The game went on, with Lord Radner accused of fibbing when he claimed he was not in love. Then the judgment against him was revised when he explained that he hoped to be in love and his blue ticket was traded out for a yellow ticket. The duke was asked about his sorrow at losing daughters to marriage, as it had become a tradition for him to claim he was delighted and be instantly denounced as a fibber. Valor was eventually sent to bed for accusing them all of fibbing about the foxes, throwing blue tickets at everybody, and then weeping over her outburst.
It all went on amusingly, but for Lord Stanford’s answer. Liveliness. What did it mean?
He was so confusing. She knew he looked at her a lot—why would he only come up with liveliness? It was the sort of compliment an older matron might give to an exceedingly plain girl. It was the sort of compliment one made when one was hard-pressed to come up with anything.
The party eventually broke up and there was the usual bustle in the hall as coats were retrieved and carriages called. Felicity leaned over to Patience and said, “I believe he only needs a little prompting.”
“Really?” Patience whispered back.
Felicity nodded. “His answer was nonsensical, but I kept a close eye on him. He was often looking at you.”
Patience felt a wave of relief upon hearing it. Her instincts could not have been wrong, even though it had seemed for a moment that they might be. He only needed prompting.
She just must figure out how a lady went about prompting, as she did not know the first thing about it. She would ask the duke about it, as she was certain her father would have heard of such a thing.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Just before Marcus’ carriage had departed the duke’s house a footman had come running out with a fan in his hand. The boy looked up and down the road and audibly sighed.
“Lady Alice left her fan,” he said.
“No matter, we can return it on the morrow,” Marcus said. “We are to visit a friend on her square, it will be an easy matter to drop it off.”
They were to see Kendrickson on the morrow and he, as well as Lady Alice, lived on Bedford Square.
“Thank you, my lord,” he said, handing over the fan. The footman paused, then said, “I hope you don’t have the wrong idea about that butler in there. He’ll be leaving soon. What I mean is, it weren’t usual for him to drink wine at the sideboard.”
With that, the footman turned and jogged back into the house.
Marcus rapped on the roof and the carriage set off. Radner sat across from Marcus with an amused smile on his face.
“Well, well, well,” Radner said.
Marcus looked at him quizzically. “Well, what?”
“Despite your carefully composed ideas of who would suit you, Lady Alice is out of the running.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Come now, Stanford, you did not look once in that lady’s direction the entire time we were in the drawing room.”
“Nonsense, I am sure I did.”
“I am sure you did not. It was all eyes on Lady Patience. As well, if you did have an interest, you would not have agreed to return her fan. Your caution and go slowly flags would have been raised up the mast and flap in a brisk wind. But, having no interest in her, it seemed a small matter.”
“I believe you are being both illogical and dramatic. In any case, if I did on occasion look toward Lady Patience, we were in her house.”
“Her rather deranged house. You see? That’s what’s so funny about it. The younger ladies at table, the odd conversation, the three-legged dog under the table, the incompetent butler, Fact or Fib with the youngest of them throwing tickets in our faces over a fox—none of it aligns with your measured ideas.”
“They are an unusual household.”
“The most unusual, as far as I can tell. Very amusing that you would go for precisely what you thought you did not want.”
“Go for? Radner, I would appreciate it if you would keep your wild imaginings to yourself.”
Radner shrugged and looked out the window.
Surely, he had looked in Lady Alice’s direction as often as Lady Patience’s direction. Or perhaps he had not.
