Page 19 of Dukes for Dessert

“So I’ve come to you for help.”

A glint of understanding entered Sinclair’s gray eyes. “And I would enjoy helping Lady Devonport—her husband is a foul man. But as I say, the case is in the civil courts. Devonport’s barristers are in Lincoln’s Inn.”

“Aha, you know which barristers then? Do you know them personally?”

“Yes.” The answer was cautious.

“Then cajole them. I want an appointment to see Devonport. I’d simply go to his secretary and ask, but Devonport hates Hart, and me by extension, and I’m certain the secretary would have a standing order to refuse me. But if Devonport’s barrister suggests it …”

He left it at that. Sinclair was canny—he’d invent something to get David inside Devonport’s house.

Sinclair gave David the barest of nods. “I will see what I can do.”

David knew then that his admittance was guaranteed. They did not call Sinclair the Scots Machine for nothing.

His second meeting of the afternoon was trickier. David didn’t have an appointment for it, but he turned up and took his chances.

Hinch, his coachman, drove him to Grosvenor Square and halted outside a tall house, as he had the morning David had fled to Shropshire. This time, David was sober, bathed, shaved, and decently dressed. He gazed up at the intimidating house, but today he was eager to rush inside and sit before the one woman in all London he knew could assist him.

At one time, David had run in and out of the Mackenzie mansion as he pleased, as Hart’s friend and confidante, but these days, he made sure to send in his name and wait to be announced. Hart’s haughty majordomo admitted him and led him up the grand staircase to a sunny room the Duchess of Kilmorgan had commandeered as her own.

Eleanor’s touches were everywhere. Haphazard stacks of photographic plates lay on every flat surface, along with open books on photography and botany, astonishingly beautiful photos of flowers, and many pictures of her two sons and husband.

The mechanical aspects of photography had progressed so that these days a person no longer had to sit motionlessly in front of a camera on a tripod, waiting in stiff agony until the shutter closed. Eleanor had the latest in photographic apparatus at her disposal, and she shoved these cameras constantly into the faces of her nearest and dearest. The results were scattered over the top of the piano—she’d caught her sons laughing, shouting, grinning, and hugging their dogs.

David lifted a framed photograph of Hart—Hart was dressed in this one, fortunately—gazing down at his youngest son, Malcolm.

The picture was amazing. Hart the formidable Scotsman in tartan kilt, the man feared throughout Parliament and the cabinet, smiled down at his son, his hard face soft, his love for the little boy apparent. Eleanor had caught him well.

“One of my best, I think.” Eleanor’s voice sounded at David’s elbow. “Hart growls like a bear about me shooting everything in sight, but I can’t help myself. And my husband is so very photogenic. He does not mind, really, but he doesn’t want to be seen as vain, so he tries to deter me.”

“Dearest El.” David returned the picture to its place to squeeze her hands and kiss her cheek. “I am pleased to see you so happy.”

“Happy and distracted.” Eleanor gently withdrew her hands, a faint smile on her face. “Young Alec is at school this year as you know, and my heaven, he can find scrapes to get into. Not always his fault, though he could avoid them if he truly tried, but he is kindhearted and apt to take things in hand for another’s own good, and then it all goes wrong. Hart, of course, thinks his son should be a model of propriety and angelic sweetness. How he can have that idea, I do not know, because you recall better than most what a hellion Hart was at school. Besides, the model of propriety is never liked—we were horrible to the prissy head girl at Miss Pringle’s Academy. She still is awful, poor lady. I saw her the other day—”

“El,” David said firmly. He’d learned from Hart long ago that the only way to stop Eleanor when she began full steam was to break in forcefully. “I do need your help on a matter.”

“Well, of course. Sit down, my dear fellow, and tell me all about it. I heard you were rusticating with Dr. Pierson. How delightful. Or perhaps it is deadly dull. Which are you finding it?”

Eleanor led David to a set of couches that faced each other, low-backed, comfortable affairs upholstered in cream and yellow. No more heavy carved furniture in dark horsehair for the duke and duchess.

David sat obediently, marveling that he could study Eleanor’s wisps of red curls and very blue eyes without the pang of regret that had filled him for years. At the moment, she was simply a friend, one whose assistance he greatly needed.

He launched into his tale without preliminary and outlined his plans. Eleanor listened with flattering attentiveness, and when David finished, laughter lit her eyes.

“Oh, that is perfect. You are the most devious man I know. How splendid.” She leaned forward with conspiratorial eagerness. “What do you wish me to do?”

6

Sophie sipped her tea in her uncle’s study two days after David had departed. Uncle Lucas had his feet up near the snapping fire, a brandy in his hands, resting from his frantic work at the dig.

He’d barely ceased his labors to conduct church services, running in at the last minute to throw on vestments for evensong, morning prayer, and the main service on Sunday. Fortunately the parishioners were very low church and expected little more than a reading of the service, a few hymns accompanied by Mrs. Plimpton on the wheezing organ, and a gentle sermon.

Uncle peppered most of his sermons with analogies to antiquities from long-lost civilizations, but the villagers, used to his obsession, didn’t mind very much. Or so Sophie heard from Mrs. Corcoran. She had not yet summoned the courage to attend church with her uncle.

“Will you tell me about Mr. Fleming?” Sophie ventured.

Uncle opened the eyes he’d closed and gave her a keen stare. Instead of asking about her curiosity, he launched straight into an explanation. “Fleming is a reprobate and a scoundrel, but a good-hearted man. I had much hope for him when I was his tutor at Cambridge. But alas, he chose the path of darkness.”