How to Marry an Earl (A Cinderella Society 1)

“If I thought it would do any good, I would consider it.”

“Would you, now?” Something in his voice made her feel like blushing. Also, she’d threatened an earl. Really, even without her scandal, she was fairly certain she had been destined for spinsterhood from the get-go. One did not threaten earls.

But she’d do it again.

Instead, she turned her attention very pointedly to the slab of stone in the next crate. It was the colour of sand and intricately carved with hieroglyphs. “How marvelous.”

“What does it say?” Conall asked, stepping closer. He looked interested, not merely polite. She certainly knew the subtle differences between the two by now.

“We don’t know yet,” Persephone replied reverently. “A similar stone was found in the Egyptian village of Rosetta by French soldiers, oh, sixteen years ago? Antiquarians are still trying to decipher it. Hieroglyphs remain a mystery and with the war not many Englishmen have had a chance for a proper look.” She rubbed the letters softly. The stone was cool, smooth under her fingertips. How she wished she knew what the carvings stood for, the little hawk for instance. Did it signify Horus? Or was it a letter? A symbol from a story long lost?

“Enjoy a good mystery, do you?” Conall was even closer now, bending his head to admire the stone. His breath stirred the hairs on her nape. That’s not all it stirred. Not now, body.

“I’ll enjoy this one even more when it’s solved. It’s so satisfying, don’t you think? Even if you’re not the one to solve it.”

“I’m not sure I agree,” he replied. The tone of his voice was odd, edgy, intense.

She tilted her head. “I know it’s frustrating but that’s antiquarian pursuits for you. More questions than answers.”

“I prefer answers.”

“You’d make a terrible historian,” she teased. “The very fact that we can even hope to understand hieroglyphs one day is because of a stone very like this one.”

“That dusty old thing?”

“Yes. The Rosetta Stone is written in Greek and demotic and hieroglyphs. As we already know how to read Greek, it gets us that much closer to deciphering it. And now that the war is over, the French no longer control our travel into Egypt.”

“You can read ancient Greek?”

“Passably,” she admitted. “It’s not my forte.”

“I had no idea the war had such an effect on your studies.”

She shrugged. “I admit I’m not likely to travel to Egypt any time soon, but it’s nice to let myself dream. More importantly, those who can travel there will bring back the most interesting stories and theories.” Not to mention proof of Henry’s innocence.

“Is that what fills these crates?”

She nodded. “We haven’t seen artifacts like these in years. The exhibits are going to be phenomenal. They’ll rival the British Museum, and Bullock’s Egyptian Hall, if only for a week.”

“Your cheeks are pink.”

She touched her face. She was always prattling on, too excited by ‘dusty old things’ as everyone put it. “I apologize. What can I help you with, my lord? You did not come here for a lecture.”

“Don’t apologize,” he replied. “Why apologize for what brings you pleasure?”

Something about the way he said that made her squirm. She cleared her throat. “All the same.”

His grin was fleeting, wicked. She narrowed one eye at him in reproach, her cheeks growing pinker. He only laughed and bowed before walking away entirely, leaving her question unanswered.

She decided he was right, after all.

Unanswered questions were a pain in the arse.

She was hidingsomething.

And she was dismal at it.

He knew the signs; the held breath, the determined refusal to glance away lest you glance in the wrong direction. He had wanted to believe she could not be part of the kind of treachery that had cost hundreds of men their lives. But he was all too mindful that her obsession with history and its artifacts were a mark against her. Especially when finding her gleefully knee-deep in ancient Egyptian objects.