Devil's Cub (Alastair-Audley Tetralogy 2)

‘Incroyable! ’ Léonie exclaimed. ‘Tell me all about him at once. He sounds very disagreeable.’

The Duke looked across the room at his son. ‘One was led to suppose from Fanny’s somewhat incoherent discourse that the young man is impossible!’

‘Oh, quite, sir,’ agreed Vidal. ‘But she’ll have him for all that.’

‘Well, if she loves him, I hope she will marry him,’ said Léonie, with a bewildering change of front. ‘You do not mind, do you, Monseigneur?’

‘It is not, thank God, my affair,’ replied his grace. ‘I am not concerned with the Marlings’ futures.’

The Marquis met his glance squarely. ‘Very well, sir. The point is taken.’

Avon held out one of his very white hands towards the fire, and regarded through half-closed eyes the big emerald ring he wore. ‘It is not my custom,’ he said smoothly, ‘to inquire into your affairs, but I have heard talk of a girl who is not an opera dancer.’

The Marquis answered with perfect composure. ‘But not, I think, talk of my approaching nuptials.’

‘Hardly,’ said his grace, with a faint lift of the brows.

‘Nor will you, sir.’

‘You relieve me,’ said his grace politely. He got up, leaning lightly on his ebony cane. ‘Permit me to tell you, my son, that when you trifle with a girl of the bourgeoisie, you run the risk of creating the kind of scandal I deplore.’

A smile flickered across Vidal’s mouth. ‘Your pardon, sir, but do you speak from your wide experience?’

‘Naturally,’ said his grace.

‘I do not believe,’ said Léonie, who had been listening calmly to this interchange, ‘that you ever trifled with a bourgeoise, Justin.’

‘You flatter me, child.’ He looked again at his son. ‘I do not need your assurance that you amuse yourself only. I have no doubt that you will commit almost every indiscretion, but one you will not commit. You are, after all, my son. But I would advise you, Dominic, to amuse yourself with women of a certain class, or with your own kind, who understand how the game should be played.’

The Marquis bowed. ‘You are a fount of wisdom, sir.’

‘Of worldly wisdom, yes,’ said his grace. In the doorway he paused and looked back. ‘Ah, there was another little matter, as I remember. What kind of cattle do you keep in your stables that it must needs take you four hours to reach Newmarket?’

The Marquis’s eye gleamed appreciation, but Léonie was inclined to be indignant. ‘Monseigneur, I find you fort exigeant to-day. Four hours! ma foi, but of a surety he will break his neck.’

‘It has been done in less,’ his grace said tranquilly.

‘That I do not at all believe,’ stated the Duchess. ‘Who did it in less?’

‘I did,’ said Avon.

‘Oh, then I do believe it,’ said Léonie as a matter of course.

‘How long, sir?’ the Marquis said swiftly.

‘Three hours and forty-seven minutes.’

‘Still too generous, sir. Three hours and forty-five minutes, should, I think, suffice. You would perhaps, like to lay me odds?’

‘Not in the least,’ said his grace. ‘But three hours and forty-five minutes should certainly suffice.’

He went out. Léonie said: ‘Of course I should like you to beat Monseigneur’s record, my little one, but it is very dangerous. Do not kill yourself, Dominique, please.’

‘I won’t,’ he answered. ‘That is a promise, my dear.’

She tucked her hand in his. ‘Ah, but it is a promise you could break, mon ange.’

‘Devil a bit!’ said his lordship cheerfully. ‘Ask my uncle. He will tell you I was born to be hanged.’