Forever and a Duke Page 12

  “If you miscalculated,” he said, “the error was harmless and of no moment. I brought you pepper pot soup with fresh bread and butter, a few slices of cheese and two apples. A pair of French chocolates might have stowed away among the offerings. For the cat, there’s a bit of gammon.”

  Only a man who’d complimented clumsy young women on their dancing and clapped heartily at botched sonatas by the dozen could have offered that speech with such breezy—and false—good cheer.

  Eleanora began to unpack their meal. “The cutlery is in the top drawer of the sideboard. Now that the food is here, I’m famished.”

  She was also blinking as if cinders afflicted both eyes.

  “Eleanora?”

  “Mrs. Hatfield, please. You even brought more wine. Very generous of you, Your Grace.”

  Your Grace. How he hated that appellation from her now, but he was beginning to understand the paths her arrows of emotion traveled and how to dodge their flights. She needed her dignity, her sense of order and predictability just as he needed to nip out to Ambledown, go for mad gallops, and wear boots to a solitary dinner in the library from time to time.

  “Give me the gammon,” he said. “I’ll feed the tiger lest she disturb our feast with her growling.”

  A single tear slid down Eleanora’s cheek. She caught it on the back of her wrist. “Voltaire loves gammon.”

  And I could love Eleanora Hatfield. What a bloody inconvenient revelation for all concerned. Rex took the wrapped meat from the table and left the lady some privacy. He could not bear that he’d made her cry, but he withdrew to feed the cat, because he too had miscalculated.

  Badly.

  * * *

  “I know something you don’t know.”

  The old taunt shouldn’t have bothered Howell, but lately, everything bothered him. “Indeed, Eddie. you know how to arrive late to the bank without getting sacked. You know how to chew enough parsley to choke a horse, a skill I have yet to acquire. You know how to cozen old Ballentyre into joining you for a pint at noon while the rest of us remain at our desks, ciphering by the hour. You still haven’t learned to dress with quite the understated good taste Elsmore displays, but I have faith in your aspirations.”

  Eddie leaned over Howell’s desk. “The skill you have yet to acquire is the ability to enjoy yourself.” His breath bore the foul under-note of one dedicated to over-imbibing.

  “While you lack discretion, among other virtues.”

  The clerks across the room pretended to ignore this exchange. On Saturdays, the bank closed two hours early, and the clerks were dismissed while the supervisors did weekly tallies. Howell liked those two hours best—or he had—because of the peace and quiet, and also because with the clerks away, he needn’t guard every word.

  Lately though, James and Eddie had been leaving the bank together more and more often, and the sense of rejection stung. They’d always been a trio—two brothers who got along better when James’s mild temperament and good humor buffered fraternal competition. The aunties and cousins referred to them as the beautiful bachelors, because all three had a fair complement of Dorset good looks.

  Eddie brought a bit of flair to his wardrobe—probably trying to outshine Elsmore, which was hopeless—while James had enough dry wit and flirtation to make Byron envious. The pair of them could make a hardworking fellow not given to fashion feel more than a tad overlooked, except that had never been the case previously. Howell had flattered himself that he was the sensible one, the one making slow and steady progress in the right direction.

  His confidence in that conclusion had wavered lately.

  “All right, lads,” Ballentyre called from his desk at the front of the room. “Be off with you, and we’ll have a look at those books. Enjoy your Sabbath rest, and we’ll see you back here Monday morning at eight of the clock sharpish.”

  The clerks, a good lot of fellows, were off their stools and piling ledgers on Ballentyre’s desk in the next instant. Amid a general chorus of “See you Monday,” and “Regards to the missus,” the room emptied out.

  “I am always astounded at how quickly those scamps can move when they travel in the direction of the nearest pub,” Ballentyre said, his standard observation on a Saturday afternoon. “Shall we to the books, gentlemen?”

  Eddie sorted through the stack of ledgers and chose two. His specialty, other than looking dapper and dashing, was commercial and agricultural real estate. He passed Howell two other ledgers having to do with general business accounts—butchers, bakers, and the like.

