And the Miss Ran Away With the Rake

chapter 8



No. I most certainly do not.

Found in a letter from Mr. Dishforth to Miss Spooner

The next morning

“What aspect of the very simple vow that we agreed upon—to keep our distance—eludes you, Lord Henry?”

Henry came to a blinding halt in the middle of the breakfast room, his thoughts too focused on the business at hand, that of uncovering the identity of Miss Spooner, to notice that the room was not empty.

And the complaints weren’t over yet. “Good heavens, I even got up an extra hour early to escape you, and still you cannot leave me be? This is unconscionable.”

He cringed. Miss Dale. His gaze swept the grand table, and at the very end he found the sole occupant.

Which also meant they were alone. Once again.

Splendid.

That always went so well for them, he mused as he gauged their surroundings.

Well, not completely alone, for Tabitha’s huge beast of a dog lay at her feet. Mr. Muggins gazed up at him with a crooked smile that suggested the big terrier wasn’t the least shocked at Henry’s arrival. Contrary to Miss Dale’s horrified greeting, the dog got up and ambled over, nudging Henry’s hand with his wiry head and then looked up at him with those great big brown, adoring eyes.

Of course, the dog was also looking over at the platter of sausages on the sideboard, as if to suggest that Henry might also make a good footman and fetch him a couple. Just between friends and all.

Some chaperone. Once fed, the dog would surely look the other way at any goings-on.

Of which there weren’t going to be any. None whatsoever. Last night had been disaster enough.

“What are you doing down here so early?” Miss Dale continued, shooting a wry glance at Mr. Muggins, one that suggested she found the dog’s attentions downright traitorous.

“I had thought to avoid you,” he said, setting his papers and writing box down at his chair near the head of the table. At least the chit had chosen a spot well away from his.

“Harrumph!” Miss Dale sputtered, her teacup rattling in the saucer as she set it down.

Ignoring her glower, he went to fetch a plate from the sideboard. Mr. Muggins followed, tail wagging happily.

“You don’t intend to stay?” she protested as much as she questioned.

“You could leave,” he pointed out as he slowly filled his plate, stopping before the platter of sausages. “So we might avoid another near catastrophe.”

“That was hardly my fault,” she pointed out. “And speaking of last night—”

Oh, must they? His ears were still ringing from the peal Hen had rung over him. The one she’d begun the very moment she’d been able to decipher what Zillah’s shrieking had been about.

Fortunately for him, his great-aunt’s ranting had managed to pull every pair of eyes in Zillah’s direction and give him enough time to set Miss Dale well out of reach. By the time anyone had been able to make out what had the lady in such a lather—he’s going to kiss her—all the evidence had been quite to the contrary.

Henry had been standing at one end of the pianoforte, feigning interest in the music sheets, and Miss Dale had stood at the other, studying the painting of the sixth Duchess of Preston.

“Kiss who?” he’d said, laughing. “No one but you, Zillah.” Then he’d bussed the old girl on the cheek and winked at the crowd as if to say, Poor dear, half out of her wits.

However, his ruse hadn’t fooled Hen. Or Preston. And as such there had been another family dustup in the back salon, where he had spent a good hour explaining that Great-Aunt Zillah had had it all wrong: he hadn’t been kissing Miss Dale. He’d finally gained a reprieve when he’d reminded Hen and Preston of the previous Christmas when Zillah had ordered ’round Bow Street because she’d thought there were Dales hiding in the basement.

Sadly, that was not the end of it, for Hen had spent the next hour giving him a thorough wigging on which ladies were proper prospects for the second son of a duke and which ladies weren’t. It didn’t take a member of the Royal Society to know on which side of that argument Hen placed Miss Dale.

Besides, he hadn’t actually kissed Miss Dale. Just meant to call her bluff.

Nor did it appear that Miss Dale had fared much better as a result of Zillah’s tirade.

