Page 14 of Scandal Wears Satin (Dressmakers #2)

To secure the honour of, and prevent the spreading of any scandal upon peers ... by reports, there is an express law, called scandalum magnatum, by which any man convicted of making a scandalous report against a peer of the realm (though true) is condemned to an arbitrary fine, and to remain in custody till the same be paid.

— Debrett’s Peerage of England, Scotland, and Ireland , 1820

Exclusive to Foxe’s Morning Spectacle

Wednesday 10 June

It has come to our attention that a Mysterious Stranger from France has arrived this week in London with a considerable retinue. The trunks containing the lady’s wardrobe, we are informed, were so numerous as to require the hire of a private vessel. This portends a lengthy stay on our green and pleasant isle. As to where, specifically, in these domains the lady will reside, to what purpose, and—most especially—her identity, we hope to inform our readers with our usual alacrity.

The Queen’s Theatre

Wednesday night

A ll of London was aware that the Duke of Clevedon had met Madame Noirot at the opera in Paris. This night was the first, however, that she’d appeared in any theater in London, and the occasion left no one in the audience—the masculine part of the audience, certainly—in any doubt as to why the duke of Clevedon had succumbed to the lady.

This was the first time any gathering of Those Who Mattered had ever seen her. While the handful of Maison Noirot’s clients present knew her, these were primarily ladies of the gentry classes and aristocracy’s lower ranks. In the great scheme of things, they counted, but not very much.

To all intents and purposes, this was Fashionable Society’s first look.

The men looked very hard, indeed, because His Grace had escorted into his box not one dashing woman but two: his duchess and a fair-haired stranger.

Across the theater, in the Warfords’ box, Lady Warford gazed resolutely at the stage, refusing to acknowledge the new Duchess of Clevedon’s existence.

Clara, however, stared for all she was worth. To Lord Adderley, who sat dutifully beside her, acting the part of attentive spouse-to-be, she said, “Do you know who that lady is with the Duchess of Clevedon?”

Adderley, who’d been staring as hard as everybody else, turned a surprised look on her. “Don’t you know? I thought she must be one of the sisters. Isn’t one of them a blonde?”

“The sisters are unwed, and this lady is wearing the dress of a married woman,” Clara said. “A married Frenchwoman, I should say.”

Longmore, who sat behind the engaged couple, said “French? You can tell that from this distance? And without employing an opera glass—as the other ladies are doing, I notice.”

“One can always tell,” Clara said. “We Englishwomen can wear exactly what Frenchwomen do and yet somehow we always look English.” She turned round to meet her brother’s gaze. “You were in Paris, Harry. Don’t you agree?”

Their mother made a harrumphing noise and sent a frigid glare their way. Both of her offspring pretended not to notice.

“What I can be sure of is that she’s got the theater in an uproar,” Longmore said. “One can hardly hear the performers—not always a bad thing, although I’d rather she’d done it at a long, boring German opera instead of during The Waterman . But a little stimulation for the performers to outdo themselves won’t come amiss. I believe I’ll toddle round at the interval and make Clevedon introduce me. Then I can tell all of you what the fuss is about, a few hours in advance of the Spectacle , for once.”

Knowing that a great many other fellows would be traveling to the same destination, he left his family’s box some minutes before the interval began, and entered Clevedon’s ahead of the pack.

His nod in Clevedon’s general direction passed for polite greetings.

“Beat the other fellows by a furlong,” he said.

“I thought you would,” Clevedon said. “You can be quick enough off the mark when you choose.”

Longmore turned to Her Grace. “Before the hordes descend, Duchess, would you be so good as to make me known to the lady?”

“Madame de Veirrion, will you permit me to introduce Lord Longmore, a very good friend of my husband,” the duchess said.

Her friend looked blank.

Her Grace repeated the introduction in French.

