Authors: Anne Gracie
She sat in her most ladylike pose, smoothing her dress and gloves, willing her heart to slow. The jackal-headed Anubis and the hawk-headed Horus stared impassively down from a sideboard. Nearby, a footstool sported four lions’ feet that mysteriously became the top half of very immodestly dressed ladies. She tried to imagine Grandpapa in this room. He would have an apoplexy, she decided. The thought cheered her.
She had never done anything so bold in her life. Apart from becoming secretly betrothed to Phillip, that is. But for an unmarried lady to call uninvited on a strange gentleman in his home—that was truly shocking. Great-uncle Oswald’s coachman had even been shocked when she’d inquired about the duke’s direction. It was a thing, apparently, that unmarried ladies did not even ask.
A sphinx stared silently at her from the wall. Her fingers tapped an impatient, anxious tattoo on her reticule. It was the pasteboard reticule, slightly lopsided from where Grandpapa had damaged it in his rage, and very dear to Prudence’s heart. It matched the room, being shaped like an Egyptian sarcophagus and carefully painted in blue, green, black, and gold.
Grace would be thrilled to see this room. Her little sister would see that not all the world thought the Egyptian taste to be wicked, heathenish vileness. Her fingers were clenched around the reticule, she realized. She forced them to relax.
If she handled things properly, Grace would never again be beaten for an innocent mistake. It all depended on how well she handled this duke. And Great-uncle Oswald.
An ormolu clock mounted on gilt gryphons ticked noisily on the overmantel. It was well after nine o’clock. Great-uncle Oswald would have finished his hot water and apple-cider vinegar drink by now and be beginning on his shirred eggs. She had, perhaps, twenty minutes. If Great-uncle Oswald was not early. He was a man of regular habits.
Prudence smoothed her skirts for the hundredth time. She’d thought it would be quite exciting to be bold and adventurous instead of always trying to be invisible, so as not to attract Grandpapa’s attention. But the longer she waited, the more anxious and the less bold she felt.
She told herself to be calm. Nothing dreadful could happen with Lily so close outside. Besides, she had no choice.
The clock ticked remorselessly on. The Sphinx stared. The lion heads snarled in frozen gilt fury.
Oh, where was this wretched Duke? Great-uncle Oswald would be here any minute!
“What have we here, Bartlett?”
Prudence jumped. In the doorway stood a tall, dark, rather raffish-looking gentleman. Prudence blinked. She had seen several dukes since arriving in London. This one did not look as a duke ought to look. Though his clothing was of the finest quality, it was rumpled and crumpled. His coat was unbuttoned and carelessly worn. His neckcloth was a little skewed and knotted negligently beneath quite moderate shirt points. And he seemed not to have shaved, for his chin, though attractively shaped, was decidedly dark and rough-looking.
She had expected a duke, even a hermit duke, to be a little more dapper in appearance. Only royal dukes looked this disheveled. But perhaps this was why he was a hermit. Or perhaps she had got him out of his bed. For some reason the thought made her blush.
Had she not known who he was, she might have been concerned at being alone with such a man, for he looked decidedly dark and dangerous. And the gleam in his eye as he looked at her was certainly not one a girl should trust, Prudence decided, duke or no! His eyes were dark and narrow and seemed to be laughing at her for no reason she could imagine.
She sat a little straighter on the hard chair and clutched her reticule beneath her bosom.
“Bartlett?” he repeated to the butler standing just outside the door. He sauntered in, not taking his eyes off Prudence. “Who is our charming visitor?”
The butler followed him into the room, bringing with him the faint scent of musk. “This young person, sir, arrived intemperently this morning, announcing her determination to converse with the Duke of Dinstable. There is another female outside, who accompanied the young person.”
Prudence jumped up indignantly. “How dare you speak of me in that tone! I am not a young person at all—I am a young lady! And I did not arrive intemperently. It is a perfectly reasonable hour—”
The tall gentleman’s brow quirked skeptically, and she flushed and corrected herself with dignity, recalling that she had probably got him out of his bed. And that she was supposed to be a bored and soignée young lady, quite accustomed to calling on gentlemen.
“Perhaps it is a little early for some people, but when you hear what I have to say, Your Grace, I am sure you will understand.”
“Oh but—” began the butler.