“—I had to endure another lengthy lecture from Lady Essex—”

She had him there. Lady Essex could probably put even Hen to shame when it came to delivering a blistering scold. Henry was ready even to offer some condolences when she went on and said, “—despite my reassurances to her that your overly licentious nature casts no spell on me—”

Now, just a bloody moment. His licentious nature?

Henry stormed down to the end of the table. “My nature?”

“Yes, yours,” she said. “You are determined to mire me in ruin, and I won’t have it. I have my future to think of. I understand that you can’t help yourself—”

“I am not the one with the made-up suitor,” he shot back.

“Made up?” she said, her hands balling into fists. “I’ll have you know that my dear—”

But to his chagrin, she stopped herself before the name slipped out.

Henry arched a brow and gave her the most quelling Seldon stare he could manage. The one his father often used to silence the entire House of Lords.

Not that it daunted Miss Dale. Not in the least.

“My situation is none of your business,” she finished.

He smiled, because this time she hadn’t said “affair.”

“Who is he?” Henry asked. “This suitor of yours?”

Her lips pressed together, her brow crinkled.

“Then I return to my original theory that he is a figment of your imagination. For whyever would any man let you wander about if you are his true love?”

“Because he is secure in my affections and I in his,” she said.

Now it was Henry’s turn to scoff, for in business he knew that when an opponent boasted or protested overly much, it was because they hadn’t a firm conviction beneath them.

Miss Dale got to her feet. “Of course you wouldn’t understand. As a Seldon, how could you? You have no sense of what true love means.”

“Oh, not that rot again,” he complained.

“Oh, yes, that again,” she shot back. “How am I to think otherwise when you persist in trying to ruin me at every turn?”

“Ruin you?” Henry laughed. “Oh, if that isn’t a lark!”

“A lark? That’s what you call it?” Miss Dale stood her ground. “You use every opportunity you can gain to take advantage of me.”

Henry had had enough. He stalked over until they were nose to nose. “Then why do you linger, Miss Dale? Why do you stay?”

“Linger?” she sputtered back.

“Yes, you. Always lingering about as if you want me to kiss you. Again.”

She took a step back. “Oh, I never! Want to kiss you? I’d rather take my chances with Mr. Muggins.” She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him.

Mr. Muggins, who still manned his spot at the sideboard, looked from Henry to Miss Dale and then back at Henry again, and gave his head a tousled shake, then another pointed glance at the sideboard. Enough talk of kissing. Sausages, anyone?

Henry gave up on both of them and went back down to the end of the table, where he’d left his writing box. “Lingering!” he muttered in accusation.

“Hardly lingering, I have correspondence to attend to,” she said, sitting back down and folding the letter she’d been writing, her jaw set with obstinate determination.

Stubborn chit. Standing her ground despite everything that had happened between them.

Could happen between them. Could ruin them both.

Oh, Zillah might rail on and on about the Dales and their failings, but Henry couldn’t fault them for their bottom. Daphne Dale’s audacity in the face of ruin was nothing less than impressive.

Like how she’d faced down her cousin. Or last night, when she’d been about to dump him on his backside. (He was now more than convinced she had been the one who’d tripped him at the ball.) Audacious, dangerous minx! Those traits alone should have warned him off. But no, he rather admired her mettle, nor did it stop him from prodding her a bit to test it.

“Writing your parents to inform them where you are?” he asked, the epitome of polite and measured concern.

“Harrumph.”

Apparently not. Yet Daphne Dale never liked to leave a question unanswered.

“If you must know—” she began.

“Truly, I hardly care,” he shot back.

“Then whyever did you ask?”

Henry paused. He supposed he had asked. “Merely being polite.”

“You needn’t be,” she told him. “I have much to attend to this morning.”

And indeed, she had what looked like a long list before her and a stack of letters. It all appeared as organized and orderly as the stacks Henry preferred for his business matters.

And a twinge of curiosity prodded at him.

Whatever was she about?

Not that he was going to pry. Not into Miss Dale’s business.

“Yes, well, so do I,” he said, hoping that was the end of it.

