Page 2 of A Foolish Flirtation

“That would have been very bad form indeed,” Jeremy answered smoothly. “I would hope you would have a better opinion of your papa.” He felt strangely winded by the exchange. Emmeline Ballentine. He had not permitted himself to think of her for years. Suddenly, he seemed to catch a faint and surely phantom scent of orange blossoms.

“You liked her, then?” Teddy persisted. “You must have, if you wanted to dance with her.”

“If I asked her to stand up with me at parties, then obviously I liked her,” Jeremy confirmed crisply, ignoring the fact he had done a good many selfish and cruel things over the years. His conscience stirred uneasily. The damn thing had been inactive for eons, until it had slowly limped forth, sometime in the past eighteen months, to trouble him. Sometimes he wished it would go back to malfunctioning. Things had been so much easier when he had been an unprincipled swine.

Previously, he had dealt with such stirrings with a stiff drink. That seemed to obliterate such feelings of guilt, but that was no longer an option. He could not be divorced and a drunkard. That was simply too much to weigh against him in the balance. He may have been considered unprincipled in his salad days, but he had never been a social outcast.

“That’s good,” Teddy said, looking relieved now that matter had been cleared up. “That should make things easier.”

“Things?”

“You marrying her, I mean.”

Jeremy’s eyes bulged. “Marrying?” he repeated faintly.

“Yes,” Teddy confirmed before turning a reproachful gaze upon him. “You told me, did you not, that you would not get married again without my approval,” he reminded his father.

“I did,” Jeremy agreed, “and yet, forgive me, my son, I envisaged your part as more of a final veto. Not the actual selector of my bride.”

Teddy leaned against the cushioned seat and closed his eyes. “I’m quite worn out,” he sighed dramatically. “Arbuthnot’s mother talks a lot. She’s rather like a buzzing fly when one’s trying to sleep.” He frowned. “I’m glad my mama was not like that, even though she did shout and scream and hit the servants.”

“Your mama had her faults,” Jeremy mused, “but a crushing bore, she was not.”

“How soon before you procure my next one?” Teddy enquired.

“Next what?”

“Mama.”

Jeremy blinked. “Well, er, these things take time, my boy. It has not been a full twelve months since my divorce, and—”

“That’s nearly a year,” Teddy pointed out critically.

“Maybe so, but people have strong opinions on divorce, which only the passage of time can assuage.”

“Mama has remarried, has she not? That French man who owns the gambling den in Paris.”

Jeremy winced. “Who told you that? Besides, he’s Italian.”

“Mrs. Oxley,” Teddy responded promptly.

“Mrs. Oxley, our cook at Vance Park?” Jeremy asked carefully.

Teddy nodded. “Well, she wasn’t telling me, precisely,” he admitted. “She was telling Iverson the undergardener. I just happened to be under the kitchen table at the time, eating a treacle tart.”

Jeremy closed his eyes briefly. “Of course you were.”

“She said Mama’s papa may have been an earl, but she was no better than she ought to be.”

Jeremy thought it best not to comment on this damning indictment of his ex-wife’s morals. “Mrs. Oxley makes a very good treacle tart, does she not?” he murmured instead.

“The best,” Teddy agreed. “Gosh, they didn’t serve desserts like that at Paverton Hall,” he said, naming the select boarding school that he had once attended. He looked suddenly wistful. “I just bet I could eat one of Mrs. Oxley’s tarts about now,” he said sadly.

Jeremy was just glad Teddy was not about to turn teary-eyed over his old school. His son had despised the place when he had been there but recently, he had turned somewhat sentimental about that period of his life. Doubtless it was all part of his depressed spirits following his illness. “It’s a good sign your appetite is returning,” he said aloud. “Shall we stop at the bakery and pick up some iced buns?”

Teddy shook his head. “I don’t care for them,” he said irritably. “They always taste stale from Fritton’s.”

“How about the bakery on Gideon Street?” Jeremy suggested.