“In other news,” Magnon said, “my mother waxed on about the Duke of Pelham returning to Town to launch a daughter. I interrupted her with the strong recommendation that she does not attempt to engineer a match between myself and that duke’s daughter.”
“As you had every right,” Percy said.
“Perhaps the right, but there was no point in it. As it happens, I was too precipitous in crossing her. There is, in fact, nothing to cross. She was telling me of that gentleman’s arrival to warn me off. She says that when she last saw the duke, he was vulgar, drunk, and had set a lady’s curtains on fire. He was as unpredictable as a cornered badger. She does not expect an improvement and would not care to be related by marriage to him.”
“Good fun, though,” Wiles said, “to see what he’s like now. With any luck, he’ll have half the hostesses in Town fanning themselves. After all, what is one to do with a deranged duke? One wishes to know a duke, and yet not know a deranged person.”
“A deranged duke?” Percy said softly. “Would not a deranged duke have a deranged daughter?”
“Who’s to say?” Wiles said.
“I bet he does,” Percy said. “I cannot know too much until I clap eyes on the lady, but a deranged daughter might be just the thing for my plan. Think of this—every lady who comes to Town comes for one thing only, a husband. It would follow that aderangeddaughter would come for… not a husband. And then, she is a duke’s daughter, one might suppose a lowly mister destined to be a viscount would be quite under her deranged shoe.”
“Your feats of logic continue to astound,” Magnon said.
“More like feats of fantasy,” Wiles said.
“I will not be chained!” Percy said.
Really, it was the phrase that kept his spirits up. He had to keep his spirits up. Nobody ever won a war against their father if their spirits flagged. He would not be chained. Not this season, anyway.
Fingers crossed that the duke’s deranged daughter would see fit to help him out.
*
Mrs. Agnes Righthad been housekeeper for the duke for nineteen years. Other servants had come and gone, most notably a butler whose mind collapsed on one glorious spring day. All along, Mrs. Right had gone on steady.
There were some who could not hold up against the duke’s eccentricities, but she was well-used to his bizarre habits and they did not ruffle her feathers one bit. In truth, she was fond of the old soldier.
As for his girls, well, it felt as if they were her own children, they were all that close. She had been there to run to at all hours and she had guarded their futures carefully.
Mrs. Right had made certain that her girls had every tutor they would require and shielded those tutors from the more uncomfortable aspects of the duke. It was essential that her girls learn to dance well, and draw middling, and she taught them embroidery herself. They’d had a French tutor until they were at least conversant. The music tutor had not fared as well, and Mrs. Right had quietly closed the pianoforte and no longer bothered to have it tuned. They’d even had a governess for a very short period of time, though that lady had decamped one early morning, leaving behind a note that only said:GOODBYE.
People had come, people had gone. Just now things were very comfortable. There was the duke’s valet, who was no trouble to anybody as he was a private person who did not stick his nose in. The two footmen were clever enough to know their lives were made easier without a butler. The cook was left to his own domain and managed his own staff. The housemaids were a good sort of girls who made sure to do just enough. The stables were its own world entirely and run under the stablemaster. None of these people had need of a butler, and all of these people were satisfied with Mrs. Right taking on the mantle.
The duke’s girls were satisfied with her too. All along, it was Mrs. Right who was the girls’ constant presence to rely upon. She’d always felt that she must be the protector of these seven young ladies.
She felt particularly protective at this moment, now that Felicity was to be shown round the viper’s pit some liked to call London. The poor girl was to be led forward by one of the preeminent vipers—Lady Marchfield.
That unpleasant lady had been in the house on Grosvenor Square all the day long, sniffing round, inspecting every corner, and threatening to hire a butler.
Let her go ahead and hire a butler. Mrs. Right would drive him out as fast as he came in. The last one, Mr. Herring, had fled the house over five years ago. Everyone presumed it had been the duke’s fault, but the truth was Mr. Herring could not cope with the various salvos she’d fired in his direction.
Mrs. Right snorted as she remembered sitting at the servants’ table and making an announcement. “I would very much appreciate it, Mr. Herring, if you would stop making eyes at me or brushing up against me in the corridors. Make no mistake, my bedchamber door will remain firmly and forever locked.”
What was a butler to say to that? He denied it vehemently, but it predictably sent the gossip in the house into a frenzy. Mrs. Right had helped the talk along by pretending at being the modest and injured party. She’d touched her cheeks with rouge to appear always blushing and she got into the habit of clutching her shawl tightly round her, as if to ward off impertinences.
Then of course she had been free with switching the dinner menus around. The duke was in the habit of leaving a note on his desk in the morning regarding what he wanted for his dinner. Mrs. Right had assiduously collected a pile of them and switched them with abandon. After Mr. Herring had gone in and read the old note she’d placed there, she would tiptoe back in and return the original. The duke wished for beef and got a ham instead. Day after day.
The duke was very particular about his dinners and went mad each time they were not what he wished for. He fell into the habit of asking Mr. Herring if he were going senile.
That had been the beginning of Mr. Herring’s mental collapse. After that, it had only taken a few light pushes to send that butler plummeting off the cliffs of insanity. The final shove was slipping a copy ofFanny Hillinto his rooms for a maid to find, firmly painting him as a rake of the highest ill-repute. That was particularly hilarious, as Mrs. Right was certain Mr. Herring could not seduce a post.
She sometimes wondered where he was now.
Yes, Lady Marchfield, bring in any butler you like. However, be prepared for the consequences.
She quick-knocked on Felicity’s door and strode in. Mrs. Right was everything to the girls, including lady’s maid, which was another thing Lady Marchfield was intent on changing.