It wasn’t.

“Whatever do you have to write about?” she asked. “Other than your usual daily apologies to the ladies you’ve wronged.”

Henry pressed his teeth together and ignored her jab; instead, he decided to retort with something more shocking—the truth.

“I will have you know, in addition to helping Preston manage the ducal estates, I have my own houses and properties, which require close attention.” Henry couldn’t help himself; he puffed up a bit, for her face was a mix of skepticism and shock.

“You do?”

He nodded. Most people—apparently Miss Dale as well—just assumed that because he was a second son, he was barely worth noting, save as a conduit to the duke . . . that is, when Preston’s favor was being curried.

“Properties? As in a house and lands?” she asked.

This question from any other miss might have implied that she was measuring him for a trip to the parson’s mousetrap, but from Miss Dale it was completely and utterly a test to see, he suspected, if he knew one from the other.

“Three houses,” he told her. “One is quite productive—good wool, and a coal vein has just been discovered on the other.”

She sat back and looked at him as if he’d fallen from the sky and just landed in front of the buffet. He could almost see the calculations going on behind her furrowed brow.

Three houses? However could that be?

“And you don’t have a steward or an agent who handles these matters?” she asked.

Not an unusual question, for most men handed over the care and maintenance of their estates to others—as Preston would have if Henry hadn’t been there.

“No,” he told her as Mr. Muggins jostled his elbow. Henry looked down at the hound, who gazed up at him with the most adoring gaze, as if Henry was the only one on earth who could save the poor beast from starvation. And even though he knew better—for hadn’t Preston warned one and all not to feed Tabitha’s dog or there would be no end to the dog’s attentions— he stole a glance over at Miss Dale, who was even now looking over a letter she held. Before she looked up, Henry slid a sausage from his plate, and the quick-witted terrier snatched it out of the air.

The snap of the dog’s jaws brought the lady’s gaze up.

“Uh, well, I find,” Henry said, quickly filling the space with words to cover his momentary weakness, “that if you want a task done right—”

“You must do it yourself,” Miss Dale finished.

They looked at each other—a sense of mutual understanding coiling between them. Both of them shifted uneasily at the discovery for it should be evident that they held nothing in common.

Or so they wanted to believe.

Miss Dale brought her napkin up and patted her lips. “I often find the same is true with a gown. If you want it just so, you must do the work yourself.”

“Yes, quite,” he said, a bit of a shiver running down his spine. Not for the world would he have admitted he held the same conviction.

Not about gowns, per se, but a task none the less.

“Yes, well, don’t let me delay you,” she told him, taking a sip of her tea and going back to her correspondence.

And normally he would have done just that, gone on with his business matters and letters, but with Miss Dale at the other end of the table, he found his attentions wandering.

Like how was it that no matter the time of day, she always looked enticing? This morning it was a pale blue muslin concoction and her hair tied up simply with a matching ribbon.

One the same color as her eyes.

And why was it that he noticed those things? He couldn’t tell you the color of Miss Nashe’s eyes, or even the shade of Lady Clare’s tresses, but with Miss Dale . . .

Henry took a deep breath and told himself he’d never really paid much attention to such things before he’d begun corresponding with Miss Spooner.

Take Miss Dale. How was it that a lady could look so perfectly refreshed, so utterly composed at such an early hour? He ran his hand over his chin, which he’d shaved himself, his valet, Mingo, having gone off in a fine fettle over something to do with the laundress and cravats, so he knew he was hardly well turned out.

No wonder he’d thought she might be Miss Spooner when they’d met in London. Outwardly she was everything he’d imagined the lady to be—pretty, self-assured and determined.

Just not possessing some of Miss Dale’s other traits—stubborn beyond all reason, presumptuous, and all-too-desirable.

Very much desirable.

Henry wrenched his gaze away from the object of his study and began to put his papers in order. There was an inquiry for the properties he held in Brighton, questions from his solicitor about a shipping venture, and a few other questions about improvements he intended for Kingscote, the house and lands he’d recently purchased.

