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Reluctantly, Solomon left off the conversation and stepped out into the yard to greet two young gentlemen who jumped down from their phaeton, complaining volubly about the flooded road that had held them up south of Peckham.

It was after dawn by the time Vaughan strolled into the yard.The other ostlers had already risen, and the inn was its busy daytime self.Vaughan stepped around the crowd of people waiting to board the Canterbury stagecoach, and directed a cordial smile at Solomon.“Would you be so kind as to tell Wallace I’m here?”

Solomon froze.“What makes you think he’s here?”

Wallace was nowhere in sight.A few minutes earlier, Solomon had sent him off to bed, where he himself would soon be bound.He prayed Wallace wouldn’t unexpectedly reappear.

“Of course he’s here,” Vaughan said.“Where else would he be?He knows you’ll take him under your wing.”

He was his usual charming self, his voice light, his smile inviting Solomon to share the joke.Solomon felt like he was being tugged in two directions.

Vaughan stepped closer and lowered his voice.“Please, Solomon.We had an argument—you know how it is.I am most anxious to make it up to him.Let me only see him, and all will be well.”

“What sort of an argument?”

“I’ve always hoped you considered me a friend, Solomon.Won’t you help me on this?Haven’t you ever had a little falling out with a lover of your own?”

Solomon bit the inside of his cheek, hesitating.Vaughan was a sound man and a good friend, or so Solomon had always thought.But he couldn’t forget the strained note in Wallace’s voice, saying,I need to make a clean break from him.

“I’m leaving town for a few weeks this morning,” Vaughan said.“I must see him before I go.”

“Listen, the Canterbury stage is leaving in fifteen minutes.I can’t dawdle here with you.”He held up his hands, palm out, in a gesture of innocence.“I’m sorry.If I see him, I’ll tell him you were here.He’ll know where to find you, I expect?”

Overhead, the yard clock struck the half hour.Vaughan glanced up at it, his expression sour.

“I must go.”He reached out to clap a hand on Solomon’s shoulder.“I count on you, my friend.”

When they both rose that afternoon, Solomon drew Wallace aside into an empty stall and told him about seeing Vaughan.“He said he was going away for a few weeks.”

“Oh, thank God.”

Solomon studied him warily.“I don’t know what you fell out over, but won’t you give him a chance to speak to you?I hate to see the two of you at odds like this.”

“We didn’t fall out.We didn’t have an argument, or whatever it is he says.I can’t even imagine myself daring to argue with him.”

Solomon blinked.That seemed such a strange thing to say.

Wallace slumped back against the wall, his hands in his pockets.“I wish I’d left him long ago.”

Solomon felt like he was groping his way across a pitch-dark room with no idea of where he was.“Well… why didn’t you?”

“I don’t know.I suppose… I mean, who else would ever put up with me?”

Solomon stared at him, dumbfounded.

“Sorry, that was a stupid thing to say.Let’s just get to work.”

During the following weeks, Wallace was a pale and silent version of his former self.Solomon managed to arrange things so that he and Wallace had the same night off, hoping to draw him out of himself, but he refused to come out.That was for the best, as it turned out, for Hugo Vaughan was at the alehouse Solomon went to.

“I was hoping you’d be here,” Vaughan said, neatly cornering him.“I just returned to London this evening, and I’m longing to see Wallace, of course.Won’t you convey him a message from me?Tell him I’ll be waiting for him tomorrow at nine by St Saviour’s.”

Solomon hesitated.

“Come, Solomon,” Vaughan said gently.“Don’t insult us both by persisting in this foolish charade that you don’t know where he is.”

“He don’t want to see you.”

Vaughan’s mouth softened in a fond smile.“He always has been an emotional sort of fellow—always living on his nerves.He needs someone to take care of him.You understand that, don’t you, Solomon?”