"Oh, no?" He prickled at her challenge.
"No." Mrs. Gaveston crossed her hams and stared him down. "On account of Lady Day and our usual occupation, yer not the only pair waitin' to be wed."
A slender, anxious-faced young man dashed into the small front room, wearing a rumpled coat of brown fustian with its capes thrown up like gills. "A room, madam! Any rooms?"
"No!" Patrick smacked a handful of coins onto the counter in defeat, silencing Mrs. Gaveston's answer. He also bought her smirk.
After the man left deflated, she dangled out a pitted iron key, suspended from a length of brown jute. "First door off the landing, first floor."
He snatched it from her fingers against more of her cackling.
"Mrs. Gaveston," whispered Amelia, leaning across the counter. "I have a trunk and some belongings outside. Do you have two stout lads who could manage it up? I would be ever so grateful."
He held his breath and waited for fork-tongued Mrs. Gaveston to flay Amelia, but instead she narrowed creased eyes. "How grateful?"
Poor Amelia Blake; she was out of her depth.
Amelia squared her shoulders, and sniffed. "Two crowns grateful, at least." She slapped her coins atop the counter next to his.
Patrick stared, cold beneath his coat, and wondered who was really out of their depth.
Mrs. Gaveston clapped her hands and rubbed them together, pleased. "Clever lass. It'll be up afore you've hung your coat."
Amelia didn't meet his eyes until they were halfway up the staircase. Then she turned back and winked. "In town it cost me three crowns to have it loaded up! She only thinks she's taking me in," she said, laughing merrily.
He nodded, words stuck behind a knot of shock in his throat.
"In A Patient Heart, Eloisia has to bargain with a tavern keeper for information." She paused on a step below the landing and clapped her gloves for mute effect. "When she strikes her coins atop the bar…ooh!" She made a little shiver. "I cheered!"
Patrick gave up, entirely gave up. He thought that he'd known her, in the cab, or in the door yard, but each time he had settled her in his mind, she tossed his understanding like a ship in a squall. All he knew or could trust knowing was that she was lovely, and naïve, and someone's damned horrid novel had sent her haring off into danger. How to undo that tangle…he had no idea.
He unlocked the room and held open the door for her to pass inside. "Is there anything I can get for you? Anything you need?"