They all required a measure of discipline and concentration, but he found himself distracted to no end by the scratching quill at the far side of the table.

Good heavens, didn’t she possess a single pen that could write a line without making such an infernal noise?

Miss Dale looked up at him. “What is the matter now?”

“Your quill—it is making the most interminable screeching.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.” And then, as if that was the end of the subject, she went back to writing her letter, scratching at it all the much louder, if that was possible. Why she sounded like a hen poking about in the gravel.

Oh, yes, Hen had been right about one thing last night—he was going to pick up Preston’s scandalous role in the family . . . starting right this moment by strangling Miss Dale.

Henry pushed his chair back and started down the table, albeit to sharpen her quill, not to throttle her, when Miss Dale was saved by the arrival of a third party to their breakfast.

A witness, as it were.

“What a cozy setting,” Miss Nashe declared, having stopped in the doorway to survey the scene before her.

Henry whirled around and then took stock of what exactly the lady was seeing—him hovering at Miss Dale’s elbow—and so he straightened and bowed to the heiress.

She acknowledged him with one of her wide smiles and came into the room. It was then that Henry noticed that the girl had brought with her an ornately decorated writing box.

“Here I thought myself so unique, getting up early to catch up on my correspondence, only to find myself in such crowded company,” Miss Nashe said. “But we make an excellent trio, do we not?”

Henry had the sense the girl was including him and Mr. Muggins and not the other lady in the room. Apparently so did Miss Dale.

“Yes, rather,” she remarked, glancing up at Miss Nashe.

Was it Henry’s imagination, or was Miss Dale once again making up lines for Miss Nashe?

Oh, the expectations placed on one when one is mentioned daily in the social columns is exhausting.

He stifled a laugh, and both ladies looked up at him. “Ah, nothing. Just that dog of Tabitha’s. Um, he’s looking at my plate again.” He waved a hand at Mr. Muggins. “I shall not share my breakfast.”

“And don’t ever,” Miss Nashe advised. “Dogs become horrible beggars when they are allowed in the dining areas.” She glanced again at Miss Dale as if she held her responsible for this crime.

Miss Dale smiled at Miss Nashe as she reached over to her own plate and slid a sausage off it for Mr. Muggins, which the dog caught with practiced ease.

Ah, so that was how the lines were going to be drawn. Henry had the sense of being caught between the English and the French.

And not for every farthing he possessed would he declare which side was which.

Miss Nashe sniffed, then delicately turned her back to Miss Dale, snubbing her. She settled her writing box on the table and began to carefully select from inside everything she needed. “I have so many letters to catch up on. Why, the attentions afforded me never seem to end.”

Henry didn’t dare look down the table at Miss Dale. She’d have that wicked light in her eyes, and he knew, just knew, he would be able to hear exactly what the lady was thinking. Still, he couldn’t keep himself from chuckling, and when both ladies glanced up at him, he waved them off and made his way to his seat. “I just remembered an invitation I must turn down. Regrettably so.”

Miss Dale made a most inelegant snort, but from Miss Nashe he received nothing but sympathy.

“Oh, my dear Lord Henry, I so understand your dilemma. Isn’t it a trial to be so pressed upon from every corner of Society?” she mused.

“Yes, I suppose so,” Henry agreed.

There was no need to look in Miss Dale’s direction to discover her thoughts. Her pen was screeching anew, as if carving her sentiments into the very table.

“Oh dear heavens, how your pen scratches, Miss Dale,” the other girl said with a delicate shudder. “Miss Emery always said at school that using a less than sharpened quill shows a disregard for one’s composition. A lady’s handwriting must be delicate and precise, so as to distinguish her from her lessers.”

The heiress’s censorious words would have been easy to dismiss as utter snobbery, but within the lady’s admonishment rang something Henry hadn’t considered.

What had that pompous chit just said?

A lady’s handwriting . . . so as to distinguish her from her lessers.

