Page 53 of Gentleman Jim

“Enough.” Maggie placed a staying hand on Fred’s sleeve. “I mean it. I’m bored to tears with all this bluster. You will oblige me by escorting me down to supper.”

“Have no fear,” Fred replied tersely. “I’ll look after you.” Tucking her hand into his arm—an unmistakably proprietary gesture—he cast a malevolent look at St. Clare. “You and I will meet again.”

“Undoubtedly.” St. Clare watched them depart through the terrace doors. Maggie was saying something to Fred, her voice too soft to be heard. St. Clare made no attempt to discern her words. He walked to the rail of the terrace, conscious of Lionel following behind him.

“An old enemy of yours?” Lionel asked.

St. Clare leaned back against the railing, his arms folded. “What do you think?”

“What I think, Cousin, is that you’re not the man you seem.”

“And you are?”

Lionel removed his enameled snuffbox from an inner pocket of his coat. He flicked open the lid. “The difference being that I can produce evidence of the legitimacy of my birth. While you”—he took a pinch of snuff—“cannot.”

The torches that flanked the terrace flickered and snapped in the darkness. St. Clare’s anger flickered, too. This time he managed to contain it. “Is my grandfather’s word not enough for you?”

“No,” Lionel answered. “I’m afraid it isn’t.”

And there it was. The unvarnished truth of the matter.

St. Clare had suspected as much, but he hadn’t anticipated his cousin would admit it quite so plainly—or quite so offensively. “I should call you out for that.”

“You should,” Lionel agreed.

“I might, if I was confident you knew how to hold a pistol straight. As it stands, I may as well be calling out a child. And I don’t engage with children in affairs of honor, offensive as they may be.”

“Your father had no such scruples.”

St. Clare drew himself up to his full height. For a moment, he didn’t trust himself to speak.

“He had a temper too, they say.” Lionel extracted his handkerchief to wipe the remaining snuff from his nostrils. “I’ve heard the stories. He was reckless and foolish. Wasting his fortune on whores and drink and gambling. Playing ridiculous pranks. According to Madre, your grandfather had had enough of him. And when your father shot Penworthy’s boy—”

“Penworthy’s son was no child. He was a man grown.”

“In years, perhaps. But not in reason. Madre says the boy hadn’t the sense of an addled pea goose. By consenting to a duel with your father, he all but signed his death warrant.”

“Your mother knows nothing about my father. Nor do you.”

Lionel shrugged. “Merely stating the facts.”

St. Clare shot a narrow glance back toward the ballroom. A few footmen and housemaids were busy tidying up near the glass doors. Conspicuously busy. There didn’t appear to be any guests lurking about, but one never knew. “By the by, where is your esteemed mother?”

“Enjoying her supper when I left her. Madre’s found a kindred spirit in your Miss Steele. They’ve become fast friends.”

St. Clare supposed Lionel’s statement was meant to put him on his guard. As if Louisa Steele was in possession of any of St. Clare’s secrets. During the past days, as he’d squired her about town, he’d done little but smile as she rattled on about herself in tiresome detail. All the compliments she’d received from men and all the ladies who were—inevitably—jealous of her.

It had been a small sacrifice to appease his grandfather, but a sacrifice nonetheless. Every minute spent with Miss Steele was one St. Clare might have spent with Maggie. And now, to know that Maggie had misunderstood him. That he might have hurt her in some way.

It wasn’t what he’d intended. Not by any stretch of the imagination.

More and more he was beginning to feel like one of those hapless street performers he’d seen in Venice as a lad. A juggler with too many balls in the air. It took all of one’s focus to keep the balls from dropping. A single fumble could mean catastrophe.

“I congratulate you, Cousin,” Lionel went on. “Miss Steele is a great beauty. The prize of the season, I understand, and that set on marrying a title. It would be too bad if she were disappointed in that regard.”

Too bad, indeed.

St. Clare’s mouth curled into a humorless smile as he crossed to the terrace doors. His shoulder narrowly clipped Lionel’s as he passed. “Do your worst.”