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from Merton’s throat. It increased in volume until it was a full-blown laugh. “I see. Very sensible.”
    “Then why are you laughing at me?” she asked sharply.
    “There is nothing so amusing as the truth. I was not laughing at you, but at the foolish hypocrisy that exists between the sexes.”
    “I know perfectly well you were laughing at me, but let us not spoil this delightful diversion by arguing.”
    “I see you will be easy to entertain, Miss Wainwright. You must consider the moldy cellars and dusty attics at your disposal, to enjoy yourself to the top of your bent.”
    “Oh, not cellars! There might be rats there.”
    “I daresay there are bats in the secret passage.”
    Charity felt a frisson down her spine. “You are trying to frighten me! I do not mind spiders. One can always step on them, but bats! Ugh!”
    “Here we are,” he said, setting down his lamp and pulling back an edge of carpet in the corner of the morning parlor. “The priest’s hole. In the old days it had a cabinet over it, to hide the trapdoor. The cabinet moved aside to let the guilty party slip into the hole. The cabinet was then replaced until whoever was looking for him left. An excellent place for a ghost! All it would require is for someone to forget to remove the cabinet and the poor soul would be there until he died.”
    He slid his fingers into the hollowed-out groove and lifted the door. There was a little cube not more than five feet all around, with a bench built into the side of it. Unless he was shorter than five feet, the person who was hiding had to sit down.
    Charity looked in at a dusty floor with a tin soldier in one corner. “Lord Winton has been here,” she said. “This is a very inferior priest’s hole, milord. At Radley Hall they had spiders and black beetles, to say nothing of cobwebs.”
    Merton frowned at a little pile of what looked like sawdust on the floor. “If you look very hard, you might find termites,” he said. “Demme, I must have this sprayed with chlorine to kill the beetles. Shall we move along to the pièce de résistance?”
    “Yes, please.”
    Merton lowered the door, replaced the carpet, then he took up his lamp and they returned to the Blue Saloon. “Why did we not begin here, as we were in this room?” Charity asked.
    “Foolish question. One does not begin with the pièce de résistance. It is always kept for the last. We Spartans eat the cake before the icing—but we do get around to the choice bits eventually.” His eyes moved slowly over her face as he spoke, lingering on her lips.
    “I wish you would not stare at me like that! It makes me feel as if I were the cake.”
    “No, the icing,” he murmured provocatively.
    A blush rose up from her collar. “You are wondering whether propriety demands a setdown. It don’t,” he said.
    “You are behaving most improperly, Lord Merton,” she said primly.
    “No, no. Not most improperly. That will come later, after we have enjoyed the cake.”
    After this leading speech, he went directly to a far corner, clothed in shadows, and began examining a cupboard built into the wall. He opened the lower doors of the cupboard, knelt down, and removed some dusty bowls and books. “You have to get on your hands and knees to get in,” he explained. Charity frowned at her gown. “No doubt things were better organized at Radley Hall,” Merton said. He began poking around the now empty cavity of the cupboard. “How the devil does this thing work?” he asked, presumably of himself.
    “You mean you don’t know? Upon my word, you treat your architectural treasures in a very cavalier manner.”
    “I come from a long line of Cavaliers,” he replied.
    Charity gave him a blighting stare for this poor pun. “There is a drawer above the bottom doors. Would the drawer be the key to getting into the passage?”
    “Yank it out,” he said.
    When she pulled out the drawer, Merton hollered. “Wait until I get my fingers out!”
    “You told me