“That will be all, Bartlett,” the tall gentleman said suavely.
The butler hesitated a moment, looking doubtfully from the duke to Prudence.
Prudence bridled at his expression. “Your master will be quite safe with me,” she snapped. “I mean him no harm!”
The tall gentleman chuckled softly. “You heard the lady, Bartlett. I am quite safe with her. You may go.”
The butler left.
“What a perfectly detestable man!” Prudence declared. “Although I suppose you pay him to be detestable.”
“Not at all—it comes naturally to him,” the duke said, “Though I must confess I find his, er, repellent skills useful at times.” He sat down on Cleopatra’s barge, crossed one long leg over another, and regarded her with a faint look of amusement on his face. “Now, what can I do for you, Miss, er…?”
She watched him critically, noting that he quite definitely lolled. “Miss Merridew. Miss Prudence Merridew,” she explained in as composed a voice as she could manage. The way he was looking at her was quite disconcerting. “I have four siblings—all sisters. I am the eldest.”
“Indeed?” he asked politely.
“Yes, and that is the heart of the problem,” she said. “For one of us must marry.” She frowned, realizing she had started her speech wrongly. She had rehearsed and rehearsed it last night, until she had it perfectly off by heart. But something in the way this dark-eyed man watched her had the effect of scrambling the words in her mind.
“I see. And you imagine this has something to do with the Duke of Dinstable?” His words were perfectly polite, but a certain harsh quality had entered his tone. His dark eyes regarded her intently, and Prudence felt her nervousness increase.
“Yes. Well, no. Not directly. It was a mistake on my part.” She stopped, realizing she wasn’t making sense. It was most unlike her. “I am sorry. I am making a shocking mull of this. It is extremely awkward, you see.”
She stood up and took a few paces around the room to cool her suddenly heated cheeks. The way he looked at her was most unsettling. She took several deep, calming breaths and considered how best to explain. He was right to be suspicious of her motives. She had claimed to be betrothed to him. He was about to be confronted by an angry great-uncle. She gripped her reticule a little tighter, glanced at the clock, and forced herself to go on.
“I must apologize, Your Grace, for it is all my fault. I truly
never
meant to drag you into it, only…” She sighed. “It is a complicated tale, but I shall try to cut it to the bare essentials.”
He smiled. “Good. I always prefer essentials bared.”
Somehow, he made it sound…wicked. Prudence blinked hurriedly and wished she’d brought a fan. It really was very warm in there all of a sudden. “You see, one of us must find a husband quickly, only it cannot be me.”
One dark, winged eyebrow arched in a sardonic query.
She hurried on. “It must be one of my sisters. Only my great-uncle thinks that we should not come out together, that I should come out first.”
“I see.”
She flushed and for some reason found that she could not bring herself to explain the reason to him. “Yes. So I told him a lie and, and, your name came up, and I’m sorry, I truly am. I thought it would help my sisters to come out, only it has all come awry. I did not think it would cause such a problem because I thought you safe in the wilds of Scotland! I had counted on the delay, you see. And letters go astray, all the time.”
The mobile mouth twitched a little and the hard expression in his eyes was replaced by an amused gleam. “It was thoughtless of me to come to London, I see. So inconvenient.” He smiled a slow smile, and for a moment it drove all rational thought from her head.
She stammered, “Oh, n-no. You could not know. But I was shocked to find you here. For you almost never mix in society, do you?”
“No,” he said apologetically. “I do not care for many of the people, you see.”
The clock struck half past the hour, chiming once in a somber, fatalistic fashion. Prudence jumped. “Oh no—half-past nine. Already!” She resumed her pacing.
“Yes, a ridiculous hour, I agree.” He yawned.
Ridiculous? Prudence stared at him in amazement. He clearly had not grasped the urgency of the situation. If only he would stop looking at her like—like an amused satyr, she might be able to manage a clear and rational explanation! “The thing is, Your Grace, Great-uncle Oswald is coming to see you. Any minute now. To demand an explanation.”
“Oh, Great-uncle Oswald is also vexed with me for not staying in Scotland, is he?”