  “Where is James?” Howell asked, taking the ledgers to a clerk’s desk.

  “He went home hours ago,” Ballentyre said. “Poor fellow was done in with an ague. Dashed weather makes my gout act up abominably.”

  Eddie returned to Ballentyre’s desk and sorted two more ledgers from the pile. “I can review his share of the books.”

  When did Eddie ever volunteer for extra work?

  “Good of you, young Edward,” Ballentyre replied. “Always said the Dorsets were a hardworking bunch.”

  Howell plucked one of the account books from his brother’s hands. “No reason you should have to do all the extra work. Damned snow is starting to pile up, and the sooner we finish here, the sooner we’ll be home before a warm fire with a tot of grog.”

  “Grog’s the thing,” Ballentyre muttered. “Nothing like a toddy to ward off the chill. I believe Mr. Bitzer’s handwriting becomes more crabbed by the week.”

  Another frequent rejoinder from Ballentyre. Howell brought two lamps over from the vacated desks.

  “Maybe that will help. Gloomy weather never did make close work easier.”

  Ballentyre’s desk was beside the parlor stove, meaning he had less natural light to illuminate his labors. Not that he labored long or hard. Within minutes, he was snoring contently, a ledger open before him, his hands folded across his belly.

  “Such a dear old thing,” Eddie said. “Once he’s planted himself on that cushion of a morning, I don’t believe he moves until noon. How he becomes fatigued enough to nap is a mystery.”

  Howell slid onto a hard stool at a desk by the windows. “He’s getting worse, but then, you probably share more than a pint with him at your Saturday luncheons.” Those luncheons had become a regular habit, now that Howell thought about it.

  “If you look over old Ballie’s ledgers, I’ll do James’s,” Eddie said.

  “Fair enough.” Howell eased the open account book from beneath Mr. Ballentyre’s hands, which provoked a few peaceful snuffles, but did not rouse the dreamer.

  “Will you apply for Ballie’s job when he retires?” Eddie asked, running a pencil down a column of figures.

  “I didn’t realize Ballie was going out to pasture.” Howell started on the weekly totals, and right off, found an error.

  “You should apply,” Eddie said, turning a page. “Let Elsmore know you’re interested, and the job is as good as yours.”

  “Somebody was having an off week,” Howell muttered, noting the volume number of the ledger before him. “I’ve found three errors in five minutes. Aren’t you interested in Ballie’s job?”

  Another page turned. “Me? I’m quite happy with my land accounts. Land is still the most respectable form of wealth for an Englishman, and I do favor the company of those with means. Elsmore would enjoy doing you a good turn, if you chose to supervise the clerks.”

  Eddie’s pomade, a citrus and musk scent perceptible even across the room, made Howell’s nose run.

  “It shouldn’t be like that, Eddie. I should be promoted on the basis of merit, not because my cousin is a director.” And a duke. And the major shareholder. The bank was inordinately pleased to enjoy that association.

  “You always were overly burdened with scruples.” Eddie set aside the first ledger and reached for a second. “Believe I’ll take the rest of these back to my office. It’s warmer, and nobody is snoring.”

  No invitation to walk back to their rooms together, n
o invitation to join him in that warmer space, but then, Eddie’s office likely reeked of oranges.

  “I suspect I’ll be a bit late leaving,” Howell said, “if the first few columns are any indication. This volume wants a close look.” And how did Eddie review an entire ledger in less than ten minutes?

  “Gout, ague, and inaccuracies. Must be the full moon.” Eddie collected his remaining ledgers and rose. “Do you ever wonder if we’ll be doing this twenty years from now? Staying late on Saturday, toting up the same dreary columns, listening to Ballie’s tired jokes?”

  “The work is honorable and spares us from the military and the church.” The church wouldn’t have been awful, but the military? Howell had no wish to be blown to bits for the glory of old England.

  Eddie leaned on the door jamb. “But what of your future, Howell? Will you ever be able to afford a wife? To send your sons to private school and university? Elsmore is our first cousin, and the old duke did right by us. Our sons will grow up at a further remove from the title, and are less likely to benefit from a ducal connection.”

