“And you could not persuade her otherwise?” The old man chuckled. “You must be losing your touch, my boy.”

“No, I could not, sir,” Lucius said, “because I did not have the authority to convince her. She will not marry me unless I have the full blessing of my family.”

His grandfather closed his eyes.

“She knows,” Lucius said, “just as well as I do that you have your heart set upon my marrying Portia.”

Those keen eyes opened again.

“It is something Godsworthy and I have talked about over the years as a desirable outcome,” he said. “But you must cast your mind back to Christmas time, Lucius, when I told you that your choice of bride must be your own. Marriage is an intimate relationship—of body and mind and even spirit. It can bring much joy if the partners are committed to friendship and affection and love—and much suffering if they are not.”

“You will not be upset if I do not marry Portia, then?” Lucius asked. “And really, Grandpapa, I cannot. She is perfect in every way, but I am not.”

His grandfather chuckled softly again.

“If I were a young man,” he said, “and if I had not yet met your grandmother, Lucius, I do believe I would have fallen in love with Miss Allard myself. I have been aware of your growing regard for her.”

“She had a sheltered upbringing,” Lucius explained, “but there was no money left after her father died. She fell into the hands of Lady Lyle and George Ralston, of all people. He got her to sign a contract to manage her singing career. You can imagine if you will, sir, the kind of singing engagements he found for her. They were very much less than respectable. He and Lady Lyle raked in the money for a while—supposedly to pay off debts. Fontbridge was courting Frances, but the countess is too high a stickler to look kindly upon his wedding the daughter of a French émigré. Then Lady Lyle took a hand in breaking off the connection—Fontbridge had told Frances she would not be able to sing after their marriage, and doubtless Lady Lyle feared the loss of income. She dropped poison in Lady Fontbridge’s ear. But her plan succeeded too well. Not only did the countess frighten Frances away from Fontbridge, but she also caused her to break away entirely from the life she had been living. She went to Bath without a word to any of them and has been teaching there ever since.”

“My admiration for her has grown,” the earl said. “And the fact that she has returned there now, Lucius, rather than allow herself to be swept away on Heath’s enthusiasm and ours, shows steadiness and strength of character. I like her more and more.”

“It is the poison dropped in the countess’s ear that is of most concern to Frances, though,” Lucius said. “It is that which she sees as disqualifying her most to be my bride. It seems that she was not Allard’s daughter even though he married her mother before she was born—and knew when he married her that she was with child by another man. Frances does not know her real father’s identity but assumes he was Italian, like her mother. Allard acknowledged her at birth and brought her up as his daughter and never breathed a word of the truth to her. But he did tell Mrs. Melford and Miss Driscoll—and Lady Lyle, who I gather was his mistress. By law, then, Frances is legitimate.”

His grandfather lay with closed eyes for a long time. Lucius even thought that he might have drifted off to sleep. There was a slight gray tinge to his skin, and it looked parchment thin. Lucius felt rather like weeping—for the second time in one day. He stroked the hand he still held between his own.

“Lucius, my boy,” his grandfather said at last, his eyes still closed, “your marriage to Miss Allard has my blessing. You may tell her so.”

“Perhaps you can do that yourself, sir,” Lucius said. “There is a prize-giving and concert at the school at the end of the school year. All of her choirs will be singing, and some of her individual music pupils will be performing too. I thought we might attend.”

“We’ll do it,” his grandfather said. “But now I will rest, Lucius.”

He was snoring lightly even before Lucius could tuck his hand beneath the blankets.

Lady Sinclair and her daughters were surprisingly easy to persuade.

Lucius’s mother was so pleased to have him living at Marshall House and behaving responsibly—most of the time—and showing concern and kindness for his grandfather and a willingness to escort his sisters on various outings that she was sure she would be delighted with any bride he chose since she had quite reconciled herself to the idea that he might never be finished sowing his wild oats. And if Miss Allard’s birth was of questionable legitimacy—well, so was that of a large segment of the ton. Genteel people simply did not talk of such matters.

