by Claudia Dain
“He is certainly unique in his height,” Sophia said blandly. Calbourne came as close to preening as a man could while seated. “You did remark upon that, did you not, Lady Amelia? Having met the man, can you now overlook what you had deemed a hindrance?”
If there were any possible way to slap Sophia and get away with it, that is to say, continue to put forth the carefully constructed aura of demure reticence and breeding that Amelia had spent a lifetime perfecting, she would have done so in that instant. Calbourne, as to be expected, looked completely annoyed and he was staring right at her with an affronted and, strangely enough, disbelieving look. Did he not know that he was excessively tall? Did he not once think that a woman, a carefully reared woman, might find his size not a little off-putting?
Oh, bother men and their vanity. It was such a cumbersome business to have to pet them at all times and about every single thing.
“The duke is a most … that is, he gives every appearance,” Amelia stammered, “of being quite vigorous. Quite robust.”
It wasn’t entirely a compliment, but it could hardly be deemed an insult either. Amelia sat very still and waited for the duke’s response.
“You have a gift for understatement, Lady Amelia,” Sophia said before Calbourne could say anything at all. “The duke is quite vigorous and extremely robust. I have it on good authority.”
Whereupon Calbourne looked quite close to blushing.
“But he is also, and this must not be overlooked, extremely tall and not at all slight of frame. Was not your pronouncement that he was excessively tall?” Sophia said with a smile.
“I am positive I did not say that,” Amelia said briskly. “I am quite, quite positive that it is impossible to be excessively tall.”
“Oh, come,” Sophia said on a trill of laughter, “what of Lady Beauchamp’s daughter? She is by every report extremely and most excessively tall.”
“I am not interested in Lady Beauchamp’s daughter,” Amelia said through clenched teeth.
“Neither am I,” Calbourne said. “If anyone’s interested.”
“But of course you should not be,” Sophia said. “You would, between you, produce nothing short of giants. I can’t think what it would cost you in tailoring, your grace.”
Whereupon Calbourne frowned and tugged on his right coat sleeve. Odd.
“But we simply must keep on task, your grace, and that is why you must do all you can to assure Lady Amelia that your … size is not an issue.”
Which of course put the most lurid emphasis on the issue. If Amelia were not so determined to interview a duke, she would leave this instant.
She stayed.
More importantly, Calbourne stayed.
In the end, that was all that mattered. She simply must find a way to make a good impression on Calbourne. Even with his disturbing size and his even more disturbing sense of humor, she could not openly discount him. There were only so many dukes to go around, after all. She could not afford to be that particular.
“I wonder if you would mind standing up, your grace,” Sophia said. “I should like for Lady Amelia to stand beside you. A couple, even so exalted a couple as a duke and his duchess, must appear well together.”
Mrs. Warren snorted in obvious amusement.
Aunt Mary snorted and shook her head a bit drunkenly, but she said nothing. Of all the times that Aunt Mary had spoken when it would have served Amelia better for her to be still, this was not one of them. Aunt Mary was, without qualification, the worst chaperone in the world. Fortunately for Amelia, she could usually make that work to her advantage. Now was not one of those times.
“I do not think that is at all necessary,” Amelia said, feeling a blush color her cheeks. She only hoped it made her look virginal and appealing. She was perhaps beyond the point in this situation of appearing innocent. If Calbourne were not discreet, and why shouldn’t he be, she would be the talk of Town by midday tomorrow. “A duke should never be required to endure such an examination.”
“Why not?” Calbourne said, cocking his head. “Don’t you think I can stand up to an examination? Are you implying that I shall be found wanting upon a closer look, Lady Amelia?”
Oh, dear. He was either honestly insulted or he was trying to be amusing. Neither option was very appealing. Calbourne might truly be more than she was ready to manage. Pity. It was rumored he had such a lovely estate.
“Don’t pick on the girl, your grace. She’s more than a little in awe of you,” Sophia said. Calbourne grinned in male satisfaction. “Just stand, if you would, darling,” Sophia directed from her seat. “How nicely you stand, your grace. You should do it more often. You have a definite skill for it.”
