Page 5 of When the Marquess Was Mine
In the silence of their wake, Georgiana looked at Kitty. “What else does Charles say?” she ventured to ask.
“Not much.” Kitty’s gaze fell on the letter, brooding and pensive. “That’s what worries me.”
“I confess I can’t see them crossing paths,” said Georgiana frankly. “Westmorland is a very different sort than Charles. Whatever it was between them, Westmorland may not have noticed or cared, regardless of what Charles fears.”
“We both know there is one place they might meet.” Kitty pressed her fingertips to her temples as if they hurt. “Charles enjoys cards more than he ought to.”
Georgiana had forgotten that. Charles wasn’t the most interesting person; handsome without being arresting, amiable without being engaging. It was entirely possible to spend an evening with him and not recall a single word he’d said the next day. It had been a bit of a surprise when Kitty married him, but he was a baronet and eligible enough. Kitty had always been a forceful personality, and Georgiana supposed she’d wanted a husband who would give way to her. Kitty would hardly be the first woman to feel so, and as she’d brought a sizable fortune to her less wealthy husband, perhaps she felt entitled to have the upper hand in her marriage. She certainly had more sense than Charles.
But Georgiana wasn’t about to say any of that aloud. She busied herself adjusting the baby’s blanket.
“Tell me the truth. Is Westmorland a gambler?” There was tension in Kitty’s question.
Georgiana smoothed Annabel’s soft, fair hair. “Well, yes. I believe he is.” She didn’t precisely know Westmorland’s habits, but several of his mates were notorious for scandalously extravagant wagers and parties. It would be shocking if he weren’t the same, given how much he was seen with them.
A fierce frown touched Kitty’s brow. “I worry about that. Charles has sometimes said the stakes at our neighbors’ parties here in Maryfield are so low as to make any game dull. I hope he would be too clever to get drawn into a table with men like that, but if the marquess joined a table where he was playing...”
Georgiana thought it very doubtful that the Marquess of Westmorland would want to join any table where Charles Winston was already playing. More likely it would be the other way around. Westmorland, with the wealth of Rowland behind him, could afford far higher and more exciting stakes than Charles could.
He also preferred gaudier, flashier company, the dashing crème de la crème of London rogues, rakes, and ne’er-do-wells. Charles Winston, simple baronet of Derbyshire, would never be dashing or outrageous enough for the jaded marquess. It really was astonishing that they’d met in the first place.
But it wasn’t shocking at all that Charles hadn’t come out of the encounter well.
“No matter what happened, I don’t doubt for a moment that Westmorland was at fault,” Georgiana said breezily. “He’s a thoroughgoing scoundrel, but I’m equally certain he’s forgotten all about... whatever it was by now. Why, he must have gone on at least two or three drunken benders since he could have met Charles.”
Kitty’s jaw set, her mood unchanged. “Charles mentioned suffering a loss at his hands. Not to his person, but to his dignity. It must be gambling.”
Probably.
“And it’s very disturbing that he thinks the man might come here,” Kitty finished slowly.
Georgiana glanced at her uncertainly, but the baby began to fret louder, then to cry in earnest. Kitty’s attention switched to her infant daughter. She took the child and settled her against her shoulder, patting the tiny girl until she calmed down.
“You mustn’t worry about it,” Georgiana tried to assure her. “Even if Westmorland has the unspeakable nerve to come here, we shall bar the door and lock him out in the rain. Pelt him with stale dinner rolls and insult his tailor. That sort of thing sends any rake worth his debauched reputation howling back to London, you know.”
Kitty quirked a brow, her expression easing. “Of course you would think nothing of locking the door against a marquess.”
“Against that one, I would not,” Georgiana agreed with a cheeky grin. “In fact, I would enjoy it.”
Finally her friend laughed. “I don’t doubt it.” She pressed her cheek to the baby’s downy head. “But still I hope he does not come.”
“Kitty,” said Georgiana honestly, “I cannot imagine that he would.”
Chapter 3
The harbinger of the apocalypse would be a lawyer.
Robert Churchill-Gray, Marquess of Westmorland, was thoroughly convinced of this. Even more, he suspected that lawyer would be his father’s solicitor, Sir Algernon Sneed, who had invaded not just his house but his dressing room. And Sneed was in the dressing room only because West’s valet, Hobbes, had thrown himself in the bedroom doorway and threatened bloodshed if the solicitor advanced.
He was grateful to Hobbes for that, as small a mercy as it might have been. He was still rousted from bed and forced to sit through a painful dressing-down from his mother, delivered in Sir Algernon’s cool, polished voice that stripped the passion from the duchess’s words but not the import. She had heard rumors of some of his latest activities and was—to put it mildly—not pleased.
For his part, Rob barely remembered the night of debauchery that had set off his mother’s ire. It had been his birthday—he remembered that well enough—and there had been a raucous celebration, plotted and carried off in high style by Heathercote. He remembered his friends, wine, excellent food, brandy, women, more wine, gambling... They might have sung “God Save the King” while flashing their arses at Carleton House.
Unfortunately, it was something he did not remember with any clarity that had brought Sir Algernon to his door, courtesy of some gossipy friend of his mother’s writing a scandalized, and quite probably exaggerated, account to Her Grace.
“I trust you will do whatever is necessary to rectify this appalling situation,” read Sir Algernon, his wire-rimmed spectacles perched on the end of his nose. “Posthaste. I should hate to have to send your father to London to speak some sense to you, and he would be very grieved to do it, as the fishing at Salmsbury has been excellent of late.”
“That’s enough. I grasp her meaning.” Rob put out his hand for the letter. The moment his mother threatened to send his father, he was doomed. The Duke of Rowland was generally an amiable, affable fellow, but when his temper was roused—and it would be, by missing quality fishing—woe betide the man who got in his way, including and especially his son and heir.
