Page 41 of Everything But the Earl
“Doing sums in your head?” Rockingham asked, pulling Owen out of his reverie.
The Duke of Rockingham was a maybe ten years older than Owen and regularly haunted his seat at Parliament. He was loud and pushy, but he had a dry wit Owen found amusing most of the time. Owen was hoping to win Rockingham over to a bill he was working on to fix a number of London’s busiest roads, inspired by his rocky trip out of town the previous month. He was swimming upstream, though; the Prince Regent wanted to redo the whole map of London to make it easier for him to get between his various residences, and Owen did not think he should earn that right at the expense of the people who lived where Prinny wanted to put roads. Owen thought fixing the existing roads, making them smoother and better for traveling on, was a good compromise.
Thus Owen didn’t want to alienate Rockingham by saying something untoward. “Woolgathering,” Owen mumbled. “How are you, Your Grace?”
“Fine, fine. I heard you hitched yourself to a pretty young lady and that is why you were late returning to the new session.”
Owen hadn’t been late. He’d arrived the night before Parliament opened. All he had missed were a few social gatherings. But he said, “Yes. We honeymooned at my estate in Wales.”
“The Midwood girl, right? I always liked Midwood. I suppose anyone that plain would come with a nice dowry.”
Owen bristled at that. “Have you met Lady Caernarfon before?”
“No, I don’t believe so. My wife says she’s perfectly pleasant to look at. She must be getting up in the years, though.”
“She’s beautiful,” Owen blurted. He sighed. “Apologies, Your Grace. She was betrothed to Beresford since childhood. That is why she did not marry previously. They broke their engagement—”
“Of course they did.” Rockingham raised a sardonic eyebrow.
“Indeed. I just mean to say, I find her beautiful and we had a lovely honeymoon, and I am happy with this turn of events.” Althoughhappyalso seemed insufficient.
“Good, good. These things are…that is, my own marriage was arranged. And my duchess is quite dear to me after our many years of living together and raising our children. I didn’t mean to imply your wife wouldn’t be. It just seemed rather sudden. My wife loves to gossip, as you know, and I’d heard nothing about you even courting until I saw the announcement of your wedding in the paper.”
“We did not make a big show of it, it’s true. But it wasn’t hasty or improper in any way, if that’s what you’re implying.”
“No, no. It’s all to the best. Young people these days have elaborate weddings, and they make such a big show of being in public and flaunting their love, and it’s all rather tawdry, if you ask me. A more modest affair such as yours is much more to my taste. I am glad you are happy.”
“Thank you, Your Grace. And if I might have a moment of your time, perhaps we can discuss a more serious matter.”
“I’d be delighted.”
Owen was still smarting from Rockingham calling Graceplainthat evening when he wrapped up his business at Parliament and opted to walk to his club. Grace was anything but plain. She was the most beautiful woman Owen had ever been with, by a long distance. He’d found his bed felt rather lonely without her in it, a sentiment he had not anticipated. But he hadn’t pushed his point because he hadn’t wanted to look like a lovestruck idiot to Rockingham, who had agreedto sign on to Owen’s bill about the roads, mostly because he agreed that Prinny’s plan was a fool’s errand.
So Owen felt somewhat accomplished as he walked into the club. He found his friends in their usual spot near the fireplace and took the fourth chair. Almost immediately, a staff member handed him a snifter of whiskey.
“You look tired,” Fletcher observed.
“Long day, but I’m fine. Parliament business.”
“The thing about the roads,” said Lark. “I read about it this morning.”
“Yes. Bad enough we have that new Regent Street, but Prinny wants to travel between his various houses without such burdens as needing to make turns. So if he has his way, he’s going to level half of London to build a series of roads connecting his palaces, with Carlton House at its nexus.”
“What an eyesore,” said Lark.
“I am merely proposing a compromise, that we make the roads more passable by investing some money in cleaning them up, rather than building new roads.”
“This is why I won’t take up my seat in Parliament,” said Fletcher. “If you spend your days talking about roads, I would certainly fall asleep.”
“This is a small thing I can do to make a difference, and if I make the right allies, I can then do bigger things that make bigger differences for the people of London,” said Owen. “I find that gratifying.”
“I should appear at Parliament as well,” said Hugh, “but now that construction is underway for my mother’s new house, I’m afraid that is stealing most of my attention.”
Owen smiled to himself. Hugh’s mother, the Dowager Duchess of Swynford, was an imposing woman. She and Adele got along reasonably well, sometimes, but Owen could understand Swynford wanting her out of their home so that he and his wife might havemore privacy.
He was less fond of his friends’ lackadaisical feelings about Parliament. Owen felt he had a certain obligation to the work, and that if he was smart about it, he could make the country better. His father had always been involved in Parliament. And while it was true that attendance at the House of Lords was often just over half of its membership, so Hugh and Fletcher were hardly the only men who rarely bothered, part of him wished his friends would take it more seriously.
But conversation had already moved on.
