Page 87 of How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days

‘That is a secret!’ Lydia told Elspeth hurriedly. ‘You mustn’t tell anyone.’

She was not sure why that felt important. If anything, it would be within her interests to spread such embarrassing gossip about him – only, in the light of the honesties they had just shared, it felt dishonourable somehow.

Elspeth gave a derisive sniff. ‘As if I needed telling, Miss Lydia. I would never betray Lady Phoebe – or her family – in that way.’

‘I have not yet searched his rooms, so he cannot be ruled out,’ Pip said bracingly.

‘Yes, the damned valet,’ Lydia said, remembering Jane’s words from earlier.

Elspeth sniffed again. ‘Dreadfully high in the instep, that one – won’t let anyone else touch his lordship’s things.’

‘We shall have to change that,’ Lydia said, thinking of the half-cooked plan she and Jane had discussed hours before. ‘For Jane and I need access to Ashford’s rooms on the morrow, too.’

20

Sunday – Four days remaining

Some people might feel some moral discomfort about carrying out such schemes upon the Lord’s Day. Fortunately, Lydia did not count herself amongst them.

Less fortunately, neither did Ashford, and he too appeared to have spent some part of the night planning, and if his techniques belonged more to the schoolboy than the sophisticate, one could not argue against their efficacy.

Directly after returning from church – and an hour-long sermon on the Virtue of Charity – Ashford had swapped her sugar for salt at the refreshment table, causing Lydia to douse the table, and Captain von Prett’s arm, in regurgitated tea. She retaliated swiftly, sticking out a leg to trip Ashford as he rose from the table and as he very almost took a nose-dive into Lady Morton’s decolletage, she felt him justly served.

In this manner, they had tripped, spilled, mimicked, insulted and inconvenienced one another all day until somehow it was nightfall and Lydia had still not managed to enjoy a single conversation with Prett alone while Miss Hesse had had several. Even now, they were seated next to one another on the low sofa, quietly conversing, and though they were too far away for Lydia to hear them, she did not like the smiles on both their faces. Even more damningly, Prett had Brutus upon his lap. Rats.

She stabbed a needle moodily through her embroidery hoop. As usual, they were all arranged in the drawing room after dinner, though in respect to it being Sunday, they were engaged in calming activities: Lady Morton and Dacre playing a quiet game of cards together, Lady Hesse reading a letter, Sir Waldo a newspaper, and Lady Phoebe had a novel in her hand but looked on the point of falling asleep.

Lydia’s eyes fell on Ashford, sitting next to his cousin, to find him looking at her. The last move having been his – calling over Prett to admire Lydia’s appalling embroidery – he had been rather twitchy for the last half hour, impatiently awaiting her retaliation. But Lydia could be patient in her revenge. She might be sitting quietly in the drawing room, primly seeing to her embroidery, but elsewhere Pip, Jane and Elspeth were carrying out God’s work.

‘I found out from his lordship’s groom that his valet has a terrible weakness for sugar plums,’ Elspeth had told them all, early this morning. ‘Alphonse keeps a supply in the pantry.’

She was to waylay him with the plums after the servant’s dinner, allowing Pip and Jane access to Ashford’s rooms where Pip could complete his search and Jane could kidnap Ashford’s trousers.

Lydia smiled just to think of it, still looking at Ashford. He gave her a sarcastic smile in return. Lydia broadened her smile to a beam. He stretched his to an unpleasant grin.

‘Are you well, my lord?’ Lady Hesse said, eyeing him in some concern.

Ashford hastily restored his face to normalcy. ‘Yes, certainly. I was merely … exercising my face.’

Lydia snorted. Ashford threw her a glare. Her role was keeping an eye on Ashford and Reeves, both of whom were present in the drawing room and both of whom she had to keep there, by any means necessary.

Ashford rose from his seat.

‘Where do you go, my lord?’ Lydia asked at once.

‘To fetch my book,’ he said. ‘If that meets with your approval, Miss Hanworth?’

It did not at all meet with Miss Hanworth’s approval.

‘Can someone not fetch it for you?’ she asked.

‘I am happy to—’ Reeves began, but Ashford waved him off.

‘I have been seated still too long,’ he said.

‘As have I,’ Sir Waldo said, laying down his paper with a sigh, though Lydia had not seen him turn a single page all evening. ‘Phoebe, surely you have more planned for us this evening than all this sitting about?’

Lady Phoebe blinked away her tiredness.