Home > Bringing Down the Duke(3)

Bringing Down the Duke(3)
Author: Evie Dunmore

   “Understood,” she managed.

   The press of his soft fingers barely registered against her callused palm. She steadied herself against the desk, the only solid thing in a suddenly fuzzy room.

   “You’ll need a chaperone, of course,” she heard him say.

   She couldn’t stifle a laugh, a throaty sound that almost startled her. “But I’m twenty-and-five years old.”

   “Hmph,” Gilbert said. “I suppose with such an education, you’ll make yourself wholly unmarriageable anyway.”

   “How fortunate then that I have no desire to marry.”

   “Yes, yes,” Gilbert said. She knew he didn’t approve of voluntary spinsterhood, ’twas unnatural. But any concerns expressed over her virtue were at best a nod to protocol, and he probably suspected as much. Or, like everyone in Chorleywood, he suspected something.

   As if on cue, he scowled. “There is one more thing we have to be clear about, Annabelle, quite clear indeed.”

   The words were already hovering between them, like buzzards readying to strike.

   Have them pick at her; at this point, her sensibilities were as callused as her hands.

   “Oxford, as is well known, is a place of vice,” Gilbert began, “a viper pit, full of drunkards and debauchery. Should you become entangled in anything improper, if there’s but a shadow of a doubt about your moral conduct, much as it pains me, you will forfeit your place in this house. A man in my position, in service of the Church of England, must stay clear of scandal.”

   He was, no doubt, referring to the sort of scandal involving a man. He had no reason to worry on that account. There was, however, the matter of her scholarship. Gilbert seemed to assume that it had been granted by the university, but in truth her benefactor was the National Society for Women’s Suffrage, which she now had to support in their quest for a woman’s right to vote. In her defense, the society had first come to her attention through a certain Lady Lucie Tedbury and her adverts for women’s stipends, not because she had an interest in political activism, but it was a safe guess that on the list of moral outrages, votes for women would rank only marginally below scandals of passion in Gilbert’s book.

   “Fortunately, an old spinster from the country should be quite safe from any scandals,” she said brightly, “even at Oxford.”

   Gilbert’s squint returned. She tensed as he perused her. Had she overdone it? She might be past the first blush of youth, and digging up potatoes in wind, sun, and rain had penciled a few delicate lines around her eyes. But the mirror in the morning still showed the face of her early twenties, the same slanted cheekbones, the fine nose, and, a nod to her French ancestry, a mouth that always seemed on the verge of a pout. A mouth that compelled a man to go quite mad for her, or so she had been told.

   She quirked her lips wryly. Whenever she met her reflection, she saw her eyes. Their green sparkle had been long dulled by an awareness no fresh debutante would possess, an awareness that shielded her far better from scandals than fading looks ever could. Truly, the last thing she wanted was to get into trouble over a man again.

 

 

Chapter 2

 

 

Westminster, October


   Now,” said Lady Lucie, “for the new members among us, there are three rules for handing a leaflet to a gentleman. One: identify a man of influence. Two: approach him firmly, but with a smile. Three: remember they can sense if you are afraid, but they are usually more afraid of you.”

   “Like dogs,” Annabelle muttered.

   The lady’s sharp gray gaze shifted to her. “Why, yes.”

   Clearly there were good ears on this one, something to keep in mind.

   Annabelle clutched the ends of her shawl against her chest in a frozen fist. The rough wool offered little protection from the chilly London fog wafting across Parliament Square, certainly not from the cutting glances of passersby. Parliament was closed for the season, but there were still plenty of gentlemen strolling around Westminster, engineering the laws that governed them all. Her stomach plunged at the thought of approaching any such man. No decent woman would talk to a stranger in the street, certainly not while brandishing pamphlets that boldly declared The Married Women’s Property Act makes a slave of every wife!

   There was of course some truth to this headline—thanks to the Property Act, a woman of means lost all her property to her husband on her wedding day . . . Still, given the disapproving glances skewering their little group, she had tried to hold her pamphlets discreetly. Her efforts had been demolished swiftly the moment Lady Lucie, secretary of the National Society for Women’s Suffrage, had opened her mouth for her motivating speech. The lady was a deceptively ethereal-looking creature, dainty like a china doll with perfectly smooth pale blond hair and a delicate heart-shaped face, but her voice blared like a foghorn across the square as she charged her disciples.

   How had these ladies been coerced into attendance? They were huddling like sheep in a storm, clearly wishing to be elsewhere, and she’d bet her shawl that none of them were beholden to the purse strings of a stipend committee. The red-haired girl next to her looked unassuming enough with her round brown eyes and her upturned nose, pink from the cold, but thanks to the Oxford grapevine, she knew who the young woman was: Miss Harriet Greenfield, daughter of Britain’s most powerful banking tycoon. The mighty Julien Greenfield probably had no idea that his daughter was working for the cause. Gilbert certainly would have an apoplexy if he learned about any of this.

   Miss Greenfield held her leaflets gingerly, as if she half expected them to try and take a bite out of her hand. “Identify, approach, smile,” she murmured. “That’s simple enough.”

   Hardly. With their collars flipped high and top hats pulled low, every man hasting past was a fortress.

   The girl looked up, and their gazes caught. Best to give a cordial smile and to glance away.

   “You are Miss Archer, aren’t you? The student with the stipend?”

   Miss Greenfield was peering up at her over her purple fur stole.

   Of course. The grapevine in Oxford worked both ways.

   “The very same, miss,” she said, and wondered what it would be, pity or derision?

   Miss Greenfield’s eyes lit with curiosity instead. “You must be awfully clever to win a stipend.”

   “Why, thank you,” Annabelle said slowly. “Awfully overeducated, rather.”

   Miss Greenfield giggled, sounding very young. “I’m Harriet Greenfield,” she said, and extended a gloved hand. “Is this your first suffrage meeting?”

   Lady Lucie seemed too absorbed by her own ongoing speech about justice and John Stuart Mill to notice them talking.

   Still, Annabelle lowered her voice to a whisper. “It is my first meeting, yes.”

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