Page 85 of The Lady Knows Best

Then again, it wasn’t just her heart. Her whole body felt heavy with the knowledge of the harm she had done, the pain her words would cause Miles and his grandmother. Her essay would confirm his own worst beliefs about himself, perhaps propel him away from Lyneham Park and the man he was there—the man he might have been everywhere, if she had not set out to prove that rakes were never to be trusted, because they could never truly be reformed.

“I’m not sorry that I let myself get close to Lord Deveraux,” she said to Constantia. “If I had not let him court me, if I had never gone to Hertfordshire, I would never have known the man he really is. I wrote that essay from a place of ignorance, ignorance and anger.”

Constantia considered Daphne’s answer. “In other words, you fancy yourself in love with the man now.”

It wasn’t a question, but Daphne nodded nonetheless.

“If you changed your mind about the essay, then why didn’t you tell Lady Stalbridge you couldn’t go through with it?”

“Because I feared disappointing her,” she said, plucking at the green ribbons to her—Bell’s—bonnet, which, like her sister’s dress, were somewhat worse for wear after the morning’s adventure. “She will see both my reluctance to expose Lord Deveraux and my willingness—no, eagerness—to marry him as feminine weakness.”

When Constantia made no answer, Daphne eventually made herself drag her eyes to the other woman’s face, expecting to see disgust etched there.

What she saw instead was something like pity. “You misjudge her,” she insisted. “But even if that were the case, you certainly did not have to supply her with such damning words about the man.”

“I didn’t intend to,” Daphne answered sharply, and explained the mix-up in her papers, without implicating the cat.

As she finished the story, the carriage jolted to a stop. Constantia glanced out the window. “We’re here,” she said.

The two of them stepped out. Constantia began to wrangle with the driver, who proved reluctant to wait. Meanwhile, Daphne approached the door of the printer’s shop, unsure what she would find on its other side.

* * *

Miles steered the curricle toward Berkley Square, on Alistair’s direction. “Lady Stalbridge lived with her stepson before her remarriage,” his friend had explained, his feet pressed to the floorboards, as if he could slow the carriage by sheer force of will. “And I have it on good authority that when the earl and his countess are in town, they stay in Manwaring’s house still.”

Good authority meant one or more of Alistair’s seven sisters, but Miles knew they were rarely wrong about such matters.

“One would think that living in such close quarters with his stepmama would interfere with Manwaring’s wilder tendencies,” Miles observed, desperate to think about anything but his own present dilemma.

But Alistair was not inclined to oblige him. “Perhaps,” he suggested, with a sideways glance, “the viscount is not as wild as he’s rumored to be”—a remark that applied at least as well to Miles as it did to Manwaring.

Manwaring’s servant showed them in, and in a few moments, they were joined by Manwaring himself. The viscount, only a year or two their junior, wore his brown curls in an unruly, artistic mop and ordinarily favored clothing just this side of foppish. This afternoon, however, he looked unusually subdued.

“Gentlemen.” He took in their road-weary appearance before bowing his head in greeting. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“We are—” Miles began, and then corrected himself. “I am looking for Lady Stalbridge.”

A slight frown of surprise notched the space between Manwaring’s brows. “She is from home, paying calls.”

Miles muttered an oath beneath his breath, but Alistair laid a staying hand on his shoulder and wagged his head to urge restraint. “Perhaps, sir, you could help us?”

“Certainly, if I can.” Manwaring gestured toward a grouping of chairs, but Alistair refused.

“We have come down this morning from Hertfordshire on a matter that requires both discretion and haste,” he explained. “We are given to understand that Lady Stalbridge is acquainted with . . . Mrs. Goode?”

An expression, not quite amusement, curled Manwaring’s lips. “Of Mrs. Goode’s Guide to Homekeeping?”

“More to the point, the Magazine for Mischief,” interjected Miles, who had to cross his arms behind his back to keep from fidgeting—or from reaching for Manwaring’s elegantly tied neckcloth, just to drive home the urgency of the situation.

Manwaring seemed to guess the direction of his thoughts and gave a sly smile as he adjusted the knot in his cravat. “As it happens, she is.”

“We need to find out where the magazine is printed,” explained Alistair.

“I’m not sure that’s information Mrs. Goode would readily part with,” Manwaring said. “The magazine has its detractors, as you may know.”

Miles’s snort made Alistair dig his fingers deeper into his shoulder. “We do. But it’s a matter of—”

“Life and death?” Manwaring interjected with a smirk.