“Do I, do you think? ” Calbourne said, striking a pose, which was flatly ridiculous. Amelia couldn’t help but smile. The Duke of Calbourne, quite unlike her father, did seem to get such a lot of fun out of being a duke, which was exactly what being a duke should be like. She couldn’t think why her father had got it all turned round. Aldreth, to her knowledge, had never found joy in much of anything.
“I’ve been able to stand for most of my life, you understand,” Calbourne said, eyeing Sophia in blatant humor. “I’ve got quite a bit of practice at it. I shouldn’t be at all surprised to find I excel at it.”
“Yes, you are truly remarkable,” Sophia said, her eyes twinkling up at Calbourne.
It was just possible that, while Amelia might find herself married to Calbourne, Sophia might find herself in Calbourne’s bed. Those sorts of alliances were not at all uncommon, but it did give one pause. She wasn’t at all certain that she wanted to share her husband, at least not at the start. Perhaps she would be more than willing to parcel him out later, when she was quite bored with him. She studied Calbourne. Yes, that seemed entirely feasible.
This entire duty to marry business was so much easier to manage when one maintained a clear head.
“Now, Lady Amelia, if you would be so good as to stand at the duke’s side? I should like to see how you two … fit,” Sophia said.
Amelia would have blushed and refused, if Mrs. Warren had not at that moment said, “And what should I mark down, Lady Dalby? Perhaps an illustration?”
It was perfectly plain that she was laughing under her breath, and not at all discreetly either.
At that prompt, and knowing full well that Calbourne expected her to refuse, Amelia got to her feet and walked very gracefully to where he stood. She smiled into his somewhat startled face and took her place at his side. And then she faced Mrs. Warren and smiled. Mrs. Warren, far from being shocked, smiled back at her and then took up her pen and began what appeared to be a sketch.
It was a victory, but of what type Amelia was not certain. Still, a victory. Any sort would do after two full years on the marriage mart.
Calbourne did, truly and completely, tower over her. Why, her head did not even reach the top of his shoulder. They looked dreadful together, she was certain of it. But then, how often did a duke and duchess appear in public together? Not more than once a year, surely.
“How well you look together,” Sophia said, confounding Amelia’s most logical conclusion, “your coloring so complimentary. Calbourne, I do think that you and Lady Amelia would produce quite the loveliest children in Town.”
“Do you think so?” Calbourne said, preening. “Of course, I do have a son, Lord Alston, and he is quite a handsome lad.”
“And should you not like another, your grace? What sort of man is content with only one child? Surely you have it in you to father scores of them,” Sophia said.
Amelia took a deep breath. Scores? Sophia had the most wicked sense of humor.
“I am content with Alston,” Calbourne said, smiling at Sophia like a fellow conspirator.
Which made all very clear to Amelia. She felt herself awash in rigid anger. It was all just a jest, the entire evening. Calbourne and Sophia were flirting with each other and she was the prop to the event, though she could not imagine why two such d
issolute people, two people given to such flagrant and frequent affairs of the heart should require a prop to their mutual seduction of each other.
All this humiliation, at her expense, mind you, was at an end. She was going to end it and she didn’t care what anyone said about it. Fortunately, Aunt Mary appeared to be snoring.
“Oh, how unfortunate,” Amelia said stiffly, “I am not at all interested in having scores of children with such an … excessively large man,” she said, for spite. It felt wonderful. “It has been a delightful evening, your grace, Lady Dalby, but I must excuse myself for the rest of it. If you will allow?”
Calbourne, to her intense joy, looked positively startled. And insulted. Perfect.
Sophia rose to her feet gracefully, and said, “I’m so sorry, your grace, but that appears to be that. You have been removed from consideration. Of all things, Lady Amelia is most decisive, but do not despair. I’m certain that there must be another woman who will not find you so … excessively unsatisfactory. Shall we go in to dine?”
Calbourne did not choose to dine. Calbourne chose to leave immediately. He had the most perplexed expression on his face. Amelia, however, felt perfectly fine.
