by Claudia Dain
“Lady Dalby, I would never—”
“Darling, don’t say what you would never do until you are actually faced with the opportunity,” Sophia said, tapping her fan against her thigh in clear agitation. “I am going to do you the great honor of being honest with you, Miss Prestwick. I do hope you have a stalwart nature and can bear up under something so uncomfortable as the truth.” Naturally, she did not pause for either permission or approval and continued on, Miss Prestwick’s lovely face showing her alarm most clearly. “The Marquis of Iveston has a wager going as to whom you shall marry. This sort of thing, managed well, can be a complete boon in situations of this sort. What I propose is that you get your brother to place a wager on White’s book that you will marry Edenham.”
“But, Lady Dalby, I have—”
“You do understand that the wager is a spur, darling. Men respond so well to the spur, it simply is foolish not to use one when they appear to require it so completely.”
Penelope got a very focused look on her face, her gaze quite penetrating as she stared at the drapes at the front windows.
“Edenham will feel the need to compete,” she said softly, stroking the edge of her crimson shawl. “He will feel slighted and will make every effort to … marry me to win a wager? No,” Penelope said firmly, looking directly into Sophia’s eyes again. “That’s ridiculous. No man marries to win a wager. Especially not a duke.”
“The wager is the spur, darling, that is all.”
“It doesn’t seem logical in the slightest.”
“Of course it’s not logical, but we’re dealing with men. Had you forgotten that?”
Penelope nodded and said, “That’s true. They can be very difficult, can’t they?”
“I’m convinced they make a study of it,” Sophia said. “Now, tonight you and your darling brother are going to attend the Countess of Lanreath’s soiree.”
“We have been invited, and I will admit that I was hoping to engage the Duke of Edenham in conversation whilst there,” Penelope said.
“I shall manage everything, including the arrival of Lord Iveston, who is most essential to our plans, is he not? As to plans, I believe it would greatly simplify things if we all arrived together. You will attend with your darling brother, and I shall go on George’s arm.”
“George? You mean, your nephew?” Penelope did not look at all pleased.
“Yes,” Sophia said. “He’s most eager to see more of London Society and this should be an ideal opportunity for him. You can certainly have no objections.”
“Of course not,” Penelope said with alacrity, stiffening her shoulders.
“You can manage your brother?”
“Of course,” Penelope said, nearly offended by the suggestion that she couldn’t manage something as ordinary as a brother. Delightful girl.
“I shall arrange all else,” Sophia said, “but I want it understood, your father must appear at my door tomorrow. I will aid you tonight only because I am choosing to believe you are an honorable girl. At heart.”
“I am,” Penelope said stiffly. “Have no qualms about that. You shall be paid in whatever manner you name, Lady Dalby. All I ask is that I get the man I want.”
“Darling, I am quite convinced that nothing will keep him from you.”
OF course it didn’t take any effort on Penelope’s part at all to convince George to drop in at White’s. The difficult bit was in convincing him make a wager that she would marry the Duke of Edenham during the present Season. His reasoning, and it was a bit logical, was that he had to make the wager with someone, and just whom did she suggest he do that with?
Typical. She had to think of everything.
In the end, she had declared that all he had to do was find someone in the mood to wager, and when was a man not in that frame of mind, and simply compel them into wagering against him. How difficult could it be? Anyone, just anyone would do. As long as the wager appeared on White’s book, well then, she’d done exactly as advised by Sophia.
Penelope didn’t give another thought to it. She had to dress for Lady Lanreath’s soiree, as did George, so he’d best be quick about it.
With that admonition hanging over his head, George, slightly befuddled, made his way to White’s.
AS it was just past eight o’clock, White’s was filled with well-dressed gentlemen of the best families looking to start their evening with a drink, a hand of cards, an on dit, a wager. When that palled, they would find their way into salons and theaters across Town. And when that palled, they would find their way back to White’s, to bring up the dawn with a dram of whiskey.
