by Sophia James
‘If you say it is a cheerful nod to the season, I shall wear the mustard.’
Even though he was suddenly desperate to wear the burgundy, especially if it imbued him with the powers of flirty mischief. And she had made him feel vigorous. Very vigorous indeed and decidedly off-kilter. The sort of off-kilter which made him yearn to be rash and frivolous for a change, rather than staidly sensible and depressingly dependable. The sort of vigorous which tempted him to seize the day, and say to hell with his mountain of ducal responsibilities, flagrantly flouting all calm and measured reason.
Before he could grab the lacklustre brown mustard, Julius whipped it away and tossed the identical-looking brown burgundy at him instead.
‘For the love of God, live dangerously! Besides, you always look jaundiced in mustard. I cannot, in all good conscience, allow you to spend the entire day looking as if you have a liver complaint.’
Then he sauntered to the door with the offending garment still crumpled in his fist, in case Marcus had a mind to argue, when in truth he was relieved to be forced into the vigorous and flirty garment instead.
‘Out of interest, which room will you be breakfasting in today?’
Whichever one the bewitching Miss Harkstead ventured into.
‘I haven’t decided yet. Probably the one with the fewest husband-hunters within it.’
‘Then be assured I shall see you there.’
Twenty minutes later, and feeling very dashing in burgundy, despite being unable to see it, Marcus took the servants’ stairs down so he could peep through the concealed entrances in the panelling, in the hope of locating Miss Harkstead before everyone else located him.
Bizarrely, aside from Uncle Horace and a few of the older gentlemen, the bigger formal dining room was deserted. Before he could do a similar reconnaissance of the Oriental Room, Gibson appeared out of nowhere, effectively blocking the route.
‘If you are looking for all the ladies, Your Grace, then you should probably know that, despite your dear mother’s best efforts at chivvying them, almost all of them are using every excuse they can muster to loiter, crushed in the hallway, until you or Lord Julius make a decision regarding where to eat this morning.’
Marcus knew the bland delivery was his butler’s preferred way of telling him off.
‘Then we expect a veritable stampede.’
‘Ah...’
‘You should also know that Cook is fuming, because her perfectly coddled eggs are cooling on the sideboard and she is resolute she will not be making more when she has slaved for hours since dawn making the things.’
The butler stared at him unblinking as the unmistakable cacophony of excited feminine noise from the hallway beyond the dining room finally permeated the door he was hiding behind.
‘However, if Your Grace is not looking for all of the ladies, but seeking somebody in particular, the ladies not in the hall are Lady Trumble and her companion Miss Harkstead, who are currently the only two people enjoying perfectly coddled eggs in the Oriental Room.’
‘The only two?’ How gloriously typical of Miss Harkstead not to be impressed enough by his title to wait around for him. ‘Then that sounds like the perfect room for me to quietly break my own fast, Gibson. You know how I enjoy a bit of peace at breakfast time.’
‘As you wish, Your Grace.’ His wily retainer did not appear the least bit fooled.
‘To that end, I wonder if you could...um...’
‘Unsubtly hint to the baying hordes so eagerly awaiting you at the foot of the stairs that you will imminently be heading to the formal dining room, Your Grace?’
‘That would be splendid, Gibson.’
‘Very good, Your Grace.’ Gibson bowed. ‘I shall quickly don some protective armour and tell them. I shall also ensure there is a physician standing by in case anybody is trampled during the charge.’ Then he smiled. ‘I hope she is worth it, Your Grace.’
His butler had been gone less than a minute when the swarm of young ladies, followed by their ambitious mamas, flooded into the formal dining room, all scanning the place settings for the optimum position. Marcus watched them, baffled, through a crack in the door as the most intrepid flung themselves into the chairs nearest the head of the table and breathed a sigh of relief he wouldn’t have to suffer them as he stealthily retreated along the warren of corridors which led to the Oriental Room.
