Page 19 of The Duke’s Hidden Duchess

“He said it because I made him promise to speak the important truths aloud where you could hear them.” Selina tightened her hold upon the girl’s fingers. “Keep him to that promise.”

Lady Helena offered one gloved hand and the single word “Duchess,” pronounced as though she were testing the weight of a coin from a doubtful mint.

“You disapprove of me, ma’am,” Selina said, accepting the hand.

“I disapprove of the haste, the licence and the flowers. I have not yet formed an opinion of you.” The pale eyes passed over her once, without hurry. “I judge people slowly. It has spared me a great many errors and cost me most of my friendships. You will hear from me. Do not mistake my silence for approval.”

“What am I to mistake it for, ma’am?”

“Work,” Lady Helena replied, and took her leave.

Petherick offered his congratulations in the tone of a man closing a file. The small company dispersed. The chairs were returned to their proper places, and a maid came to remove Georgiana’s unsuitable flowers. By evening, the room had forgotten the entire affair.

Nathaniel and Selina stood at the foot of the great staircase, with separate rooms waiting for them above.

“Well,” Selina said. “We have managed it.”

“So it appears.”

“You may find that making me a duchess does not silence the gossip.”

“I did not expect it to.”

“And now you must share your house with the subject of it.”

Nathaniel looked at her. “Do you intend to speak of yourself as a scandal for the rest of our marriage?”

“It may save time if others are going to do it for me.”

“I know what others will say.” He rested one hand upon the newel post. “I also know what you did. You entered that house to bring my sister home, although you understood what it might cost you. I will not pretend the two accounts are equally true.”

Selina regarded him for a moment. “You may have to tell me that more than once.”

“Then I shall.”

She placed her hand upon the bannister and climbed two stairs before glancing back. He remained below, watching her.

“Good night, Duchess.”

“Good night,” she replied, leaving off Your Grace without quite intending to.

Their separate rooms awaited them, exactly as agreed. Selina lay awake for a long while, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of a house which was now, impossibly, her own: a stair settling below, a horse passing through the square, and the door across the landing remaining closed.

***

Across the city, in a set of rooms considerably less distinguished, another conversation was drawing to its close.

“You are certain that it is she.”

Giles Calvert, Earl of Merrow, had been on his feet for a quarter of an hour and had not ceased moving. He was a heavy, soft-handed man with the Calvert nose and none of the Calvert pride.

“I have laid out money upon this, Rowland; money I do not possess, as you are perfectly aware. I should dislike to discover that I spent it upon a face glimpsed across a hall full of candles. You were certain before. You were certain about the Ottley affair, and I am still paying for that.”

“I knew her father.”

“So did half of London, and half of London could not have distinguished his daughter in a crowd at ten paces.”

He lost the remainder of the sentence and went to the window instead. He drew the curtain aside by an inch, then let it fall.