Page 19 of The Lady Knows Best

“Forgive me for interrupting,” said Theodosia, laying her bonnet and gloves aside. “What were you discussing when I came in?”

Lady Stalbridge picked up a sheet of figures, the uppermost item in her stack of papers. “From what I can see, we have Lord Deveraux’s broken engagement to thank for our success this month. As soon as rumors about the identity of the man in Aggrieved in Grosvenor Square’s letter began to circulate, so did the Magazine for Misses. And I have an idea for how we can thank him,” she finished, lowering the paper to look straight at Daphne.

“Th-th . . .” Daphne’s mouth was dry, too dry to form the word without pausing to swallow. “Thank him?”

“Although, I doubt he’ll appreciate the sort of gratitude I have in mind,” Lady Stalbridge said with a humorless smile. “You see, since I read your answer to Miss Grey, I’ve been considering the need to speak to our readers in more pointed terms about the dangers posed by certain gentlemen of the ton, both those who wear their villainy like a badge of honor, and those who hide every appearance of it.”

Lord Deveraux was the former sort, of course. But when Daphne looked back on his behavior of the evening before, she wondered whether he might be hiding something of himself, nonetheless.

“Is not the Magazine for Misses our united attempt to speak to our peers on such matters?” demanded Constantia, her chin tucked back toward her breastbone, like one affronted.

“Of course it is, Miss Cooper,” Lady Stalbridge said in a mollifying tone. “But subtlety may be overlooked. Satire may be misread. Miss Busy B., however, has a knack for plain speaking, and clearly readers do listen. I had in mind an essay, or a series of essays, on rakes—”

Daphne’s heart began to race. On one hand, she would like nothing better than another opportunity to shame Lord Deveraux. On the other, more exposure of his bad behavior would hardly improve her chances of finding him a suitable wife—which was to say, her chances of saving herself and the magazine.

“I want young women to be able to recognize them,” continued Lady Stalbridge, “and thus avoid being ruined.”

Beneath the table, Daphne twisted her fingers into a knot. She could have done without hearing that phrase again.

“Rakes and ruination?” Miss Julia Addison peered around the tall bookshelf that screened the room from the doorway. “We must be talking about Lord Deveraux again. Do tell us, Miss Burke, what was it like to dance with him?”

Lady Stalbridge’s dark, delicate brows rose in a perfect arc. Constantia, who had been gesturing with her pencil for emphasis, lost her grip and flung it across the room. Zwolf obligingly lumbered out from beneath the table to fetch it.

“And who is this darling boy?” Julia crooned, stepping forward. Zwolf tilted his head at the sound of her voice.

Daphne took advantage of his momentary distraction to retrieve the slobbery pencil from the dog’s jaws and return it to a nonplussed Constantia. “I didn’t realize you were at the Clearwaters’ ball, Miss Addison.”

“I wasn’t,” Julia said, scratching the dog between the ears and favoring him with a scrunch-faced smile before taking her seat. “But Mrs. Hayes was—she and Lady Clearwater are old friends, you know.”

Mrs. Mildred Hayes was the liberal-minded aunt of Julia’s sister-in-law, Lady Sterling, and a devout lover of the theater, the more awful the farce, the better. Following the recent marriages of both Julia’s brother and mother, Mrs. Hayes had invited Julia to move to Clapham as a sort of companion. Together, they attended all the plays and performances Julia reviewed in her column under the name Miss on Scene.

“She regaled me with the news over breakfast. Said that when you and Lord Deveraux danced together, the ballroom was . . . abuzz.” That last word, a clear reference to Miss Busy B.’s column, was punctuated with a mischievous giggle.

Constantia and Theodosia were all astonishment. Lady Stalbridge looked thoughtful. “Tell me, my dear, did Lord Deveraux say—or do—anything of note in your presence last night? Anything particularly scandalous?”

Daphne gnawed at her lip. “Um, maybe?” She glanced around the table. “My goodness, shouldn’t we wait for Lady Clarissa?”

“She won’t be joining us this morning. She is preparing for her debut performance at the Estleys’ musicale this evening,” Lady Stalbridge said with an indulgent smile at Daphne’s obvious attempt to change the subject. “She credits your marvelous advice for her ability to persuade her papa to allow it, even though she is not strictly speaking ‘out’ in society.”

Daphne knew then that the countess had no intention of letting Miss Busy B. squirm her way out of the planned essay on rakes.

“She is to play a duet with her mother,” Lady Stalbridge went on, “and they have been practicing three hours every morning. Lady Clarissa feared that to cry off on the day of the performance itself would raise suspicions and so she had to miss our meeting. Now, you were saying about Lord Deveraux . . .”

“I heard he tried to take you off somewhere—alone—after you danced,” said Julia.

“Excellent,” Lady Stalbridge purred.

“Excellent?” Constantia echoed, incredulous. “How so? Why, he’s obviously only looking for some way to win his bet.”

Slightly wounded by that harsh truth, Daphne nevertheless looked to Lady Stalbridge for an explanation.

“If Miss Burke is to speak with her usual authority on this matter, it will unfortunately require some first-hand experience with rakes. If Lord Deveraux has shown interest, I believe you should encourage it. That way, you will soon know his tricks well enough to be able to teach our readers to avoid them.”

“It seems to me any plan for Miss Burke to associate further with the man runs the risk of damaging her own reputation,” observed level-headed Theodosia.

“If there is any scandal—which I doubt,” said Lady Stalbridge, “for our Miss Burke is far too clever to be ensnared—her family will help her to weather it. They strike me as a fiercely loyal clan.”

“Anyway, those sorts of scandals never last long,” Julia added, sounding vaguely disappointed. She was still scratching Zwolf behind the ears. A rope of saliva hung from the dog’s jowls, and a puddle of drool had begun to form beneath the table, a sure sign of his contentment. “By next Season, everyone will have moved on to something else.”