Mary Balogh: Gentle conquest

He had seemed touchingly concerned about her earlier in the evening when he came to see her for a few minutes. He had refused to sit down and had been pale and ill-at-ease. Poor Ralph! He probably imagined that she was dying at the very least. He had been on his way out. She smiled. At least she knew he was not going to keep an assignation with another woman. The next Kenington night was tomorrow. The thought sobered her. She would not be able to go, of course. But the fact that she was supposed to do so must make it all the more important for her to talk to Ralph tomorrow.

She smiled at her maid and directed the girl to snuff the candles. She would try to sleep and dream up some magically tactful way to break the awful truth to her husband.

Ralph in the meanwhile was being shown into Lord Beauchamp's dressing room, where his lordship's butler was helping him into a particularly well-fitting evening coat.

"Ah, Ralph, my lad," he said cheerfully, "looking for company, are you? I am on my way to a card party. Do you care to join me?"

"No," Ralph said. "But I would like to have a word with you before you leave."

"Well, fire away, my boy," Roger said, smoothing the fine face of his cuffs over the backs of his hands while his valet pulled the coat into place across his shoulders. "Oh. You may leave, Perkins. I believe you have done a good enough job that your reputation will not suffer when I appear in public."

The valet gave a doubtful glance at his master's neckcloth, which still lay in its starched perfection on the dresser. But he turned and left the room, closing the door quietly behind him.

"Well," Roger said heartily when they were alone, "I can see from your face, my boy, that you know. So I might as well save us both from the tedium of pretending ignorance and surprise. It is a dreadful coil, Ralph. He took me completely by surprise, you know, and I had said pistols before having a chance to think. Quite a disastrous choice! I shall delope, of course, but that will leave me dreadfully exposed to the young lunatic's bullet. Is he a good shot, by any chance?"

"My God," Ralph said. "What are you talking about?"

Roger looked back at him and then closed his eyes for a few moments. "I should have put us both through the tedium," he said. "You did not know after all, did you?"

"No," Ralph said. "You are talking about Stanley, are you not? A duel? Has the world gone mad?"

"I seriously fear young Stan might have," Roger said, turning and picking up the unfolded neckcloth. He proceeded to arrange it himself, with the aid of the mirror in front of him. "You should seriously consider packing him off to Oxford, Ralph. He could work off his energies there in acceptably unruly undergraduate activities. He maneuvered me very handily into accepting his challenge and then I blurted out pistols without a thought to the consequences. Someone is likely to get killed, and I very much fear it might be me.-

"Isit true?" Ralph asked quietly.

Roger swiveled sharply on his chair. His brows were drawn together. "Is what true?" he asked.

"Is Georgiana your mistress?" Ralph asked. "I swear if it is true, Roger, I shall kill you myself before you even leave this room."

Roger pulled the half-tied neckcloth off his neck again and slammed it down on the dresser. He got to his feet. "Damn you, Ralph," he said. "I never thought to hear you ask me such a question."

"I want to know if it is true," Ralph persisted.

"No, it is not true, dammit!" Roger replied.

"Is it true that she had been leaving the house and driving away in your carriage late at night?" Ralph asked.

Roger sat down again. "Look, Ralph, my lad," he said, "I think you should have a good talk with Georgie. I can't say any more."

"Can't or won't?" Ralph asked.

"Won't." Roger said firmly. "But there has never been anything remotely improper in my relations with your wife, my boy. If you will just look at me and remember who I am, I think you will know that I am speaking the truth."

"If that is so," Ralph said, "why did you accept Stanley's challenge?"

"There were reasons," Roger said reluctantly. "I am fond of Georgie, you know, and she is married to my favorite cousin."

"What did he say about her?" Ralph asked.

"You would not want to know, my boy," Roger assured him.

Ralph moved for the first time since he had entered the room. He began to pace the floor. "You cannot fight this duel, Roger," he said. "When is it supposed to be, anyway?"

"Tomorrow morning," Roger said. "At dawn, of course. Everything has to be dramatic with young Stan."

"It must not take place," Ralph said. "You must just send him word that you have changed your mind."

"Spoken like a true man of the world, my lad," his cousin said, grinning despite the seriousness of the topic. "And where would I find a hole deep enough to hide my head in for the rest of my life, may I ask?"

"You cannot fight!" Ralph said vehemently, coming to a halt in front of his cousin. "Do you realize how appallingly public the whole affair will be if you do so? I will not have that happen to Georgiana."

"I must confess the thought has bothered me somewhat," Roger admitted. "But I am afraid this thing has gone rather too far, Ralph. I don't know quite why it is, my boy, but people like me take affairs of honor rather seriously, you know."

"I shall put a stop to it!" Ralph said firmly. "I shall look for Stanley until I find him tonight. And I shall make sure that he does not keep his appointment tomorrow. He will come to apologize to you, Roger. And if there is any fighting to be done, I shall do it. Georgiana is my wife, for heaven's sake, and my brother and my cousin are about to fight to the death over her! She is not your concern or my brother's."

He turned and stalked from the room. Lord Beauchamp turned back toward his dresser with a shrug and a half-smile and regarded the ruined neckcloth ruefully. He rang for his valet.

AT HALF-PAST FOUR the following morning, Ralph was sitting in his brother's darkened bedroom. He had not bothered to light any candles. He was feeling worried and had to force himself to sit still. Pacing up and down the room would bring Stanley home no sooner. Indeed, his worry stemmed not so much from the lateness of the boy's return as from his fear that he would not return at all before his dawn appointment with Roger.

Ralph had searched for him. The trouble was that he did not know which places Stanley was in the habit of frequenting and could find no one who knew of his plans for the evening. Finally, at well after midnight, he had been forced to give up the search. There was always the possibility, anyway, that while he was wandering the streets, Stanley would be at home in his bed.

He had been in this room for two hours, interminable hours during which every sound outside the house drew him to the window. He had had no idea that a street in London could be so noisy at night.

Ralph tried to force his mind to stay on the main issue. He must see his brother in time to stop the duel. Duels were rare enough in these days to become immediate items of news. By noon of tomorrow-no, today-half the population of London would know the location of the fight, the outcome, the identities of the duelists, and the cause of the quarrel. The thought did not bear contemplation. Georgiana would be the talk of the town.

Besides, it was an unjust quarrel. Roger was not keeping Georgiana as his mistress. Stanley, probably in a burst of youthful idealism, had decided that challenging his cousin was the only way to preserve the family honor. As it was, he was about to make a fool of himself. An expensive fool. He might end up dead, though Ralph recalled suddenly Roger's decision to delope, to shoot his pistol into the air rather than risk injuring his opponent. But Stanley could well end up killing Roger, and he would have to live with the guilt for the rest of his life. Indeed, he would be in a great deal of trouble with the law if any such thing occurred.