Page 75 of The Lady Knows Best

“Rake?” suggested Gabriel with a wry smile and a half-raised eyebrow, as if coaxing her to remember the things that had once been said of him. “Gambler? Ne’er-do-well?”

“That was different,” Cami protested weakly.

He nodded. “I’m quite sure our situation was worse.” Then his smile widened. “At least Daphne hasn’t been penning scandalous untruths about Deveraux just to advance her own writing career.”

A terrible stew began to bubble in Daphne’s stomach, a noxious concoction of guilt, disbelief, and self-doubt. Here was Bell arguing for the importance of learning from their own mistakes, while Daphne had been busily committing her eldest sister’s over again.

Was there nothing she could do that wasn’t simply a pale imitation of something another Burke had done already, and better?

“And for the record,” Bell said, “no, I don’t think it’s a mistake. Someone who gives such good advice, who’s honest with others, even when the truth stings . . .” She punctuated that remark with a surreptitious wink at Daphne. “Surely she would be honest with herself too.” She took a step toward her. “So, this marriage must be what you want. I should hope you wouldn’t go through with it otherwise.”

Daphne leaped to her feet, threw her arms about her sister’s neck, and tried not to sob. In Bell’s words, it all sounded so simple....

“But I still don’t understand,” said Cami, “why no one has mentioned any wedding plans. I thought this was all supposed to be a matter of great urgency on Lord Deveraux’s part.” Her voice had a familiar scornful edge. “Lady Deveraux doesn’t even seem to know you’re engaged!”

“Miss Palmer believes it’s all to be a surprise,” explained Bell, extracting herself from Daphne’s damp embrace, “for Lady Deveraux’s birthday.”

“But surely you know the details, Daphne?”

Daphne could only shake her head.

“Well, I can’t like this,” Cami declared. “Secrecy combined with a rush to the altar—and to win a wager, at that! Sounds like a recipe for—”

“Romance,” Gabriel declared, speaking over Cami, with a sympathetic nod toward Daphne. “Which your sister would know all about if she—”

“Ever read any of Galen’s poems,” finished Bell with a laugh.

“All right, all right.” Cami threw up her hands in mock surrender. “I can see it’s three against one. So I’ll hold my tongue. For now,” she added under her breath.

As the conversation shifted to other matters—their travels, the children, an update on Rosamund and Paris’s baby, who had not yet deigned to make an appearance—Daphne’s pulse slowly returned to normal and the knot in her stomach began to unwind. She hadn’t realized Bell valued her advice or admired her honesty . . . or rather, Miss Busy B.’s. But it was something to be going on with, at least.

A few moments later, there was a tap on the door. “I do beg your pardon,” said Lord Stalbridge as he entered. “I hope I’m not interrupting, but Lady Stalbridge wondered if she might have a word with Miss Burke before we go?”

“Go?” echoed Cami.

“Yes, now that Miss Burke and Miss Bellis have you and Lord Ashborough here to look after them, we should be on our way. This visit is really a family concern.”

“Of course,” said Daphne, rising to accompany him from the room. “You’ve been most generous with your time and attention.”

“My wife thought you might have something for her,” Lord Stalbridge explained at the bottom of the stairs, and then added in a lower voice, “some message you wished to relay . . . to Mrs. Goode?”

Something for the magazine, in other words. She was actually planning to return to London to publish Daphne’s essay.

“Oh. Yes, of course. It’s in my room. I’ll just be a moment,” she promised, hurrying up two or three steps.

Lord Stalbridge didn’t follow. “I’m bound for the stables. But you’ll find her in our room, overseeing the last of the packing.”

With a nod, Daphne turned and bustled up the stairs. Once in her room, she reached into her writing desk. Finding the folded pages of the essay by feel, she withdrew them, carried them across the corridor, and handed them to Lady Stalbridge. “Finished just this morning, ma’am.”

Surprise sketched across the countess’s features. “Oh?”

“Yes, I . . . I finally figured out what I wished to write.”

Lady Stalbridge glanced down at the papers but did not unfold them. “I must say, Lord Deveraux’s demeanor here at Lyneham Park is something altogether different from how he conducts himself in Town. I began to doubt . . . that is to say, I thought you might . . .”

“Yes?” She couldn’t bring herself to confess that she hadn’t written the essay everyone expected. Lady Stalbridge would discover that for herself soon enough. But Daphne would have given a great deal for some sign that the countess wouldn’t be disappointed in her choice . . . along with a bit of guidance as to what that choice should be.

“Never mind,” said Lady Stalbridge, waving away her hesitation. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Our readers will surely benefit from whatever drops of honeyed wisdom Miss Busy B. has chosen to dispense.”