It was a lovely, predictable, comfortable life. Or it had been.
The Marquis of Dutton was miserable, and he knew why. He had been made a laughingstock by a woman. By two women, quite possibly. Make that most assuredly. Sophia Dalby and her pet project, Anne Warren, had, between them, made him look a fool. It hadn’t helped his cause that he’d been struck a blow, a literal blow, twice in this very room, by two different members of the club, regarding two entirely different women, and that he’d been involved in a rather famous public brawl outside of Aldreth House. He had not, as was to be expected, come out looking the better for such activities. Oh, it was perfectly fine to engage in a fight or two or three, but not when one was continually found to be the loser.
He had failed to find his way beneath Anne Warren’s skirts, though why that should be so was still a vast mystery to him. He was a marquis of some reputation, true, but not an entirely bad reputation, and she was a widow of reduced circumstances and highly unsavory pedigree who had nothing on the balance sheet besides Sophia Dalby. Having Lady Dalby as a protector of sorts had tipped every scale against him in his pursuit of Mrs. Warren. He had been foiled. He had been reduced to ridicule. He knew how to rectify all.
He would find another woman.
Which woman?
He had yet to decide. Certainly there were more than enough widows to keep a man busy. He did prefer widows; so much less complicated, really. No husband hunt involved. No husband banging at the door. A lonely, experienced widow was exactly what he preferred in women. All he had to do was find another woman, willing and eager to share his bed, and his reputation was restored to its former luster.
It was as Dutton was pondering women in general and widows in particular that he happened to glance up from his whiskey and see Mr. Prestwick enter the room, looking about with a mild degree of urgency. Upon seeing the Marquis of Penrith lounging in a corner, legs stretched out before him, Prestwick walked over to him and sat down. As Dutton was nearly certain that Penrith had placed a bet or two on White’s book at Sophia Dalby’s instruction, Dutton felt no great affection for Penrith, not that he was well acquainted with the man, but any man who would stoop to being a tool for a very devious woman was not a man he cared to know intimately, nor even cordially.
Penrith leaned his dark blond head forward to catch Prestwick’s words. Prestwick shook his dark head once, gave a negligible shrug, smiled, and then shook his head again. Upon which Penrith laughed without noticeable sound, and the two men got to their feet as one and made their way to White’s betting book.
At that, Dutton stood and followed them. What wager was currently afoot? And was there a way to salvage his reputation upon its back? Certainly, there must be. A wager and a widow to his credit? He’d erase the events of the past few weeks from all memory.
On the book was the wager. Ten pounds that the Duke of Edenham would propose marriage to Miss Penelope Prestwick, only daughter of the Viscount Prestwick, by the end of the current Season. The wager had been taken up by the Marquis of Penrith.
Did Edenham even know Miss Prestwick?
Why had Prestwick sought Penrith out?
To make the wager, almost certainly.
Penrith, Sophia Dalby, another girl on the market for a husband, and a wager. All the same pieces, though he could not quite piece them together into a coherent pattern. But he would.
Twelve
ANTOINETTE, the dowager Countess of Lanreath, was hosting a soiree. She was doing it not to please herself, though it would not displease her exactly, but to please her sister, Bernadette, the dowager Countess of Paignton. Yes, rather a lot of dowager countesses going on, but who would have thought that they should each have lost their husbands so early in life? Of course, Antoinette’s husband had been old, a friend of her father’s actually, so it was not unexpected that he find himself dead one morning in his kippers, but Bernadette’s husband had been in the prime of life and killed in a duel, which as he was given to dueling, was not as unexpected an end as it might have been.
As Antoinette’s husband had died in the normal way and Bernadette’s had died in a scandalous way, Bernadette was looked at askance by many if not most of Society and Antoinette felt it was her duty to try and repair fences for Bernadette. Mostly because Bernadette told her it was her duty. Since Antoinette did not actually disagree, she did her duty.
