Only if Susannah let him live beyond this night.
“Mr. Dorning, I do not recall proposing to you.” Susannah resumed walking, for the rest of the party was about to turn a corner, and the only safety on the streets of London at night lay in numbers.
“You kissed me,” Will said, lacing his arm through Susannah’s. “You called me an old friend, and you are looking for a husband. Have you kissed other old friends, my lady?”
No, Susannah had not, simply because she had no other old friends. Indignation threatened to become humiliation.
“Mr. Dorning, do you kiss your dog?”
“Georgette? What has she to do with anything?”
“Do you kiss your dog, sir?” Where was Susannah’s dratted purple parasol when a man needed sense smacked into his handsome head?
They reached the corner before Will answered. “I have. Rarely. Georgette is not a demonstrative creature.”
Bother the perishing dog. “Shall you propose to her, then? Does a friendly kiss signal addresses must follow? If so, I can assure you Lord Effington is about to plight his troth with any number of spaniels and at least one malodorous pug. My sister doesn’t stand a chance. Perhaps His Grace the Duke of Quimbey harbors a tendresse for that exuberant mastiff, and Nicholas has given his heart to his mare.”
Susannah slowed her pace, lest she catch up to the larger group.
“So you were not…” Mr. Dorning said. “That is, this husband you’re looking for, he’s—I beg your pardon, my lady. I have apparently misconstrued matters.”
Susannah experimented with silence for about half a block, but she could not outlast Will Dorning’s reserve. He had not misconstrued anything. She’d kissed him in the first act of hope she’d permitted her heart in years.
Also, apparently, the last. She hadn’t gone so far as to make designs on his future, but the ache in her chest assured her she’d strayed past casual gestures onto the boggy ground of maidenly hopes.
“The husband I seek is for my sister, Mr. Dorning. My instincts when it comes to social ill will are not to be trusted, for my own experience skews my perspective, but Della’s dance card has typically filled before the orchestra opens their violin cases. Tonight, she danced only three times before you intervened. I must see her married. I owe it to her.”
“You suspect somebody wishes her ill?”
Will did not dismiss Susannah’s fears out of hand, and he never had. He never would, and he would never return her kiss, either, apparently.
Rot this stupid evening.
“I suspect Della is about to be treated to the same polite cruelty I was,” Susannah said. “Perhaps the same vile women are resuming the game with a different Haddonfield sister. Della is vulnerable, though.”
Susannah ought not to have said that, but Will Dorning’s discretion was as formidable as his silences.
“We all have weaknesses,” he said. “Her ladyship has strengths as well. She’s comely, intelligent, graceful, witty. Compared to any number of young women, she’s impressive.”
“Compared to any number of other young women, she’s plain, penniless, and—I suppose you’ll hear it soon enough—from irregular antecedents.”
Mr. Dorning’s stride did not falter in the slightest, and his hand remained relaxed over Susannah’s knuckles, for which she could have kissed him all over again—when she was through smacking him with her parasol.
“Half the younger sons in that ballroom are similarly situated,” Mr. Dorning scoffed. “My brother Hawthorne is too. Sycamore and Valerian are proof Papa and his countess moved beyond her ladyship’s misstep, or perhaps beyond my father’s neglect of his wife.”
Will’s words were a comfort, because his brother’s situation was not common knowledge—Susannah would have heard of it—and thus a confidence exchanged between friends.
“I am frantic for my sister. I can’t bear that anybody would hurt her, much less for something completely beyond her control.”
“As you were hurt, merely for the entertainment of nasty young women and their nasty mamas.”
The Haddonfield town house lay ahead, and yet Susannah longed to walk farther in the company of the man she’d never kiss again.
“My family doesn’t know much about the circumstance surrounding my come-out,” she said. Only Will Dorning knew, because he’d been too decent to ignore a girl crying in Lady March’s garden. He had passed Susannah his handkerchief, along with a stout dose of courage, and a plan for enduring the remaining tea dances with her dignity intact.