  For Eddie that observation bordered on solemn reflection.

  “If that’s your concern, young Edward, then stop spending your wages on expensive tailoring, a horse you seldom ride, and gentlemen’s clubs where you lose more at cards than I earn in a week.” Howell put a bit by with every fortnight’s wages. The sum was invested in funds that provided a steady return, and the principal was growing at a modest rate. More than that was nobody’s business but his own.

  “Howell, she doesn’t even see you.” That remark was offered gently. “Lady Joanna might be able to overlook your lack of a title, but you have neither fortune nor prospects beyond a career waiting for old Ballie to go to his reward. She will never see you.”

  Was Lady Joanna Peabody the cause of the distance Howell felt from his brother? “Her ladyship doesn’t see you either, brother, despite your fine wardrobe and witty banter.” None of the respectable ladies took Eddie or Howell seriously, not when Elsmore was running around unmarried. The other kind of women were too busy fawning over James, not that paying for a woman’s attentions appealed to Howell.

  “And the sheer hell of it,” Eddie said, shoving away from the door, “is that Elsmore sees all the hopeful ladies as so many pretty duties he must stand up with.”

  Howell returned to checking figures, which he could do with one part of his attention while mulling over Eddie’s strange mood with another. Ballentyre occasionally roused, but mostly napped, while Howell reviewed ledgers—Eddie had left him one of James’s in addition to all of Ballie’s—and contemplated another twenty years of tidy columns and small errors.

  Ballentyre’s clerks were going to pot, that became plain before Howell had finished the first ledger. Eddie was unhappy, that was also obvious and puzzling, and as for Lady Joanna…

  Maybe someday, but today was not that day.

  Chapter Eight

  Pepper pot was Ellie’s favorite soup, and yet, she’d barely tasted her serving. Elsmore had taken leave of her after they’d eaten, a bit of gallantry she’d appreciated. For her to have kissed him and then all but burst into tears had to have been as bewildering to him as it was to Ellie.

  Voltaire sat on the mantel looking peevish, as if she blamed Ellie for chasing away the person who brought the lovely gammon.

  “I kissed him,” Ellie said, dashing away another stupid tear. “I should have known better.”

  Voltaire closed her cat eyes and flicked her tail.

  The tears were because the duke had kissed Ellie back. Gently, then passionately and gently, and oh…ye angelic choruses, he knew more about kissing than Ellie had ever known about anything. She’d been a fool to yield to impulse with him, but his savoir faire had been equal to the occasion. He was a virtuoso kisser, having so much ability to stir both sensation and emotion—yearning was an emotion, wasn’t it?—that Ellie wanted to simply be still and recall every instant of Elsmore’s embrace.

  And then—the most sophisticated kindnesses—he’d agreed that such a glorious intimacy was “of no moment.”

  A sharp rap on Ellie’s door nearly startled her out of her chair. “Coming.”

  “Don’t open the damned door until you know who is calling,” came an annoyed male voice.

  The apartment doors in Lord Stephen’s building were equipped with spy-holes. The opening was covered with a pear-shaped metal flap on the apartment side, so that the occupant could peer into the corridor, but not conversely.

  “I recognize your voice,” Ellie said, opening the door. “Come in, my lord.”

  Stephen Wentworth made Ellie uneasy, and she suspected he liked it that way. She liked making everybody at the bank uneasy, after all. He wheeled his Bath chair through the door and over to the fireplace.

  “Are you religiously opposed to heating your dwelling?” he asked. “I understand Laplanders thrive in caves of ice, but I had taken you for an Englishwoman.”

  “I am an Englishwoman, meaning I conserve coal.”

  Without rising from his wheeled chair, his lordship pushed the fire screen aside, dumped half a bucket of coal onto the flames, and poked it about so the blaze doubled in size.