She was giving a soiree. She had invited Bernadette. She had also invited Camille, her next younger sister, who had yet to marry and, therefore, yet to become a widow. She had not invited Delphine as Delphine had not had her come out, much to Delphine’s annoyance. At seventeen, Delphine felt she was well old enough to mix and mingle with the men of Society. Antoinette had married at seventeen and married well, in most lights, a man thirty-two years her senior. Delphine could sit at Sheviock, their father’s Cornwall estate, for another year. It would do her no harm at all.
“Toni, what do you think of the Marquis of Penrith?” Bernadette said, coming up softly behind her.
“I think he’s too young for you, Bernie,” Antoinette answered without turning her head. The soiree was slightly dull, the guests milling about almost tediously, fully half her list not yet arrived. Where was everyone?
“In years? Ridiculous,” Bernadette said, twitching the hem of her white muslin skirt.
“In experience, dear,” Antoinette answered.
They were a family given to pet names, as girls are wont to do. As there were four of them and as their mother, the Countess of Helston, was rarely at Sheviock and their father, the sixth Earl of Helston, didn’t care if he saw his wife or children beyond the odd holiday, they had formed their own small family of four. The results of such emotional independence had not been entirely pleasant.
“I’m a widow, Toni, not an abbess,” Bernadette answered. “Where are all the lovely men tonight? I had thought Penrith to make an appearance. He did show such promise at the Prestwick ball.”
“Before the conservatory, certainly,” Antoinette said. “After the rose incident, every rumor states that everyone was so busy gossiping and making wagers that the orchestra only served to get in the way of the gossip.”
“Very true,” Bernadette said, twitching her skirts again. Bernie had developed the habit sometime in her youth of doing little things to gather attention unto herself. As she was only twenty-three now, the habit might have been broken with some effort. Bernadette saw no reason to make the effort. She liked attention. Why not get it any way possible? “But who told you that? You weren’t there, though I begged you to attend with me.”
“You’ve never begged for anything in your life.”
Bernadette smiled. “Oh, yes I have. Got it, too.”
Bernie was, without qualification, a woman of exotic good looks and a definite erotic inclination. She had been a normal enough girl throughout her unremarkable childhood, but upon her marriage to a complete rake, who also happened to be an earl, she had learned she liked men very much indeed. Her husband first and foremost, but as he had not stopped being a rake upon marriage, she had found her own entertainment elsewhere upon occasion. She and Paignton had lived recklessly, loved brutally, and he had died predictably. The Paignton estate and title had passed laterally, that short phase of her life over. Not the men, obviously, but the house.
It was hardly possible for Antoinette to have experienced marriage, and indeed widowhood, more differently.
“I heard it from Lady Richard, actually,” Antoinette said, watching the door for more guests, who did not appear.
“What? She wasn’t there,” Bernadette said sharply. “I’m sure of it.”
And well she should say it sharply. Bernadette had indulged in a not very discreet affair with Lady Richard’s husband. As Katherine, Lady Richard, had loved her husband very much, it had not been at all pleasant for her to share him.
“She heard it from her brother,” Toni supplied. Which ought to have been obvious as Katherine’s brother was none other than the Duke of Edenham and he had seen the whole thing, or very nearly.
“Oh, very well then,” Bernie said, looking about the room. There was no one to interest her at present. Toni quite agreed with her. All the most remarkable men, no matter their age or experience, had yet to arrive. “Is Edenham coming tonight?”
“He was invited,” Toni answered. “As was Lady Richard.”
She cast her sister a sideways glance. Bernie liked her men well enough, but she did not like any entanglements they dragged into bed with them, such as wives. As for Toni, she had not quite decided yet how she felt about men. Certainly her husband, while not odious in the extreme, had not been remarkable in the extreme either. She was cautiously undecided and intended to remain so until experience taught her otherwise.
