Page 4 of The Truth About Love and Dukes

“Even you won’t be able to prevent her from being laughed at, and all of us along with her,” David pointed out. “Not unless you can stop this elopement altogether, and it’s seems too late for that. You can’t chase her and her Italian all the way to Gretna Green.”

Henry cast his brother a glance of impatience. “Mama is fifty years of age. She has no need to sneak off to Scotland in order to marry. Foscarelli is somewhere here in London, so they probably intend to marry here, perhaps at the Registry Office, since I daresay he’s a Catholic. Let’s hope that is the case.”

“Hope?” Sarah echoed in tearful disbelief. “You talk as if there could be a worse alternative.”

There were several, but Sarah was an innocent, and he refrained from voicing the more unsavory ones. “They could be thinking to go abroad and marry there,” he said instead. “The Continent is much more lenient than England. Here, the law requires fifteen days of established residency before a license can be obtained, and I’m not certain Foscarelli has his own establishment. The man has no family here, and he seems to live off of friends, floating from one residence to the next every other week or so—at least, if the gossip can be believed.”

“The gossip might be out of date,” Jamie pointed out. “He may have established residency and obtained the license already.”

“He may have done,” Henry acknowledged, “but I doubt it. A man like that would never pay the fees for a license and sign the lease for a residence unless he was certain of Mama’s consent.”

“And before agreeing to marry him,” Angela added, gesturing to the paper by Henry’s plate, “she was clearly waiting to see what this Lady Truelove would advise.”

“Then the woman did tell Mama to marry him?” Jamie asked.

He reached across the table for the paper so that he might read the columnist’s reply for himself, but Henry flattened his hand over it before the other man could pick it up. “She did, but let’s not dignify this column by giving it our attention.”

Jamie acquiesced, once more sitting back in his chair. “Still, whatever the woman’s advice, we seem to be taking it for granted that marriage is Foscarelli’s intent, but I’m not sure the man’s even that honorable. He could simply have Mama holed up with him somewhere—”

“That’s enough, Jamie,” Henry cut in with a glance at his sisters. “There are ladies present. And there’s no point in speculating at this stage. Now,” he added, rising to his feet as the doors opened and Boothby came in, “I believe my carriage is waiting.”

He started to move away from the table, but then paused, studying the newspaper that was causing everyone such anxiety. He’d thought to have the footman throw it away, but upon reflection, he deemed it best to take it himself, keeping it—at least for the moment—from his distressed siblings. And he might need to refer to its contents later. He took it up, and started for the door.

“But Torquil,” David called after him, “what are you going to do?”

“Find Mama, of course,” he replied as he walked out. “That is,” he added under his breath, “if I’m not too late.”

No matter what the situation was at present, he knew there were various steps he could take to resolve it or mitigate the damage, and he contemplated them as he went downstairs.

If, despite his conclusions to the contrary, Foscarelli had already obtained the license, the damage might well be done, but if so, the marriage could perhaps be annulled. Making a mental note to consult with his solicitors about that, he paused to accept his hat and stick from the footman waiting by the front door. If annulment was not possible, then paying off the groom to move abroad and stay there was the only other option.

On the other hand, Jamie could very well be right about Foscarelli’s true motives. It wasn’t hard to imagine that scoundrel putting Mama up in some seedy flat in an obscure part of London, with no intention of marrying her at all. If so, a demand for funds to keep the whole thing hushed up would no doubt be forthcoming.

Either way, the family would be supporting a worthless cur of a man for the rest of his life unless Henry could prevent it.

To that end, his first step was to find his mother, which would necessitate the employment of private detectives. If it was determined that she’d gone abroad, there was nothing more that could be done until she returned. If she was still in England, however, private detectives would find her, though it might take days, or even weeks. Unless—

Henry paused by his carriage, struck by an idea, and he looked again at the newspaper in his hand. He glanced past his mother’s question and the columnist’s ridiculous reply, his gaze coming to a halt at the bottom of the page.

Are you suffering the pain of unrequited love? Are you baffled by the unaccountable behavior of the opposite sex? Are you tormented by an affair of the heart and feel there is no one to whom you can turn for understanding and advice? Fear not. Lady Truelove can help. You may write to her through her publisher, Deverill Publishing, 12 Belford Row, Holborn. All letters will be answered, and will only be published by mutual consent.

As Henry read those words, he wondered if a method of finding his mother more expedient than even London’s finest detectives might just be staring him in the face.

Chapter 2

Publishing a scandal sheet was not for the faint of heart. It required a shrewd head, an unsentimental heart, and a thick skin. Fortunately for the Deverill family and for all the avid readers of Society Snippets, Irene Deverill possessed all three of those qualities. She was also blessed with a sense of humor, and there were days when Irene found that trait to be the most necessary one of all. Today was one of those days.

“Mr. Shaw,” she began for the third time, hoping she could at last succeed in getting a word in amidst the angry stream of criticism from the irascible, elderly man seated on the other side of her desk, “I do see your concerns, but—”

“The Weekly Gazette,” he said, referring to the paper by its former name, “was a newspaper, young woman, and its purpose was to convey to the public serious and important events of the day in East and Central London. But now? Now, thanks to you, it is nothing more than a . . . a purveyor of scandal and titillation.”

Irene tried not to smile as she studied the prim mouth of the man opposite. A bit of titillation, she felt, would do Ebenezer Shaw far more good than the liver pills sold by his company, but it wouldn’t do to say so. “I realize the changes I have made may be a bit unsettling—”

“Unsettling?” Mr. Shaw tossed his copy of yesterday’s edition on top of her desk. “Gossip columns, fashion news, advice to the lovelorn . . . what’s next? Reports of England’s haunted houses and a weekly astrology report?”

At once, Irene’s imagination began to envision a series of articles on England’s most haunted places—Jamaica Inn, perhaps, and Berry Pomeroy Castle, the Tower of London . . .

She glanced past Mr. Shaw to her sister, Clara, who was seated by the door, clipboard in hand. Clara, who acted as her secretary, perceived the meaning in that glance and scribbled a note. With that, Irene was forced to abandon the delight of contemplating future issues of Society Snippets, and return her attention to one of the less appealing aspects of her profession: pacifying irate advertisers.

---