Page 62 of How to Ruin a Duke
This admission was made grudgingly, though Edith could easily picture Lord Jeremiah making a dangerous boast when among his cronies.
“The book depicts the whole incident much differently.”Very differently, with Emory nearly going into the ditch and winning by the slimmest margin.“Did you win?”
“I won the race without besting the Regent’s personal record, though it was a near thing.I did not want Jeremiah to lose a prized possession, but neither could I have the Regent taking us into disfavor.”
“From whom did Lord Jeremiah win the vehicle?”
Emory took another bite of the tart then passed it to her.“Finish this, please.The curricle had been the property of one of his drinking companions who doubtless goaded him into the wager in hopes of recovering the carriage for himself.”
“Do you have a name?”
“Not yet, but I will.”He scribbled something on the paper.“Any more questions?”
“What about the drinking wager?”
“I will never touch another drop of gin for so long as I live, that’s what about the drinking wager.The very recollection makes my head pound and my gut roil.”
“And yet, you won that one too.”
His Grace grumbled out an explanation: A friend of Jeremiah’s had proposed to drink under the table any man holding his vowels in exchange for a return of the IOU.Losing the bet would ruin the fellow, and yet, he was more of a braggart than a drunkard or a Captain Sharp.Emory had accepted the wager, altering the terms such that if the duke could out-drink the other fellow, the duke came into possession of the debts of honor.
“I am a mastodon,” he said, “according to a noted authority, and thus able to hold my liquor.I won the bet and gave the notes of hand to Jeremiah to be collected if and when the fellow could pay.”
Again, very different from what the book had portrayed.
“It’s almost as if,” Edith said, “somebody who had no firsthand knowledge of these incidents colored them all with a fierce resentment for you, and relied on readers also not having any firsthand knowledge to fuel the book’s appeal.”
Emory ranged an arm along the back of the sofa and crossed his feet at the ankles.“One attempts discretion, especially when indulging in rank folly.Those who were witnesses to the lunacy would be unlikely to gossip beyond the masculine confessional of the gentlemen’s club.”
And what was said behind the walls of a gentlemen’s club was not to be repeated elsewhere.
“So we are likely dealing with a woman,” Emory went on.“A woman who hears a lot of male gossip, or can consult with male gossips, but not with the men who were present when I was making such an ass of myself.”
Edith liked watching his mind work, she liked that he’d abandon formal manners with her, and she liked very much sitting beside him when he did.She loathed that his basic decency had been misconstrued by some misanthropic female.
“What woman has cause to be angry with you, besides Miss Antigone?”
The duke’s expression was bleakly amused.“My mother, but then, she’s easily and often vexed.She fits the criteria though: She’s quite literary, she has the ear of half the tattlers in the realm, and she might well think a book of this nature would chivvy me into taking a duchess.”
“Has it?”That was none of Edith’s business, of course, but she wanted Emory to have at least one reliable ally to call his own.When she’d first joined his household, she’d realized that beneath his posturing and consequence, he was a decent fellow.
Even she hadn’t understood how decent.
Emory perused the notes he’d made.“Mama’s novel hasn’t inspired me in the sense she doubtless intended—if she wrote the blasted thing.Who among the young ladies would have taken me into dislike?”
They discussed disappointed hopefuls, matchmakers who might be out of patience with Emory, and wallflowers given to bitterness.That list was troublingly long, though few of the names on it had as much entrée among the gentlemen as a well connected duchess would have.
“A widow, I suppose,” Emory said, rising and stretching.“I have been avoiding them in recent months, not that I was ever much of a gallant in that regard.The hour grows late, but we have made progress.When might I call upon you again?”
Edith arranged her skirts and found a ducal hand extended in her direction.A gentleman typically did assist a lady to rise.
Well.She took his hand, but with the side table still before the loveseat, the confines were cramped.His shaving soap was still evident this close—a subtle blend of woods and spice.The fragrance graced a rainy, chilly day with a note of elegance, and memories of the ease Edith had enjoyed in the ducal household.
When she wasn’t being run off her feet by endless silly demands.
“May I ask you something?”Emory said, peering down at her.The afternoon light was waning, and the rain had slowed to desultory dripping from the eaves.
“You may.”
