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“I assure you, the corridors of Aphrany positively buzz with your name these days.” James glared at him, but the viscount seemed oblivious as he gave Gunnilde his most gentle smile. “I look forward with bated breath to your next move, Mistress Payne. My apologies, Lady Wycliffe , I should say.

“I cannot wait to see how you set about ousting The Bartree from the coveted position of royal favorite.” He leaned in a little closer.

“Might I suggest finding her a suitor?” he said slyly.

“That never fails to do the trick. But I don’t need to tell you that, now, do I? You’re an old hand at such ploys.”

Gunnilde blinked, rather a dazed look in her eye. “Er, I do not think that I would quite put it that way...”

James straightened up. “ If my wife should end up supplanting the current favorite, it will be due to her own merits alone and nothing to do with subterfuge, I assure you,” he said coldly.

Viscount Bardulf’s smile widened, and he turned to view James full on. “Well, well, this is quite fascinating!” he said slowly. “One day of marriage and you are become quite the defensive spouse, Wycliffe. Do you know, for the first time since I have known you, you almost interest me.”

“ Alisander! ” His wife’s voice was more insistent now. “That is quite enough.”

Bardulf patted his wife’s hand indulgently, then turned back to Gunnilde, sketching her a bow. “Thank you for the entertainment, my dear Lady Wycliffe. My compliments to your coiffure.”

Bows were exchanged, and despite the crush, the Bardulfs seemed to find a way to trickle through the crowd toward the King’s state room.

“ Well ,” said Gunnilde uncertainly, “I am not quite certain how to take his lordship. On the surface, he appears to compliment one, but his words seem to leave an aftertaste that is not altogether pleasant.” She bit her lip. “When he said that about my using ploys—”

“Do not pay him any heed,” James recommended, cutting across her words. “He only meant to insult me, really, not you. He can’t abide me for some reason. Never has.”

“Really? I wonder why?”

James shrugged. “Who knows? But every chance he has to snub or put me down, you may be sure he takes it.”

He felt her gaze on his face. “I have a theory,” she said suddenly. “’Tis because he is jealous.”

James gave a start. “What?”

“That’s the only thing that makes sense. Viscount Bardulf is so elegant and beautiful himself that he cannot stand having a rival moving in the Queen’s circles and stealing attention away from him. He is the ambassador from her home country, is he not? And one of her great favorites.”

“Rival?” James repeated. “That is not...not how men view things.”

Gunnilde snorted. “You think men cannot feel jealousy?”

“Over some things, maybe, but not over something like that!”

“But certainly, they can, over lots of things. My own father fell out with his closest friend and neighbor over a horse they both coveted. It ruined a twenty-year friendship.”

James took a deep breath. “Viscount Bardulf has no cause to envy my position at court,” he said forthrightly. “He outranks me in every regard!”

“It is probably your masculine beauty that irritates him so much,” she said.

James spluttered, unable to put together a reply to such absurdity.

“Only consider,” Gunnilde continued earnestly, “the viscount works so hard at cultivating his appearance. His clothes are gorgeous , his accessories exquisite . Did you see his gloves? And his jewels ? He does not have a hair out of place, his nails are immaculate, and then you turn up in a pair of dark brown stockings—”

“What’s wrong with my stockings?”

“And a matching tunic of no distinction—”

“There is naught amiss with this tunic!”

“Yet you fill out those stockings so well, and you have such good shoulders that your clothes somehow look quite perfect, and your hair, which you barely dragged a comb through, falls just right, and in short, your natural good looks lend your overall appearance a distinction it does not really warrant. You must own, it must be very frustrating for him.”

James regarded her speechlessly. “I— He—” He gave up. “Please stop.”

“You know I speak sense,” she said sagely.

“I know nothing of the sort!”

Feeling a tap on his shoulder, James turned about to find the Portstanleys stood looking rather forlorn. In truth, he had forgotten all about them.

“Oh, Harriet, do come stand next to me,” Gunnilde urged guiltily. “We have been neglecting you.” She gave James a significant look that he could only assume meant he should pay some attention to the old lady.

James had always thought Lady Portstanley a worthy woman of education and good sense.

He did not really know then why he felt strangely reluctant to turn to her now and converse with her a while.

Still, he did as good manners dictated and set himself to making some conversation with her while they inched their way toward the King’s state rooms.

Lady Portstanley was keen to discuss some new philosopher and James listened with half an ear as he watched Gunnilde chattering away to the daughter.

Harriet Portstanley was a drab sort of girl, so it was no wonder that his eye remained firmly riveted to his wife.

Of course, that didn’t explain why he was craning to hear whatever nonsense she was currently spouting.

That part was a complete mystery even to himself.