Kitty supposed he would know. He was the sort of man girls would have been tumbling over since he was in his teens.
“Very well. I suggested to the dowager that she wouldn’t want to live on in a place that had such unhappy memories for her.”
“Stillno blood?”
“If eyes could pierce... What places are available?”
“She won’t go, but in addition to the Dower House here, there’s a house in Bath that has been rented out for a decade or more, her old house in Lincolnshire, and the place in Wales. Though that’s more of a farm.”
“No London house?”
“Yes, but we’ll need that at times.”
A London house. It would be a grand one in Grosvenor Square or some such fashionable quarter. Another place to manage, and being there would mean tackling the haut ton.
“Do you live there now?” she asked.
“I keep my rooms.”
She’d like to see them. She suspected they’d tell her a great deal about her husband. “Is the house rented?”
“No. The fifth viscount used it fairly often.”
“But it’s stood vacant for at least a six-month. That’s a waste.”
“The viscountcy is not so desperate for income.” He might as well have looked down his fine nose, and she wanted to snap something about pampered privilege, but she must try to think and speak like a grand lady.
“I plan to speak to the cook,” she said. “Are you content with the meals provided?”
“They’ve mostly been edible. I offended you?”
“Not at all. Mostly?”
“Inedible was tried once. I put a stop to it.”
“Flogging?”
“Beating servants was outlawed long ago.”
“But not beating wives,” she pointed out.
“Wives are chattel. Servants aren’t.”
He might be teasing, but in her present mood, Kitty couldn’t tell. “Why was the food inedible?”
“The dowager instructed the cook to it. Oversalted soup, rubbery meat, scorched potatoes.”
“And she obeyed?” It felt good to turn her anger on a worthy object.
“It was early days,” he said. “I put an end to it by making it clear that another meal of that sort would lead to the instant dismissal of all the kitchen servants.”
“Somewhat drastic, and very unjust.”
“It never serves to slap at arrant insubordination. At least in civilian life, we don’t have to hang people to bring the rest to heel.” He halted and inhaled. “I apologize. That’s not the sort of thing—”
“To say to a lady. Think where I spent most of my adult life, Braydon.”
He’d been growing angry, however, as angry as she, perhaps responding to her emotions, and because of his cool restraint, she hadn’t been aware of it. At least with Marcus there’d been no concealment.
