Page 22 of Her Scandalous Pursuit

Of course, she ought to tell him who her family was. Indeed, she ought to have told him long before now. She hadn’t lied to him, but she had certainly withheld the truth. Everything she said about herself or her family had carefully excised any detail that would give away the Morelands’ position in society. Her original intention had been to put him more at ease, but the longer it went on, the more deceptive it seemed.

But she continued to put off telling him, fearing that the revelation might ruin everything. What if it changed how he acted around her? How he felt about her? Would he still see her as she was, the Thisbe who walked with him? Or would everything suddenly be awkward between them? Would he decide Thisbe wasn’t really a scientist, just an aristocratic woman, like Lady Burdett-Coutts, who liked to dabble in science? Desmond was one of the few men she had met who spoke to her as an equal. She couldn’t bear it if her social status changed that. But, no, surely not. After all, Desmond had come to know her. Surely, he wouldn’t view her through a different lens just because she had a title in front of her name. The problem was that the risk if she was wrong was too devastating.

With each passing day, she felt guiltier keeping silent. She had to tell him. She promised herself she would do so the day of the final Christmas lecture. If she did not, she wouldn’t see him again until the next Covington meeting, and that was over a fortnight away. Yet as they strolled through the park after the last Christmas lecture, ignoring the flakes of snow drifting down around them, she could not bring herself to say the words.

They reached an empty spot, sheltered from the sight of others, and Desmond took her in his arms and kissed her. It was a most satisfactory kiss, and when he raised his head, both of them were breathing a little shakily. Desmond said, “I want to see you again.”

“Yes. So do I.” Now was the time to confess the truth. “Perhaps you could, um...” She looked into his eyes. The nerves in her stomach danced, and all she could think of was his face changing, turning uncertain, his drawing back from her. “Perhaps we could meet at the British Museum Reading Room. They allow women. It’s not mandatory that we stay in the ladies’ ‘magazine reading’ room.”

“When?”

“Um, let’s see.” Tomorrow would seem too eager, surely. “Perhaps Sunday afternoon?”

He smiled. “I’ll be there.” He bent to kiss her again.

It was a most satisfactory ending to their day, but Thisbe berated herself all the way home for not telling him the truth. It was silly to think that he might withdraw from her. Most people would consider it grand that her father was a duke. Just because Desmond had made a few slighting remarks about “wealthy dilettantes” when they were discussing scientific patrons didn’t mean that he would think of her that way. He knew who she was.

She was underestimating Desmond, thinking he would react like other people. He would look past the grandiose home and see the true picture of her family. Indeed, if a man could not do that, she wouldn’t want to be with him, no matter how much it might hurt to give him up. She would tell him when they met on Sunday. She would write it down and show it to him if her mouth shut down on her again.

But when she walked into Broughton House and saw the bags and trunks cluttering the entryway, her heart sank. There was something far worse to show Desmond than her home. Her grandmother had arrived.

CHAPTER SIX

IT SEEMED IMPOSSIBLE that one woman could need so much baggage for a visit. It raised the fear that her grandmother intended to reside with them for the rest of her days. But the dowager duchess always carried an inordinate amount of clothes when she traveled. And she rarely budged without her chest of “treasures.”

“Thisbe!” Her mother turned to her, relief on her face. “Your grandmother is here.”

“Yes, I see. Hello, Grandmother.” Thisbe went forward to kiss her grandmother’s cheek.

The dowager duchess was not especially large, yet somehow she managed to appear so. Her hair was almost entirely silver, her eyes gray, and her face still held the remnants of her onetime beauty. She would have looked the picture of a sweet and doting grandmother had it not been for the ice in her eyes and the determined set of her jaw.

She wore her usual fashionable dress and the jewelry that so fascinated the twins. A gold necklace circled her throat, with a matching bracelet on one arm and a mourning bracelet set with obsidian on the other. Large rings decorated three of her fingers, and around her waist was a chatelaine. From the chatelaine hung her gold-framed pince-nez and other “necessities”—smelling salts, a mirror, digestive tablets, a small sewing kit and miniature scissors, each of them encased in ornate gold containers. The back of the mirror was monogrammed in diamond chips.

“Your mother tells me that Theo is not here,” the dowager duchess said, shooting an accusing look at Emmeline.

“Had we known what day you would arrive, I am sure Theo would have made a point to be here to greet you,” Emmeline responded pointedly.

“I hope your trip wasn’t stressful,” Thisbe said.

“Of course it was. Dreadful rackety train—makes one quite ill. I would have preferred to come in the carriage, but I left that for Hermione.”

“Lady Rochester was in Bath?” Thisbe asked, exchanging a look with her mother. That explained her grandmother’s sudden decision to visit them.

“Yes. She’s thinks the waters will help her gout. I told her that not eating a plate of roast beef every night would improve her gout more. Of course, she doesn’t listen to me. I felt I had to leave her the coach, given her infirmity, so I traveled by train. I am not one to complain,” the dowager duchess said and proceeded to do exactly that about the people on the train, the incompetence of the porters and the presence of ragtag urchins darting about the station.

“I was just telling the duchess that she should go upstairs to rest after such an ordeal,” Emmeline said. It amused Thisbe that her mother and grandmother went out of their way to avoid using the other’s given name.

“Nonsense. I’m not of an age yet where I must take a nap in the afternoon. Too much sleep dulls the brain, you know.” The dowager duchess turned and marched into the formal drawing room, which was rarely used by the duke and his family.

Emmeline sighed as she turned to her daughter. “I am glad you arrived. Everyone else is out. Well, Bellard is here, but he bolted up the backstairs the moment he heard Cornelia’s voice. And I have my suspicions that Smeggars was lying when he told us Henry had gone to his club.”

They followed the dowager duchess into the drawing room. She was sitting in a chair beside the massive fireplace. “It’s freezing in here.”

“We don’t usually keep a fire in this room, as we rarely use it,” Emmeline replied. “But Smeggars had them set it when you arrived. It should be much warmer soon.”

“But where do you receive guests? Don’t tell me you still insist on that hideous red monstrosity.”

“I prefer the sultan room, yes.”