Taking a glass of refreshing lemonade from a table, he wondered whether he should actually leave. He was, after all, entirely uninterested in music these days, although he had vague memories of singing and playing instruments as a child.
He had come only at the request of the host, Leo Payne, the Duke of Mildenhall, who apparently wished to consult him on some business matter.
He ought to have declined the invitation, he reflected gloomily. He had the strong suspicion that Leo was trying to be his friend and wasn’t sure he liked it. There were enough damned friends to keep up with as it was.
In addition, Leo’s persistent amicable overtures were an odd reminder that Nathaniel himself might have easily and indifferently married Primrose, Leo’s wife, if Leo and Primrose had not fallen in love.
It would have been convenient to install a duchess to oversee the domestic concerns of the duchy that he didn’t wish to bother with. Primrose’s lack of interest in Nathaniel would have made her an ideal wife in some respects, motivated solely by a wish to save her family.
Ah, well, no point in thinking about that now. The past and the future were both distant countries, and visiting them took far too much energy. Nathaniel preferred to live in the present, or at least exist there.
“There you are, Nathaniel!” said a familiar man’s voice at his shoulder.
Nathaniel suppressed a sigh of dismay. “Leo, I thought you would still be listening to the orchestra in there.”
“I came to find you when you stepped out of the recital, but you’ve been missing for a full half hour,” Leo told him. “And I noticed the Countess of Mountingdon leaving the room a few minutes before you…”
Nathaniel shrugged his shoulders, unwilling to confirm or deny Leo’s suspicions.
“I cannot keep track of your other guests,” he said in a neutral tone.
“People will talk,” Leo warned him. “Lady Mountingdon already has a reputation, and it is only a matter of time before her husband is pushed to his limit. You could have ignored her.”
“As long as the lady was willing, that’s no one else’s business,” Nathaniel declared, unwilling to have his conduct questioned. “Anyway, you found me alone, so you cannot accuse me of anything.”
Leo laughed, knowing him well enough by now not to be offended by his turn of speech, but he did not back down.
“This is my house, Nathaniel. I only ask you to try to be a civilized human being while you’re in it. I know you can when you try.”
“You’re the one who invited me here, and you still haven’t told me why,” Nathaniel pointed out with dry humor. “I have the invitation to prove it, too. Look, there is even a personal note from you on the back.”
“Primrose insisted that I invite you,” Leo answered, equally amused. “My Duchess wants us to be friends, or at least to be civil with each other after all that… misunderstanding. For some reason, she considers you highly worth the trouble of knowing.”
Nathaniel had to smile at this explanation, knowing that his conduct and lifestyle could appear odd and off-putting to many, as he intended it to be.
“For the Duchess’s kindness, I can only be grateful,” he acknowledged with a bow of his head. “I shall be sure to give her my thanks after the performance.”
“She will be pleased, I am sure. But tell me, how is Lilian? Primrose thinks…”
Lilian. His daughter.
The simple question lanced sharply through Nathaniel. Would he have to admit to Leo that he had no idea how his own child was? He supposed she was well since no one had told him otherwise.
Thankfully, before he could answer, applause erupted in the recital room, and Leo glanced at his watch.
“Right on time,” he commented. “We’ll let everyone get a drink first and then open the buffet room. Now, before the masses descend…”
Before he could finish, however, the doors were flung open, and scores of guests flooded out into the anteroom, drowning out the rest of his words with their chatter.
“Magnificent, Mildenhall! Some of the best Mozart I’ve heard played in London…”
“Your Grace, what a fine orchestra you have assembled for us tonight!”
“Did you choose the program yourself, Your Grace?”
The words washed over Nathaniel as he swirled his drink and stifled a yawn, wondering what to do with himself until the buffet was opened.
He was not left to wonder for long.