Eight
IT was at two o’clock the next day, a perfectly dreadful time of day when one was still half foxed from the night before, that Calbourne found himself sitting in White’s coffee room and scowling into a glass of whiskey.
“Bad whiskey?” the Marquis of Ruan asked.
Calbourne glanced up and nodded to Ruan, which Ruan took to be an invitation to sit. He sat.
“Bad night,” Calbourne answered. “I dined with Lady Dalby. Or was supposed to.”
Ruan raised his brows in surprise. “I didn’t think it possible to have a bad night with Sophia Dalby.”
Calbourne grunted and scowled into his drink. He hadn’t thought so either. He also was not in the habit of discussing his affairs with anyone, but he was in such a state of mental disturbance and the Marquis of Ruan was known to be such a discreet fellow, as well as being a man who knew his way around the knottier tangles of life, that Calbourne, still slightly, just slightly, foxed, found himself confiding in the man. He was certain he would come to regret it. He was equally certain that he didn’t care. The worst had happened. What more could be done to him?
“She was not alone,” Calbourne said, to which Ruan raised his dark brows and smirked. “Yes, well, it wasn’t like that,” Calbourne continued. “She is conducting … interviews.” At this Ruan’s brows raised themselves even higher. “For a husband.” Ruan’s eyebrows plummeted to their proper position in an obvious state of unpleasant shock. “For Lady Amelia Caversham.”
Ruan’s breath appeared to have caught in his throat. He coughed, nearly choked, before regaining his composure. Which had been precisely Calbourne’s response, until he had done what any reasonable man would do under the circumstances; he had got himself good and drunk.
“And you do not want to marry Lady Amelia?” Ruan asked mildly.
“Of course not,” Calbourne grumbled, taking another drink.
“Then why did you accept her invitation?”
“Blast it, man,” Calbourne snapped, “I didn’t know that was what she had in mind. We had a private wager between us and dinner was the outcome. Naturally, as it was a wager, I could not leave and retain my honor.”
“But you did leave?”
“Blast my honor,” Calbourne said sullenly. “I was rejected. A man does not linger when he has been rejected.”
“Perfectly logical,” Ruan said. Calbourne, who did not know Ruan well at all, had always had the sense that Ruan was a very calm and reasonable sort, the sort of man who did not require tedious explanations. He was glad to have been proved correct. Certainly he was overjoyed to find he had been correct about something; the situation with Sophia and that slip of a girl could not have been more bungled. “Yet your honor?”
“I cannot think that Sophia would not agree it has been satisfied. After all, I did stay for the interview, did I not?”
“Did you?” Ruan asked with the barest smirk.
“Why not? It was a flimsy bit of fun, but I could see the humor in it. I’m not going to marry, after all. Let these women have their jest.”
“These women?”
“Sophia, Amelia, her chaperone, and Mrs. Warren, who took notes.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“She took notes,” Calbourne repeated, not at all happy to be required to do so. “How else to keep an account of all the interviews? ”
“I’m so sorry,” Ruan said. “You seem to have lost me. There are others?”
“Don’t be dense, Ruan,” he said. “Do you think I am the only man without a wife? Of course there are others. Although,” he added with some pride, “I was the first. Top of the list, I should think.”
Ruan was silent at that, his green eyes thoughtful, and his gaze on his shoes. Quite nice shoes; Ruan did know how to dress to the demands of fashion. He was rumored to be fabulously wealthy, something to do with land in Canada. Or perhaps it was in Barbados. Somewhere foreign, of that Calbourne was certain, or nearly so.
“It’s quite a nice bit of work, isn’t it?” Ruan said eventually, jerking Calbourne out of a doze. “I do wonder why Lady Dalby should be so interested in the marital prospects of Lady Amelia. Is she friends with Aldreth?”
“I have no idea. I shouldn’t think so,” Calbourne said, his thoughts swirling in a sea of whiskey. “Though, I do seem to remember that Sophia is or once was closely acquainted with Zoe Auvray, Aldreth’s mistress.”
“Is that so?” Ruan mused with a half smirk. “That might explain it.”