“Your family doesn’t know what happened, but you will never forget. Cruelty changes us.”
Will stopped again, this time in the shadow of a leafy maple. A hackney jingled past, and Susannah wished he’d lend her his handkerchief again.
“If I had means,” he said, “if I had fewer responsibilities, if I had more time, if I had resources sufficient to support an earl’s daughter…I might tempt you into considering a husband for yourself. But I do not. I have only my friendship to offer you, my lady, and the hope that you will forgive a friend the limitations of his circumstances.”
A beautiful speech, a speech to break a woman’s heart, if she let it.
“Thank you, Mr. Dorning, and good night.”
Susannah would have marched off to join the larger group, but Will’s hand on her arm stayed her. He took off his hat, kissed her gently on the mouth, then walked away into the darkness without another word.
Four
“Kettering, Andromeda is not your wife, that you should pet her and coo at her every instant.” Will kept his tone friendly, lest Andromeda, a sensitive soul, think his impatience was directed at her rather than at his brother-in-law.
“But I want my dog to delight in my presence,” Kettering replied, stroking Andromeda’s head. “Not to the extent Jacaranda does, of course, but a man should be a delight to his dog, don’t you think?”
No creature on earth could delight in Sir Worth Kettering to the extent Jacaranda Dorning Kettering did. Will’s sister was smitten, besotted, top-over-tail, and in love with her dark-haired husband. Kettering’s regard for Jacaranda regularly veered past all of those excesses into public adoration, at least in part for the pure joy of embarrassing Jacaranda’s brothers.
“Think of it this way,” Will said, dropping into a wrought iron chair on Kettering’s shady back terrace. “If you randomly praised your clerks during business hours, for work done well, done poorly, barely done at all, or not even undertaken, what would happen?”
Kettering folded himself into another chair, the dog putting two paws on his knees as if to hop into his lap. She was a full-blooded Alsatian, one Will had coaxed from hiding in the mews one winter morning. Though she’d been starving, bleeding, and wretched, she’d allowed Will to tend her wounds and befriend her.
A creature of such courage and discernment deserved a second chance.
“If I handed out random praise, the clerks would think I’d finally gone daft,” Kettering said, scratching the dog’s ear. She was particularly fond of having her right ear scratched, but Kettering fondled the left. Though her tail was wagging, the dog kept moving her head to encourage Kettering to attend the other ear.
Will’s patience, usually abundant, had lately been in short supply.
“Kettering, when you scratch her ears like that, even the wrong ear, you’re telling her she’s a good girl for trying to climb into your lap. She’s nearly ten stone of teeth and claws, and not everybody will take her friendliness in the right light.”
Andromeda had nearly reached her ideal weight, though she was only a few months into her recovery. Kettering cared for the dog with the enthusiasm of a boy, not the affection of a mature man taking responsibility for his dependents.
“Down,” Kettering said to the dog, finally using the hand signal. “The archbishop says I’m corrupting your morals, my dear.”
The dog, who’d probably been the head of her pack, removed her paws from Kettering’s lap
.
Will waited. One… Two…Three… Four… Five.
Hopeless. Kettering had something on his mind today, and no amount of figurative cheese would keep him focused on his pet.
“Kettering, if one of your clerks did a brilliant job, and you ignored his efforts…”
“Good girl,” Kettering said. “Exactly right, Meda. Now can you sit?”
He forgot the hand signal, but she sat because she was a good girl, also patient and devoted to her charge. Kettering stroked the right ear.
“Now tell her all done.” Because Will’s patience with his usually brilliant brother-in-law was all gone.
“I’m out of cheese,” Kettering said, lounging back.
His terrace was a profusion of potted pansies, salvia, ferns, and lavender. Lady Susannah would love to read away a morning here. A hammock would be a perfect addition, and for her, a lap cat.
Will surrendered a morsel of cheese, though the moment had passed for teaching the dog a connection between her good behavior and her reward. She should have been given the all done signal before her master had settled on the terrace.
