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"To soften my heart," she said.
"Yes." He stepped back from the bed. "And in another moment, I shall be on my knees, begging you to take pity. I am abominable. A great problem."
"Yes," she said. "Yes, you are. Go away, Esmond. Now."
He went promptly because, though he'd spoken as truthfully as he could—more truthfully than he'd done in years—he could not overcome the habits of a lifetime. He had missed nothing—the way her eyes softened while he spoke, the way her posture eased and her body shifted ever so slightly, inclining toward him—and every instinct had urged him to take advantage. He would have fallen to his knees and begged, conscienceless beast that he was. Because he hadn't lied. He didn't know how to stop wanting her. And so nothing—honor, wisdom, caution, even pride—could keep him from trying.
Chapter 10
On the stroke of noon, Nick entered Ismal's bedroom to announce Lord Avory's arrival. Ismal was still in his dressing gown.
"Shall I let him cool his heels in the library?" Nick asked.
"What sort of mood is he in?"
"About as beastly as yours." Nick slammed shaving materials onto the washstand. "I daresay you'll expect to get shaved in thirty seconds."
"You should not have let me oversleep."
"When I tried to wake you, you offered to relieve me of my private parts. In painfully explicit terms." Nick commenced to stropping the razor with vicious energy.
"I think I prefer to shave myself today," Ismal said. "Send His Lordship up."
Nick stalked out.
Ismal had lain awake a long time, pondering Leila Beaumont's aching temples and the self-loathing that seemed to be part of it—a shame Ismal had little doubt her husband had planted. Beaumont, clearly, had possessed a gift for poisoning minds.
Undoubtedly, Sherburne's mind had been poisoned, to cause such a bitter and painful estrangement from an adoring wife who'd erred but once—and then mainly thanks to her husband's provocation. Then there was Lady Carroll, who'd conceived such an intense hatred of Lord Avory...and Avory himself, with the terrible secret that prevented his wooing the girl he loved.
Unfit, Avory had called himself. He had also pinpointed the time his problems had begun. Two years ago, right after Edmund Carstairs' suicide.
During his sleepless hours, Ismal had begun to formulate a theory. Now, as he began lathering his face, he prepared himself to test it. He wasn't looking forward to the procedure. He had become rather fond of Lord Avory...who was attached to him, trusted him, looked up to him as though Ismal were an infinitely heroic and admirable older brother.
Avory couldn't know Ismal was a vulture, waiting to pluck out his secrets.
Just as Ismal finished lathering his face, the marquess entered.
"Please forgive me," Ismal said as he took up the razor. "I overslept."
"I wish I had done." Avory plunked himself down on the window seat. "Instead, I spent the morning reviewing my accounts with Mama."
Ismal gave him a sympathetic glance. "Your expression tells me the experience was not agreeable." He began shaving, his mind working with the same brisk sureness as his hand.
"It is thoroughly mortifying to have to account—with receipts—for every curst ha'penny," his guest said. "Today I learned receipts aren't enough. I'm now expected to provide all the whys and wherefores as well. So we quarreled." He bent to brush a speck of dust from his boots. "I told her that I she disapproved of how I spent my paltry allowance, she needn't give me any. She threatened to oblige me. I recommended that she and Father make a proper job of it and disown me entirely," he said, straightening.
The vulture began to circle and descend.
"It is no use, you know," Ismal told him. "If you do not wish to inherit, you will have to hang yourself. They cannot disown you. You are all they have—the last male of your line."
"Not all they have. There are other branches of the family tree." Avory gave a short laugh. "Still, I most certainly am the very last of the direct line. Father's so proud of the fact that the title's gone straight from father to son since the time of the first Duke of Langford—unlike the convoluted genealogy of the Royal Family. As though that were anything to boast of, when it's just a matter of luck."
His face hardening, he rose and moved to the dressing table. "It seems our luck has run out." He sank down into the chair and began arranging Ismal's toiletries in rows in order of size.
