The Watchmaker's Daughter (Glass and Steele #1)(31)

I pressed my lips together to suppress my smile. "Go ahead."

"You fixed that watch for him, even though he couldn't. How can that be?"

I shrugged one shoulder. "He's old and ought to retire, perhaps. It was only a matter of re-attaching the spring."

"Mr. Lawson has decades of experience, yet you wish me to believe he missed something so simple?"

"What other explanation is there? It wasn't working; I fixed it easily when he couldn't. There's nothing more to it."

He nodded slowly without taking his gaze off me. I found it unnerving so concentrated on the streets passing us by outside. After several turns, I realized we weren't heading in the right direction. I opened the window and shouted as much up to Cyclops.

He leaned over and looked back so that he could see me then touched the side of his nose as if to keep a secret. I closed the window again.

"What did he say?" Mr. Glass asked, rubbing his temples.

"That he knows what he's doing."

When we pulled into Park Street, Mr. Glass shoved open the door and leapt out before the coach had come to a complete stop outside his house. "What the devil are you doing?" he roared at Cyclops.

"Bringing you home to rest," Cyclops said. "And keep it down. You're scaring the horse."

The front door of number sixteen burst open just as I stepped out of the coach. A woman in her fifties stood on the threshold, an angry scowl on her face as she took in both myself and Mr. Glass. Dressed in black lace from head to toe, she looked like a cobweb in mourning.

"Matt!" Willie called out from behind her. "Better come inside real quick before she causes a scene."

"You!" The woman pointed at Mr. Glass before he had a chance to move. "Squatter! Intruder! Get out of my house or I'll have you arrested."





Chapter 7





"Vagabond!" The woman cried in a shrill voice. "House thief!" She advanced down the steps, still pointing her finger at Mr. Glass. Her hand shook, and next to him, she looked tiny and fragile, yet she faced up to him as if she were a warrior. I admired her immensely.

I remained on the pavement, waiting to see Mr. Glass's response. Cyclops didn't move the coach onward, and Duke now joined Willie at the door. Unlike her, his gaze was on Mr. Glass, not the woman. He looked concerned.

A quick glance at Mr. Glass proved why. The telltale signs of exhaustion tugged at his eyes and mouth. "You're mistaken, madam," he said. "I own this house."

He owned it? I’d thought he'd simply leased it. How did an American come to own a house in one of London's best areas?

"You cannot own this house," the woman said with a haughty sniff. "My nephew does."

Willie's eyes widened so far they were in danger of popping out of her head.

"Coyote's balls," Duke muttered.

Mr. Glass blinked several times before finally clearing his throat. "Then you must be Miss Letitia Glass." He bowed. "I am Matthew Glass. Your nephew."

The woman stumbled backward, only to trip up the stair. Willie and Duke caught her and righted her. She hardly seemed aware of her near-accident or the people behind her, despite another colorful phrase spilling from Duke's lips.

"No," she muttered. "No, no, no. You cannot be Matthew. He is in America, doing…American things. He would write to notify me of his arrival." She leaned forward, squinted hard at him, then leaned back and continued her scrutiny, as if the distance would help her see better.

"Why would I write when I've never written before?" Mr. Glass said. "Aunt Letitia—"

"Don't call me that," she snapped. She reached out and caught his chin. He could have avoided her grip but he bore her inspection as she turned his head from side to side. "Hmmm. You do have some of the Glass bearing, and you're as handsome as your father. But you cannot be Matthew. He is only thirty. You look much older."

"He's been ill," Willie said.

Mr. Glass gave his cousin a sharp glare as Letitia Glass let him go. "I am unconvinced. Prove to me that you are Matthew and I'll allow you to stay here."

"You'll allow me?"

"Yes. I'll allow you, Mr. Whoever-You-Are. The more I see of you, the more I doubt you are my nephew. My dearest brother would not bring his son up to be impertinent to his aunt. Harry had manners."

At mention of his father, Mr. Glass lowered his head. He heaved a sigh.

"You prove who you are," Duke said before Mr. Glass could respond.

The tiny woman turned to him. "Everyone knows me." She waved a hand at the neighboring window. The curtain moved and the face that had been watching disappeared. "I am well known in London. I was—am—a dear friend to the queen." She touched the gray curls at the nape of her neck, poking out from beneath the cloud of black veil surrounding her hat. "I've been painted by masters, courted by foreign princes, and dined in palaces. A white knight even slayed a dragon for me, once."

Stunned silence followed her odd pronouncement as we all stared at her. A light rain began to fall and the curtain of the neighbor's house parted again. Letitia Glass stood in the center of us with an outwardly thrust chin, a straight back, and a glint in her eye that I now suspected was madness.