That was it. Gazing down the table at the two ladies quietly writing their letters—well, one of them quietly composing—his heart pounded.

Handwriting. Miss Spooner’s distinctive script. Why hadn’t he thought of it before? Why, he could spot her scrawl from across the foyer.

And here were two examples right before him. Henry began to push back from the table, but he had to stop himself.

Demmit, he had no good excuse to go ambling down to the other end of the table to peer over Miss Nashe’s shoulder to see if her handwriting matched the very familiar hand of Miss Spooner.

And what about Miss Dale’s?

He cleared his throat in an effort to force that thought out of his head. No, he wouldn’t venture that far in his quest. Stealing a glance down the table, he found her bent over her page, her teeth nipping at her bottom lip as she was lost in her composition.

Scratch. Screetch. Scratch.

Henry shuddered. The infernal noise was enough to peel the gilt paper from the walls. And yet . . . he had to admit that delicate was not the word he would use to describe Miss Spooner’s determined penmanship.

And watching Miss Dale write was like watching a mad artist paint. Her words flowed from her pen with passion and . . . dare he admit it? . . . purpose and determination.

Just like he’d always imagined Miss Spooner at her desk, writing to him.

No, no, no! It couldn’t be. Not her.

Henry took a deep breath, for he knew exactly what he would have to do if it was Miss Dale: Hie off to London as fast as he could and then pay his secretary an indecent amount of money never to let him compose another letter ever again.

Well, he wasn’t ready to flee just yet, not before he’d scratched Miss Nashe’s standing from his shrinking list.

Slowly and with as much nonchalance as he could possess, he rose from his chair and, looking around for an excuse, picked up his half-finished plate and wandered over to the sideboard to refill the empty spots.

“Miss Dale, do you have a spare piece of paper?” Miss Nashe was saying. “I need to make a list for my maid, and the coarse sheets you seem to prefer appear perfect for such a task.”

“Yes, of course,” Daphne told her and fished out an extra sheet of paper for the girl.

As Miss Nashe walked down the side of the table, Henry saw his chance.

But then, as it had with everything else in his search for Miss Spooner, Fate intervened.

Or rather Hen did.

“Henry! There you are!” she said in that exasperated tone of hers. “I’ve been searching all over for you.”

“Just a moment,” he told her, the page and his answer nearly in his sights.

“I will not be put off. Zillah is causing another commotion. I have assured her you want nothing to do with that wretched Miss—”

At that moment Hen stopped her grand entrance and spied the rest of the occupants of the room. “Oh, my, Miss Dale. And dear Miss Nashe. How charming,” she said, shooting a glance at Henry that said she was anything but.

Charmed, that is.

Henry took this momentary diversion to start for the other end of the table, but Hen was too quick for him.

“Oh, don’t think to escape through the butler’s pantry. You will help me with Zillah, or I will move her to your wing of the house.” She bustled over to his side, one hand coiling into the crook of his elbow like an anchor line. In the blink of an eye, he was being towed from port, a reluctant ship against the tide.

And when he stole one last glance at the room, he found both ladies watching him leave.

Miss Nashe with a smile that encouraged him to return.

From the far end came the wry glance of Miss Dale, one that wished him well on his journey.

And if he didn’t know better, she hoped it would be a long and hazardous one.

Daphne drew a deep breath as Lord Henry was hauled from the room, and she did her best to ignore the knowing glance that Miss Nashe tossed in her direction.

Yet the heiress was hardly done with just her snide expression. After several minutes, she set down her pen and pushed her “urgent” correspondence aside. “Lord Henry,” she announced, “is certainly a creature of strong habits if both our maids have discovered his penchant for an early breakfast and correspondence.”

“Our maids?” Daphne said, not quite catching on.

“If we are both arriving here at this ungodly hour to catch him,” she supplied, one brow tipped in a challenge.

