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“Do you know the Earl of Blanchard, Munroe?” The king gestured to his host.
“I haven’t had the pleasure.” Alistair made another bow. “Forgive me, sir, for bursting into your party so precipitously.”
Blanchard’s expression was sour, but he could hardly demure now that the king had welcomed Alistair. He nodded curtly.
“And these gentlemen are the Duke of Lister; his son and heir, the Earl of Kimberly; and Lord Hasselthorpe.” The king indicated the men sitting across from him and to his other side.
Hasselthorpe sat to the king’s left. He was a distinguished-looking gentleman of middling years. Lister and his son were across from the king. Lister was of an age with Hasselthorpe. He wore a wine-colored coat with a waistcoat beneath that curved over his sloping belly. His heir was a brawny young man who wore his own brown hair clubbed back and unpowdered. He was frowning slightly as if in confusion at Alistair’s abrupt entrance. Lister was eyeing Alistair narrowly beneath a curled gray wig.
Alistair bowed and sat. The fact that Lister’s heir was present was an unforeseen bit of luck. “I beg your forgiveness, Your Majesty, gentlemen, but the matter I come about is most urgent.”
“Indeed?” The king was a fair man with pink cheeks and prominent blue eyes. He wore a snowy white wig and strikingly brilliant blue coat and waistcoat. “Have you finished your opus on the flora and fauna of Britain?”
“I am very near the end, Your Majesty, and if it pleases Your Highness, I beg the favor of dedicating my book to you.”
“Granted, my dear Munroe, granted.” The king’s color had risen in pleasure. “We look forward to reading this tome when it is finished and published.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Alistair replied. “I hope to—”
But Lister cut him off with a loud cough. “Pleasant as the information of your book’s progress is, Munroe, I do not see why you need interrupt the king’s luncheon to tell him of it.”
A very slight frown appeared between the king’s eyebrows. At the far end of the room, the door opened again and a blond young lady entered and seated herself in an empty chair at the table. She cast an inquisitive glance at them.
Alistair turned to Lister and smiled genially. “I do not mean to bore you with the details of my studies as a naturalist. I realize that not everyone is as fascinated by the oddities of God’s world as His Highness and I.”
Lister’s face went blank as he understood his faux pas, but Alistair continued. “Actually, the business I come about involves you as well.”
He paused and took a sip of the wine that had been placed at his elbow.
Lister’s eyebrows rose. “Do you mean to enlighten us?”
Alistair smiled and set his wineglass down. “Naturally.” He turned and addressed the king. “I have been studying the habits of badgers recently, Your Majesty. Amazing what secrets are hidden in even the most mundane of animals.”
“Indeed?” The king leaned forward in interest.
“Oh, yes,” Alistair said. “For instance, although the badger sow is a creature known for its unpleasant and even aggressive disposition, when it comes to her young, or kits, she shows a pretty maternal side that rivals even the most caring of animals.”
He paused to take another sip of wine.
“How extraordinary!” the king exclaimed. “We would never think a lowly badger to hold the higher feelings God has granted mankind.”
“Exactly.” Alistair nodded. “I myself was moved to sympathy by the plight of a sow when her kits were killed by a hawk. She cried most piteously for her dead children, running back and forth and refusing any sustenance for days. Indeed, I was afeared that she might starve herself to death, so saddened was she by the loss of her young.”
“And what has this to do with us?” Lister demanded impatiently.
Alistair turned slowly to him and smiled. “Why, do you not feel a small portion of sympathy for a badger so grief-stricken by the loss of her young, Your Grace?”
Lister sneered, but the king replied, “Any gentleman of true sensibility would, of course, be moved by such devotion.”
“Naturally,” Alistair murmured. “And how much more moved would a gentleman be by the plight of a lady deprived of her children?”
Silence fell. Lister’s eyes were narrowed to mere slits. His son was watching him in dawning understanding, and Hasselthorpe and Blanchard sat frozen. Alistair wasn’t aware how much the other gentlemen knew about Helen and Lister and their drama involving the children, but Lister’s son at least knew something. He looked quickly between his father and Alistair, his mouth set in a grim line.
“Do you speak of a specific lady, Munroe?” the king asked.
“Indeed, sire. There is a lady formerly acquainted with His Grace, the Duke of Lister, who has recently suffered the loss of her children.”
The king’s lips pursed. “They are dead?”
