“What exactly did you say to people last night?” Effington asked, leafing past the financial pages. Never any good news there.
“Pity about the girl’s situation,” Mannering said, wandering along the mantel, Yorick at his heels. “Such a shame people are so cruel about matters that are truly of no moment. Puts her family in an awkward position, but one must admire their loyalty to her.” He peered at the painting above the mantel, an image of a fellow wearing a plumed hat and a lot of velvet, flirting with a portly wench. “Is this a Caravaggio?”
The morning was sunny and cool, as spring could be. Effington had not ordered a fire lit, the London coalmen having no sense of how to deal with their betters regarding accounts owed.
“Of course it’s a Caravaggio.” Or had been, before Effington had sold the genuine article and hung a copy in its place. “How did people react to your insinuations?”
“Odd about that.” Mannering ran a gloved finger over the mantel, then wrinkled his nose at the resulting gray spot on the pale leather. “They mostly didn’t react. Some made the predictable noises of false sympathy, others changed the subject. I gather Lady Della Haddonfield is well liked.”
Too well liked. Effington began rolling the newspaper into a stout bat. Yorick scooted under the sofa, but Mannering wasn’t as smart.
“Her dance card filled,” Effington said, rising with the newspaper in his hand. “The plan was for Lady Della to be ostracized and pathetic, such that I could salvage her evening by dancing the last set with her. I didn’t even approach her, once the Dornings started lining up.”
“Bloody lot of Dornings, you’re right about that. They left half the regiment back in Dorset too. I went to school with—ouch!”
Effington smacked Mannering again with the newspaper, and again and again. To hit something stupid and helpless felt good, as good as hearing Yorick whining under the sofa.
“I say, Effington,” Mannering groused, rubbing his arm. “I followed your orders to the letter, despite having no call to speak ill of the lady, and this is your thanks? Are you mad?”
“You failed, Mannering. Your job was to ensure Lady Della was made pathetic, a pillar of bewildered shame. She became the toast of the bachelors instead.”
“She’s pretty,” Mannering retorted, jerking down a peacock blue and green waistcoat that must have cost a fortune in embroidery alone. “In case you haven’t noticed, she’s also amusing to talk to, and she dances well. Not only that, she has a pack of enormous brothers, all in good health. What do you have against her, anyway?”
Mannering was proof of nature’s whimsy. He was wealthy, handsome in a blond, pleasant way, rode well, and was universally tolerated. Effington had seldom met a stupider soul of any species.
“I have nothing against the woman and might well end up married to her, not that you need concern yourself with my motives. Concern yourself with redeeming your vowels, Mannering, in the coin of my choosing.”
Mannering got down on his hands and knees and peered under the couch. “Yorick, there’s a lad. You can come out now. It’s just us fellows here, after all.”
“He’ll cower under there until Domesday unless I bid him come out,” Effington said. “You are to renew your assault on Lady Della’s character. Enlist the aid of your sisters if you must, intimate that Lady Della has a gambling problem, a fondness for the poppy, a weakness for handsome footmen. By this time next week, she must be a pariah.”
Mannering sat up, but didn’t get to his feet. “This is not how you treat a woman you seek to marry, Effington. You ought to be raising her in the esteem of others, not wrecking her good name.”
The greatest stupidity of all was good moral character, for those afflicted with that virtue attributed a similar weakness to everybody around them.
Effington laid the newspaper on his desk. “Violate my confidence at your peril, Mannering. I want Lady Della to have the most generous, outlandishly lavish settlements this side of Cleopatra’s arrangements with Caesar. Her family must be strongly motivated to send her into my keeping. If I’m paying addresses to just another pretty, virtuous young lady, that won’t be the result, will it?”
Mannering looked disgruntled, as if an application of logic disagreed with his digestion. “If she’s in love with you, then the settlements won’t matter to her.”
In love. The two most ridiculous words ever used. “She’s the daughter of an earl. The settlements will matter, particularly when she’s one of several daughters not yet married off. If the family is shamelessly relieved to be rid of her, they’re more likely to dower her handsomely, and that is entirely in the lady’s best interest.”
Mannering popped to his feet and dusted off his knees. “Then I’m away to assassinate the poor dear’s character in the clubs, but I want my vowels back, Effington. Fair is fair.”