Page 31 of Never a Duke
“We need to talk.”
Mr. Wentworth glanced at Her Grace, who was chatting up Mrs. Barnstable on the topic of tisanes for nervous digestion.
“At the interval. Althea and Constance will keep your loyal vassal occupied, and if their good offices fail, Lord Nathaniel will escort her to the buffet.”
“They will throw us together?”How interesting.
“At the first opportunity and as often thereafter as they possibly can. They will report what you say word for word to Her Grace of Walden, and she will discuss the particulars with His Grace. Lord Stephen will stick his oar in, after protracted consultation with his lady wife of course, and they will all—out of sincere concern—give me the benefit of their thinking.”
“They willmeddle?”
“It’s what they do. As virtuosically as Walden manages money, the rest of the family manages one another.”
And clearly, they included Ned Wentworth in the family fold. “This bewilders you.”
“The Wentworths would bewilder anybody.”
Just as clearly, Rosalind’s escort saw himself outside of their family circle. Why? If she asked him that, he’d come up with some half-humorous observation about the guitarist taking her place at the front of the room.
Rosalind limited her mental agenda for the interval to what progress Mr. Wentworth had made questioning the demimonde, and the news of Calliope Henderson’s disappearance.
Those were important matters, very important. That Rosalind also wanted more of Mr. Wentworth’s kisses did not signify in the least, but it was uppermost on her mind for the duration of the first half.
***
Do not stare at Lady Rosalind’s mouth.Ned’s internal litany sounded very like Her Grace in a sermonizing mode.Do not sniff her. Do not drop your program like some callow swain who needs the most obvious, pathetic excuse to bend nearer to the woman he’s longing to impress.
Do not glower at Althea and Constance. Do not surreptitiously tromp on Lord Nathaniel’s damned toes.
Ned had all but elbowed his lordship away from Lady Rosalind’s side. Only Althea’s gentle hand on Lord Nathaniel’s arm had spared the blighter some discreet parlor pugilism.
The guitarist strummed and plucked for six eternities. The duet thereafter lasted eight more, and the soprano was an undeserved penance for all in attendance.
“No more musicales,” Ned muttered, rising at the interval to offer Lady Rosalind his hand. “I beg of you. I will endure your at-homes, walk dogs with you in the park, or steel myself for a literary salon featuring American poets on the subject of humanity’s many ills, but no more musicales.”
“Agreed.” She put her hand in his and rose. “The accompanist was as enthusiastic as the singer, and they appear thoroughly besotted with each other. One fears for their children’s hearing.”
She smiled at Ned, and every rational thought departed his brain. The spacing of the chair rows meant he and the lady stoodquiteclose, and—
“Neddy,” Constance called, “spring the horses, would you? Nathaniel is determined to be sociable while my burning objective lies in the direction of the buffet.”
Ned escorted Constance and Rosalind from the music room and across the corridor to the library, which had been pressed into service to house the buffet. Most of the guests had tarried at their seats, and thus Ned could make a flying pass down the offerings, holding a plate for each lady.
“Now seat us up on the mezzanine,” Constance instructed. “We want privacy, but also to keep an eye on the proceedings. I’ll find you.”
She swanned off after aiming a particularly fierce look at Ned. She would find them at her leisure, but find them, she would.
“She’s lending me her consequence,” Rosalind said, winding her way toward the spiral steps that led to the library’s mezzanine. “She’s a duchess, and she need not favor anybody with her company. Your family is kind.”
They are not my family.“In their way, they are very kind. Also ferocious. I haven’t made much progress with our investigation.”
Lady Rosalind preceded him up the steps, and Ned nearly dropped both plates.
“It has been mere days, Mr. Wentworth. If there’s a scheme afoot to collect decent women from Mayfair’s streets, we won’t uncover it by surviving ‘Caro Mio Ben’ rendered as a marching song.”
Ned found them a sofa with a low table before it. The library proper began to fill with guests, conversations blending into a dull roar. Constance had chosen well, for few would think to look up, though through the balusters of the banister, Ned had a clear view of the gathering.
Like perching in a tree in an alley to eat a purloined pie. The beadles and constables never looked up.