Daphne’s mouth fell open. “Oh, goodness, no! You don’t think that I . . . that is, I have no desire to—”

“Miss Dale, everyone at this house party is discussing your blatant attempts to ensnare Lord Henry.” Miss Nashe’s nose turned up slightly. “A girl in your situation and a man of his wealth and lands, why wouldn’t you set your cap so far above your station?”

For a moment Daphne was too shocked to take in the more insulting parts of what Miss Nashe was saying. How was it that this girl knew all about Lord Henry’s wealth, as if his holdings were common knowledge?

Perhaps she knew as little about the Seldons, as she’d accused Lord Henry of knowing about the Dale dynasty. Well, she’d make sense of all that later.

Right now there was a more insulting matter to be dealt with.

“Above my station?” she echoed.

“Well, of course,” Miss Nashe said in all sympathy.

For her. Daphne Dale of the Kempton Dales.

“Miss Dale, you seem quite intelligent despite your lack of finish and must know the only reason you are here, in this company, is because of Miss Timmons’s dear and simple affection for her former friends.”

Former friends?

“But if it were any other lady marrying the Duke of Preston, you would never have been invited.”

There was some truth there, Daphne would admit. She was a Dale at a Seldon wedding after all, but she doubted that Miss Nashe, with her cit origins and new money, had any notion of the Dale and Seldon relations.

Or therein lack of.

“Surely you can see how embarrassing your pursuit of Lord Henry is becoming—”

“My pursuit?”

“Yes, well, it can hardly be called a courtship when the man has no interest in you,” Miss Nashe declared. “I fear for what little credit you do possess, for there will be nothing left of it when you leave here, unattached and so very humbled.”

Daphne’s blood boiled. Oh, whyever had she promised Tabitha not to dump anything over Miss Nashe? Worse yet, she was so furious that she couldn’t find the perfect retort, the right words to send Miss Nashe packing.

Meanwhile, the other girl was gathering up her belongings, tossing them haphazardly into her expensive writing box and, worse, taking Daphne’s silence as agreement.

Mr. Muggins, hoping for a sympathetic handout, stirred, his gaze flitting from the heiress to the sideboard.

“Leaving so soon?” Daphne said, finally finding her tongue and her own pitchfork. “What of your multitude of admirers?”

Miss Nashe glanced up as if she’d all but forgotten Daphne. “Excuse me?”

“Your correspondence? Your admirers? Won’t they be watching their posts for some tiding from you?”

The girl smiled. “Why, Miss Dale, that is why I have a secretary.” Her smirk finished the sentence. And you clearly do not.

And when she left, Daphne noticed she had not taken the sheet of paper she had borrowed.

“Horrid mushroom,” Daphne said, glancing over at Mr. Muggins.

The dog seemed to agree. For certainly there had been no sausages from Miss Nashe.

“As if I am chasing Lord Henry!” Daphne shook her head. “Nor am I lingering after the man.”

Lingering after him! As if she might want his kiss. Which she did not. Not in the least.

She glanced over at Mr. Muggins. “I don’t,” she told the dog. “Not at all.”

And why would she? Lord Henry left her all a tangle. Furious one moment, and the next . . .

Well, Daphne didn’t want to consider what came next. Not with him.

For there was Dishforth—steady, reliable Dishforth. And he was ever so close. He’d never leave her at sixes and sevens. Never tower over her and accuse her of lingering.

He was all that was comfortable and sensible and right about a gentleman. And Lord Henry, for all his protestations and Miss Nashe’s claims of his desirability, was none of those things.

He is so much more.

That thought stopped Daphne cold. How could she even think such a thing? This was what came from not keeping to their vow to stay out of each other’s company. Well, no more, she promised herself.

Again.

She reached for her pen. This time she meant it. To that end, she snatched up the unused sheet of paper and wrote the only words that needed to be said.

Glancing over at Mr. Muggins, she said, “This is the solution to everything.” With that, she addressed it with the one name that could save her from the lonely depths of humiliation to which Miss Nashe had described with such glee.

Dishforth.

