Lenox took a last gulp of air and stepped out of the vessel. His driver was waiting with a cup of cold tea and a cloak-and when he had placed the latter on Lenox’s shoulders, hoisted the scull over his head and moved slowly toward the carriage. Lenox sipped the tea gratefully, thirsty, and called out, “I’ll walk home,” to the driver. Then he climbed the stairs from the riverbank to the street, every muscle in his legs crying out for mercy, and with an exhausted happiness filling his body started on the short trot home.

It was a little past seven in the morning, and Lady Jane was coming to have breakfast at eight. When he reached home, Lenox hurriedly bathed and dressed, checked to see what Ellie, the cook, was preparing, and with a quarter of an hour till his friend’s arrival sat down to look over the morning post. There wasn’t much in it, beyond a letter about Hadrian’s Rome from one of his Italian correspondents, who wrote half in English and half in Latin, and who disagreed vociferously with Lenox about the social breadth of slavery. Lenox read the letter with some amusement and then tucked it into the book he had bought the day before to remind himself to respond to it. There was also the card of a man named John Best, whom Lenox had never heard of.

“John Best?” he said to Graham.

“A young man, sir. He was here late yesterday evening.”

“Don’t know him.”

Soon there was a tap at the door, and Lenox knew that Lady Jane had come. His heart fluttered a little, and he had that hollow, happy feeling of unspoken love. Checking his tie, he stood and made his way toward the hall, where Graham would be taking her things.