“Ah, yes,” said Madame. “Thees friend of a long time. Comme un frère, n’est-ce pas? Lord Lun-mour.” She gave a little nod, and the brilliants artfully arranged among the plumes of her headdress sparkled and danced.

Her English was comically dreadful. To spare her, Longmore carried on their exchange in French. This gave him a small advantage over the mob of males who stampeded into Clevedon’s box a moment later. While most of them spoke correct French, as a properly educated gentleman ought to do, it was like Clevedon’s—correct French spoken by an Englishman. It was the conversational version of dress, as Clara had described it: They had all the right words, but they still sounded English.

Longmore, the world’s worst scholar, had, for some reason, an aptitude for languages. The Latin-based ones, at any rate.

“But Monsieur de Lun-mour speaks my language like the parisiens ,” said Madame. “How is this? Me, my English, he is stupid. I cannot be taught. Hélas , they try. Mon mari —my ’usband so dear—” Her blue eyes grew dewy. A lacy handkerchief appeared in her beringed and braceleted hand, and she dabbed gently at the tears. “ Ce pauvre Robert! He try and try to teach me. But what? I am the dunces.”

All the gentlemen begged to differ.

Longmore said, when they’d quieted down, “But you are a charming and beautiful dunces, madame. And,” he continued in French, “a charming and beautiful woman can get away with murder. Can you imagine that any man here would prosecute you for assassinating our language?”

L ongmore left Madame and her coterie shortly before the interval ended, and returned to his family’s box.

His mother was looking daggers, and no wonder: Lady Bartham had joined her, and had undoubtedly been rubbing salt in as many wounds as she could find. Or inflict.

“A French lady, as you deduced,” Longmore told his sister, not troubling to lower his voice. The two older women stopped talking. “Madame de Veirrion. A friend of the duchess from her Paris days. A widow—of some means, I’d say. I bow to my sister’s knowledge of dress, but the lady’s looked deuced expensive to me. The jewelry’s easier to judge, and it isn’t paste, I assure you.”

Lady Bartham put her glass to her eye and proceeded to inspect the French lady.

After the briefest hesitation, Mother did the same. “A widow, did you say, Longmore?”

She always took care to use her eldest son’s title with Lady Bartham, who had two marriageable daughters, both dark-haired little fairies, too bony for his taste.

“Quite a young widow,” Longmore said. “Speaks the most appalling English.”

“That presents no problem to you,” Clara said.

“No, indeed,” Adderley said. “Always was your forte, language. That and the punishing uppercut.” He smiled ruefully, and stroked his jaw. The bruise was still visible. “Served me right, too,” he said in a low voice.

It was exactly what a man ought to say if he wanted to make peace with his in-laws-to-be. He did it so well that a less cynical man than Longmore might have believed it.

“You were there a good while,” Clara said.

“She’s pretty, and she mangles English in a most charming manner,” he said.

“Clearly, she’s charming,” Lady Bartham said. “She seems to have enthralled all the gentlemen.”

“Frenchwomen so often do,” Lady Warford said darkly.

“I thought the duke would be obliged to summon the attendants to control the crowd,” Clara said.

“She’s undoubtedly caused a commotion,” said Lady Bartham. She turned her sharp hazel gaze upon Longmore. “But who is she?”

Exclusive to Foxe’s Morning Spectacle

Thursday 11 June 1835

Who is she? That is the question on everyone’s lips since last night, when the Mysterious Stranger made her appearance at the Queen’s Theatre, wearing a black satin dress, the corsage à la Sevigné , ornamented with a row of black bows. The sleeves, which were topped with n?uds de page , were very full, with double sabots of white satin. What appeared at first to be a robe was in fact an artful illusion created by a front panel of gold brocaded satin.