He would rescue her. Save her from Miss Nashe and her ilk.

And from Lord Henry . . . and the other sort of ruin he represented.

Hen’s attempt to pull Henry into another one of Zillah’s tempers came up short when they crossed paths with Benley in the foyer.

“Ah, my lady,” the butler intoned. “A word with you if I may. About the masquerade costumes.” He waved his hand over to the stack of trunks piled up in the corner.

“Excellent,” Hen declared, letting go of Henry and marching over to survey her newly arrived treasures.

Taking advantage of his sister’s diverted attention, Henry backed out of the foyer and beat a quick path toward the morning room, determined to investigate Miss Nashe’s handwriting.

Oh, and that of Miss Dale’s as well.

But when he came up to the room, he could hear Miss Nashe’s voice, slightly raised from its usually well-modulated tones.

Something about the pinched notes gave Henry pause, and so instead of returning to the room, or getting caught lolling about the door, as if he’d been eavesdropping, he slipped into the butler’s pantry to the side.

The footman standing near the slightly opened door gave a bit of a start. Apparently Henry wasn’t the only one intrigued by the conversation inside.

Instead of chiding the man for listening in—how could he when he had every intention of doing the very same thing?—he whispered to the fellow, “Will you go see if cook has some more scones baked?”

Thus dismissed, the footman yielded the prime spot at the door, and Henry stepped up to where he could hear Miss Nashe saying in a smug, loud voice, “A girl in your situation and a man of his wealth and lands, why wouldn’t you set your cap so far above your station?”

Henry bristled with annoyance. How dare this mushroom accuse Miss Dale of such toady behavior, when clearly it was Miss Nashe who was scraping and clawing her way above her lot in life.

Miss Dale was, after all, a Dale, something Henry could appreciate.

For while the Seldons and the Dales might disdain each other, never once when England had been threatened had the two families ever shirked their duties. They’d stood shoulder to shoulder at Agincourt, in the fields of Flodden, and at Bosworth and Blenheim.

Something the Nashes couldn’t claim.

Miss Dale had the blood of heroes in her veins. So who was this Miss Nashe to snub her? Who was this dressed-up cit who had Society all a-dither? Quite frankly, he’d rather kiss a Dale.

Henry paused. Oh, bother. He already had.

And it seemed the puffed-up heiress wasn’t done.

“Miss Dale, you seem quite intelligent despite your lack of finish and must know the only reason you are here, in this company, is because of Miss Timmons’s dear and simple affection for her former friends.”

Once again, Henry held back from bursting into the room, for he was quite certain, nay he was completely positive, Miss Dale would give this chit the set-down she deserved.

He stole a peek in the room, listening to Miss Nashe’s haughty opinions, and never once did Miss Dale bat an eye or give way to the dark emotions that were certainly bubbling up in Henry’s chest.

No, she sat there, serene and calm. Hands folded in her lap, her expression bland.

Then he remembered something his mother had told Hen on more than one occasion, especially when faced with the censure that often came of being a Seldon: A true lady never lowers herself to argue with her lessers. A well-bred lady always rises above the rabble.

And apparently it was a dictum that Miss Daphne Dale held as well. But of course she would. She was a lady.

Just then, Miss Nashe gathered up her belongings and went marching from the room, as if she held the higher ground.

He was about to push the door open and congratulate Miss Dale on her noble composure when he heard her sputter, “As if I’m chasing Lord Henry!” There was once again the indignant rattle of china. “Nor am I lingering after the man.”

Henry felt a bit chagrined. She needn’t sound adamant. And bother it all, who the devil was she talking to?

Taking a peek, he found her ruffling Mr. Muggin’s bristled head, confessing her secrets to the mutt.

Go in there, a very Seldon voice inside him urged.

“And say what?” he whispered back. Because if he went in there now, he knew what he’d find out.

For hadn’t his list of possible suspects gone down to a single name?

A name he dared not say aloud for fear his heart would hear it and refuse to let go.