“Old Marchfield is trying to give you the slip again?” the duke called after her. “Tell him, he cannot pawn you off on me by dropping you here and speeding off! If he tries it,I’lldrop you at the nearest gin shop! Hah! Then the gin shop people will probably run you up to St. Giles! Who knows what that neighborhood will do about it. Put you on a boat at Portsmouth maybe. Watch out, Boston—things are about to go downhill!”
Lady Marchfield did not deign to respond to any of the various places where she might be relocated.
The duke’s daughters were remarkably unaffected by this exchange between their father and their aunt. Percy supposed he could understand—he was rather unfazed by his own father’s outbursts. When a person was outrageous on a regular schedule, it hardly caught one’s attention after a while.
Lady Winsome put the pile of yellow and blue strips of paper on an ottoman and dragged it to the center of the room. “Now, Mr. Stratton, the game is simple—you will be asked a question. When you answer you may tell the truth or tell a fib, and then the rest of us will guess at it before you reveal which it was. If you fool us, you get a yellow ticket, and if you do not, you get a blue ticket. Papa has already earned one blue ticket for pretending we are bad dreams and he cannot stand the sight of us. Don’t worry, he always loses.”
Percy supposed the dukewouldalways lose, ranged against seven determined daughters.
“Now, if you get two yellow tickets, you win,” Lady Verity said. “But a blue ticket cancels a yellow, so Papa already is in the hole.”
Percy began to worry that this game of theirs might wander into dangerous territory, depending on what questions wereasked of him. The questions might well be more embarrassing than having to admit he had a cat named Blueberry.
“I’ll pull rank and start the game,” the duke said. “Stratton, what would you say is Felicity’s best feature?”
Chapter Eleven
Percy stared atthe duke. What would he say was Lady Felicity’s best feature? This game was going to get very personal. Too personal!
Seven pairs of eyes bored into him.
“Uh, well, let’s see, if I am pressed…”
Lady Felicity’s complexion was growing redder by the minute. He assumed his own was following suit.
“The clock is ticking,” the duke said, “our lives are draining away minute by minute.”
“Her hair,” Percy said.
“Fibber!” Serenity cried. “It’s her eyes!”
Percy did not think he had a very good understanding of this game. Was it that he was to tellhistruth ortheirtruth?
“Well, I…”
“Never mind it, Stratton,” the duke said, pouring himself another port. “You can’t win with this army of hooligans. Have another port, it’s really the only thing you can do while you rack up blue tickets.”
Patience gave him his blue ticket, while the duke refilled his glass.
The game went on and Percy was grateful that there were so many daughters. Not every question was pointed in his direction.
Over the next hour, he discovered that the last sunrise Serenity had cried over had been that very morning. Apparently, she was very struck by sunrises.
Patience was asked how she fared with tea delayed for over an hour that afternoon, as there had been some sort of kerfuffle with the kitchen’s stoves. She claimed she simply occupied herself with a book. Everybody, including the duke who had not even been there, named her a fibber and she was promptly given a blue ticket.
As it would turn out, Lady Patience had several times stomped on the floor over the kitchens. The cook, being well used to the family and impossible to rattle, had answered her by using a broom handle to whack his ceiling in response.
Winsome was asked when last she’d accused Verity of making something up. It had been only a few hours ago and was perfectly true.
Verity was then asked if shehadmade something up. She stuck to her story, which was that it was an accepted fact that she had grown an inch in the past month. As everyone had eyes and could see her, she was promptly named a fibber.
It was inquired of Grace whether or not she’d tripped over anything that week. She vehemently denied it, but covered a bruise on her elbow at the same time so she was caught out.
Finally, all eyes drifted toward Lady Felicity. Grace said, “Felicity, has your opinion of Mr. Stratton changed since he saved you from a tiger?”
There had been a long pause. Then she had said quietly, “I believe so.”
She had been given a yellow ticket with no debate from anybody.
