“How many of us are living our lives in disguise?” Michael asked as a fat flake smacked him in the eye. “Too many.”
He turned his steps west, prepared to make another call, and this one was not likely to go half so well as the meeting with Ricardo had.
“Delancey’s not sick.” Danner made that pronouncement around a mouthful of cinnamon bun. The box sat on the edge of his desk, while Twillinger and Ingram had brought their chairs over to gather ’round and aid the cause of not letting food go to waste. “Damn, these are good.”
“Fresh,” Twillinger said, sniffing his bun. “I keep your dear mama in my nightly prayers, Danner. You must never do anything to vex her, lest I starve.”
Natty Ingram selected the smallest of the buns still in the box. “If Delancey isn’t ill, then what’s he up to? He’s never missed a day since he started.”
“He was marching over the bridge one way as I was marching over t’other,” Danner said. “I fancied a little sortie in the new-fallen snow.” He wiggled his eyebrows, confirming—had there been any doubt?—that he hadn’t slept in his own bed the previous night.
“Aren’t you the romantic?” Twillinger said, elbowing Danner in the well-padded vicinity of his ribs. “Did you compose an ode to Barbara’s fair countenance while giving your boots a soaking?”
“We never used to enjoy our treats like this,” Ingram said, lest Danner had composed an ode and was inspired to recite it.
“Answering the mail won’t take all day for a blessed change,” Danner said, pausing between buns. “Why not pass the time agreeably and avoid getting crumbs on wet ink?” He selected the largest remaining bun and smiled cherubically. “The Lord bless and keep dear Mama and darling Cook and the porter who brought us these buns.”
“We never had time to enjoy our treats before,” Twillinger said. “Delancey got us caught up, and, Danner, you did not see him crossing any bridges.”
Danner tore off a bite of bun. “I didn’t?”
“You did not,” Ingram said. “Have either of you met Hannibal Arbuckle?”
Danner wrinkled his nose and chewed busily. “I have. Old-school. Pomposity and prayer, the poor will always be with you. Port and roast of beef for him, thunderation and God’s wrath for the rest of us.”
Ingram exchanged a look with Twillinger. For all Danner’s bluff good cheer, he had a certain shrewdness.
“Helmsley is careful of him,” Twillinger said. “Showed Arbuckle all around the palace as if he were the angel Gabriel’s right hand. Arbuckle is a few years Helmsley’s senior. I wonder when their paths crossed previously, because Arbuckle’s conversation had the condescending edge bishops sometimes take with curates.”
“Do not say that word,” Danner muttered around a mouthful of bun.
“Curate, curate, curate,” Twillinger shot back.
“Where do we suppose Delancey was going?” Ingram said. “He is the most private fellow I know, and here he is, dodging class and not even being subtle about it.”
“He’s in love.” Danner—still holding his bun—placed his hand near his heart. “Only love could inspire such a paragon to dabble in mendacity.”
“He can’t afford a wife,” Twillinger observed. “None of us can. Maybe he has a ladybird.”
They could not afford wives yet. Ingram kept to himself what Helmsley had passed along the previous morning: Ingram was to have his own congregation. No curate’s post, no toadying to a series of deans or bishops. A congregation, where a real churchman could roll up his spiritual sleeves and get to work. Delancey had made that happen.
“Our Michael undertakes charitable activities,” Ingram said slowly.
“Stands on street corners with pamphlets?” Danner asked. “Nobody with any sense will loiter about in this weather to get sermonized at.”
“Delancey doesn’t sermonize,” Ingram replied, “but if Arbuckle should ask either of you about Delancey, keep mum. Pleasantries and platitudes, nothing more.” Arbuckle either had a genuine interest in ecclesiastical architecture, or he excelled at making excuses to loiter about the palace. Perhaps Twilly and Danner had noticed as much too.
Twillinger dusted his hands over the half-empty box. “I had a little peek at the records. Curates usually last less than six months with Arbuckle. Some of them have left the profession to get away from him, but Delancey lasted five years. You stick with a miserable job when you have no alternatives, or when you’re the only one who can stand to do the work. Delancey could have run home to Papa at any moment.”
Ingram saluted with his bun. “I’ve underestimated you, Twilly.”
“So many do. It’s part of my charm.” He batted his lashes and rose. “Back to the epistolary salt mines with me. And, Danner?”
“I know. I did not see Delancey hiking across the bridge, he did not see me wandering home from the fleshpots of Mayfair, and it all grows quite confusing for a mere clerk.” He closed the lid on the box of buns. “Do we even have correspondence to see to?”
“A few letters came in yesterday’s post,” Ingram said, pushing to his feet. “Nothing challenging.”
He was following Twillinger out the door when one of the palace messengers stopped his progress.
“Mr. Ingram, you have callers.”
“You are grinning as if Danner’s mama has come by to inspect my fingernails.”
“Danner’s mama hasn’t a patch on these two. You will want to brush the crumbs from your cravat before you greet them, sir. They’re ladies. They specifically asked for you and told me I wasn’t to mention to Mr. Helmsley that they were taking you away from your duties.”
Ingram sidled past him. “Half a cinnamon bun in it for you to keep your mouth shut, Smithers.”
“Give him a whole one,” Danner called. “They’re best when they’re fresh, and I’ve had all I care for.” He fired a bun at Smithers, who caught it one-handed.
“What passes for piety in these parts would shame the devil.” Smithers shook an admonitory bun at them. “Thank God.” He bit into his sweet and closed his eyes. “Bliss. This is bliss. When I go to heaven—”
“Study your Bible,” Ingram said, “and you, too, could number among the correspondence clerks. I might even put in a word for you.”
Smithers’s eyes popped open. “You would?”
Delancey had put in more than a word for Ingram and for his fellow clerks, and he’d expected nothing in return. Would probably have been embarrassed by even passing thanks.
“The job can be grueling,” Ingram said, “but the company is most agreeable, and we get a half day when we’re caught up. You learn a prodigious amount of Scripture and theological law despite yourself. I’ll see what I can do.”
Smithers tossed the remains of his bun in the air and whooped. “Thank you, Mr. Ingram. Thank you most kindly.”
Ingram was already moving down the corridor, curious to meet the ladies who’d call upon him at his place of work. Perhaps he’d answered a letter one of them had sent. Perhaps they were the advance party from his new congregation. He was to be billeted to a London neighborhood, not too wealthy, not too poor—and not too far from Helmsley should any thorny ecclesiastical law questions come up—and he already had plans for how he could advance the schemes Michael Delancey had put in place.