The Wicked Duke Takes a Wife

Chapter Seventeen

It was another unspoken rule in the Boscastle family that one discussed an unpleasantness only in private. In public one pretended these events had not occurred. If a Boscastle stopped to deny every accusation hurled his way, he would likely never make it from his front door to the pavement.

When Harriet arose the following morning and hastened to help Lady Powlis plan the afternoon, her ladyship made no reference to the previous day’s disaster. She behaved in her usual grumpy manner, while two chambermaids tended the fire and hunted for the bonnet that Primrose insisted had been stolen, until Harriet reminded her she had sent it back to the milliner’s to be replumed.

The minute Lady Powlis dismissed the chambermaids, she jumped from her armchair, as spry as an elf, and closed the door. “I demand a full accounting, every detail.”

And so Harriet gave her an accounting, naturally leaving out the details of the carriage ride, which she herself had reviewed countless times. If her ladyship once again suspected certain omissions, the grim depiction of her visit to St. Giles seemed enough to occupy her mind.

“By the by, I am delighted to death that you dropped Lady Constipation’s bag in the cradle.”

“Lady-” Harriet shook her head. “Oh, madam, how looks deceive. And here I’ve always thought that a lady could never slip into low talk. How I admire you for breaking that rule with such aplomb.”

“I shall slip into something much lower if my nephew marries that piece of work.”

Harriet smiled. She knew a powerful ally when she found one. The duke had to be mad if he thought Primrose would drive her away. “Let me ring for some tea and cake. It’s hours before the breakfast party. I should not want all this distress to weaken your ladyship.”

“What comfort you are, dear.” Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial tone. “You didn’t tell me everything about yesterday, did you?”

“Madam, my life is an open book.”

“I shall dismiss you, Harriet, if I discover that you are fibbing.”

Harriet nodded demurely. “Yes, and so you should.”

But Harriet kept her thoughts to herself for the rest of the day. The duke escorted her, his aunt, and Edlyn to a breakfast party at the Mayfair mansion of a viscount whose title escaped Harriet’s notice. She had enough to worry about, what with keeping an eye on Miss Edlyn, not stealing looks at the duke, and placating Lady Powlis, who ate half a mutton pie and complained about her bunions and the bonnet that was taking forever to replume.

It was an enjoyable party, if only because the duke spent most of his time with his handsome cousins and not with Lady Constance, who was said to be recovering from the insult inflicted upon her person by the cutpurse in the park. Harriet overheard several ladies at the party discussing the incident. One ventured to guess that Constance might not make another public appearance until the perpetrator was caught. Her friend whispered that Constance’s doctor had suggested the young lady spend the rest of the Season taking the waters. Harriet was afraid that Lady Constance was made of sterner stuff.

“Harriet.” Lady Powlis poked her gently with her cane. “Where has Edlyn gone now?”

Harriet glanced up. “She was watching the archery contest a minute ago.”

“Well, I cannot see her through the featherbrains dancing about the place. Be an angel and make sure that she has not been lured off by some handsome fortune hunter. And take a bite of this pie. I think the meat is off.”

“Do you wish me to taste it before or after I find Miss Edlyn, madam?”

“I wish you to stop answering me in that impertinent manner. And I forbid you to taste the pie. No point in both of us taking ill.”

Harriet set off through the park, leaving Lady Powlis at the trestle tables that had been arranged around a drooping fig tree. Miss Edlyn was not watching the archery contest. The duke, however, had removed his frock coat and was sauntering across the green to compete. Harriet would have given a month’s wages to watch. An ornamental bridge that crossed a pond was crowded with ladies who gathered to cheer him on. His black hair shone like a raven’s wing in the dappled light. He paused, looking around as if he was waiting for someone to join him.

It was then that Harriet spotted Edlyn hurrying up the steps of the ivy-draped rotunda. Harriet glanced back wistfully at the duke. He had raised his bow to take aim at the target. She turned for a fraction of a second to witness Edlyn emerge from the other side of the edifice, appearing considerably brighter than she had been in days. She appeared to be by herself. A lady in a bonnet was walking in the other direction.

And there wasn’t a rake in view, disregarding the duke, whose arrow had struck the target dead center, to the delight of his female audience. The cheers and claps of his devoted supporters echoed in the park, a chorus that Harriet could not escape. She would have applauded him herself, had a companion been allowed to express her enthusiasm in public.

All in all, however, discounting her ladyship’s in digestion, Harriet decided it had been a pleasant day. An uncommon one, indeed, without a single drop of rain to ruin the party.

The same could not be said of the following night’s entertainment.

“Grayson has promised that this will be an intimate affair,” Lady Powlis reassured the duke, when he complained that he would rather not go. “I don’t see why you’re being so unsociable, Griff. The marquess is family, after all. One does not travel to London to sit brooding in a library.”

“But we just attended one of his balls.”

“This is meant to be a quiet party,” she insisted. “I don’t imagine there will be a crush.”

Yet even Harriet knew that what the Marquess of Sedgecroft considered to be a private supper could include a hundred or so guests. Most of them would be titled or well connected at court, although the marquess was probably best known in the ton for allowing love affairs to take place during his soirées. The mansion provided many private chambers suitable for this purpose and, for family only, an Italian gallery where acts of amour could unfold without a chance of interruption. If Miss Edlyn or any of the academy’s graduating ladies were invited, it would fall to Harriet or Charlotte Boscastle to make certain some scoundrel did not compromise their good names. Although Harriet was no longer employed at the elite school, she had formed a surprising bond with those girls who struggled alongside her for acceptance.