Page 82 of Never a Duke
“I should. If I love her, then I want only her happiness. Woodruff will see her transported to Derbyshire if I’m caught skulking about behind the hedges in her vicinity, and that’s bad enough.”
Stephen considered the pretty box, which made no sense to him. Ned was a banker, not a seamstress. “What’s worse than a little ruralizing with the dowagers?”
“Marrying me and seeing every door closed in your face, hearing every rumor become more vile with each telling. Rosalind thinks I’m some sort of gentleman because I can speak the lines and wear the costume, but I am not a gentleman. I am…”
“Yes?”
“I am gallows bait dressed up in banker’s clothing.”
“Then what is Walden? If I recall correctly, he’s the fellow who actually wore the noose.”
“Walden was innocent. I knew that from the first moment I beheld him delivering that freeze-you-to-death stare to the guards. I am not innocent.”
Something distant in Ned’s gaze suggested he wasn’t referring to safecracking or picking pockets. He was referring to some personal version of original sin, and Stephen well knew what that felt like.
“Then tell Lady Rosalind what a scoundrel you are. Lay it all at her dainty feet. Just as she has decided when your birthday is, she can decide if you’re too great a fiend to claim her heart.”
“Duncan said the same thing. Said I should tell her the whole of it.”
“And yet, here you sit, after having consulted the Oracle of Berkshire himself. If you have to call Woodruff out, I will cheerfully serve as your second.”
Ned closed the box. “What would Abigail say about that?”
“She would offer to serve as your other second, and she would make a proper job of it too, Quaker leanings notwithstanding. You belong to us, and we will not let you go into battle alone. Word of a Wentworth.”
That little sermon had come out with just the right amount of condescension and humor, if Stephen did say so himself. To emphasize the point, Stephen scrubbed his knuckles across Ned’s crown, and kissed the top of his head.
“Walden offered to find me a few acres for my own,” Ned said, finger-combing his hair back into order. “A wedding present.”
“A birthday present too, apparently. Neddy, go talk to your lady. She sent you a lovely present and now you are supposed to thank her.”
Ned rose, though he first put the box into the bottom drawer of his desk. “I embroider,” he said, producing a handkerchief awash in bright flowers. “My mother taught me the basics. I like the feel of the fabric and thread. I like the colors. I like threading the needle.…I like the memory of Mama singing to me as I sat beside her by the window and made the most crooked seams with the most uneven stitches.…” He folded his beautiful handkerchief and tucked it into a pocket. “Woodruff thinks I’m illegitimate. I’m not.”
Hidden compartments and double linings, and Ned had apparently handed Lady Rosalind the key to them all.
“What matters legitimate or illegitimate when you’re a Wentworth?” Stephen countered. “Woodruff is a donkey’s arse, and Lady Rosalind would be well shut of him.”
Ned opened another drawer and took out a book bound in red leather. “I have a present for her ladyship.”
“Maybe it’s her birthday too,” Stephen said. “Deliver it in person. If Woodruff sent you packing, her ladyship needs to know you’ll try again.”
Ned went to retrievehis hat and walking stick from the stand by the door. “What is the worst thing you’ve ever done, Stephen?”
“The list of my transgressions is long and impressive.…”
Ned fixed him with a stare not quite in league with a ducal freeze-you-to-death stare, but full of weary forbearance.
“I wasted years blaming myself for saving my own life and the lives of my sisters. Abigail sorted me out, which gives you some idea of the magnitude of the task.”
Ned tapped his hat onto his head. “Jack Wentworth?”
Stephen nodded. “Commended him into the keeping of his Maker, or more likely into hell’s privy. Abigail approved. Emphatically.” Acknowledging the past, even to Ned, required fortitude.
“I approve emphatically too. Your father was a blight upon the species. Wish me luck.”
Ned collected his book and walking stick, and to Stephen the moment seemed to call for more than luck. “If Lady Rosalind turns up her nose at your boyish peccadillos, she’s an idiot.”
“You don’t know the extent of my boyish peccadillos.”