Kettering’s schooling yet continued, however.
Kettering fed the dog her treat, stroking her head. “Well done, Meda. We’ll be ready for the park soon, and then won’t Jacaranda be proud of us?”
Will was not proud of himself. Last night, he’d delivered his stirring, correct speech to Lady Susannah, the oration that ensured she’d develop no marital designs on him. He’d thought himself very gentlemanly, to spare the lady embarrassment, when all he could think about was kissing her witless.
He, trainer to the Regent’s puppies, had got the situation all wrong. Responded to the wrong command, read the signal incorrectly. Will had earned no treats for his honorable efforts. Lady Susannah’s set-down had been a rolled-up newspaper smacked across the nose of his conceit. Cam and Ash would have howled themselves to flinders if they’d known.
Though Will felt rotten for having presumed to reject a woman who’d been rejected enough. If he’d had a tail, he would have tucked it between his legs.
“How are the other dogs doing?” Kettering asked when Andromeda lay panting at their feet.
“Comus is coming along. Had I known Lord Harold would suffer an apoplexy, I’d have placed the dog elsewhere. Quimbey understands leadership, though, and has a reluctant affection for his late brother’s dog. They’ll manage.”
“Quimbey is a puzzle,” Kettering said, snapping off a sprig of lavender and twirling it under his nose. He had a good nose, worthy of a Dorning even. Jacaranda was similarly endowed, and Will had wondered what their puppies—God help him—their children would look like. One child had recently arrived, with a darling baby nose and blue, blue eyes Kettering claimed were his contribution to the equation.
“Quimbey is a genial, wealthy duke,” Will said. “He can be any damned thing he wants to be given those particulars.”
Kettering brushed the lavender with his fingers, then held it down for Meda to sniff.
“You could have offered to take the dog back, Will, to find another home for it, but you knew the old boy would be lonely. You gave him a young, rambunctious dog when he was grieving for his only brother.”
Kettering could be very attentive when motivated. His courtship of Jacaranda had been a blazing display of focus, though Will was uncomfortable being the object of Sir Worth’s notice.
“I found a patient, even-tempered owner for a young dog who’d known much hardship,” Will said. “Of the four of them, Comus was in the worst physical shape, but he’s resilient and fair-minded by nature.”
The poor brute had likely been beaten for the hell of it in an effort to teach him who was the superior species. Will had learned not to swear and curse, for it upset his dogs, but after Comus’s wounds had been tended to, Will had taken Georgette out for two straight hours of fetch the stick.
“What about Hector?” Kettering asked. He rolled the lavender between his palms, then crushed it to dust and brushed his hands together. The terrace was perfumed accordingly, a soothing scent that put Will in mind of Lady Susannah.
“Hector will take a special owner,” Will said, though every dog required a special owner, for every dog was special. “Somebody with a tender heart, who’s fierce when the moment calls for it. His own man, but willing to laugh, even at himself.”
Kettering propped his boots on the low table before them and crossed his ankles. He was like a long, lean purebred hunting dog who had the knack of looking elegant and appropriate wherever he was and whatever mood he was in. Jacaranda had chosen well.
Or Kettering and Jacaranda had.
“What about the fourth one?” Kettering asked. “I forget his name. Something heroic. Am I allowed to pet my dog now?”
“Yes, you may pet your dog. It’s like business hours, Kettering. If you accosted your clerks at their breakfasts with some pressing memorandum, then failed to discuss business with them all morning, but talked only about the weather at your business meetings, you’d have very confused clerks.” Will suspected Kettering did have frequently confused clerks, but they were loyal and hardworking too. “Meda needs to know when the training session starts and when it stops.”
“Right,” Kettering said. “When I wear my old plaid waistcoat, we’re to learn doggy tricks. Always in the morning, always after our doggy prayers among the hapless bushes. Next you’ll have poor Meda reciting vespers, matins, and lauds.”