“Oh, bother, Toni,” Bernie said. “Why? I thought you gave this soiree for me. I have such trouble getting invited anyplace anymore.”
“You were invited to the Prestwick ball.”
“Only because they invited everyone.”
“As did I. You don’t need to make it sound such an insult. Who knows whom you might meet tonight? Perhaps you shall even marry again.”
“Why ever should I do that?” Bernadette said with a lovely pout.
A man across the room dropped his glass. As he was not quite as young as a woman preferred, it might have been due to palsy and not the pout. But it wasn’t likely. Bernadette was that sort of woman, blatant, and not at all apologetic about it either. Half the time Antoinette envied her, and the other half, she pitied her. Paignton had done something to her sister, though she couldn’t think what. Whatever it was, Bernie was not as happy as she ought to have been. There was a restlessness to her that seemed almost dangerous.
“Companionship? Children?” Antoinette said.
“Perhaps later,” she answered. “When I’m tired.”
That roused a laugh from Toni and from Bernie. It was not to be helped.
“Is Lady Richard truly coming tonight?” Bernadette asked.
“I hope so,” Antoinette answered. “She needs to get out into Society more. I don’t know how she fills her days, living with Edenham as she does. The two of them, widow and widower, alone in that house. Hiding away, is what it looks like. It can’t be healthy.”
“Edenham may have been hiding before, but he’s not now,” Bernadette said. “I think it’s something to do with Lady Dalby. He appears to enjoy her very much.”
“That sounds rather sordid.”
“I know.”
“Perhaps he’ll marry again. Perhaps Lady Dalby will be the next Duchess of Edenham,” Antoinette said.
“I can’t think why she’d want to marry Edenham. Her life is perfectly ordered and well settled.”
“But you can see why Edenham would want to marry again?”
Bernadette shrugged. “He’s a man. And he’s been married so often now that it must feel very peculiar to him not to be married. Why don’t you marry him, Toni? You enjoy his sister so much, it would be quite nice for you.”
“You’re not afraid he’d kill me?” Toni asked with a grin.
“Not at all. Are you afraid he’d kill you?”
“I can’t think how. I can’t have children.”
Bernie made a most unattractive sound with her mouth; it was very nearly comical. “You can’t possibly be certain of that. Lanreath was nearly an old man. I would say I�
��m surprised the marriage was even consummated, but I know what men are capable of doing when they are inspired. I’ve no doubt you inspired him beyond his normal capacity.”
“Bernie, you are grown coarse.”
“I notice you don’t deny it.”
“I could say the same of you.”
It was at that moment that, quite abruptly, the doors to the Countess of Lanreath’s salon nearly burst in upon them and very many of the most interesting, most attractive, most unattached men who had been invited entered the room. Lady Dalby entered on the arm of one of those American Indian relatives of hers everyone was talking about.
And that is when the soiree at the dowager Countess of Lanreath’s home on the corner of Berkeley Square truly began.
LANREATH House had large rooms done up in the French style of perhaps ten to fifteen years ago. The walls of each of the main rooms, defined as the reception room, the drawing room, and the dining room, were painted in white paint that had gone to cream and ivory with time, and gilded trim everywhere, from the ceiling to the skirting boards. The floors were lightly stained parquet in a very pleasing geometric design and the furnishings were all French, from the gilded chairs with their rose-hued silk upholstery to the chandeliers hovering massively above them.
The rooms, it was perfectly obvious, set off a woman’s beauty to perfection. It was such a pity that the dowager Countess of Lanreath did not entertain more often as very many women in Society would have benefited from appearing to their best advantage in such delicately hued rooms lit by gentle candlelight. As the current Earl of Lanreath, the son of the late Earl’s first wife, was not married and was more interested in his hunting dogs than in the ton, he had happily allowed Antoinette to live in the family house in Town. He had not, nor had his father, allowed her to redo the rooms in the more current fashion.
Well, that was a man for you.