Exactly as Gibson had said, the object of his fascination was indeed sitting prettily sipping tea. Looking positively ravishing in brown. Or green. Or hopefully flirty red.
Completely unsure of what he was going to say, but mindful he probably had less than five minutes alone with her before the unsuccessful overflow of guests gave up trying to secure a seat in the other room and were forced to venture here instead, he smoothed down his waistcoat, checked the knot in his cravat, neatened his cuffs, took a calming deep breath and then opened the door.
‘Good morning, ladies. Would you mind if I join you?’
Chapter Five
At the unexpected sound of his deep voice behind her, Eliza almost choked on her tea. She managed to avoid choking only by sloshing half the contents of her teacup into the saucer, and then half of that onto the pristine white tablecloth. She winced at the sight of the spreading brown stain blooming on the starched linen and he winced back.
‘G-good morning, Your Grace.’
She had positioned herself in order to see both the main door and the secret door he had emerged from yesterday, on the off-chance he might turn up and because, being proudly sensible by nature, she wanted to appear thoroughly nonchalant if he did. So to say she was more than a little stunned to learn there was yet another concealed entrance, through which the wretch had slipped at the precise moment she had been daydreaming about him was an understatement.
‘You startled me, Your Grace.’
‘And you almost gave me an apoplexy!’ Great-Aunt Violet clutched at her heart as she scowled at him, before her irrepressible good humour returned. ‘Although I can hardly say I blame you. It is absolute chaos out there.’
She gestured to the chair opposite them, and for some inexplicable reason Eliza’s pulse quickened as he sat in it.
‘And by all accounts, Your Grace, chaos entirely of your making.’ Great-Aunt Violet slanted them both an odd look before she picked up her cup and stared at the Duke over it. ‘I am curious, young man...what on earth possessed you to change things?’
‘Well, I...er...’
Before he could form an answer a wide-eyed and breathless Aunt Penelope bustled in, dragging Honoria. ‘There you are, Eliza dearest!’ The beaming smile she bestowed upon her niece did not touch her eyes. ‘We’ve been looking everywhere for you!’
As her aunt never called her ‘dearest’, nor beamed at her—or even smiled, for that matter—it did not take a genius to work out her scheming aunt was here solely for the Duke.
She had been spitting feathers last night when she had discovered, third-hand, that Eliza and the elusive Duke had dined together. In fact, she had been so annoyed her niece hadn’t immediately come to fetch both her and her cousin to join them, Eliza hadn’t dared inform her aunt Penelope that dinner had been their second encounter yesterday.
She hadn’t quite found the opportunity or the words to confess that to Great-Aunt Violet yet, either, preferring to claim it had been a chance meeting at dinner, rather than one brought about entirely by the handsome Duke’s design after she had so shockingly called him arrogant, rude and pompous.
But she knew her great-aunt would read much more into his actions than mere happenstance. She would convince herself he was interested in more than Eliza’s forthrightness and undeferential conversation, and then everything about this house party would become unbearable. Romantic people like her great-aunt were incapable of being sensible if they sniffed even the vaguest whiff of the chance to matchmake. No matter how far
-fetched that chance was.
Aunt Penelope practically threw Honoria into the seat next to Eliza, before settling down beside her and pinning the Duke with her stare. ‘I did not have the opportunity to introduce you to my daughter last night, Your Grace.’ She framed her daughter’s face with her outstretched arms like a painting. ‘Although I daresay you must have already noticed her. My Honoria is widely regarded as an incomparable.’
Only in her aunt’s mind.
‘And she has only been out for one Season.’
‘I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Lady Honoria.’ The Duke politely inclined his head before his gaze wandered briefly back to Eliza’s, amused. ‘Your cousin has told me a lot about you. You too, Lady Broadstairs. She holds you both in great esteem.’
Would it be wrong to kick a duke under the table? Before she could consider it properly, her foot shot out and clipped him on the shin. Her insolence was rewarded by a very naughty smile, which suited him immensely.