“Next, we’ll have Meda behaving like a perfect lady in the park, despite all temptation to the contrary. Recall your own efforts to learn decorum, Kettering. The project wanted time and considerable effort, and has yet to reach its conclusion, though you’re an exponent of a supposedly intelligent species.”
As was Will, when not fuddled by Lady Susannah’s kisses. He wished he’d kissed her back properly, not a mere gesture of apology and regret in the moonlight.
“What was the fourth dog’s name?” Kettering asked. “It will bother me, like a snippet of Handel I can’t place.”
“Samson. He’s coming along.”
“Which suggests he went after the stable boys this very morning. Do you never give up on a dog, Willow?”
Not the stable boys, because Will allowed nobody but himself to handle Samson. He was not a pack leader by nature, but Meda had been weakening, and Samson had been distraught. He had not been treated as badly as Comus, but he was a mongrel, unsure of his place in the world, and easily upset.
The four of them—Meda, Comus, Hector, and Samson—had skulked about the Dorning mews for a week, rooting through the midden, terrorizing the cats, and scaring away even the birds. Ash and Cam had come upon one of the stable boys loading a pistol and fetched Will to intervene.
“Do you give up on a slow clerk?” Will asked. “A client who can’t manage his money? If your son turns out to be backward at his Latin, will you turn him loose on the docks to fend for himself?”
“I have given up on clerks,” Kettering replied. “A few. Not many. I mostly separate goats and sheep before taking anybody on as an employee or client. I can afford to be very choosy, especially now, and no power on earth could coerce me to do business with somebody I thought was crooked.”
Kettering’s reputation alone, for scrupulous dealings and scrupulous attention to details, was worth a fortune. A rapidly growing, immense-to-begin-with fortune.
“There are no crooked dogs,” Will said, because Kettering comprehended business metaphors. “Only dogs we’ve broken, or dogs beset by illness and pain. The same is true, I believe, of every species we’ve appropriated for our comfort and well-being.”
Will had not made up his mind regarding humankind’s inherent capacity for bad behavior. Crooked, rotten, mean people abounded, though, and woe to any—dog, bear, or debutante—in their paths.
“The stewardship lecture comes now,” Kettering said to Meda. “Though I rather think you put me in Meda’s keeping, not the other way around. Taking her
outside every so often, going for a stroll with her in the evenings, seeing her lounging about the hearth at the office… One can’t be quite as…”
Will waited, because Kettering was a smart fellow, and Will had had a strategy when he’d put Meda into Kettering’s care.
“One is a happier, healthier person for accepting the companionship of a dog,” Kettering said. “One must care for them responsibly, and learn to take pleasure in that. Owning a dog is good training for being a husband and father.”
Will was so proud of his brother-in-law, he nearly reached for a bite of cheese. Meda was safe now, and Kettering and his little family were safe too.
“On that pleasant note, I’ll take my leave of you until next week,” Will said, rising. “Work especially on that’ll do, on making Meda stop what she’s doing and come to you no matter what task you’ve given her. I’m off to pay a call on the Duchess of Ambrose.”
“Poor Annabella is in a state,” Kettering said, Her Grace being one of his clients. He took on the affairs of many widows, and if the lady wasn’t wealthy when she came to him, she often became wealthy. “She’s in a taking over that missing dog.”
“I know, which might be why she sent for me.”
Kettering got to his feet, and Meda did as well, remaining by her owner’s side. Will always felt a pang to leave one of his dogs with their owners, but leave them he must. Casriel’s coffers could not afford any additional strain, and Will’s own means were limited.
“Let’s go in through the office,” Kettering said. “I have your last two quarters’ earnings reports, but I keep forgetting to pass them along. Meda, come.”
Good. She was training Kettering to give the commands, the word and the signal both. When Will reached the office, he jammed Kettering’s reports in a pocket and checked his watch. One was not late to pay a call on an upset duchess, and Will had already done the pretty with his sister.
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