Your correspondent has it on the very best authority that Madame de V_____ is the descendant of a French count whose family was long associated with the court of the House of Bourbon, and who perished, tragically, as did so many members of the ancien regime, under the guillotine blade. Given the present unrest in Paris, we cannot be surprised that the lady, bereft in this last year of the protection of a devoted husband and acting no doubt on the sage advice of her counselors, has determined to place herself and her considerable fortune (rivaling, we are told, that of the Duke of C_____) in the peaceful realms of His British Majesty. We are told that the lady has determined to seek a permanent residence in London. In the meantime, she has taken a suite of rooms at one of those hotels described in Cruchley’s Picture of London as having “sheltered the incognito of foreign grandees and potentates.” We are reliably informed that the lady was one of the Duchess of C_____’s premier patrons during Her Grace’s long sojourn in Paris, and that both Madame and the late Monsieur de V_____ were among His Grace’s numerous acquaintance during his time there.

Following the usual court news, general gossip, commentary on the Sheridan-Grant elopement, and amusing anecdotes, there appeared at the end of the last column preceding the page of advertisements, this note:

We observed last night a certain lord in the company of the lady he is to wed in a fortnight. We are pleased to report that the lady appears fully recovered from her recent alarming illness. We cannot claim to be pleased to inform our readers that later in the same evening—or it would be more accurate to say, in the early hours of the following morning—his lordship was observed to enter a gaming establishment of dubious reputation, from which he did not emerge until some hours after dawn. For all of those—and we count ourselves among them—who have wished her ladyship, in spite of the distressing circumstances that precipitated her engagement, a happy future, this is a most disheartening turn of events. We had hoped that, having obtained the hand of this beautiful lady, his lordship would show his gratitude by resolving to go and sin no more. We had hoped that, having left his errors behind him, he would reflect upon the errors of his forbears, and resolve—for the lady’s sake if not his own honor—to restore dignity to the family name. As our readers are no doubt aware, his lordship’s father was awarded a barony for services rendered to a royal personage. These included considerable loans, one of which was the loan of his beautiful wife for an indeterminate time. The fortune having long since been dissipated at the gaming tables, we must wonder at the motives and mendacity of any person who encourages his lordship to further folly by extending him credit for such a purpose.

Drawing room, Warford House

Thursday afternoon

L ike most of the ton, Lord Adderley had read the Spectacle with his morning coffee. He swore a great deal, and abused his valet and every other servant who had the misfortune to cross his path this day. Having put his household into a state of seething resentment, he’d hastened across town to present himself to his intended. There he proceeded to lie through his teeth—that was to say, issue a suitably indignant denial.

He’d taken the offending document with him. After being shown into the drawing room, where his bride-to-be awaited him, he’d flung it down on a table with a fine show of righteous outrage.

“I don’t know how those curs of the Spectacle get away with printing these filthy falsehoods,” he said. “They need to be taught a lesson. It’s long past time they were prosecuted for these slurs. If Tom Foxe were a gentleman, I’d call him out. Since he isn’t, I’ll insist he be arrested.”

Lady Clara drew in a deep breath, let it out, and said, “People can be so unkind. They will take the most innocuous circumstance, and twist it into something shameful. They exaggerate everything they hear and see. But the Spectacle never name names, do they? In any case, surely anybody who reads that won’t believe it refers to you.”

“They won’t?” He frowned at the paper. Though he’d never thought Lady Clara Fairfax particularly clever, he’d supposed she could put two and two together.

“Certainly not,” she said. “Harry said that even a man of the meanest intelligence would know better than to game there. The place is as crooked as Putney Bridge, he said.”

His face heated. “Longmore was here—about this?” He nodded in the direction of the scandal sheet.

“Oh, he often collects a copy of the Spectacle on his way home from wherever he goes after the theater or a party,” she said. “He came by a little while ago. He was on his way to call on Madame de Veirrion. He was going to try to persuade her to drive out with him. Is she respectable, do you think?”

Not if she’s driving out with your brother , he thought.

He said, “I’ve heard nothing to the contrary.”

“I think she must be,” Lady Clara said. “She’s a friend of the Duchess of Clevedon, and the duke apparently made her acquaintance as well, when he was in Paris. I can’t imagine their taking her to the theater if she wasn’t.”