‘In fact, you are to be commended in your generosity, Lady Broadstairs—not many would be so sympathetic towards such a scandalously impoverished relation as to welcome them so completely into the bosom of her own family. I applaud your egalitarianism.’
Oblivious to the irony, Aunt Penelope took his words as a gushing compliment. ‘We do what we can for poor Eliza, and we are grateful to you too, Your Grace, for condescending to speak to her last night. It was most benevolent of you.’
He nodded solemnly, clearly enjoying himself. ‘Yes, it was, wasn’t it?’
Before Eliza could kick him again, Great-Aunt Violet nudged her with her knee.
‘And here he is again... Being egalitarian once more by honouring us with his presence rather than breakfasting with the masses. What an unexpected privilege.’
‘Thank goodness!’ Never one to squander an opportunity, Aunt Penelope gave a smile that was all teeth. ‘For this gives us a chance to get to know one another properly, away from all those other silly girls.’ She dismissed them with one flick of her wrist. ‘I know my Honoria has a million questions for you, Your Grace. Don’t you, Honoria?’
There was a pregnant pause, during which Eliza could only imagine her supercilious aunt pinched her poor daughter’s thigh hard under the table, because Honoria suddenly sprang forward, eyelashes fluttering for all she was worth, her expression decidedly panicked.
‘I do indeed...’
But then the poor thing floundered, until her mother stepped into the fray to save her. ‘You wanted to ask him about his favourite...?’
‘Colour!’
Honoria was clearly relieved to have remembered one of the many questions her mother had relentlessly drilled into her during the carriage ride on the way to Manningtree, attempting to school her in the subtle art of charming small talk and the not so subtle art of flattering an eligible gentleman.
‘I wanted to enquire as to your favourite colour, Your Grace.’
Judging from the brittle smile now pasted on her face, her mother was mortified at the choice, which made Eliza want to hug the poor girl close and tell her she had done well in trying. Honoria was only eighteen, and desperately wanted to please everyone. Most especially her mother.
‘Well...um... I suppose my favourite colour is...’
‘That is entirely and singularly the most pointless question to ask my brother, ladies.’
The Symington spare suddenly filled the door frame, making a point of standing still to take in every face around the table, before finally resting his eyes on Eliza. He grinned.
‘He’s not one for the frivolousness of colours—but if you were to ask me the same question, I’d say it depended entirely on my mood and the situation. Today I have a penchant for lilac.’
Which just so happened to be the exact shade of the sensible woollen walking dress Eliza had donned for the planned trip to the village.
Two dark eyes nowhere near as disarming as his brother’s fathomless blue ones twinkled. Then continued to study her as he sat down in one of the vacant chairs beside his sibling.
‘Aren’t you going to introduce me to your lovely new friend Marcus? Seeing as she is the only person at this table I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting?’
‘Miss Eliza Harkstead—my brother.’ The Duke’s tone was unusually clipped. Either he was annoyed by his brother’s mere presence, and his shameless flirting, or he was annoyed at his insinuation that she and he were friends. ‘Lord Julius Symington.’
Eliza politely shook his hand, and then waited for two footmen to pour hot beverages. While everyone else took more tea, she and the Duke took chocolate. She tried not to read more into that pathetic coincidence than was wise, but did so anyway. What was it about this Duke which made her suspect they were kindred spirits?
As she pondered this, she felt Lord Julius staring at her, and in turn realised she had been staring at his brother. To cover it, she smiled and returned her attention to the latest arrival. ‘Actually, we have met before, my lord.’
The darker sibling looked surprised by this. ‘We can’t have... I’d have remembered.’ Then Lord Julius grinned wolfishly, earning him another censorious glare from his brother. ‘You make quite the impression Miss Harkstead.’
‘I couldn’t have made that much of an impression as it was only last month, my lord. We briefly collided by the refreshment table at the Renshaw ball. I was fetching Lady Trumble some lemonade.’ Which was an entirely inconsequential detail which nobody would have any interest in. ‘And you were—’
‘Oh, stop, Eliza! Can you not see you are embarrassing the man?’