“Explain it? There is no explaining it,” Calbourne said.
“I wonder who else shall be summoned?” Ruan said.
“Who else? Why, it’s perfectly obvious who else. Certainly the Duke of Edenham. He’s available, though I can’t think how he’ll pass.” Calbourne smirked and crossed his excessively long legs. Excessively, indeed. Blasted women and their ridiculous notions. He was an exceptional-looking man. Exceptional in the extreme. “And then there’s Iveston. He’ll be a duke one day. I don’t see that they’ll overlook him.”
“Dukes? Dukes are all that interest her?” Ruan said, sitting up in his chair, looking very nearly alarmed. Well, why should he be alarmed? He wasn’t a duke. He was free and clear of the whole business.
“Isn’t it perfectly obvious? Lady Amelia is only interested in becoming a duchess. I thought I’d explained that.”
“Oh, right,” Ruan said, leaning back against the cushion. “Lady Amelia. Yes, well, it’s very forthright of her, isn’t it? Not many girls have that sort of singleness of purpose, and it’s not an unworthy goal, is it?”
“Not unless you’re a duke, then it’s a blasted nuisance,” Calbourne said. It was insulting as well. Especially as he’d been rejected.
Blasted women and their foolish ideas. There was nothing wrong with his height, or with his coat either.
Calbourne reached out to put his glass on the small table in front of him and felt the stitches rip at his shoulder.
Blasted tailor.
BY six o’clock that afternoon White’s was buzzing with the news of Lady Amelia’s interview. After the initial astonishment, things proceeded as they always did at White’s. Wagers were placed as to who would be called, who would attend if called, who would be found acceptable by Lady Amelia, and how Aldreth would react when he heard the news.
It was a very busy afternoon at White’s and the betting book was a mass of wagers and counter wagers.
One wager stood out in that sea of impossible wagers and that was if Calbourne had been rejected by the mild Lady Amelia, who had before this day been considered so demure and so proper as to be nearly invisible in any gathering of more than four people, or if Calbourne had done the rejecting. Odds were on Calbourne.
That Lady Amelia intended to interview Iveston was a foregone conclusion, the
proof being that there were no wagers placed on that. Not even one.
The Earl of Cranleigh was not in the least bit amused. He was quite determined to force Lady Amelia Caversham into dropping the entire idea of marriage as it pertained to Iveston. Quite determined. He was simply not going to allow her to marry his brother. She could have anyone else she could get her grasping little hooks into, but not Iveston. He would have thought that should have been perfectly obvious to her.
As to the interview, as to that blasted interview of Calbourne, that he laid firmly at Sophia Dalby’s feet. Oh, Amelia Caversham was no innocent lamb led into ridicule by the merest of enticements. No, she knew what she wanted and she was pursuing it without shame or the slightest care for protocol. To be honest, he had not thought she had it in her and he could not quite puzzle out why she had stooped to such tactics now.
Yet she had. And he would respond as he must. She would not get Iveston.
He had every expectation that things would be permanently settled regarding Iveston by tomorrow dawn as tonight there was a ball at the Prestwicks’ to which nearly everyone had been invited. The elder Prestwick, newly made a viscount by the normal route in that it had been tidily bought and paid for, was quite eager to make his new and exalted mark in Society. Cranleigh wished the entire family well with the endeavor as he did not know the Prestwicks even slightly. He had not intended to attend, but as Amelia was now flagrantly in the market for a duke, she would certainly attend and there would hardly be a better, that is to say, more convenient time to make his position known regarding Iveston.
She was not going to marry Iveston.
Put thus, Cranleigh hardly expected any sort of trouble at all from her. She would marry where she willed, but not into the Hyde family. Let her have Edenham or Calbourne, though his gut clenched at the thought. Grasping, ambitious, calculating female. He would force her out, back, and away from his brother. The question, really, was how he would accomplish it. He would prefer to keep any fuss to a minimum, but if that were not possible, if she made it impossible, well then, he was prepared to do what he must to drive her off. He was entirely confident that whatever action was required would come to him at the proper time.