When Archibald reached the foyer, he spied Victor Lanaklin waiting in the anteroom. He paused for a moment and watched the old man pacing back and forth, and it brought him a sense of satisfaction. While the marquis enjoyed a superior title, he had never impressed Archibald. Perhaps he was once lofty, intimidating, or even gallant, but all that was lost long ago, shrouded under a mat of gray hair and a hunched back.

“May I offer you something to drink, your lordship?” a mousy steward asked the marquis with a formal bow.

“No, but you can get me your earl,” he commanded,” or shall I hunt for him myself?”

The steward cringed. “I am certain my master will be with you presently, sir.” The servant bowed again and hastily retreated through a door on the far side of the room.

“Marquis!” Archibald called out graciously as he made his entrance. “I am so pleased you have arrived—and so quickly.”

“You sound surprised.” Victor’s voice was sharp. Shaking a wrinkled parchment clasped in his fist, he continued, “You send a message like this and expect me to delay? Archie, I demand to know what is going on.”

Archibald concealed his disdain at the use of his childhood nickname, Archie. This was the moniker his dead mother had given him and one of the reasons he would never forgive her. As a youth, everyone from the knights to the servants had used it, and he always felt demeaned by its familiarity. Once he became Earl, he made it law in Chadwick that anyone referring to him as such would suffer the loss of his tongue. Archibald did not have the power to enforce the edict on the marquis, and he was certain Victor used it intentionally.