“So you’ll tell the fat swell we seen her?” the child asked, eyeing the pretty lady with the flower basket.

“I will, but happen not today, me lad. He pays good, and we’re due for another installment when I call on him tonight. Too hot to do more than stand about in the shade anyways—might as well get paid fer it, aye?”

“Aye.” The child grinned at the soundness of his superior’s reasoning and went back to getting paid to watch.

“You tell old Whit if the lady goes out, mind, and be ready for yer shift again tomorrow at first light.”

“You use the same employment agency as Her Grace,” Hazlit began, his eyes meeting the earl’s unflinchingly. “So I started there and eventually found copies of references your housekeeper brought with her two years ago. They all came from older women, ladies of quality now residing in York and its surrounds, so I went north.”