“Clevedon seems to care nothing about what others think of him,” he said.

He didn’t say, and she was too tactful to point out that, with an annual income numbering in the hundreds of thousands, the Duke of Clevedon could afford not to care.

“He cares what’s said of his duchess and her daughter,” Lady Clara said. “The King and Queen have accepted her. I don’t think she’d wish to jeopardize her position by associating with improper persons.”

“It would be foolish, I agree.”

“If she is respectable, Mama will be in alt,” Lady Clara said. “Madame’s husband left her everything. Mama won’t mind her being a widow. She’s always been terrified that Harry would end up marrying a ballet dancer or a barmaid.”

Adderley’s face burned. His mother was a sore spot. Still, she hadn’t been a barmaid but an innkeeper’s daughter. She’d been a royal mistress, as had scores of “respectable” women. Unfortunately, she’d become one after he was born. No one cared if one was a bastard, if one was a royal bastard. It’s no small thing to be descended from kings. He, alas, was descended from an innkeeper and obscure country gentlemen. Not a drop of royal blood trickled through his veins.

“Marry?” he said, bewildered. “Longmore?” That was inconceivable. “Has it gone so far as that already?”

Clara shrugged. “Who can say? But he seemed quite taken with her. And you know Harry, always plunging headlong into—” She broke off, coughing. She put her hand to her forehead.

It was a small, involuntary gesture, but it was enough to remind him that she’d recently been ill—ill enough for the house to be closed to all but a very few visitors, for three days. He hurried to her, and knelt by her chair. “My dear, are you unwell?”

She let her hand fall. “No, a little ... oh, it’s nothing, only I’ve been indoors forever, it seems. What I need is a dose of fresh air. I think I’ll order the cabriolet, and take a turn about the park.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “If you wish to take the air, I’m happy to drive you. You’ve only to send a maid for your bonnet and shawl.”

T he fashionable hour of promenade hadn’t yet arrived when Lord Longmore turned his curricle into Hyde Park’s Cumberland Gate. He was listening to his fair companion. She was prattling in a fractured English so ridiculous that he couldn’t help but smile, though he wasn’t in the most cheerful frame of mind.

“You have too much in your head,” said Madame. “One part of milord attends me. The other part of him rests in another place. I am compelled to demand to myself, Do I cause to him the ennui?”

“I begin to wish, oddly enough, that you were some degrees more boring,” he said. “It’s almost more excitement than I can bear. Last night ...” He shook his head.

“But how calm you seemed! Not in the least fearful.”

He looked at her. “You’ve deceived the ton with breathtaking ease. I vow, women who must have looked straight into your face countless times while you adjusted their bows and such ought to have recognized you, even from across the theater. Several men who came into the box last night were at White’s on the day you stood in the rain on St. James’s Street, generously offering them a view of your petticoats and ankles.”

“People see what they expect to see,” she said. “In the shop, one is the modiste. When one isn’t in the shop but in a place where she isn’t expected to be, she merely seems vaguely familiar.”

Her false voice, the false accent, the mangled English slipped away, and he marveled at that, too: the ease with which Sophy shed one personality and assumed another.

“Shopkeepers are like servants, invisible,” she went on. “Outside their proper sphere, their customers don’t recognize them. If one pretends, boldly and confidently, to be someone else, the observer simply accepts.”

Servants were another matter. No one was invisible to them. If that hadn’t been the case, Madame would be residing at Clevedon House, and Longmore would have one less worry. But that was out of the question. One couldn’t expect a large household to keep such a secret—or any secret, for that matter. She’d gone out in one of her guises and hired French servants from one of the agencies she knew and trusted. These made up the retinue attending her at her hotel. In time, the Spectacle would explain the circumstances under which she’d fled France. That, he had no doubt, would be a bloodcurdling story of treachery and betrayal and flight under cover of darkness and harrowing escapes from Enemies.

