“I wanted it to be a surprise. If I told you, I’d become anxious for it to come true—and I’m rather fond of the old bloke and don’t really want him to give up the ghost yet.”
She couldn’t help smiling this time. He really was an adorable man. And now her cheeks warmed at having jumped to such far-fetched conclusions. “Well, now that’s all cleared up between us, I’d better return to my house before the servants report my suspicious activities to my father and worry him.”
“Your father is in London?”
“Yes.”
“Then wait two minutes; I’ll come with you. We’ll fetch him and get married right away, since we already have the license.”
Her jaw dropped. She grabbed him by the shoulders. “I think I have formed an attachment to you. You know, what the English call a desire to have symphonic concerts with someone at all hours of the day?”
He smiled. “And I love you too, darling.”
Verity and Stuart made tea and toast for breakfast. After breakfast, they returned to bed and made love again. Toward midmorning he got up, washed, and came back to the bedchamber to dress.
She lolled on the bed, still naked, and watched him. “My goodness, you look so handsome and so unbearably respectable. Why don’t you shag me fully dressed right before you leave?”
“You’ve an amazingly rotten mind, my dear Madame Durant.”
“I’ve had years to let it putrefy in fervent lust of you, my love,” she said. “Now, where do you think you are going dressed like that?”
“To see my solicitor and put you in my will.”
She set her chin on her palm. “What are you giving me?”
“Everything.”
That made her sit up straighter. “Not Fairleigh Park too.”
“Yes, Fairleigh Park too.” He shrugged into his waistcoat.
Her mouth opened wide. “You will petition Parliament to break entail?”
He chuckled. “You are thinking of titular land, my love. Fairleigh Park is not that. The entail on it isn’t even a primogeniture. My father gave Fairleigh Park to Bertie for the remainder of Bertie’s life, and to Bertie’s issue upon Bertie’s death. But he also provided that should Bertie die childless, the estate will pass to me. I can renew the entail in my own will, but now I won’t.”
“Still, Fairleigh Park has always remained within the Somerset family.”
“You are my famly now,” he said.
“You’ll make me cry, you know,” she murmured.
He came and kissed her. “For giving you things when I’ve no more use for them? You are too easy to please.”
It had begun to snow during the night. Several inches of snow had already accumulated on the ground. She watched him leave from the bedchamber window and wondered how her heart could hold so much love without levitating her clean off the floor.
When he’d disappeared in the direction of Buckingham Palace Road, she quickly washed, dressed, and made ready to go out and buy provisions for their meals. The doorbell rang just as she reached the ground floor. She opened the front door. The cold air that gushed in was refreshingly clean for London; beyond the portico, snow fell luxuriantly.
“Is Madame Durant at home?” said a young, redcheeked footman. Flecks of snow clung to him.
“I am she.”
The footman bowed. “Mum, Her Grace the Dowager Duchess of Arlington requests your company.”
She couldn’t quite believe her ears. She looked at the footman again. But of course she should have recognized his livery the moment she opened the door. And she hadn’t even noticed the crest on the brougham parked by the curb—her mind had been entirely on happier matters.
The dowager duchess worked fast—despite her uneasy thoughts the day before, Verity had not believed the dowager duchess would infer everything quite so soon. Her heart, warm and toasty a second ago, felt impaled by an icicle. She had to forcibly remind herself that the dowager duchess’s power lay in the denial of privileges and recognitions—that she, Verity, had none left to be taken away.
“And what does Her Grace plan to do with my company?” she said, with a bite to her tone—she’d done nothing wrong, she didn’t need to humbly suffer a lecture from the dowager duchess.
The footman looked nonplussed. Presumably those whose presence the duchess requested never asked why, but hopped into the nearest carriage and presented themselves before Her Grace at the earliest opportunity.
“I’m sure I don’t know, mum,” said the footman, sincerely indifferent.
She could say no. But what if the dowager duchess didn’t want to lecture her? What if she only wanted to see Verity for some reason? Wasn’t it often said that as people settled into old age, they looked more leniently upon those who had earlier given them great offense?
“If you will wait a minute,” she said.