Beauty and the Blacksmith (Spindle Cove #3.5)(26)

She made herself at home, settling on a stool. “We’ve had a mysterious rash of thefts at the Queen’s Ruby. Diana’s thimble. Mrs. Nichols’s ink bottle. Mama’s lorgnette, my vinaigrette, and sundry loose coins.”

“That wouldn’t seem to add up to much.”

“It adds up to a pattern,” she said. “A mystery. I’ve appointed myself investigator, and I’m making interviews. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”

“Not at all.”

She took out a notebook and pencil. “Now, then. Mr. Dawes, do you have any idea who might have taken the missing objects?”

“I can’t say that I do, Miss Charlotte.”

“Has anyone brought any suspicious items to the forge?”

“No.”

“Very good. Just one last question.” She lowered her notebook. “Do you mean to marry my sister?”

Aaron looked up at her, startled. “What does that have to do with missing trinkets?”

“Nothing.” Miss Charlotte shrugged. “I’m just proving my powers of deduction, that’s all. I may not know who’s been filching things around the rooming house—yet—but I know there’s something between you and Diana.”

“Did she tell you?”

“No.”

“Then when . . . ?” God. He hoped she hadn’t witnessed them on the way home from Hastings.

“I’ve known for more than a year! After I missed the signs when Minerva eloped, I made a commitment to observation. I’ve long known she fancied you.” Her head tilted. “If you do mean to propose, you will have to confront my mother.”

“I . . .” Aaron didn’t know how to refute the idea. So he didn’t. “I know I will.”

“Do you have a plan of attack?”

“Attack?”

Charlotte’s bow-shaped mouth quirked. “This is my mother you’re dealing with. She’s a dragon. Arm yourself. Gird your loins. Gather your courage and your best steel. And yes, formulate a plan of attack.”

Aaron just shook his head. He knew the matron would be surprised and displeased, to say the least, but he didn’t want to see Mrs. Highwood as an enemy. He was usually good with mothers and sisters.

Miss Charlotte brought out a fan from her reticule, snapped it open, and began to work it vigorously. “Here. Let’s play a scene.”

“I know you ladies enjoy your theatricals, but I don’t count acting among my talents.”

“But you don’t have to act. You’re you. And I’m my mother.” She adopted a high, screeching tone. “My Diana, marry a blacksmith? Of all the horrid, unthinkable notions. She will marry a lord. If not a duke! She is the beauty of the family, as everyone knows.”

Aaron sighed under his breath. He tried to exercise patience with the matriarch of the Highwood family, knowing most of her excesses were born out of a desire for her daughters’ well-being. But he heartily disliked the way she compared the Highwood sisters against each other.

“Miss Charlotte, you are a very pretty girl. Well on the way to becoming a beauty in your own right.”

She made a face. “I wasn’t fishing for compliments. I’m pretty enough, but Diana is the beauty of the family. Just like Minerva’s the brains of the family.”

“And what are you?”

She smiled proudly. “The spirit, of course. Now come along.” She fluttered the fan. “Argue back.”

Aaron wiped his hands on a rag and sat down across from her. “Here’s the thing of it, Miss Charlotte. If your sister married me, it would affect your whole family.”

“Naturally. Diana will live here, and Min and I should always have a reason to visit Spindle Cove. That will make all three of us happy.”

“You know that’s not what I mean. Your own prospects. You’re going to have your season in London soon. And I suspect you want that excitement, even if it didn’t suit your sisters. If Miss Diana marries this far beneath her station”—he quelled Charlotte’s objection with a hand gesture—“there’s bound to be gossip. Fewer invitations, fewer suitors . . .”

He could tell his words were sinking in. She shifted uncomfortably on her stool.

“Listen, Mr. Dawes. I don’t think you’ve understood. I’m meant to be my mother in this scene we’re playing, and you’re stealing all her lines.”

He chuckled. “Let’s just say I’ve realized something. If there’s a member of the Highwood family I must approach for permission, it’s not your mother. It’s you.”

She sat tall. “Well. Don’t I feel important.”

“You are important. I know Diana wouldn’t like to see you hurt.”

“I don’t like to see Diana hurt, either, Mr. Dawes. And yet I’ve watched her hurting ever since I could remember. I’ve held her hand through horrid, endless minutes when she struggled to simply breathe. While I would run and climb and play, she was always kept indoors. I was young then, but I’ve grown up now. I won’t have her penned up for another two years just so I can dance and make merry in Town.” Her gaze lifted to his. “I want, very much, to see my sister happy. If it’s my blessing you need, you have it.”