“That’s hardly the point. The papers are discussingherindiscretion, not mine.”
“Her indiscretion!” Sir William repeated, looking apoplectic. “You were supposed to keep her safe.”
“As was your sister,” Philip reminded him. “Where is Mrs. Cumbersome in all this muddle?”
“You shall not slander my sister. It was not as though she could accompany my daughter onto the dance floor with this cur, Lowry. Could she? Poor woman took to her bed with a fit of the vapors. I didn’t understand why until someone kindly sent me the snippet.” He tossed the newsprint back onto his desk.
Kindly, his arse,Philip thought. Someone was stirring up trouble.
“Delicate female feelings are at stake,” the magistrate continued.
“Your sister’s?” Philip asked.
“Don’t be ridiculous. I meant Miranda’s. My sister is as tough as Wellington’s boots. The vapors were merely a ruse to avoid me while feeling ashamed. Lucinda rallied and accompanied my daughter to the country. It’syouwho should be mortified at failing to handle one easily managed young woman.”
“If you don’t mind my saying, sir, Miss Bright is not the docile crumpet you make her out to be.”
“What!” The magistrate was back to yelling. “I do mind. Go to Northampton and bring her back. Or you can forget about your brandy and bid your freedom a fond farewell, too.”
There was no point in arguing further. Philip had given Sir William too much information, and now the man was using it against him.
“I want my daughter safely back here, brought willinglyafteryou have apologized. Tell her she has gentlemen callers waiting.” The magistrate came around his desk and marched up to Philip. “She had watery eyes when she left. When I next look upon her, I don’t want to see a single tear, nor a hair out of place. Is that clear?”
The magistrate was as formidable as any general on the battlefield.
“I shall do my best, sir.”
“Your best?” the man repeated. “Then you shall succeed, my lord. I know it!”
MIRANDA LAUGHED WHEN Helen scooped up one of the family’s cats and deposited it onto her brother’s lap. Peter pretended the cat was a nuisance, but quickly, he was stroking its head, letting it lean against his hand and close its eyes. She found her affable cousins to be a welcome change from the company she’d been lately keeping in London.
“I wish you could see it all for yourself,” she mused.
“We may someday,” Peter said, sounding unbothered about their country existence. “At any rate, I’ve told Helen she should spend time with you and Uncle William in Town. It would do her the world of good. She might even find herself a husband.”
“I won’t leave you,” his sister said. “I would miss you, dear brother, far too much. I get everything I need of the London experience from Miranda’s letters, and her book will be the talk of Britain. I can’t wait to read it.”
It was true her book would be printed shortly. Before coming away, she’d sent her stack of pages to Lady Harriet. After all, since her association with Lord Mercer was at an end, there would be no more amusing vignettes of Mayfair. She assumed if the story wasn’t good enough, then Lady Harriet would toss it away.
“Besides Helen is sweet on the farmer’s eldest son,” Miranda reminded Peter, making her cousin’s pretty cheeks turn pink.
Peter nodded. “He is a good man and will inherit a large, fertile piece of land. I hope he asks for her hand soon so she’ll stop mothering me. We already have a mother, and I don’t need two.”
Although his tone was light, a measure of seriousness lay underneath it, and Helen shrugged.
“I don’t mean to mother you, but I am loath to marry and leave you alone.”
Peter rolled his eyes. “Miranda will visit as she always has, and I have our parents. I am not alone.”
A second cat jumped onto his lap. “And I have these beasts always hanging on me. They’re making me too hot in truth.” He stroked each one before giving them a firm push off his lap which was covered with a light blanket despite it being a late-summer day.
“And I don’t need this.” He picked it off and tossed it aside onto the grass, the only sign he felt irritable. Normally, he would have folded it and handed it gently to one of them.
“Let’s go for a stroll.” He used the word despite remaining seated.
Miranda and Helen rose from their wrought iron chairs.
“Yes, let’s,” Miranda said, catching her cousin’s eye when Helen went behind the pushchair. “Do you want assistance,” she asked Peter, “or are you going to exercise those muscles of yours?”