He shook his head. “It’s still hard to swallow: the same men who gawked at you through White’s bow window, all competing now to be witty and charming in French.”

“Because the scene was so beautifully set,” she said. “All we needed was for you and Lady Clara to pretend not to recognize me.”

“Clara contrived to do it without telling an outright lie, I noticed.”

But Clara had had only a small part to play. It was Sophy who’d had to take center stage. It was she who’d had to adopt another identity—with every single eye in the theater on her.

She’d done it with a flair and assurance that took his breath away. She’d seemed thoroughly at ease, and he’d thought, She’s in her element .

“You played your part splendidly,” she said. “So well, in fact, that you almost threw me off-stride. I’m still not over the shock of your perfect French.”

He shrugged. “That won me some flattery from Adderley. He even had the temerity to compliment my uppercut—and to say he deserved it.”

“He’ll say anything,” she said. “He’s in very bad trouble.”

And that was one of the many matters worrying Longmore’s brain. “He’ll do anything, too,” he said. “Kindly remember that. And remember as well that he’s not stupid. You’d better have a care.”

She stiffened. “I can’t believe you’re giving me acting advice. Have you forgotten our day at Dowdy’s?”

“This is different.”

“It’s the same thing,” she said. “I’m pretending to be somebody I’m not. I do it all the time. I pretend I don’t want to slap a customer. I pretend she isn’t an idiot. I pretend I like changing the ribbon fourteen times because she doesn’t know what she likes or wants until thirty of her friends have all given their opinions.”

“This isn’t women in a shop,” he said.

“I’m well aware of that,” she said. “Have you forgotten whose idea this was? Have you forgotten that you said it was a perfect plan?”

“You were stark naked when you told me,” he said. “At the time, any plan would have struck me as perfect.”

“Well, then. It ought to be imbedded in your brain.”

“Well, nothing. That was before Clevedon gave us the nasty details about Adderley.”

While they’d been hunting for Clara, Clevedon had been doing his own sleuthing. He’d learned that Lord Adderley’s debts were considerably greater than rumored—and rumor had named a very high figure. He was in so deep that some of his creditors were keeping a close watch on him. He wouldn’t be the first gentleman to decide to flee his obligations via a packet to Calais or other continental parts.

“He’s dealt with some unsavory moneylenders,” she said with a dismissive wave. “I know about them.”

“Their methods aren’t always sporting,” he said.

“I know what they’re like,” she said.

“They’re not harmless oafs like Dowdy’s hired ruffians,” he said.

She let out a huff. “I told you: I know . You’ve no idea what we dealt with in Paris.”

“I don’t,” he said. “It grows clearer and clearer how little I know about you.”

... except that her breasts were perfect, and her bottom was beyond perfect, and when she made love she was completely honest.

... and that he was spending far too much time working on the problem of how to get her back into his bed.

“We’ll have to indulge in reminiscences another time,” she said. “There they are.”

He looked up. Adderley’s carriage was approaching.

“I only want you not to be overconfident,” he said. “I don’t want you to get into trouble.”

“You don’t know what I’m capable of,” she said. “I’m not your sister. I never had a sheltered life. You don’t know what it takes to establish a successful shop. You have to stop fretting about Adderley’s creditors and unsavory moneylenders, and leave him to me. You need to trust in me to know what I’m doing, so that you can concentrate on doing your own part. You have to be Longmore, who’s taken a fancy to Madame de Veirrion. Look at me. I’m Madame now.”

And she changed.

It was a marvel to him, to watch her. As the other carriage approached, her demeanor changed completely: her posture and the way she moved—even her face wasn’t quite the same face. This all happened in a way too subtle for one to put into words.

Unlike her stint as his cousin Gladys, she wore no disguise this time: no tinted spectacles to dull the brilliant blue of her eyes, no artificial blemishes to spoil her perfect skin, no noxious mixtures to dull the gold of her hair. She was dressed more expensively and extravagantly than usual—and that was no small accomplishment—but her face was in plain view.