“Oh no,” said Prudence, distractedly. “He is delighted you are here, of course.” She flushed and swallowed and tried to gather her composure. “For…for reasons that are rather complicated—but altruistic—I allowed my Great-uncle to come to a certain conclusion about you. And me.” She felt her face heat further. It was not like her to dither, but the situation was truly fantastical, and the way this man’s gaze kept slipping over her was very disconcerting. He flustered her.
“A certain conclusion?”
She cast him a look of entreaty, putting off the horrid moment of truth yet again. “You must believe me, Your Grace. I never meant to land anyone in a pickle.”
“No, of course not.” His eyes were dancing now, she noticed. How could he be amused at a time like this!
He stood up, strolled across the room, and pulled at the cord hanging by the fireplace. In a moment the door opened and the butler stood there.
“A brandy, if you please, Bartlett. And something for the lady. Ratafia? Tea?”
Prudence was appalled. “You cannot possibly mean to be drinking spirituous liquor at this time of the morning!”
The duke nodded at Bartlett. “Tea for Miss Merridew, then, and brandy for me. And Bartlett, bring the decanter.”
“But you cannot greet Great-uncle Oswald with a glass of brandy in your hand!”
“My dear girl, I am afraid I cannot greet him any other way. It is not morning for me, you see, but the end of a particularly long and tedious night. And if I am to be thrust into a pickle without the fortification of a brandy, I cannot answer for the consequences.”
Guilt stabbed Prudence at his words. She rallied. The situation was difficult enough to explain without the duke getting drunk. “But Great-uncle Oswald abhors the evils of liquor!”
“He can have tea, then.”
“Oh, will you please be serious! You cannot imagine what is about to happen!”
He laughed at that, a deep-throated chuckle that filled the room. “I have not the faintest notion what
any
of this is about.”
Just then Bartlett arrived with a tea tray on which stood a pot of tea, a plate of cakes, a cup and saucer, a fat crystal glass, and a tall crystal decanter containing a mellow golden liquid. As he placed it on a side table, the front-door knocker sounded thunderously. Prudence squeaked. “Oh no! He is here! Great-uncle Oswald!”
“I believe it is the lady’s great-uncle at the door, Bartlett,” the duke said. “Show him in, if you please.”
Bartlett bowed, thin-lipped, then left the room in a stately manner to answer the summons.
“The thing is,” Prudence gabbled, “for reasons I have no time to explain just now, I told him that you and I were secretly betrothed—”
The smile on his face froze.
“Betrothed!”
“Yes, I am sorry. It was all I could think of to make him see reason about Charity and the twins making their coming-out—for which the need is urgent, though I cannot explain why. But Great-uncle Oswald will not let them come out with me—”
“I imagine he has good reason—” the duke said ironically.
“Well, yes, because—” She flushed. “The reason does not matter. What matters is that they cannot enter society until I am out of the way and I thought you would suit my purposes perfectly, being a famous hermit—”
“Are you really?” he interjected interestedly.
“Am I what?” demanded Prudence, confused.
“A famous hermit.”
“Not me, lack-wit—you!” she snapped. “Oh, I do beg your pardon—my nerves are shredded! But
you
are the famous hermit! Except you’ve emerged from your hermitage, and some wretched busybody put it in the paper, and now here is Great-uncle Oswald come to demand that you marry me! Immediately!”
“What!”
That wiped the smile from his face, she noted with satisfaction. “I
told
you it was serious, Your Grace.”
An expression of unholy glee flashed across the dark-visaged face. “I can see it is.” He chuckled. “And I definitely need that brandy.” He strolled across the room to the tray with the decanter. “Would you care to pour your tea, Miss Merridew?”
Outside, Prudence could hear Great-uncle Oswald noisily demanding to see the Duke of Dinstable. She hurried across to where the duke was standing and laid a reassuring hand on his arm. “Do not fear,” she whispered hastily. “It may be a tangle, but it is
not
a trap. If you will only allow my uncle to believe we did have an understanding, I promise you most faithfully I will sever the engagement immediately. Please, I beg of you, just follow my lead. Trust me, Your Grace. I mean you no harm.”
He glanced down at her hand patting his arm soothingly. “Trust you?” His eyes caught hers and held them for a long, long moment, and for a second Prudence felt as if something important had happened. But then he shifted, and his eyes laughed down at her again as if that moment of connection had never been. “Then bring on your dragons, fair maiden,” he said, and lifted his glass to his lips.