Page 7 of A Perplexing Regency Romance (The League of Meddling Butlers #5)

Hugh had reluctantly agreed to be abed for twenty-four hours on the advice of Sir Henry.

Really, though, it was for Browning’s sake.

The fellow was forever worrying that Hugh would die, especially when he was out with Seddie, which was not an unreasonable concern.

Then, when Browning had trotted out the disappointed looks and the promise to Hugh’s mother to keep her boy safe…

well, there was not much to be done at that point but acquiesce.

He hated to be abed. The minutes seemed like hours. There was no reason to be lying prone unless a person was asleep or dead. He’d shouted that he was bored a few times, confident that Browning would do something about it.

His butler had sent Jimmy up to play backgammon with him. When Hugh tired of that, they played cards. When he got bored with that, they played a drinking game. Hugh was certain that Browning had not been overjoyed to find his senior footman coming back downstairs foxed.

When he’d not been corrupting the footman, his mind did drift to Miss Fernsby.

What a charming person she was. She’d knelt beside him and held his hand with not a care for her dress.

The road was muddy, he was wet, it seemed precisely the conditions a fine lady would avoid.

She’d no care for her glove when she’d placed her little hand in his wet and muddy hand.

When she’d stood, he’d seen that her dress had been terribly soiled. She had not even glanced at it.

And then her look of concern! She had been concerned without having the first idea of who he was.

He might have been an apothecary or a solicitor, or even a bargeman.

He might have been anybody at all, but she’d not cared for that.

He’d appeared injured and she’d been concerned.

He must think it spoke well of her character.

Well, he supposed he would see her at Almack’s. His inquiries had confirmed that she’d received a voucher. He could take that opportunity to properly thank her and find out more about her.

Just now, he was at his desk in the library, looking at a pile of papers his steward had sent him.

It was a tedious business. So many gentlemen had told him how lucky he was to be the master of such a vast estate.

He supposed so, but overseeing the whole pile was endless.

Just now, one of the more problematic tenants had taken it into his head to run a large debt at the local tavern and the barman had made a complaint to the steward.

Apparently, the fellow kept coming in and then causing trouble when he got thrown out.

Hugh suddenly sat up. Through the closed door he heard her. Blast. His sister had stormed into the house again.

Lucinda was much older than he was and walked around with a chip on her shoulder.

Or maybe it was a boulder on her shoulder.

Apparently, before he’d been born, she had been well aware that the entire family waited anxiously for a boy.

Then when he had made his appearance, all eyes were on him as the heir.

He’d been told there had been a deal of fretting that he must survive his first years.

Once, when he’d been around eight and Lucinda was eighteen, she’d said to him, “I always hoped you would never be born, to spite them.”

The library doors flew open and there she was. She was a tall and pinched woman and Hugh thought her looks very well represented her temperament. “I heard Sir Edward tried to drown you,” she said.

“As you know, Seddie is never malicious. If he almost drowns a person, it is quite accidental.”

“I’ve told Browning to send in a tea tray.”

“I’m sure he was in raptures to see you.”

Lucinda sniffed. Hugh thought she must be very well aware that the butler was not overfond of her.

Browning would never say anything to indicate it, but he had a certain tone he used that was clear as day.

Seddie was the other person in Hugh’s sphere who often got that tone from his butler.

It was distinctly disapproving. It was if Browning sent the message, “I need not say anything to say everything .”

“So, here you are at twenty-seven,” Lucinda said. “Congratulations.”

He knew very well what she meant by noting his most recent birthday.

She meant to mention the family tradition and somehow insert herself into his search for a wife.

Lucinda valued her judgment above all others.

She also had some very high-flown ideas about being a Finstatten.

She was in the habit of reminding her husband that she was a Finstatten so he might recall that he’d won a very great prize.

Hugh did not think Lord Gaddington saw it exactly that way.

Lucinda would want to stick her nose in with all her opinions.

He would not let her do it though. The last person he’d want to assist him was his sister.

“And you did promise Papa you would follow the tradition,” she said.

Browning entered and set the tea tray down. “Will there be anything else, Your Grace?” In his lower, disapproving tone, he said “Lady Gaddington?”

