“Here we are,” Nightingale said, bustling back into the studio. He deposited a cardboard box onto the floor beside the camera. On top was printed the words Eastman’s Dry Plates. Nightingale removed a small knife from his coat pocket and worked the blade around all four sides of the box, creating a lid, which he then removed. “Would you like to choose one?”
“I’m sure whichever Miss Jones selects will suffice.”
Evangeline rose and went to kneel beside the open box. The plates inside were wrapped in brown paper, two to each parcel. She removed the topmost and placed her hand flat against the wrapping.
“Come and place your hand over Miss Jones’s, if you please, sir.”
At these words of Nightingale’s, she glanced up quickly, but her face gave no clue to what she thought or felt.
Alex was only too happy to comply. He knelt beside her, so close that he could feel faint warmth emanating from her. She smelt of lavender water, which he knew was to be had for pennies. The ladies of his acquaintance favored expensive perfumes, and the simpler fragrance pleased him, perhaps because it was novel. She kept her head bowed over the plate, supposedly praying, but he felt the tension in her hand beneath his. For good or ill, she wasn’t unmoved by his touch. Just this once, he allowed himself to close his eyes and bask in her nearness.
Nightingale cleared his throat and Alex wished him a thousand miles away.
“Amen,” she whispered and pulled her hand free.
Alex opened his eyes to find them both watching him, Nightingale with a certain smug satisfaction, Evangeline with wide-eyed consternation. What had they seen in his expression to make them stare so?
“Well, that’s that,” Nightingale said. “Now if you’ll take a seat on the settee, we’ll see if the camera can detect any spirits.”
“His Grace is a skeptic, Mr. Nightingale. We mustn’t speak to him as though he were a believer. We’ll only irritate him.”
“A skeptic?” Nightingale shook his head sadly. “Oh, now that is a shame.”
“He may even be one of those unfortunates who refuses to admit the truth regardless of the evidence. He doesn’t wish to believe.” Her expression remained solemn throughout this little speech, but her voice had a teasing lilt to it, a faint echo of that mocking tone she’d used when she challenged Alex to flip the slate.
Did Nightingale know her well enough to detect these subtle nuances? His face was grave as if he took her words at face value, but Alex knew enough about the company he was in not to believe everything he saw. Which, ironically, chimed perfectly with Evangeline’s assessment of him.
The sagging upholstery sank even further under Alex’s weight as he sat. “Now there you are wrong, Miss Jones. I may be a skeptic, but I would like nothing better than if you proved me wrong.”
“Indeed?” Her lips twitched. She was trying not to laugh, he was almost certain. “Never tell me that underneath that cynical exterior, there’s a man in search of something to believe in.”
He placed a hand over his heart. “You wound me. After all, am I not a man like any other?”
“Is not a duke a breed apart? Isn’t your supposed superiority the reason you feel you’ve the right to lord it over the rest of us?”
She glanced at Nightingale and whatever she saw in his expression checked her. Alex hadn’t noticed how animated she’d become until the light in her eyes dimmed. She seemed to retreat into herself, the woman who teased and challenged subsumed once more into the role she played.
“I had no idea—” A spring prodded Alex through the faded brocade, so he shifted to the right. “I had no idea you were a radical, Miss Jones.” But it was no use. She refused to meet his eyes. Irritated, he turned his attention to Nightingale. “Were you at the Nimble Rabbit two nights ago, sir?”
“As it happens, yes, I was. A right friendly establishment, the Rabbit. Very popular with the theatrical set. Always good for a sing-along.”
Yes, this must be the same man. Alex was almost sure.
“The sun’s gone in again,” Nightingale said. “I’ll have to use extra flash powder.”
“Oh no.” Evangeline took several steps back, and Alex’s confidence in Nightingale’s capabilities as a photographer decreased accordingly. Flash powder was a newish invention and notoriously hazardous. If the photographer used too much or if the powder was damp, someone might lose a limb or even their life.
Nightingale ignored Evangeline’s retreat and peered at Alex through a square he formed with his thumbs and index fingers. “Would you like to employ the headrest, sir?”
“Thank you.” If Nightingale was going to detonate a loud and potentially dangerous explosion, Alex would need the headrest to help him remain still. Nightingale’s methods would be easier to decipher if the image he began with was free from blurring.
While Nightingale retreated to the darkroom to prepare his powder, Evangeline retrieved a wooden stand from behind the sofa, unfolded it, and adjusted the headrest to the correct height. Alex leaned back before she’d quite finished, and her hand brushed his neck as she withdrew, setting off a thousand tiny sparks. He’d never been this sensitive to a woman’s touch before.
“Is that comfortable?” she asked. Her voice sounded different. Low and hoarse. A bedroom voice.
He looked into her face but as usual it gave nothing away. He couldn’t be certain she’d felt the same frisson he had from that brief moment of accidental contact, but he hoped.
“Yes,” he said, and somehow his voice matched hers. “Thank you.”
She nodded, then retreated to her earlier position, well away from the forthcoming explosion.
“Won’t you come nearer?”
“Not bloody likely,” she muttered. He loved it when she dropped character like that. There was no need for pretense between them after yesterday. Their cards were on the table. Which was one of the many places where he’d like to—
Nightingale returned with a small dish of flash powder. He set it on a small stand which jutted out from the tripod. When he was in the darkroom, he must also have loaded the plate into its holder, a wooden box with sliding panels on either side. There was no way for Alex to ascertain whether a switch had been made but, frankly, he didn’t much care. The man vanished under the black drapery of the camera’s hood. Wood scraped against wood as he slid the holder open. Now all that protected the plate from exposure was the shutter. “Are you ready, sir?”
Evangeline sighed. “Let’s get this over with.”
Nightingale lit the powder but for two seconds nothing happened. Then blinding white light, followed by an anticlimactic bang so muffled it was barely a pop. Nevertheless, a thick plume of smoke shot up and then outward.