Cupid's Dart by Maggie MacKeever Page A

Tibble. He tries so very hard. I inherited him from my grandmother along with the house, and could not bear to turn him out. Although I admit to being tempted the day I found him trying to break the claws of a lobster between the hinges of a dining room drawer." She then went on to divert Lord Warwick with additional tales about her household, including Janie's efforts to attract the attention of the new footman down the street, which took the little maidservant out of doors at every opportunity on the slightest of pretexts, with the result that they now had the whitest front steps in the entire neighborhood; and Agatha's efforts to tempt Andrew's sluggish appetite with mutton cutlets, eel broth, and rice milk. "She is now experimenting with home remedies for which I have even less hope," Georgie concluded. "They include dried toad, powdered mole, and fresh horse dung."
    Georgie seemed comfortable with her bizarre household, Lord Warwick realized. Indeed she seemed comfortable with herself in a way now that she had not as a girl.
    How dull as ditchwater were his companions. Lump dropped the driftwood that he had been clutching all this time in his jaws. His mistress had ignored him sadly since the gentleman had interrupted them at play. She had not even included in her tales of the household Lump's own discovery in the larder of a sleek and well-fed mouse. A seagull flying overhead caught his attention. He leapt up and barked.
    Lord Warwick grasped Lump's collar. "No!" he said. "Sit, you wretched hound."
    What was the world coming to, when he was spoken to so rudely twice in so many days? Lump sank down on the sand.
    Georgie clapped her hands in admiration. "How did you do that?" she asked. "None of us can." The wind blew her errant curls into her eyes and she untied her bonnet with the intention of pushing her aggravating hair back beneath its confining bounds. "Although I havenoticed that gentlemen can sometimes persuade people to obey them just by employing a certain tone of voice."
    Lord Warwick could not help himself. "Oh?" he inquired.
    "Not that sort of thing!" Georgie made a strong effort to discipline her mind. "You are out early," she added. "Or have you not been to bed?" Quizzically, he looked at her. She sighed. "That didn't come out right."
    "Come, let us continue our walk. You must be very cold." Lord Warwick regained possession of her arm. "No, I have not been to bed. We fashionable gentlemen would be appalled at the notion of cutting short our revels before cockcrow."
    Georgie was not deceived by the lightness of his tone. "I am glad to see you return where you belong," she said. "You were gone from us for a long time."
    Only with great difficulty had Garth rousted himself from the sprawling estate near Penrith where he had been rusticating—or, as some would have it, sulking—for some months. "So I was," he said. "It is almost as good as a play to see the fashionable world watch each other to determine how they must react—for the gossips hint that if I did indeed dispose of my wife, who knows what other dark secrets might lie buried in my past?"
    Thus was Georgie confirmed in her opinion of the fashionable world. "Fiddle-faddle!" she said crossly, and slapped the bonnet against her skirts. "You had no previous wife to dispose of, and even the largest chucklehead would find it difficult to credit that you would sooner do away with a tiresome petite amie than simply pay her off."
    Lord Warwick smiled. "I thank you, my dear, for that vote of confidence. Between you and Prinny, I may yet contrive to hold up my head. Although all the world knows Prinny is hardly a judge of character. Speaking of which, I have been privileged to see Mr. Wyatt's plans for remodeling the Pavilion in the most extraordinary Gothic style. It is expected to cost a minimum two hundred thousand pounds."
    Georgie had forgotten that Lord Warwick was an intimate of the future king. It did not place him in exclusive company—the indolent,