In true Aunt Penelope fashion, she couldn’t hide her true colours for long and, in view of her obvious annoyance that her niece was currently receiving more attention than her daughter, she took great pleasure in publicly knocking her down a peg or two.
‘Why would he notice a decrepit old lady’s drab companion in a ballroom full of the highest in society?’
Then she turned to the Duke and his brother, apparently all concern and totally oblivious to Great-Aunt Violet’s shock at the insult.
‘Bless her, but dearest Eliza does tend to fade into the background. Sadly, she inherited her father’s drab colouring.’ She managed to say this as if the mere mention of Eliza’s papa was distasteful. ‘He is a bookkeeper, don’t you know?’
There was true malice in her eyes when she leant forward, her next words an octave above a whisper to ensure everyone heard them.
‘But of course you must know. When my foolish sister ran away with him to Gretna Green it caused quite the scandal. It even made it into The Times.’
A fact Eliza’s parents had always worn like a badge of honour. A declaration of the real strength of their love. She had always admired them for that and occasionally, when she wasn’t being cynical, she wished she might one day find someone who would be happy to brave a scandal alongside her.
‘My poor sister was thoroughly ruined, of course, and has not dared to show her face in society since. But, being of liberal mind and charitable nature...’ she grabbed Eliza’s hand and squeezed it hard ‘...I have opened my arms to her daughter and pray she is not completely tainted by her mother’s rash actions all those years ago.’
Whatever effect Aunt Penelope had hoped her poisoned dart would have, it wasn’t the heavy veil of awkwardness which immediately cloaked the table like smog. To their credit, both the Duke and his significantly less handsome brother seemed appalled by her aunt’s bad manners. Great-Aunt Violet was silently shooting daggers at her, still not over being called decrepit, and for once even Honoria wasn’t oblivious to the tension because she looked every inch like a startled rabbit.
It was the Duke who finally broke the silence. ‘Are your parents still nauseatingly pleased with their rash decision, Miss Harkstead?’
Those bright blue eyes were kind, yet behind them she s
aw the challenge, daring her not to give a fig.
‘They are, Your Grace. Neither has regretted it for a second. They treated the story in The Times as their wedding announcement rather than a scandal.’
Great-Aunt Violet joined the rescuing cavalry charge too. ‘Eliza’s mother and father enjoy one of life’s rarest gifts, Your Grace—a genuinely happy marriage. They are as nauseatingly besotted still as they were the first moment they met.’
‘Then it all happened for the best.’ He toasted her with his chocolate cup. ‘My parents were lucky enough to share much the same feelings. They met, fell instantly in love, and married just three short weeks later.’
‘At Christmas time,’ added Lord Julius with a surreptitious wink in her direction. ‘I believe that caused quite the scandal in its day too. Back then, dukes were not supposed to marry into the merchant classes.’
‘Our maternal grandfather was an importer of goods from the Orient, Miss Harkstead.’ The Duke gestured around the room with a smile. ‘And his father was a midshipman on a merchant frigate.’ His next smile seemed only for her. ‘So, you see, I am not a particularly illustrious duke after all—all things considered.’
A blessedly quiet Aunt Penelope had been put securely back into her box, and along with the growing trickle of clearly confused guests hovering outside the door, wondering where they were supposed to go, the Duchess arrived and forged a determined path through them all, like Moses parting the Red Sea.
She shut the door behind her before she glared and said, ‘There you are!’
Both Symington males winced, looking like two naughty schoolboys caught doing something wrong, then plastered on twin smiles before answering in unison. ‘Good morning, Mama.’
‘I will grant you it is morning, but I can assure it is not a good one! You’ve created pandemonium, Marcus! And we shall be having words about it! Many, many words! Just as soon as this lawless debacle of a breakfast is over.’