Yet she became someone else, as though she had a hundred souls at her disposal, and could become another person as entirely and as easily as another woman changed hats.

In some way, through the sheer force of personality, she made the world believe the illusion she created.

But she was right, or at least partly right: He had to stop thinking about the delicious and troubling puzzle that was Sophia Noirot and concentrate on the allure of Madame de Veirrion.

He’d driven into the park through the Cumberland Gate, at the park’s northeast corner, in order to “accidentally” meet up with the other couple. Most of London’s fashionable set typically entered at Hyde Park Corner, making a great crush at the southeastern edge of the park. The aim was for Longmore and his companion to seem to be on their way out of the park when the encounter occurred.

Once abreast of each other, the two vehicles halted, and Longmore made the introductions.

Clara showed exactly the right degree of feminine curiosity about Madame.

Adderley was doing the masculine version: trying to size up Madame’s assets under the capes and gigantic sleeves of her carriage dress without being obvious about it. But of course it was as plain as plain to Longmore, as it would be to any man, that Adderley had discerned her splendidly rounded figure, and dwelt on it rather longer than he needed to. He made a valiant effort not to appear interested—one must give him a little credit, as little as possible—but Madame kept his attention. He was the hapless fish, swimming into her nets without realizing the nets were there.

Longmore had watched her captivate his friends last night. This afternoon he watched her casually throw the bait: a sidelong glance at Adderley, a tilt of her head, a gesture here, a fleeting smile there. In five minutes, she had him. A speculative gleam came into Adderley’s eyes, and a silent dialogue went on between them—and Longmore was developing a headache from the effort it took to pretend not to notice.

All the while, Madame was talking mainly to Clara. She made it seem that she was eager to win Clara’s approval. And all the while Clara listened to Madame’s mangled English with a perfectly sober expression, seeming completely oblivious to the silent byplay between Madame and Adderley.

“I am too much—oh, what is the word I want?” Madame frowned prettily. “To go ahead too much. Ah, forward . I am too much forward, yes? Too bold.”

“Not at all,” Adderley said, gallant fellow. Conceited, sneaking swine.

Madame feigned not to notice, her attention apparently given to Clara. “But my Lady Clara, this I demand: Who knows what arrives? Today we are content, so ’appy. The day after this, the one we love so much— poof! —he is gone. This is what arrives in my life. One day all is content and peace. The day that succeed, all is agitation. Mon époux , he die. Then Paris go mad. Who can say what will pass?”

“Not I, certainly,” said Longmore.

“The time, he run away from us,” she said. “One cannot attend.” She closed her eyes. “That word is not correct.”

“The word you want, madame, is wait ,” Longmore said. He’d learned her trick of using English words that sounded similar to French but whose meaning was not quite the same. Demand when she meant ask . Succeed instead of follow . “I believe you meant that because time does not wait for us, you will not wait for time.”

“This is so true,” said Madame. “I make haste. My Lady Clara— la très belle s?ur of Lord Lun-mour—let us make an acquaintance with each other. Let us encounter again.” She sent a fleeting glance Adderley’s way. “Tomorrow, yes? We attend the exhibition of the paintings at—What is the place, Lord Lun-mour?”

“The British Institution,” he said.

“That place,” said Madame. “I persuade Lord Lun-mour to accompany me to regard the art.”

“Oh, yes, I should like that above all things,” Clara said. She did not break into hysterical laughter or mention how many times her brother had said he’d rather have his eyes put out with hot pokers than join a mob shuffling about, gaping at paintings and making pompous, and inevitably wrong, comments about them.

She simply turned to Adderley and donned a sympathetic look and said, “But perhaps you’ll find it dull, Lord Adderley? If so, there’s no need to try your patience. My brother can easily escort two ladies. He can borrow Papa’s landau.”

