“I suppose that’s your privilege,” she said.
He took a sip of sherry. “I do say what I please. I doubt anyone in the ton thinks I am a gentleman.”
“You’re the brother of a marquis,” she reminded him. “Surely that counts for . . .”
“It counts for nothing,” he interrupted, finishing her thought. “I am not playing the game I was born to play, Miss Ambrose, and some take offense.”
She sat up straight and turned to face him impulsively. “How can you say that? I have been reading of the good you have done!”
“You are too kind, my dear.” He poured another drink. “When I was in York today, I spoke to the warden at the Abbey. You’re from a crusading family, yourself, aren’t you?”
She nodded. “Papa and Mama lived in Egypt for nearly twenty years. I am not their only ‘extra child,’ as Papa puts it.”
“The warden was sufficiently impressed when I mentioned that a member of the Ambrose family was visiting the Marquis of Falstoke.”
Cecilia smiled and swirled the sherry in her glass. “And now they are doing good in India, and plumbing the depths of Sanskrit.” She looked up, pleased to see Lord Trevor smiling at her, for no particular reason that she could discern. At least he does not look so tired, she thought. “We came to England in 1798, when I was sixteen. I went four years to Miss Dupree’s Select Academy, and now I teach drawing and pianoforte.”
“You weren’t tempted to go to India with them?”
“No, I was not,” she said. He was still smiling at her, and she decided he was a most attractive man, even with his untidy hair and rumpled clothing. “I like it right here, even with . . . with its occasional difficulties.” She set down the wineglass. “And that is all I am going to say now. It is your turn to tell me why someone of your rank and quality thinks he is a black sheep.”
“It’s a sordid tale,” he warned her.
“I doubt that. Slide the hassock over, please. Thank you.”
He made himself comfortable, too. “Miss Ambrose, the fun of being a younger son cannot be underrated. I did a double first at Oxford, contemplated taking Holy Orders, considered buying a pair of colors, and even thought I would travel to the Caribbean and invest in sugar cane and slaves.”
She relaxed, completely at ease. “That sounds sufficiently energetic.”
“I didn’t have to do anything. Some younger sons must scramble about, I suppose, but our father was a wealthy man, and our mother equally endowed. She willed me her fortune. I am better provided for than most small countries.”
“My congratulations,” she murmured. “You know, so far this is not sordid. I have confiscated more daring stories from my students late at night, when they were supposed to be studying.”
“Let me begin the dread tale of my downfall from polite society before you fall asleep and start to snore,” he told her.
“You’re the one who snores, according to Davy,” she reminded him.
“And you must be a sore trial to the decorum of Miss Deprave’s Select Academy,” he teased.
“Dupree,” she said, trying not to laugh.
“If you insist,” he teased, then settled back. “I suppose I was running the usual course for second sons, engaging in one silly spree after another. It changed one evening at White’s, while I was listening to my friends argue heatedly for an hour about whether to wear white or red roses in their lapels. It was an epiphany, Miss Ambrose.”
“I don’t suppose there are too many epiphanies in White’s,” she said.
“That may have been the first! I decided the very next morning, after my head cleared, to toddle over to Lincoln’s Inn and see about the law. My friends were aghast, and concerned for my sanity, but do you know, Miss A, it suited me right down to the ground. I sat for law through several years, ate my required number of dinners at the Inn, and was called to the Bar.”
“My congratulations. I would say that makes you stodgy rather than sordid.”
He smiled at her, real appreciation in his eyes. “Miss Ambrose, you are a witty lady with a sharp tongue! Should I pity poor Janet if she actually tries your kindness beyond belief and you give her what she deserves?”
She was serious then. “She is young, and doesn’t know what she says.”
“Spoken like the daughter of the well churched!” He leaned across the table and touched her arm. “Here comes the sordid part, Miss A.” And then his face was more serious than hers. “I went to Old Bailey one cold morning to shift some toff’s heir from a cell where he’d languished—the three D’s, m’dear: drunk, disorderly, and disturbing the peace. It was a matter of fifteen minutes, a plea to the magistrate, and a whopping fine for Papa to pay. Just fifteen minutes.” He stood up, went to the fireplace, and stared into the flames. “There was a little boy in the docket ahead of my client. I could have bumped him and gone ahead. I had done it before, and no magistrate ever objected.”