Page 6 of The Lyon Whisperer
They showed their hands.
Culver laughed with glee. “This round goes to me. Another?”
“Why not?”
The dealer shuffled the deck.
“Never have known what that brother of mine and his sorry excuse for a wife did to cause a lad of sixteen to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders as Chase has always done. To this day, he’s straight as an arrow, implacable as steel, with nary a thought for the less serious things of life that makes all the struggle worth it. Still. He’s a good lad. Loyal, too, if a mite too concerned with the proprieties.”
Fallsgate didn’t hear a thing wrong with the man Culver described. In point of fact, he wished his own daughter had more respect for the proprieties. She with all her hare-brained notions, outspokenness, and ill-conceived plots.
He sorted his hand and contemplated Amelia. He’d hoped when she began attending meetings of the Ladies’ Literary Society of London last year she might mature—and come ’round to his way of thinking. Thus far, the bettering works she and her friends must surely be reading had produced no discernible fruit.
Oblivious to Fallsgate’s morose musings, Culver continued. “If you must know, Lady Culver and I, well, we have a love of entertaining and ajoie de vivrethat”—he broke off, a chagrined expression covering his face—“mayhave gotten out of hand while the lad was away in Spain, fighting off that devil Napoleon.”
Fallsgate nodded, mouth twitching at hearing the hard-as-steelIron Lionreferred to aslad. “Where he helped land the victory earning him his moniker.” He slid his discards toward the dealer.
She snapped off two cards from the deck.
“The Iron Lion of Barrosa,” Culver stated with obvious pride. “Precisely. The same victory what led the king to grant him a barony in his own right. Ah, thank you, my dear.” Culver picked up his cards.
The pretty, glittering blonde gave him a wink.
Fallsgate drank more port and re-sorted his cards. “I don’t mind telling you your nephew impressed me immensely yesterday when he came to luncheon—in your stead. I had anticipated you and I discussing the commission’s findings. Instead, I found myself hanging on the baron’s every word as he shared anecdotes about his military career and time on the peninsula. He has a good head on his shoulders. Seems solid. Steady. He’ll do well in the House, with the right contacts behind him, of course.”
Culver nodded and flicked him a glance before returning his focus to his cards. He might have missed the tell-tale glimmer of amusement in his old acquaintance’s eyes had he not been watching for it.
Bloody hell.He squared his shoulders. Best to confront the elephant in the room head on. “I take it the Iron Lion told you of yesterday’s debacle in my home perpetrated by my silly chit of a daughter?”
Culver coughed into his fist, clearly fighting laughter. “He may have mentioned something to do with a litter of pups.”
Fallsgate snorted in disgust.
The viscount sent him a commiserate grin. “Come now. It’s not so bad as all that.”
“Says the man who has a paragon for a nephew.”
Culver called.
They laid out their hands.
“My three of a kind beats your pair. I’ve almost won back all m’ blunt. Mayhap I won’t have to beg for a forward on my quarterly allowance after all. Got my eye on a beauty at Tattersalls.”
Culver scraped his winnings toward him and motioned for the dealer to go again. “Paragons ain’t all they’re cracked up to be. Don’t misunderstand, Lady Culver and I love Chase like he’s our own. It’s because we do we sometimes lament his too-upright nature. What’s so wrong with a little spirit, I ask you?”
Fallsgate opened his mouth to outline exactly what was wrong with it, when a lady’s voice forestalled him. “Good evening, gentlemen. Enjoying yourselves tonight?” The mysterious, veil-clad lady arrived to stand beside their table.
“Why, Mrs. Dove-Lyon. Good of you to pay us a visit,” Culver said. “Brought a new customer in for you tonight. Meet Lord Benedict Duval, Earl of Fallsgate.”
“Madam,” he said in greeting.
Her mouth, all of her face he could see, curved in a slow smile. “Lord Duval of Fallsgate.” She spoke his name and title as if committing it to memory then made to leave. Before she stepped from the alcove, her face pivoted in the direction of their dealer.
The woman looked up, brows raised in silent query.
“Take good care of them,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said. “Let us see if we can earn the earl’s patronage.”
“Of course, madam.”
