Page 97 of Miss Delancey’s Tragicomedy

“Oh!” Dessie said. Her eyes went wide and she rocked on her feet. “We saw them! At Gunther’s. Ophelia, she bamboozled us!”

“What do you mean?” Lynch demanded.

“She said her mother made her go for a carriage ride with Hayworth to make Trentham jealous. It seemed silly, of course, but we thought Lady Barrington was being foolish, so it also seemed plausible. I never doubted Bitsy.” Then she frowned. “But why Southampton and not Gretna Green? Hayworth seems like such a decent young—”

“Southampton is a port,” Miss Delancey said quietly. “They went there for the ships.” Her voice rose. “He’s taking her to Greece. To…what did they call it? Orchomenus. Like that archeologist couple.”

Trentham nodded, relief flooding through him. “Hayworth may be decent, but he’s dangerously naïve. I’ll wager they plan to wed when they’re shipboard. The idiots expect the captain will marry them.”

Lynch snorted.

“Why not?” Dessie asked.

“Because it’s a myth,” Trentham answered. “Ship captains have no authority to perform weddings except in novels. And even if there is a vicar on board, he won’t marry two underage lovebirds with no license.”

“So she’ll be compromised,” Miss Delancey murmured. “Oh, poor Elizabeth.”

This was his fault. He’d driven her to ruin. Had he not been courting her, she would have met Hayworth at some London function or another, and things could have taken an entirely different course. Hayworth was a viscount. If he had enough of a fortune to pursue his mad obsession, he had money enough to satisfy Barrington. They might have been deliriously happy. Now, they’d be outcasts. Unless…

He sighed. “Right, then. I’ve got to go after her.”

Lynch groaned. “Robin, that’s ridiculous. You can’t catch them. It’ll take at least seven hours to get to Southampton, even the way you drive that curricle.”

“I don’t have to get there before them. Ships are not going to set sail so late in the day. I’ll catch them in the port.” He paused. He couldn’t fit three in his curricle on the return, not for seven hours. And his coach was too cumbersome and conspicuous for a run to Southampton. “Lynch, send a wire to March. Tell him to bring the barouche I keep at Lannington. Quick. It should take him less than an hour. He can start scouring the train station and the docks. But tell him not to accost them, just follow them quietly. We don’t want to risk the scandal of getting bobbies involved. Have him send me a wire at Greatham, that’ll be the last coaching inn on the way, to let me know if he’s found them.”

“And when you get back?” Lynch asked.

If he succeeded? “I’ll dump Lady Elizabeth at her home and leave Hayworth to explain.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

“Now there goes a good fellow.” Ophelia’s father nodded toward the door after Trentham had gone. He stepped away from the mantelpiece and tucked his thumbs into his vest. “Of course, I don’t know the story, but it doesn’t sound as if he is under any obligation to help the young fools. And maybe he should count himself well out of it.”

“That’s about the right of it.” Lynch’s broad shoulders drooped. He sounded frustrated. “He’s so dead set on making amends…”

Ophelia’s heart ached. She had doubted him. And he’d seen her doubt.

Never mind that. This needed fixing first. And he couldn’t do it alone.

“Trentham is the wrong one to chase after them. He’s betrothed to Lady Elizabeth. When she and Lord Hayworth see him barreling toward them, they’ll expect the worst. He needs an intermediary.” Her eyes snapped to Dessie, who knew at once her part to play.

“And Lady Elizabeth needs a chaperone. It’s not going to help her reputation if anyone learns she spent the night running around with two men who are fighting over her.”

“Hold on there, girls,” Daddy said. “I see where this is going.”

Lynch started. “No. No, Dess.” His voice was firm and panicked at the same time.

Mr. Cameron let out a low whistle. “The devil of it is, they’re right. If Hayworth takes a swing at Robin”—he paused and gave Lynch a meaningful look—“it could get messy. Messier.”

Dessie said, “Ophelia and I are taking the landau. Lynch, you can come with us, but you can’t stop us. Lady Elizabeth doesn’t deserve this.”

He regarded his wife for a moment with a helpless expression. Ophelia could see him weighing his arguments in his head. Then he made up his mind. “Eli, send that wire to March. I’ll tell Peters to have John ready the carriage.”

Dessie beamed at him before turning to their father. “Sorry, Daddy. We’ll be back by morning. Just make yourselves at home.”

He laughed, a boisterous all-is-right-with-the-world sound that Ophelia had been missing since leaving New York. “Already feels like it.”

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