“I have been given the honor of the first,” Charles said.
Of course he would have run to the duchess and asked for it, Roland thought. As soon as he’d seen Roland approach thelady, he’d been determined to find out more. His brother would have seen that he’d taken the dance before supper and decided to make it into some sort of competition. There was nothing Charles could not make a competition out of.
“I will lead Lady Serenity into supper,” Roland said.
“Ah,” the duke said, pointing at Charles, “he’s got you there, has he not? He got you on the title, and now he’s got you out the gate at Almack’s. Though, naming it a supper is very complimentary and entirely a fib. I wouldn’t feed that nonsense to my dog, and he’s only got three legs and one working eye.”
Charles’ back stiffened. The duke would not know he’d just hit a very sore spot by mentioning the title.
“Roland!” Lady Marchfield hissed.
Roland turned to her in alarm, but she was glaring at her brother. Then he recalled that they both carried the same given name.
“Papa, you know perfectly well that Nelson is the best dog in the wide world, despite what might look like deficiencies.”
“So I’ve been told many times, my dear,” the duke said. “I suppose that’s why he gets the best of our meats for his dinner?”
“Just so,” Lady Serenity said. She turned to Roland and Charles. “We discovered Nelson outside of an inn. He was surviving on scraps.”
“Scraps?” Charles said. “How cruel!”
This pretending to be shocked seemed to strike Lady Serenity rather hard, though it was nonsense. Charles did not have a care for animals at all, and it had caused many a rift between them over the years.
The orchestra had been tuning for some time. Now couples began to move to their places for the cotillion. “Lady Serenity,” Charles said, holding out his arm.
His brother led the lady away. Roland suppressed a sigh and walked off to find Lady Matilda.
