Page 81 of The Trouble With Dukes
Colin had done the pretty for the past week, while Hamish had lurked in the gentlemen’s clubs, gone out on errands of his own, and generally broken the heart of a young lady whom Colin had hoped would be his brother’s salvation. When that young lady crossed paths with Colin in Hyde Park early one morning—nothing like a good gallop to chase the cobwebs from a fellow’s brain—he wanted to keep on galloping, all the way to the Highlands.
“Lord Colin, good morning.”
Colin’s horse snorted and puffed and acted like an idiot, while Miss Megan Windham controlled her chestnut mare easily.
“Miss Megan, good day. Enjoy the park, and give my regards to your—”
The lady twitched at the drape of her habit over her boot. Her gesture bore an air of patience, as if waiting for Colin to get through his prevarications.
“How is he, Lord Colin?”
He being Hamish, of course. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen him since the last ball, not to speak of.” Hamish ate breakfast long before the rest of the family, closeted himself with solicitors and bankers, and then disappeared into the clubs, most of which he’d only recently been admitted to.
According to extended family gossip, he’d also consulted with a MacHugh cousin who was a publisher, another who made saddles, a third who ran a fishmonger’s stall in the Haymarket, and a fourth who owned a pub in Knightsbridge.
“One worries about His Grace,” Miss Megan said. A hundred yards up the path, some gentleman on a sizable black gelding waited for her. Her groom tarried a respectful dozen yards back. Colin looked for Miss Anwen, but she apparently hadn’t ridden out with her sister.
“I’ve been worrying about Hamish for years,” Colin replied. “It doesn’t do any good. Hamish will do as he pleases, and there’s no stopping him. If he has toyed with your affections, I can only apologize on his behalf, and tell you that’s not at all like him.”
As much as Colin hated to see Miss Megan gazing at the door at one society gathering after another, he was equally troubled to have lost track of his older brother. London in springtime was probably Hamish’s idea of a nightmare, and yet, Colin had had such hopes.
“Will you ride with me, Lord Colin? I’d like to put a few questions to you, and we have relative privacy.”
She was a lady, Colin was a gentleman—or aspiring to become one—and he could not refuse her. He turned his gelding alongside the mare and prepared to dodge an awkward interrogation.
“I will tell you what I can,” Colin said. “I won’t violate any confidences.” Not that Hamish confided in his siblings. Possibly in his horse, or their papa’s headstone, but never anything so trifling as a mere younger brother.
“Tell me about growing up in Scotland,” Miss Megan said as her mare ambled along in the sun’s first rays. “Tell me about your home and your younger brothers.”
On those topics, Colin could be effusive, and so he held forth for a good half hour, while the horses walked the bridle paths, the sun rose, and Megan’s escort kept them in sight at all times.
“Hamish ought to be the one hacking out with you first thing in the day,” Colin said, some while later. “I don’t know what’s amiss with him, Miss Megan, but if I were to ask him, he’d snap and growl and tell me to buy a new pair of boots.”
Maybe not boots, given the expenses Rhona and Edana had been running up lately.
“He’s not been right since Spain, has he?”
Abruptly, Colin realized that all the reminiscing about Perthshire and describing the family tree had been so much subterfuge on Megan Windham’s part. She’d been earning his trust, letting him maunder on as if his every word were her greatest delight. Like the bumbling idiot he often was, Colin had obliged her.
“Hamish never wanted to go to war,” Colin said. “I know that, and I tried to talk him out of it. Leaving Scotland was like parting with a vital organ for him, but more and more of the local lads were joining up, and I’d seen as much of Perthshire as any young man needs to. I was mad to buy my colors, and there was nobody to stop me.”
“You were young, Lord Colin. We haven’t much sense when we’re young.”
She spoke as if she—a perfect lady from a perfect family—had blundered badly at some point, which wasn’t possible.
“Hamish did not want me to go,” Colin said, the words twisting a knife of guilt in his conscience. “I concocted stirring speeches about patriotism, and the Corsican monster, and doing my part, but the truth is, I don’t care a bit for whichever George we’re stuck with on the throne. Never have, which makes me a scoundrel, I suppose. I simply wanted adventure, new sights, new faces, and some glory of my own.”
Other riders were coming toward them, a pair of fellows whom Colin recognized as more perfectly turned-out Windhams—still no Miss Anwen. Both men rode fine horseflesh, and while the smiles they aimed at Megan were affectionate, Colin rated only a scowling tip of the hat.
As it should be, because the wrong MacHugh was keeping the lady company.
“Did you find new sights, new adventure, and a bit of glory of your own?” Miss Megan asked when she and Colin had resumed their progress down the path.
Colin gave her question some thought, because this was not a woman to be dismissed with casual gallantries. Without her glasses, she wasn’t scrutinizing his expression, but she’d hear insincerity in his voice.
“I made wonderful friends, saw parts of the world a Scottish lad wouldn’t have seen otherwise, and I fought well. I enjoyed most of army life, and I can say that honestly.”
“Then Hamish is doubtless pleased for you, and your happiness means the world to him. Maybe you ought to be pleased for yourself?”