  “I’m considering installing a furnace,” he said. “The difficulty is controlling the dissipation of the heat. If the fire in the basement is roaring and you take a notion to freeze, then you close your vents, and the fire stops drawing. When I want my rooms as toasty as the tropics, you will have all but put out my fire. The design wants further study. I could maintain the furnace exclusively for my own use or create a separate furnace for each apartment.” He shoved the screen back against the hearth. “Have you been crying?”

  Lord Stephen was not a bank employee or a duke to be put in his place with a firm none of your business. He was neither and a little of both.

  “Women do,” Ellie said. “Men do as well.”

  “If you are crying because your female humors are in an uproar, I know better than to offer any comment, lest even my blighted existence be brought to a period. If you are crying because Elsmore misbehaved, I will hold him accountable.”

  Lord Stephen maneuvered his Bath chair like a charioteer in battle. He was nimble and decisive in his navigations, and they took him to the window box.

  “He plied you with wine.” His lordship held up the last of the bottle of claret. “Not enough to get you drunk, assuming he drank a portion, but enough to make you tipsy.”

  Ellie resumed her seat rather than stand higher than her visitor. “My lord, did you call for a particular purpose?”

  “Yes and no.” He opened the bottle of wine, sniffed the cork, and then put it back. “I wanted to let you know that I’ll be making modifications to the lift next week. You might have to use the steps, so best do the big marketing on Monday. At least Elsmore plied you with a decent vintage.”

  “Nobody plied anybody.” More’s the pity. “We enjoyed an informal meal, not the first or the last.” Lord Stephen in his present mood reminded Ellie of her nieces and nephews, a one-person swarm of intrusion. “If you are hungry, I can offer bread and butter, leftover soup, and the last of the wine.”

  “I would never impose,” he said, apparently in all seriousness. “Tomorrow is my day to review the bank books, my feeble effort to compensate for your absence at Wentworth and Penrose. Have you any guidance for me?”

  Ellie knew his lordship well enough to see the distraction in that question. She would focus on the topic he raised—the bank ledgers, her favorite subject in the world—while he circled around to pounce on the information he was truly interested in.

  “If I provide you warnings,” she said, “such as that Mr. Cummings tends to argue with his wife on Thursday night, which is skittles night at his favorite pub, so his accounts are slightly the worse on Friday mornings, or that all the clerks bear closer scrutiny on Friday morning, then you will not see the errors Cummings makes on Tuesday, or the rest of them make on Saturday.”


  He wheeled over to position his chair opposite Ellie’s near the hearth. “You think me incompetent?”

  That possibility amused him. “I think you human. We all have a tendency, once our vigilance is rewarded, to relax our guard. When I find an error in one column, I often miss the error in the very next one, but am back on my mettle by the time I turn the page. Sophisticated crooks know this, so they leave small errors in plain sight, the better to hide the large deceptions lurking nearby.”

  “Do you trust me, Mrs. Hatfield?”

  And there was the Congreve rocket aimed at Ellie’s self-possession, fired from a harmless thicket of nosiness and shop talk.

  “In some capacities, of course.”

  “Fair enough. Have I ever given you reason to doubt my honor?”

  Ellie reviewed what she knew of him and what she knew of his ledgers. “I trusted you with the Wentworth and Penrose books, so I would say my opinion of your honor is positive.”

  “I am gratified rather than insulted that you had to think about that answer. One likes to be considered a bit menacing when one cannot cross a room without stumbling.”

  “You menace my peace, your lordship. If you have any other questions regarding the bank accounting, I am happy to answer them.” Happy was an overstatement.

  “My sisters bide in the north for much of the year,” he said. “You’ve seen their estate books.”

  Ladies Althea and Constance had the same fierce quality Lord Stephen did, though their acumen expressed itself more subtly. Ellie liked them, in part because neither woman was the least bit intimidated by their ducal brother’s consequence or Lord Stephen’s intellect.

  “I review your sisters’ books quarterly, now that the properties are in hand.” A few years ago, the picture had been very different.

  “They have nothing better to do for much of the time than take an interest in their neighbors and the local society, such as York boasts of society. I correspond with them as a dutiful brother should.”

  Unease joined the general misery of Ellie’s day. “Say your piece, my lord.”