“That is all, Browning,” Hugh said. “We probably did not even need tea. I doubt Lucinda will stay long.”

“Do not be too sure,” Lucinda said.

Browning raised his brows ever so slightly before making a dignified exit, closing the doors behind him with a resounding thud to express his opinion.

“He’s just as sour as ever, I see,” Lucinda said of the departing butler.

Hugh did not bother to mention that while Browning was always on the grim side, he was particularly grim to see her.

“So? What is this I hear about a certain Miss Fernsby?”

How would she know anything about Miss Fernsby?

“Do not pretend you do not know what I’m talking about. Word has gone round that the lady came to your aid while you were inexplicably lying in the mud of The Strand.”

“I fell off the litter the bargeman and barber-surgeon forced me to lie on after fishing me out of the Thames.”

“And I heard that you inquired of the Countess of Cholmondeley if Miss Fernsby will attend Almack’s.”

Hugh had no idea all that would be traveling round. The town was confounded. A man could not say one sentence outside of his club without it being repeated everywhere.

“What if I did?” he asked.

“What do you know about her, Hugh?”

“I know her name is Miss Fernsby and she rides round in a carriage with the Duchess of Ralston.”

Lucinda had poured her tea and emptied half the sugar bowl to sweeten it. Hugh thought it was a shame that all that sugar did not sweeten her temperament.

“She is the daughter of a baron. A new baron. A very, very new baron. Apparently, this new baron’s land abuts the Duchess of Ralston’s land and the lady took it into her head to have pity on Miss Fernsby and bring her to Town.”

Hugh should have known Lucinda would know more than he did. She spent her life trading in gossip. There was not a drawing room she would not have passed through over the course of a week.

“And?” he asked her. He thought he understood her, knowing her as he did, but he would pretend he did not.

“She is new. That means she has been raised in a gentry household, not a peer’s household.

I wonder, could she really have the right air, the right manners, the right friends, to be connected to the Finstattens?

She was probably raised in some sort of farmhouse. Perhaps she milks her father’s cows.”

“I did not examine the lady on any of those subjects, but I did find an appreciation for her concern over an injured man lying in the mud, her pretty curls, and I strongly suspect she has dimples.”

“For heaven’s sake, Hugh, stop dodging and weaving around what I mean. You know it yourself—she’s a mushroom. A mushroom of the worst sort.”

Lucinda was forever worried about mushrooms. She, and women like her, were determined on some sort of high wall around her notion of the “right people.” Anybody wishing to burst forth into the green garden of the ton without the proper credentials was a climber, a striver, a mushroom.

They must be yanked from the soil and thrown back over the wall to rejoin the hoi polloi, where Lucinda thought they belonged.

Meanwhile, Hugh knew perfectly well that if she’d been born to a new-minted baron, she’d be fighting her way up through the soil and viciously clawing at anybody attempting to stop her.

“I do not particularly care for your ideas about social climbers, or mushrooms as you call them,” he said. “I never have.”

Lucinda rolled her eyes, which he considered a very unfortunate habit.

“A convenient stance for a duke. However, if there is no exclusivity, who are we?” she asked.

“Is the queen to throw open her doors and have tea with a tradesman? Perhaps I ought to have my coachman in to dine? If we do not respect rank, the whole country falls apart.”

It was very like Lucinda to assume a patriotic duty in trying to keep those she deemed less worthy out of the ton .

“Miss Fernsby seemed very charming,” Hugh said. “I met her for a moment and she seemed charming. Furthermore, she has a voucher to Almack’s, so I presume the patronesses do not agree with your assessment.”

Lucinda waved her hand as if to dismiss his words. “Miss Fernsby has a voucher because the patronesses do not dare cross the Duchess of Ralston. If she were not under Her Grace’s protection she would never be offered one.”

“Well she was, and that’s that.”

“You are the Duke of Greystone. Everybody in the wide world knows you will wed this season. You will be hunted from every direction. You cannot go round making inquiries about a lady you met for a moment and thought charming. It’s bound to give Miss Fernsby ideas.

Ideas, I might add, that will be well above her reach. ”