“Milord does not enjoy to regard the paintings?” said Madame, looking up at Adderley, her mouth turning down in an adorable little pout.

“In the company of two such beautiful and charming ladies, I should enjoy looking at paving stones,” Adderley said.

Exclusive to Foxe’s Morning Spectacle

Friday 12 June

A Curious Coincidence? An intriguing piece of information has been brought to this correspondent’s attention. We recently learned that, mere days before the King’s Birthday Drawing Room on the 28 th of May, a certain gentleman was denied further credit at a number of establishments where he has large accounts substantially in arrears. As we are all aware, many of our tailors, purveyors of furnishings, vintners, tobacconists, boot makers, &c, often find themselves obliged to wait months, sometimes years, for their patrons to attend to accounts. His late Majesty, it may be recollected, left debts amounting to many tens of thousands of pounds. To what extremity a merchant must be driven, to refuse one of his lordly patrons further credit, we can only speculate. We need not puzzle our minds quite so much, perhaps, regarding the close proximity between this turn of events and the one leading to the same lord’s hasty engagement, a consequence of his luring to her disgrace a certain lady. The lady concerned, as everybody knows, will bring to her marriage a dowry reported to be in the vicinity of one hundred thousand pounds.

That afternoon

I t was the British Institution’s annual summer exhibition of old masters, featuring works from the collections of everybody who was anybody, from His Majesty on down through a selection of dukes, marquesses, earls, lords, ladies, and sirs. A privileged few had attended a private viewing on the previous Saturday. On Monday, the exhibition had opened to the public.

In spite of his aversion to pretentious mobs shuffling past fusty works of art, Lord Longmore might have found some entertainment in paintings of battle scenes and grisly deaths.

He wasn’t in the mood. Within a very short time of their arrival, Adderley and Madame had begun trailing behind Longmore and his sister. Now they’d moved out of hearing range though still within sight. Adderley stood quite close to Madame as they ostensibly discussed No. 53, Rocco Marconi’s “Woman Taken in Adultery.”

“You saw the Spectacle , I suppose,” Clara said, drawing him out of a darkly enjoyable fantasy whose highlight was the breaking of Adderley’s teeth.

“Like the rest of the world,” he said.

“Adderley was furious,” she said. “We had another scene when he came to collect me. He’s threatening to have Foxe arrested for scandalum magnatum . I feigned sympathy, but pointed out that the week before our wedding seemed not the ideal time to get involved in legal wrangles. I told him that Papa said they couldn’t hope to prosecute Foxe, since he named no names. Papa pointed out that if the previous king hadn’t been able to arrest every man who wrote scandal about him, a nobody like Adderley hadn’t a chance.”

“ ‘A nobody like Adderley,’ ” Longmore said. “You said that to his face.”

She turned an innocent gaze on him. “I was only repeating what Papa said.”

“How unfeeling of you,” he said.

“Yes. I daresay he’s telling his troubles to Madame.” Clara threw them a glance. “She looks very sympathetic, don’t you think?”

Madame was gazing up at Adderley, listening for all she was worth, one gloved hand resting over the center of her extremely tight bodice.

“She missed her calling,” Longmore said. “She belongs on the stage.”

“I’m amazed you can watch them with a straight face,” Clara said. “She’s so funny, is she not? So clever while seeming so thoroughly bubble-headed. I quite love her.”

“Which her do you mean?”

“Both,” Clara said. Her gaze came back to her brother. “You don’t seem to be enjoying yourself.”

“I’m not supposed to,” he said. “The fellow’s poaching on my preserve. That’s the scene. I’m supposed to be sending suspicious looks their way.” This had turned out to be extremely easy. “Then, after running out of patience, I’m supposed to have a blazing great row with Madame.”

“Perfect,” she said. “She’ll run into his arms for comfort.”

That ought to be very funny. It wasn’t.

“Yes,” he said. “That’s the plan.”

He started toward them.