‘If you will excuse me, ladies. An urgent state matter requires my attention.’
He strode purposefully from the room, the very picture of innocence, blithely and unrepentantly leaving the rest of them to endure Lady Eugenie’s interminable rendition ofThe Discerning Gentleman’s Guidewithout him. And Amelia could not help liking him for that as well.
* * *
Early the following morning, Amelia stood in the grand hallway with the butler, waiting for the Duke to make an appearance. Lovett was looking particularly pleased with himself.
‘I believe I gave His Grace’s valet a touch of the vapours when I instructed him to leave His Grace unshaven this morning. Then, when I showed him the suit of clothes he would be wearing, I swear I saw the upstart swoon. Mind you, I had the devil of a job finding workman’s boots big enough at such short notice. His Grace does have deceptively large feet.’
As if that were their cue, a pair of large, scuffed boots appeared at the top of the stairs and began to clomp down them. ‘Are you sure that these are not clogs, Lovett? They certainly sound like them.’
The worn coat, shabby trousers and frayed shirt should not have made him seem more attractive, but bizarrely the sight of the pompous Duke looking just like a man was quite intoxicating. The lack of cravat meant that the base of his throat was exposed and Amelia found her eyes were suddenly transfixed to that spot.
‘Those would be the hobnails, Your Grace,’ Lovett explained helpfully. ‘They are hammered into the soles of boots to increase their durability.’
By the time he had noisily reached the bottom of the stairs, she could see the day’s worth of stubble on his jaw and her own throat went dry.
‘This coat itches.’
‘Coarse wool has a tendency to be a little abrasive, Your Grace. Try not to scratch it. You will get used to the discomfort soon enough.’ Lovett made no attempt to hide his delight at the spectacle of his employer dressed like a labourer and stepped back so that he could take a thorough survey of his creation. ‘You almost pass muster, Your Grace.’
‘Almost? What is wrong?’
At that, Lovett stepped forward and held up his palms. ‘If you will permit me to make some minor adjustments, Your Grace?’
The Duke nodded and the butler plunged his fingers into his master’s hair and ruffled it mercilessly. At the top of the stairs, the valet whimpered at the destruction of his only piece of work this morning and then scurried away with his hand covering his mouth in mortification. Satisfied, Lovett grinned. ‘Perfection, Your Grace. Now you look as common as muck.’
No, he didn’t, thought Amelia with mounting alarm, he looked delightfully dishevelled and completely accessible. The mussed hair, stubble and bare throat made him appear as she imagined he would had he just got out of bed. A part of her was disappointed that he was wearing clothes. A larger part was horrified that she would even think such a thing.
‘The carriage is outside, Your Grace, and I have instructed the driver to drop you in Piccadilly.’
‘Very good, Lovett. Shall we, Miss Mansfield?’ Solicitously, he held out his arm and smiled at her boyishly, the last vestiges of the pompous Duke gone.
Amelia nodded curtly. It was the only response she could muster at that precise moment. It was all so surreal, and so utterly charming, that it was overwhelming. He was charming. And handsome. Even in hobnails.
And an aristocrat.
She had to remember that. The clothes did not make the man. Underneath the coarse coat he was still a duke and she should never lose sight of that fact.
Chapter Seventeen
The perfect young lady is very industrious. She sews and paints, plays the piano, sings or composes poetry. Such pursuits are wholly suitable for the delicate female temperament...
Miss Mansfield was unusually quiet in the carriage and wore an expression of uncomfortable bewilderment. Whether that was because she was stunned that he had actually come with her today or she was horrified to be stuck with him for the duration he could not rightly say, but the effect was unnerving. Nobody was as surprised as Bennett himself at what he was about to do. A week ago, if somebody had said that he should dress as a pauper and work in a soup kitchen, he would have told them in no uncertain terms that he had much better things to do with his time. Like helping to run the country. He was more knowledgeable about the poor than anybody else he knew. Hadn’t he read extensively on the topic? Hadn’t he visited the mines, factories and workhouses on numerous occasions? Hadn’t he lobbied for change on their behalf?
However, since he had lain in his own hallway to look at his own painting in wonderment, he could not shake the feeling that there were other things that he had once been quite certain of which he was now convinced he might have got wrong. From that moment, it had been imperative that he find out for himself what was actually going on in the slums as an ordinary working man rather than as a duke who lived, as Miss Mansfield had scathingly called it, a gilded life. There were so many things that now needed urgent clarification that he did not know quite where to start. What sort of people went to a soup kitchen? Surely they were only the most wretched? What were the doss houses like? He needed to know how Miss Mansfield had suffered to reassure himself that it was not as bad as his imagination warned him it had been.
And what did those people really think of the government? Because if the government was as out of touch with reality as he was beginning to think, then perhaps therewasa very real possibility of a revolution in England whereby all of the old would be ruthlessly swept away, much like it had in France and America, and everything that Bennett stood for would be gone. Somebody needed to do something to prevent that from happening and that somebody might as well be him. He had a duty to all of the people of Britain to do right by them, not just the noble few. He just wished that Miss Mansfield was as confident in his abilities as he was himself. And why was it that her good opinion of him was suddenly paramount?
‘I shan’t let you down,’ he blurted as the carriage lurched to a stop at the end of Piccadilly. ‘Nobody will know that I am a member of the aristocracy, if that is what you are worried about, and you will still be able to continue your good works unaffected after today.’
She gave him a lacklustre smile. ‘I am sure that you will do your best, although your accent might well betray you.’
‘I can change that,’ he offered reassuringly in his best impression of a cockney. ‘I knows how the common man speaks.’
Her answering smile was genuine. ‘Where would you like to go first? We have an hour or two before I need to be at the kitchen.’
Bennett shrugged as he helped her out of the carriage. ‘You are my guide today. I want to know the truth, Miss Mansfield, no matter how awful that might be. Show me all of the things that you think I should see.’
