“It’s not an emergency. It’s not even important. In fact, it might never come to anything, which makes it all moot anyway.” Yet he still waved the invitation away as he turned back toward the door, which was also odd because he had never once turned down food in the year she had known him. The wretch was constantly eating. “I shall come back later…”
“What is the point of that if you are here now?” Olivia was typically relentless. “And if the quick word you seek is unimportant, might come to nothing, andcanwait till later, I see no reason why you cannot eat first, too, if you clearly aren’t busy.”
“You make a good point.” He smiled again, a little baffled by what had just occurred and a lot awkward. Then his eyes flicked to Diana’s briefly, making her wonder if his discomfort was something to do with their conversation last night. The conversation she had been compelled to have with him, rather than reveal in the newspaper first as she should have when it found its way to her desk. As much as Giles vexed her, she wouldn’t want to see him trapped in a loveless union with the dim-witted Dahlia, any more than she wanted to see poor Dahlia used that way.
She was tempted to ask outright what the upshot was, but that didn’t seem fair with everyone watching. Neither was it prudent when she had kept the true extent of her role atThe Tribunea secret from everyone.
“Excellent! Then it is settled. Payne, have another place set immediately. Preferably one next to Miss Diana.” Olivia beamed at her in triumph. “And tell Cook we are ready the second her soufflé is.”
The imminent soufflé proved to be exactly that, and not two minutes later they were all seated in the dining room. Him indeed next to her—but stiffly. Almost as if he was agitated. Worried by something. Which was ridiculous since Giles never worried about anything. Ever.
“I read all about your ball in the newspaper, Giles.” Vee hadn’t gone to the party because Olivia had deemed her too young for such debauchery. “It sounds as though it was great fun.”
“It was rather.” Even his smile to the youngest Merriwell appeared false and brittle. At least to Diana it did.
Vee certainly didn’t notice as she leaned closer for the gossip. “Was Lord T really so inebriated he had to be carried out?”
Giles grinned at her, leaning in conspiratorially, to all intents and purposes exactly like his incorrigible normal self again. “It wasn’t only Lord T but Lady T, too. Neither of them could stand, but for the sake of the lady’s reputation we sneaked her out the back door.”
“No!” Her sister giggled, still so innocent and cosseted that something like that shocked, which was a miracle really when one considered where she came from. “And was there really an illicit tryst in your orangery?”
“The details I have from the orangery are too sketchy to confirm, Miss Vee, but thankfully Lady Sewell was quite the scandal in the music room.” Giles winked at the youngest as he snapped open his napkin. “And with a rather dubious Russian count no less.” His eyes locked with Diana’s. They seemed troubled behind the usual sparkling mischief. “Or so it says inThe London Tribune, which seems very informed about the evening for some reason.”
“But were there enough scandals to thoroughly incense your father?” These were the first words Diana had uttered since his arrival. “Did steam shoot out of his ears this morning?” They both knew she was alluding to Dahlia and the rumored engagement.
“No… at least not for that. However…” His handsome face was suddenly perplexed as he leaned closer. Automatically Diana and Vee did, too.
“What are you all whispering about so covertly?” Diana almost groaned aloud at Olivia’s interruption.
“The scandalous gossip from last night,” said Vee, oblivious to the odd undercurrent. “I am getting it all directly from the horse’s mouth seeing asIwasn’t allowed to go.”
Olivia smiled at Vee in maternal sympathy. “I would be derelict in my duty as a chaperone if I allowed an impressionable young lady in my charge to attend a function called the Annual Reprobates Ball.”
“But Diana is in your charge and she was allowed to go.”
“Your sister is long past the age of majority and I am quite certain that while she does her damndest to be invisible, she has never been impressionable.”
“Besides,” added Jeremiah with a knowing smile as he tapped the side of his nose, “we all know she was working.”
“How many times do I have to tell you all I only edit the punctuation and grammar at the newspaper?”
“About as many as I hear your dulcet, pithy tones written all over that gossip column, missy. We can all always tell when it’s been written by you—because you make all that society dirge sound interesting.” Being an American, Jeremiah disapproved of the English aristocracy on principle, even though he had married into it. “The piece you wrote about that idiot Lord R’s pathetic attempts at love poetry was hilarious. I’d love to know where you found that sonnet. He must have been mortified to have mislaid it.”
He hadn’t mislaid it and she hadn’t found it. She had, instead, been hiding behind a statue and heard it performed to the cringing young debutante on a terrace by the besotted idiot himself and had written it down verbatim. “I have no earthly idea what you are talking about.”
“Yet it had your hallmark stamped all over it.” Jeremiah waved his fork in her direction. “But if my humble opinion counts for anything—”
“It really doesn’t, dear,” said Olivia.
“… You are wasted on the gossip column, Diana. You should write for the other column thatThe Tribuneposts from time to time. The one that digs up the real dirt. What’s it called?” He snapped his fingers while she did her best to focus on her soufflé and act indifferent, even though her ears had pricked up.
“The Sentinel?”
“Yes, Giles! That’s the one!” Jeremiah jabbed the air with his fork this time. “Now, that really is some first-rate journalism. That exposé he wrote last month on Lord Jessop was something else.”
He.
How predictable people were.
