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been more than welcome to stay with them in London for an extended visit. What fun times they could have had in Chloe’s laboratory. What discoveries they could have made. And perhaps an extended absence could have improved Camille’s conditions at home.
    “Well, I do not care,” said Chloe. “I am going to the funeral if I have to attend alone.” She glared at Mrs. Malone and swept the table with a defiant look.
    “Chloe, please,” Ambrose said so softly that he was nearly inaudible. Chloe softened and looked down at her plate of cooling lamb and potatoes. She took a bite to keep herself from saying anything further. Conversation at the table gradually resumed.
    “—Can’t control a wife half his age,” said a female voice. Chloe looked up to see Beatrice patting her mouth with a napkin. Dora had a catlike look of satisfaction. She was the one who had spoken.
    “My husband—” Chloe blazed, then felt Ambrose’s hand on hers beneath the table and stopped. With supreme effort, she placed another bite in her mouth and Ambrose’s hand disappeared.
    Ambrose fixed Dora, then Beatrice and Mrs. Malone with a cool look. Chloe was ashamed for rising to their bait. If they found her marriage strange, so be it. The details of her marriage agreement were none of their concern. Her husband was a great deal older than she was. But Ambrose allowed her freedoms that a less mature man would have forbidden. She knew she could be impulsive, and resolved, for the hundredth time, not to shame Ambrose ever again.
    At the far end of the table, William glared at Dora and Beatrice, red-faced with fury.
    “We are going to the funeral,” he declared, savagely cutting into his lamb. “Mrs. Granger was our friend, and we will mourn her with respect. And if we are the only reputable family in the church, then so be it!”
    After a silence during which Dora scowled and Beatrice flushed pink, the conversation returned to the safe topic of wedding preparations. Robert made eye contact with his older brother Ian, who had been mostly silent throughout the entire meal. Robert looked pleased, and a ghost of a smile passed over Ian’s frowning lips.

Chapter 5
    C hloe removed two tiny screws, pried off the metal cover panel and squinted as she examined the innards of Beatrice’s mechanical robin. It was an older model, at least three or four years old, and judging from the color and consistency of its lubricants, had never been taken in for service.
    The bird’s embroidered cloth plumage lay in a brown and red crumple in a corner of the worktable that had appeared in Ambrose’s study while they were at supper. A gas lamp hissed softly in the other corner, its etched glass globe providing too little light. She absently reached a hand to twist one of the scroll arms and the light flared. She squinted into the bird again.
    Beatrice had been vague about the bird’s symptoms, but Chloe had examined it and had a good idea of what was wrong with it. She had already removed most of its casing and she flipped it over and set to work on the five screws that held on its head. Once the outer shell was completely removed, she could see the entire mechanical system. She let her eyes travel over it, easing into a relaxed concentration that allowed her to see the whole and the parts simultaneously.
    Chloe held her lower lip between her teeth as she went through each potential failure point, from most likely to least. An hour later, the table was covered in tiny gears and springs.
    “It’s time for bed,” said Ambrose in the doorway. She hadn’t heard him open the door.
    “Won’t take too much time,” she said, not looking up.
    She knew if she stopped now, she would lose her train of thought. The repair was not a terribly complex one, but she was eager to finish it. She was still in a pique over Beatrice and Dora’s comment at supper but, even so, she wanted to make this bird work even better than it had when it was new. She may never excel at