usually motivated by greed, revenge, or passion,” Mr. Belmont said. “Gervaise doesn’t strike me as particularly greedy, or passionate, and I cannot discern what revenge he might have taken on his aging father.”
    “Gregory was hardly doddering.” Though he’d no longer been a man in his prime. Abby had never seen him unclothed, but she’d noticed the tremor in his hands of late, a quaver in his voice where command had once been. Gregory had been tall, but in the past year, that height had taken on the stooped quality of advancing age.
    “Eat something, Mrs. Stoneleigh.”
    For form’s sake, Abby arched a brow at Mr. Belmont’s peremptory tone, but then reached for a scone. Her digestion was off, though no worse than usual.
    “With butter, madam, if you please.”
    She let her hand fall and hoped her stomach wouldn’t growl. “You are not my nanny. What else would you like to know?”
    “Tell me of Lavinia.” Mr. Belmont slathered a scone with butter, slapped it on a plate, and passed it over.
    They were to be
very
informal then. “She is the friendlier of the two.” Abby’s stomach did growl, drat the luck. “Lavinia wed the year after I married Gregory, and has two small children. She dotes on them and on their father, Roger, a successful solicitor who should manage Lavinia’s bequest quite competently.”
    Or… was Roger a solicitor who only
appeared
successful? “Roger has sent the children here for an occasional summer,” Abby went on, “and the children seemed to love their holidays.” She had certainly loved having the children underfoot, while Gregory had barely tolerated them. “Roger would be called high-strung were he a female, and I think he’s relieved when the children are elsewhere.”
    And their mother with them, though Abby munched a luscious, buttery bite of scone rather than admit that.
    “Any other family?”
    “Gregory had a cousin or two, older fellows. Gervaise could tell you more about them. They sent Gregory the occasional letter. I recall a few old chums from the army too, some of whom were mentioned in the will. Mr. Brandenburg, his London factor until recently, was a business acquaintance of long standing, but he’s gone to his reward.”
    “Do you have Gregory’s correspondence?” Mr. Belmont asked, picking up the second half of Abby’s scone and holding it out to her.
    He was relentless, like one of those thorny climbing roses that took over all in its ambit.
    “I have his letters,” she said, accepting the scone. How had Mr. Belmont’s children avoided acquiring dimensions comparable to market hogs? “I suppose you’ll want to see every note and rough draft? At times Gregory and Mr. Brandenburg were weekly correspondents.”
    “My brother, who has brought numerous felons to justice, has cautioned me against undue haste in my investigations. Nonetheless, the murderer doesn’t seem inclined to step forward and announce himself, so I’d best have a look at those letters.”
    “A woman can fire a gun, Mr.