Page 70 of Better Than a Duke
“Oh. Thank you, then. Both of you.”
Blast it all. If she’d acted more swiftly she might have announced that she couldn’t stay due to a prior engagement, but that she wanted to take a moment to come by and thank him in person for the invitation. But now Betty had seated herself at the back of the box, and she’d already gushed about how pleased she was to be there. She had to stay.
“I didn’t even think to ask,” she said, as the thing folded her arms over her flat chest and sank lower in her seat, “but what will we be seeing tonight?”
“The Rivals,” Beckett answered over his daughter’s head. “Rebecca’s been wanting to see it.”
Ugh. A Richard Sheridan play. She detested them. The man thought he was so clever, giving his characters allegorical names and putting them in situations of utter nonsense. And no one said anything without turning it into a pun or a double entendre or a rhyme or some other mad thing.
“I’m certain you’ll enjoy it, Lady Rebecca,” she cooed. “It’s a grand, clever play.”
It didn’t work. The girl didn’t speak. By the halfway point of the play Pauline had given up on any attempt to have a private word with Beckett, or with trying to get the beast to smile or laugh or speak, and her sobering presence positively destroyed any possible chance to remind Beckett that he was meant to be proposing.
By the time they reached the play’s final line, she felt ready to tear out her hair. What a disaster. The only thing she’d demonstrated was that she didn’t flee from sulking children—though perhaps that would be a good point to remind him about later. Yes. She would find a way to mention that the silly moods of children didn’t trouble her, and in fact, she found it all endearing.
And the beast sticking out her tongue the moment her father’s back was turned? Well, Rebecca Raines could continue to stick out her tongue to her heart’s content—from behind the windows of a boarding school.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“Rebecca, I chatted with Mrs. Silbern during your rhyming lesson. I told you that. I apologized for Delilah, again, and she said she had nowhere to stable a mount, anyway, so there was no reason to apologize. And they couldn’t attend dinner night before last because her aunt had a party to attend.” Beckett snapped the top of the newspaper down to view his daughter, but she continued sketching what he presumed to be a portrait of Edmund.
She remained silent, and he felt a twitch beginning in one eye. He’d been the target of her silences from time to time, but generally he could figure out the reason he’d fallen out of her good graces and resolve the issue. This was different.
“Very well,” he said, folding the newspaper up again. “If you won’t tell me what’s still upsetting you, there isn’t much I can do about it, is there? I am therefore going to White’s to meet Lord Nyfeld. You are in Mrs. Brubbins’s care. Do not go anywhere without her.”
Rising, he walked around the table to kiss her on the forehead, collected his hat and gloves, and left the house. And tookan immediate step back from Charles Llewelyn Biscuits as a giant black coach racketed up the street and nearly bowled him over.
“You!” he shouted, jabbing a finger at the driver. “Stay right there!” Then he yanked open the coach’s door. “I don’t know what the devil you’re thinking, Mother, but Rebecca might have been out here with me.”
The dowager marchioness smiled at him from the interior of the coach. “I require a word with you, dear,” she said, patting the seat beside her.
“I’m not climbing in there with you,” he countered, sending a quick glance at the driver again to make certain the man wasn’t closing in on him with a stout stick. “I’ll never be seen again. Go away.”
“My son, this is important. Join me.”
“That is precisely what the devil would say, except that he would have offered me sweets. No.” Turning, he caught Charlie’s reins, swung into the saddle, and set off up the street.
He knew what it would be; his mother wanted to demand that he immediately propose to Lady Pauline. The rumors were everywhere, and so he needed to stop wandering about London gawking at all the sights like some country clod, make all of this official, get on with making a son, and preserve the Raines family legacy.
The moment the street broadened, the coach drew even with him. “Propose to Lady Pauline,” his mother said, leaning out the open coach window.
And he’d thought Rebecca was relentless. She couldn’t hold a candle to her grandmother. “I am not bound by your calendar. Satisfy yourself with the knowledge that I intend to do my duty.”
“But when? She confided in me that she’s felt some resistance from Rebecca. Do not be governed by that. Of course the girl doesn’t wish anything to change; you give her all of your time andattention, and she never lacks for a companion with whom she can hold tea parties. That doesn’t mean she knows what will be best for herself. Or for you.”
“I had no idea Rebecca was resisting the match until you mentioned it just now,” he stated. That would explain her silence, he supposed, though she generally told him precisely what she was thinking. He had some more questions to ask, evidently.
“Then what is your blasted hesitation?”
“I hardly think being cautious is a poor strategy, given the misery of my last attempt. And now you’ve noted that Rebecca isn’t yet convinced, so I have even more reason to move slowly before I add someone to my household. We mustallbe in agreement. That includes Rebecca. It does not, however, include you.”
“I’ve heard the whispers, you know, about you and Mrs. Silbern. It’s detestable that you’re courting Lady Pauline and doing God knows what with the widow.”
“Her son is Rebecca’s friend. The rest is just gossip.” And it would stay that way, for all of their sakes, because Iris wasn’t… proper. Rebecca was already talking about punching people. That would not make her successful in Society.
“If you feel the need to help Rebecca find playmates, then go to your married friends with daughters and spend time with them. And make your proposal before you’re labeled a rakeshame. Those with high connections do not keep low company.”
They parted as the coach and the horse overtook a milk wagon. It gave Beckett a moment to consider that his own childhood had never been normal, even before his father’s death. One parent had given him vague acknowledgments as if he’d been the family pet, and the other had needled his every word or thought or step. And a normal mother and son would stop to chat rather than pursuing each other down the street. Rebecca needed someone calm, collected, and proper in her life.
