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strain of being with child,” he confessed. “But yes, the opera is wearing her thin, too.”
    Merrick’s eyes widened. “Congratulations, old chap!”
    “We are thrilled, of course,” Wynwood went on. “Her morning sickness has almost passed. But everything else is going wrong. Her lead soprano quit in a temper last week and went back to Milan. Unfortunately, the understudy sounds like a choirboy fending off puberty. Now Vivie’s half-afraid she’s going to have to sing the lead herself—which is what Signor Bergonzi wanted all along anyway.”
    “Ah, Bergonzi!” said Merrick. “I rather like your new father-in-law, Wynwood. He is so politely ruthless.”
    “I like him, too,” said Wynwood. “But he is a part of the problem.”
    “Aye? In what way?”
    “He needs space,” said Wynwood. “Music rooms! Parlors! Pianofortes! Merrick, the man has stuffed my smoking parlor full of cellos and violas, and there is an old harpsichord standing on end in the butler’s pantry. Worse, the children have nearly burst the seams of the schoolroom—”
    “Schoolroom?” Merrick interjected. “I did not know you had one.”
    “Well, it was my billiards room,” Wynwood admitted glumly. “And I should like to have it back someday. ”
    “Forget it, old chap. That same misfortune once befell Alasdair.”
    Wynwood did not look consoled. “Now Mamma, Henry, and my sister Alice have come down for the season with her three children. Alice is as big as a house herself, and they say she’s likely having twins this time. Merrick, I’m desperate, and in a dreadful rush. Can you not simply knock out a wall between a couple of those terraced houses near the river? I’ll just buy two of the bloody things.”
    “That is not a bad notion,” said Merrick. “Why do we not go have a look? You seem to have lost your appetite.”
    “What of you?”
    “I never had one,” Merrick admitted. “I never eat during the day.”
    Wynwood grinned. “Alasdair claims you never eat at all unless you can do so in his dining room,” he said. “But that will be hard to do, old boy, with the bride and groom gone back to Scotland.”
    “I finally built myself a house,” Merrick reminded him. “I do have servants.”
    “You built a house and stuffed all your employees into it,” Wynwood corrected. “It is not at all the same thing. Alasdair, you do not even have a dining room, last I saw.”
    “My draughtsmen have need of it,” Merrick complained.
    “I can eat off a tray at my desk. Now, do you mean to come along and look at these bloody houses or not?”
    Wynwood shut his mouth, and they set off.
    The walk along the river was not a long one, and the breeze blowing in off the Thames helped clear Merrick’s head. The sun was unseasonably warm, and both gentlemen were compelled to loosen their neckcloths. Soon they reached an area of excavation where six sweat-stained men were assiduously digging out a cellar. Adjacent, three masons were mortaring the stone foundation of a second house, and beyond that, carpenters were framing up the skeleton of yet a third. Running up the street beyond them were another ten terraced houses, the next nearer completion than the one before it.
    “Good Lord,” said Wynwood, surveying the scene. “This is like a mill without walls—except that you are churning out houses instead of stockings.”
    “Just so,” said Merrick. “And therein lies a part of the cost savings—or perhaps I should say profit. Now, do you wish a corner house?”
    “I should prefer it, yes.”
    “Well, the topmost house has been spoken for,” said Merrick. “Rosenberg sent the papers last week. You will have to wait on these two at the bottom of the hill.”
    Wynwood’s face fell. “Blast!” he said. “That house above is perfect.”
    “It will take the wind coming off the river,” Merrick warned. “So will be more expensive to heat. Besides, a widow from Yorkshire has already contracted for it.”
    Wynwood