“Ah,” he gave a wry smile. “About that sort of thing.”
“Indeed. Will midnight in your study be convenient?”
“It will, provided dinner goes no later than eleven.”
“Oh, Lord Thurston,” Lady Jarles chimed at the back of his head. “I’ve been meaning to ask if you intend to visit Almacks when next in London?”
Whit crammed a forkful of food in his mouth before turning his head. He’d have to make the bite last, as the footmen were even now replacing his plate of pork loin with a covered bowl he could only assume contained some sort of soup. There was no chewing of soup.
He needn’t have bothered with the ruse, nor worried over how he was to continue it, because even as he was shaking his head to indicate to Mrs. Jarles that he did not intend to visit Almacks, but was unfortunately unable to elaborate at this time, the footmen were uncovering the bowls.
And all hell was breaking loose.
Toads and lizards of varying sizes were bounding, leaping, and scurrying out of what appeared to have been otherwise perfectly good cold soup.
“What the devil?”
“Oh my! Oh my!”
“Catch it!”
“Aiiiieeee!”
“Put the lid back on! Put the lid back on!”
Amidst the screams and shouts of the adults, the wild laughter of the youngest children, and the clattering of chairs and the frantic attempts of the staff to either replace the lids on the bowls that still contained their extra ingredient or catch those that had made good their chance to escape, Whit noticed two things. One—Victor Jarles looked tremendously pleased with the melee, and two—Mirabelle looked respectably shocked and horrified, but she was watching Victor with an evil glint in her eye.
He knew that glint well.
“Enough!” Lady Thurston’s voice cut through the riot of noise. “Victor Jarles, you will explain yourself.”
“Me?” The boy’s expression went from delighted to mutinous in a heartbeat. “Why me? I haven’t done anything.”
“It is coincidence, then,” Lady Thurston inquired coolly, taking her seat once more at the foot of the table, “that your bowl is the only one not to have contained a reptile?”
“That’s not my fault.” He looked to his mother for help. “It’s not my fault.”
“I’m certain there’s a reasonable explanation for this,” Mrs. Jarles insisted. “Perhaps the staff—”
“My staff put these creatures in the soup?”
“Well—I’m certain they didn’t,” Mrs. Jarles backtracked at Lady Thurston’s cold stare. “But I’m sure there’s a reason for Victor not to have one in his. And not everyone has taken their lids off—”
“Miss Browning hasn’t,” Victor cried.
“It seemed imprudent under the circumstances,” Mirabelle replied. “I’ve no great fondness for reptiles…particularly lizards.”
“Lizar—” Victor’s eyes grew round and he squirmed excitably in his seat, pointing at Mirabelle. “She did this! She did! There won’t be a thing in her bowl! You! Footman. Take off the lid.”
The nearest footman turned to Mirabelle with a questioning look.
“I’d prefer you didn’t,” Mirabelle said calmly. “We’ve only just caught the others.”
“But he has to do what I say!” Victor snapped.
“Brindle,” Lady Thurston addressed the footman, “did you accept an offer of employment from young Mr. Jarles and neglect to inform me?”
The corner of Brindle’s mouth gave the slightest twitch. “No, ma’am, not to my recollection.”
“Ah, well,” Lady Thurston replied turning back to the boy. “It seems you are mistaken, Victor. Now, if you insist on dragging this nonsense out, you may do so, but you’ll be quite alone in the matter.”
“Fine.” He sniffed and stormed around the table toward Mirabelle. “I’ll do it myself.”
Mirabelle edged away from the table, which should have given the boy something to worry over, but he was determined in his mission to prove her a liar. Mirabelle stepped back when he reached her bowl and stepped back again when he lifted the lid.
A fat toad hopped lazily from the bowl to the table. In a somewhat anticlimactic ending to the whole dramatic affair, Brindle leaned forward and scooped it easily into his hands and back into the bowl.
“Shall I take it away with the others?”
“Please,” Lady Thurston replied. “And you, Victor, may take yourself to the nursery, unless your mother would prefer differently. Until you learn to behave as a gentleman, and a gentleman does not attempt to frighten my guests with reptiles, I’ll not have you at my table.”
“The nursery? But—”
“Come along, dear.” Mrs. Jarles bustled her son out of the room.