"So that is the problem," Ismal murmured as he angled the shaving glass for a better view of the marquess' countenance. "You believe you will fail to produce the necessary heir." He saw the muscle leap in Avory's jaw. "Or do I misunderstand?"
There was a very long silence. Ismal continued shaving.
"I shouldn't have quarreled with Mama," Avory said at last in a low voice. He was staring at the orderly arrangement he'd made. "I simply should have told her. But it's not the sort of thing one tells anybody. I didn't mean to tell you. But I seem to have dropped a broad enough hint. I'm always complaining to you. Sorry."
"It is necessary to speak to someone," Ismal said. "You refer to impotence, yes?"
¯¯
Several hours later, Ismal sent Avory home with a list of dietary instructions, a recipe for an herbal tisane, and the promise that Nick would prepare and deliver some pills before nightfall. The pills were no more necessary than the diet and tisane, for the cure was already taking effect. The problem was all in Avory's head, where Beaumont had maliciously put it with a few well-chosen words. Ismal had simply excised it with a few very different well-chosen words. But being English, the marquess was more likely to believe in the efficacy of bad-tasting medicines than mere speech.
After instructing Nick to make the harmless pills as foul-tasting as possible, Ismal set out for a walk. The last few hours had proved emotionally wearying. Since the fatigue was mental rather than physical, exercise was a preferable remedy to lying about brooding.
He was striding briskly through Pall Mall when he spied a familiar black-garbed feminine figure entering the door of number fifty-two—the British Institution. Madame Beaumont was accompanied by a gentleman. And neither Gaspard nor Eloise was anywhere in sight.
Within minutes, Ismal had gained admittance. Moments later, he found her in a chamber where a handful of artists labored before an assortment of old master works. She was speaking to one of the artists—a young woman—and the fellow with her turned out to be Lord Sellowby. Who turned out to be standing much too close.
Ismal simply stood in the entryway, looking idly about while he focused all his furious concentration on Leila Beaumont. Finally, after two interminable minutes, her posture stiffened and her gaze shot to him.
Arranging a polite smile on his face, Ismal approached.
"The British Institution is exceedingly popular today,” said Sellowby, after greetings had been exchanged and the young artist introduced as Miss Greenlaw.
"I misunderstood," Ismal said. "When I saw Madame Beaumont enter, I assumed some of her works were on display."
"They might be," said she icily, "if I'd been dead a couple of centuries."
"And if she were a man," said Miss Greenlaw. "You shan't find a woman artist's work in this lot." She informed Ismal that she was entering the annual competition to create a companion piece to one of the works on display. The three best works would win prizes of one hundred, sixty, and forty pounds, respectively.
"Miss Greenlaw did me the honor of requesting a critique," said Madame. "Which I am sure she would prefer not be done before a crowd."
"I do not believe two onlookers constitute a crowd," Sellowby said with a faint smile.
"Two bored and fidgety men do," she said. "I know you'll fidget—first, because the discussion isn't about you and second, because you won't understand what it is about." She waved her hand dismissively. "Go talk among yourselves—or look at the pictures. Perhaps you'll absorb some culture by accident."
"I shouldn't dream of taking such a risk," said Sellowby. "I shall await
you outside, Mrs. Beaumont. Esmond, care to join me?"
By the time they reached the pavement, Ismal was apprised of the fact that Mrs. Beaumont had consented to dine with Sellowby and his sister, Lady Charlotte, at what Sellowby deemed the ungodly hour of six o'clock.
"One encounters fewer strictures when dining with the King," Sellowby said as they ambled down the street. "My sister must have an early dinner. Mrs. Beaumont must speak to Miss Greerdaw first, for she promised. But before she could do that, we had to wait for Mrs. Beaumont's woman servant to finish whatever it was she was doing, so that she could accompany us."
Eloise, it turned out, was waiting in His Lordship's carriage. This news allayed Ismal's agitation not a whit.
