“Well enough.” Fanny stood. “And better after Tensford and I settle this small matter.”
“I’m sorry, Fanny.” Tensford shook his head. “There are too many needs at Greystone. I have to rank hungry tenants higher than your elephants.”
“Hmmph.” Fanny’s nose went into the air. “I should have known better than to ask. I told Forsham that this tender business was stuff and nonsense. He doesn’t know you as I do.” She swept toward the door. “Good day, Tensford. And I hope you feel it keenly when you enter some other hostess’s parlor and find tiger skins and embroidered floor cushions.”
“I’m sure I shall.” But not for the reason she expected.
“Elephants?” Sterne asked as the door closed behind her. “Tiger skins?”
Tensford shook his head. “Just another fashion emergency.” But he gazed after his sister. What did she mean when she mentioned this tender business?
“Well, we’ve no time for nonsense,” Sterne said. “Come, and get rigged up. We’re going out.”
“Where?”
“Hadn’t you heard? My uncle is giving a lecture at the Surrey Institution. This afternoon.” He paused dramatically. “He’s displaying some of the pieces from his collection?”
Tensford brightened. “The skull?”
“Of course.”
He’d never seen it in person, the four-foot reptilian skull that had made Mr. John Sterne’s name in naturalist circles. “Let’s go, then.”
In minutes, they were headed out. Sterne’s driver had been walking the horses around Portman Square. They were turning the curved corner now, and the Tensford and Sterne stood talking as they waited on the pavement.
“I know you stayed away last Season because you felt like time and distance would allow the rumors around your name to fade. Have you put it to the test yet, this year?” Sterne asked.
Tensford sighed. “I did. At the Loxton ball, last night.” Shaking his head, he admitted, “But it was all still turned shoulders, disapproving glares and young girls quaking in their shoes at the thought of exchanging a word with me.”
“I did wonder,” his friend said sympathetically. “There was as much talk when you were gone as when you were here.”
“Spurned on by my female relatives, no doubt. They each love to play the martyr, and constantly try to outdo the others.” Tensford hesitated. “However, there was one young lady, last night . . .”
“Oh?”
“She took the risk to converse with me. Spoke readily and easily. Even before—”
“Oh, watch now.” Sterne stepped back and tipped his hat as a trio of young ladies approached, trailed by their maid.
Tensford moved quickly out of the way, wishing to avoid either glares or shivers, but the oldest, first in line, a pretty girl with large, grey eyes, nodded politely. She met his gaze—and paused.
He tensed, waiting.
But she smiled. Nodded again and dropped a curtsy. “So nice to see you again, Lord Tensford,” she said. “A beautiful day, isn’t it?”
The other two girls bobbed in his direction as well, then they all sailed on, heading for Upper Seymour Street.
Sterne grinned as Tensford stared after them. “Well, perhaps you had the right of it, after all. Might this mean that the tide has turned?”
He stared after the retreating figures. “Damn, but I hope it does.”
* * *
The Surrey Institution was crowded. Sterne’s connection with the speaker meant that they had good seats in the lecture hall. A fortunate thing, because even the gallery above was filled with gentlemen—and ladies, too—all eager to hear Mr. Sterne speak.
He was skilled at it. Tensford was not the only one absorbed in his lecture and excited over his displays. When the talk finished, most of the attendees lingered, eager to discuss the scholar’s theories and expand upon their own.
And it quickly became apparent that Barrett Sterne might just perhaps have been correct about the turning tide of public opinion. As they made their way down the aisle, debating fine points with a few others and comparing fossil discovery stories, it appeared that more than one young lady not only didn’t avoid him, but might actually have sought out his opinion.
He exchanged a relief-filled glance with Barrett.
But as they slowly moved toward the exit, his hopes began to fade as it became obvious that the gentlemen were treating him differently as well.
“We thought you might not still be interested in fossils,” Mr. Finch said with a smirk. “Hunting and chipping them free is so difficult and stony fossils are so hard.”
“My interest hasn’t changed,” he replied warily.
“You cannot blame us for wondering.” Finch’s friend Harding elbowed him. “It’s perhaps too much for a man with your tender sensibilities.”
The pair of them snickered and a couple of other gentlemen chuckled along with them.
There was that word again. Tender. A sinking feeling began to make him sweat.
“Don’t listen to these jackanapes.” Lady Hargrove, an older woman with a keen mind and a quick sense of humor, was well known in scientific circles. “I find the whole affair ridiculous, but at least this new label is an improvement over the old.”
“Indeed, the fact that he’s out in public at all today proves that Tensford has a hide tough as leather.” Barrett’s uncle had joined them. He gave Tensford an approving nod. “Proving the gossips wrong, as usual.”
The gossips? “I’m afraid I don’t understand the joke,” he said. And he knew he wasn’t going to like it when he did.
“Oh, dear heavens. The man hasn’t seen it.” Lady Hargrove fanned her face with her notepad.
Anger and the old frustration began to rise. They’d all made their way out of the lecture hall and into the entryway. He blinked in the light. “Seen
