Page 68 of The Duchess Audition

“Yes, but you do not know the correct preparations,” she urged.

“Doctor Stanforth does.”

She shook her head defiantly. “No, he does not. He is a physician, not an apothecary or an herbalist. He understands sickness, not the cure. He gives medicine from a prescribed list; he does not make the medicine himself.”

“Marina…”

“No, do not try to convince me to give up,” she interrupted. “I will not rest until I have found a remedy. I have the means that Doctor Stanforth does not. I know how to make good medicine.”

Her uncle sat back in the armchair and expelled a weary breath, looking so much older than he had just a month ago. She could not deny that she was furious with him for keeping his illness from her, but now that she knew, nothing would stop her.

“I will not prevent you from trying, though I would ask you not to tell anyone of my condition,” he said with a sad smile. “But… I do want you to prepare yourself for the worst. I do not want it to be a shock to you if it does not work.”

Marina swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Very well; I will prepare myself for the worst and hope for the best.”

I will not lose you too. I refuse, was what she really wanted to say but, for now, she would play along with his request.

Besides, if he knew her as well as she thought he did, he was already well aware that she was lying through her teeth.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“Is your wife quite well?” Harriet asked abruptly, poking her head into Anthony’s study.

He had been in the middle of balancing his ledgers, her intrusion diverting his thoughts at the worst possible moment.

“What?” he snapped, trying to remember what number he had just calculated.

His grandmother stepped further into the room, oblivious or indifferent to his irritation. “I asked if your wife was quite well… not that you would know when you spend all of your day in here. Should you not open a window or something? It is unreasonably stuffy in here; I do not know how you can bear it.”

“Why would she not be?” he asked impatiently.

Harriet made a judgmental harrumph. “Have you not noticed her behavior these past few days?”

“Grandmother, I have not had time to notice anything other than my work,” he replied, sitting back, the numbers gone from his head. “She has seemed well enough at breakfast and dinner.”

Although, now that he thought about it, she had been uncharacteristically quiet, rushing through her meals and excusing herself shortly afterward.

He had assumed it was her way of distancing herself after the ball. Or, perhaps, that was what he had wanted to think, so he would not have to come up with a way to distance himself.

“You should not have given her your father’s personal library,” Harriet chided, tapping her fingertip on the rim of the teacup she had brought in with her.

“Whyever not? She must do her work, and I must do mine.”

The old woman shook her head. “It is not right for a young lady to sequester herself all day. According to Mrs. Havers, she has been in there most of the night, too. Why, the housekeeper found her asleep on the chaise-longue in there just this morning.”

“It is who she is,” Anthony countered. “We had an agreement that she would be allowed to continue with her interests—interests that, if I may remind you, saved my son—and I suspect that is what she is doing. She is allowed to be busy, Grandmother.”

Harriet pursed her lips. “Well, I do not like it. Nor does William.”

Anthony paused. He had not thought about how his wife’s work might affect his son, for they had agreed that she would work around William. If she was in her library all day and all night, then when was she taking care of the boy?

“She is looking after him, is she not?” he asked.

His grandmother shrugged. “He plays in the library while she is doing whatever she is doing, but I can tell he is bored. He will begin to have the same struggles as before if you do not do something, Anthony.”

He relaxed, reaching for a fresh quill. “It sounds to me as if all is well. Let the boy be somewhat bored; it will be good for him to entertain himself now and then.”

He did not believe for a moment that Marina was neglecting William in favor of her work. Most likely, she was just studying every time Harriet happened to pass by, and his grandmother had jumped to the wrong conclusions.