Dad Hears My Thoughts novel · Chapter 12 of 32

Chapter 12: Sad Gold

The Duke looked at me in my shawl and my bare feet.

Then he looked past me, at Tristram in the back doorway.

Shirtless, stitched, blood drying down his side, my hammer in his fist.

"Well," the old man said. "I see I've interrupted."

"Your Grace." I pulled the shawl tighter. "It's past midnight."

"I'm aware of the hour. I came at this hour so that nobody would see me come."

He set something on my counter.

A small silver cup, the kind they give at christenings, with a boar's head stamped on the side.

"For the child," he said. "It was her great-grandmother's. I'd like to see her."

Tristram didn't move from the doorway.

"Men in your livery came at us tonight," he said. "With knives."

The Duke's eyes went to the stitches. Something tightened in his face, and then smoothed.

"Anyone can buy a coat."

Tristram walked into the shop and dropped the blue livery coat on the counter beside the cup.

The silver boar on the breast was cut from the same die as the one on the cup.

"Anyone can buy a coat," Tristram said. "Not that badge. You have it struck in one shop, by one silversmith, for your own men."

The Duke looked at the badge for a long time.

He didn't touch it.

"Sit down, Your Grace," I said. "I'll get her."

She was awake in her drawer, which meant she'd been awake for all of it.

She was lying on her back looking at the ceiling with both feet in her hands.

When I lifted her, she craned over my shoulder toward the front room and kicked.

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