A week later Lucius learned that she had made a point of speaking with the Countess of Fontbridge at Almack’s the evening before when she had taken Emily there. She had deliberately brought the conversation around to Frances Allard and had talked quite openly about her birth and connections but had also given it as her opinion that a young lady of such modesty and gentility and astonishing talent could only be a desirable friend to cultivate and perhaps—who could know for sure?—even more than a friend to the family in time.

Oh, and did Lady Fontbridge know that Miss Allard was heir to both Mrs. Melford and Miss Driscoll, great-aunts of Baron Clifton? With both of whom ladies, by the way, she had such a close and loving relationship that there were no secrets between them whatsoever?

“I have never heard Mama talk like it before,” Emily said proudly. “She quite outdid any of the tabbies in sweetness and venom, Luce. One could tell from the stiff, haughty look on the countess’s face that she understood very well indeed.”

“Emily,” their mother said sharply, “do watch your tongue. Your mother a tabby, indeed!”

But everyone gathered about the breakfast table only laughed.

Margaret, who at Christmas time had been volubly in favor of Portia as her brother’s bride, had married Tait for love and now gave it as her opinion that if Miss Allard was the woman Lucius loved, then she was not going to say anything to dissuade him. Besides, Tait had warned her long ago that Lucius would slit his throat rather than marry Portia when the time came.

Caroline, who was still living with her head in the clouds following her betrothal, could only applaud her brother’s choice of someone with whom he was so obviously enamored. Besides, she still felt somewhat awed by Miss Allard’s singing talent and thought that she would like very much to have her as a sister-in-law.

Emily had been severely disillusioned with Portia since seeing more of her than usual this spring. She did not think Portia at all right for Luce. Miss Allard, on the other hand, was perfect, as witness the fact that she had had the backbone to return to Bath to teach even though Luce had gone after her to try to persuade her to come back to London.

Amy was simply ecstatic.

A week or so after her meeting with the Countess of Fontbridge at Almack’s, the viscountess ran into Lady Lyle at a garden party to which she had taken both Caroline and Emily, and had a very similar sort of conversation with her about Frances—if conversation was the word, since Lady Sinclair did most of the talking and Lady Lyle listened with her habitual half-smile playing about her lips.

“But she was listening,” Caroline reported afterward.

Lucius was not allowing his mother to fight all his battles, however. He encountered George Ralston at Jackson’s boxing saloon one morning. Normally the two would have ignored each other, not because of any particular hostility between them but because they moved in totally different crowds. But on this particular morning Lucius took exception to the fall of Ralston’s cravat and told him so—to the mystified surprise of his friends. And then, quizzing glass to his eye, Lucius noticed a splash of mud on one of Ralston’s top boots and wondered audibly that anyone could keep such a slovenly valet unless he were basically slovenly himself.

He then, as if the thought had just struck him, invited Ralston to spar with him.

By now his friends’ reaction had progressed from surprise to amazement.

It was not a friendly sparring bout. Ralston was incensed at the insults to which he had been subjected by one of society’s most respected Corinthians, and Lucius was more than ready to give him satisfaction.

By the time Gentleman Jackson himself put a stop to the bout after six rounds of a planned ten, Lucius had shiny cheekbones and shinier knuckles and ribs that would remind him of the bout for several days to come, while Ralston had one eye reduced to a puffy slit, a cut over the other eye, a nose that glowed red and looked suspiciously as if it might be broken, and bruises about his arms and torso that would turn blacker by day’s end and keep their owner awake and stiff for many days and nights to come.

“Thank you,” Lucius said at the end of it all. “This has been a pleasure, Ralston. I must remember to tell Miss Frances Allard the next time I talk with her that I ran into you and spent a pleasant hour, ah, conversing with you. But perhaps you remember her as Mademoiselle Françoise Allard. Lord Heath is eager to sponsor her singing career—had you heard? She may well take him up on the offer since she is quite free to do so. You met her, I believe, when she was still a minor? A long time ago. Perhaps you do not even remember her after all. Ah, you have a tooth loose, do you? If I were you, I would not wiggle it, old chap. It might settle back into place if you leave it alone. Good day to you.”

“And what the devil was that all about?” one of the more obtuse of his friends asked him when they were out of earshot of Ralston.