Mr. Cavendish, I Presume

“Ah, the plight of the younger sibling,” he murmured sympathetically.

Amelia looked at him with interest. “You share the experience?”

“Not at all,” he said with a grin. “I was the one ignoring the hangers-on. I was the eldest of the brood. A fortuitous position, I think. I should have been most unhappy not to have been in charge.”

Amelia understood that well. She’d often thought she was a different person with Elizabeth than she was with Milly. “I am the second of five,” she said, “so I can appreciate your sentiments as well.”

“Five!” He looked impressed. “All girls?”

Amelia’s lips parted with surprise. “How did you know?”

“I have no idea,” he replied, “except that it is such a charming image. It would have been a shame to have sullied it with a male.”

Good heavens, he was a rogue. “Is your tongue always this silver, Captain Audley?”

And, indeed, the smile he gave her was positively lethal. “Except,” he said, “when it’s gold.”

“Amelia!”

They both turned. Grace had entered the room. “And Mr. Audley,” she said, with some surprise.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Amelia said, somewhat confused. “I thought it was Captain Audley.”

“It is,” he said with a very slight shrug. “Depending upon my mood.” He turned to Grace and bowed. “It is indeed a privilege to see you again so soon, Miss Eversleigh.”

Grace curtsied in return. “I did not realize you were here.”

“There is no reason why you should have done,” Mr. Audley said politely. “I was heading outside for a restorative walk when Lady Amelia intercepted me.”

“I thought he was Wyndham,” Amelia told Grace. “Isn’t that the oddest thing?”

“Indeed,” Grace replied.

Amelia thought Grace’s voice sounded a bit irregular, but it was probably just a bit of dust in her throat. It seemed impolite to mention it, however, and so she said, “Of course I was not paying much attention, which I am sure explains it. I only caught sight of him out of the corner of my eye as he strode past the open doorway.”

Captain, er, Mister Audley turned to Grace. “It makes so much sense when put that way, does it not?”

“So much sense,” Grace echoed. She glanced over her shoulder.

“Are you waiting for someone, Miss Eversleigh?” he inquired.

“No, I was just thinking that his grace might like to join us. Er, since his fiancee is here, of course.”

Amelia swallowed awkwardly, grateful that neither one of them was looking at her. Grace did not know that she had spent the entire morning with Thomas. Or that she was supposed to have been shopping in Stamford. And she never would, Amelia thought, with the beginnings of irritation, if Mr. Audley did not go on his way. Hadn’t he said he wanted to take a walk?

“Is he returned, then?” Mr. Audley asked. “I was not aware.”

“That is what I have been told,” Grace said. “I have not seen him myself.”

“Alas,” Mr. Audley said, “he has been absent for some time.”

Amelia tried to catch Grace’s attention but was unable to do so. Thomas would not like it to be well-known that he had been so impaired the night before-and this morning as well, for that matter.

“I think I should get him,” Grace said.

“But you only just got here,” Mr. Audley said.

“Nonetheless-”

“We shall ring for him,” Mr. Audley said firmly, and he crossed the room to the bellpull. “There,” he said, giving it a good yank. “It is done.”

Amelia looked at Grace, whose face now held a vague expression of alarm, and then back to Mr. Audley, who was placidity personified. Neither spoke, nor did either seem to recall that she was in the room with them.

It did make one wonder just what, exactly, was going on.

Amelia looked back to Grace, since she knew her better, but Grace was already hurrying across the room to the sofa. “I believe I will sit down,” she mumbled.

“I will join you,” Amelia said, recognizing an opportunity to have a private word. She took a seat directly next to Grace, even though there was quite a length of cushion. All she needed was for Mr. Audley to excuse himself, or look the other way, or do anything other than follow the two of them about the room with those catlike green eyes of his.

“What a fetching tableau the two of you make,” he said. “And me, without my oils.”

“Do you paint, Mr. Audley?” Amelia asked. She had been brought up to make polite conversation whenever the situation called for it, and even, quite frequently, when it did not. Some habits were hard to break.

“Alas, no,” he said. “But I have been thinking I might take some lessons. It is a noble pursuit for a gentleman, wouldn’t you say?”

“Oh, indeed,” she replied, although privately she thought that he would have been better served had he begun his studies at a younger age. Amelia looked at Grace, since it seemed only natural that she would add to the conversation. When she did not, Amelia gave her a polite nudge.

“Mr. Audley is a great appreciator of art,” Grace blurted out.

Mr. Audley smiled enigmatically.

And Amelia was once again left to fill the breach. “You must be enjoying your stay at Belgrave Castle, then,” she said to him.

“I look forward to touring the collections,” he replied. “Miss Eversleigh has consented to show them to me.”

“That was very kind of you, Grace.” Amelia said, working to keep her surprise off her face. Not that there was anything wrong with Mr. Audley, except perhaps for his inability to leave the room when she wished him to. But as Grace was the dowager’s companion, it seemed odd that she would have been asked to show Thomas’s friend the collections.

Grace grunted something that was probably meant to be a response.

“We plan to avoid cupids,” Mr. Audley said.

“Cupids?” Amelia echoed. Good heavens, he did move from topic to topic.

He shrugged. “I have discovered that I am not fond of them.”

How could anyone not be fond of cupids?

“I can see that you disagree, Lady Amelia,” Mr. Audley said. But Amelia noticed that he glanced at Grace before he spoke.

“What is there not to like about cupids?” Amelia asked him. She had not intended to engage him in such a ridiculous conversation, but really, he’d brought it up.

He perched himself on the arm of the opposite sofa. “You don’t find them rather dangerous?” he asked, clearly out to make mischief.

“Chubby little babies?”

“Carrying deadly weapons,” he reminded her.

“They are not real arrows.”

Mr. Audley turned to Grace. Again. “What do you think, Miss Eversleigh?”

“I don’t often think about cupids,” she replied.

“And yet we have already discussed them twice, you and I.”

“Because you brought them up.”

Amelia drew back in surprise. She’d never heard Grace so short of temper.

“My dressing room is positively awash in them,” Mr. Audley said.

Amelia turned to Grace. “You were in his dressing room?”

“Not with him,” Grace practically snapped. “But I have certainly seen it before.”

No one spoke, and then Grace finally muttered, “Pardon.”

“Mr. Audley,” Amelia said, deciding it was well past time to take the situation in hand. She was turning over a new leaf today, she’d decided. She had managed Thomas and she could manage these two if she had to.

“Lady Amelia,” he said with a gracious tilt of his chin.

“Would it be rude if Miss Eversleigh and I took a turn about the room?”