Chapter Seventeen #2
Had he got this one wrong, too? Was it possible he had leapt into this situation with just as little knowledge as with Minny—and been incorrect again?
“I…Peg, I am sorry,” he said awkwardly.
Her dark laugh only increased his sense of guilt. “Don’t be. I knew what I was…well. The Duke of Ashcott has a reputation, and not a good one. I was a fool to think I could charm him into…into a commitment of any kind.”
Henry nodded as though he understood what had just happened. The world did not appear to wish to stay straight for more than five minutes together.
Minny—her secret—her brother—now Peg?
“You still haven’t told me where you have been,” Peg said perceptively.
Henry sighed and picked up the glass he had been so swift to abandon. “It’s not a topic for a lady, let alone my little sister.”
He had not expected his little sister to snort with laughter.
“Little sister? Henry, I am two and twenty years old, more than old enough to hear about your mistress.”
Cheeks flaming, Henry protested, “I have not been with my mistress!”
“Well, then?” asked Peg archly. “Where have you been?”
His intention had been to keep the entire thing a secret. Why should Peg have to know just what lengths he had been prepared to go to protect her?
But after the sudden discovery of a man—a man!—with his sister, Henry had a rather horrible feeling she was right. She was more than old enough to hear about the underbelly of the world.
More wine disappeared into his mouth. “I have been attempting to discover who has been writing those slanderous lies about you in the newspapers.”
Henry was unsure what he had been expecting at those words. Thanks, perhaps? A sense of gratitude? Perhaps embarrassment at the nonsense the newspaper had been printing?
It was therefore gratifying to see pink dots appear once more in his sister’s cheeks.
At least Peg would never change—
“What lies?” she asked faintly.
Henry snorted. “Oh, Peggy, you must have seen them! All this nonsense about you sneaking out of Almack’s—avoiding Lady Romeril, as though that were possible! The guff about you attending the Old York’s. As though any respectable lady would—”
“Ah,” said Peg.
Henry blinked. His sister was looking…uncomfortable.
It made no sense. Unless of course, and his spirits rallied, she was affronted at the mere suggestion of such disgraceful rumors. Yes, that must be it. There was no possibility that—
“Is this a bad time to say,” his sister said awkwardly, “that…all those stories are true?”
Henry’s jaw fell open as horror overcame him. “All are—”
“I mean, I wasn’t able to slip past Lady Romeril, that part isn’t true, as if anyone could escape her watchful eye,” said Peg swiftly, as though these words would in any way mend.
“No, I was being chaperoned by the Duchess of Axwick at the time, and I truly felt awful for disobeying her order to stay in Almack’s but Ashcott—”
“The blaggard!”
“Henry!”
Henry glared at his sister, hardly able to understand what he was hearing. All…true?
All those rumors, lies, slander—not slander at all? Merely an accurate retelling of the mischief his sister was getting up to under his watch?
All sense of what was true and what could be trusted was slipping away. Minny was protecting and supporting those who had no one else to protect them; Peggy was galivanting with gentlemen in the dead of night and frequenting gaming hells of disrepute.
And he…he was in the center. Getting it wrong at every turn.
“You’re angry with me, aren’t you?” Peg said timidly.
Henry swallowed. It was on the tip of his tongue to say yes, he was absolutely furious. He had trusted her, thought what he was doing was the right thing. Sacrificed his place in Society to go off searching for something that did not exist.
That he had given up soft bedsheets for weeks on this wild goose chase.
But he couldn’t. Not with Minny’s words ringing in his ears.
“I don’t want to hear it. Please leave, Your Grace. I got it right that time, didn’t I?”
“I suppose I am,” he said hesitantly, unable to lie. “But I am more upset you could not come to me about these things.”
Peg laughed dryly as she tucked her feet under her on the chair. “You would have permitted me to go to Vauxhall Gardens unaccompanied?”
Henry’s stomach dropped to his knees. “You went—”
“See, I told you,” Peg said. “I couldn’t come to you, Henry, because you would react so.”
“But—but how did it all start?” Henry asked, utterly bewildered.
This was not the Peg he knew—or at least, the Peggy he thought he knew. His little sister was quiet, demure, nervous, shy.
“Well, it did start off with an untrue piece of gossip in the newspapers,” Peg admitted. “The most ridiculous thing, a story of me selling off kisses for a shilling—”
Henry’s heart twisted painfully, and he tried to prevent himself from interrupting. That had been the first he’d seen, too.
“And then—well, as I was still receiving invitations to the very best parties, I suddenly realized that I was…missing out,” confessed Peg with a wry smile.
“I mean, if everyone thought I was doing something so scandalous and still considering me excellent company, the question remained, why not enjoy the things I was being accused of?”
Henry went pale. “You didn’t sell—”
“Henry Everleigh, the very idea!” His sister looked truly affronted. “No! But I have seen parts of London I was never brave enough to visit, gambled with ruffians and spent…well. Too much time with the Duke of Ashcott, I can see in hindsight. Oh, Henry, I was so bored. And this has been…exciting.”
The entire reason he had gone to Pathstow and made Minny’s acquaintance in the first place was to end the terrible lies about his sister…lies that were not lies.
Truths about her wild behavior because he was too foolish to see that she was bored.
“I suppose I have acted a little rashly.”
Henry barked a laugh. “A little!”
“But don’t you see? Everything will be fine, I promise,” Peg urged. “Everyone thought the publications false, except Ashcott, naturally, and they will peter out now, won’t they?”
“Why?”
His sister laughed again. “Well, I am hardly going to get away with doing such things while you are here, will I?”
Henry’s mind had been pulled in so many different directions over the last few days, it was hard to keep track. But of one thing he was absolutely sure.
“You certainly won’t,” he said firmly. “I suppose we will have to trust this Duke of Ashcoote—”
“Ashcott.”
“Whatever—will not reveal the truth of the matter to anyone in the ton.”
If Henry had been paying attention, he would have seen the look of pain across Peg’s face. As it was, he was too busy looking into his empty glass and thinking of Minny to notice.
“I am sure he will never darken my doorway again,” said Peg faintly.
Henry heaved a sigh of relief. Well, it may not have ended in the way he had expected—Lord knows, entirely differently—but at least he could rest easy now, knowing his sister’s name would not be dragged into the headlines again.
“You know, I don’t think it’s right that ladies should not be able to do all those things,” Peg said wistfully. “But—no, do not fear, Henry, I will not fall out with you about it. I said I would cease, and I meant it. This sort of thing is not worth losing friends over, after all.”
Pain, swift and sharp, stabbed at Henry’s chest.
“Once said, those words can never be unsaid.”
“Henry? Henry, you…you did not lose a friend over it, did you?”
It was all Henry could do not to snap at his sister, tell her to mind her own business, tell her that because of her he had made a complete fool of himself.
But as he lifted his eyes, he saw the pain there, the sadness. The regret. The shame, perhaps, and the disappointment that Ashcott’s lack of action had burnt into her heart.
And he could say nothing but, “No.”
Peg sighed with relief. “Oh, good.”
“No, I haven’t lost a friend,” Henry said bleakly. “I think I have lost the love of my life.”