you can win a lady’s heart in ten minutes, you’re a better man than I am,” Whit said with a chuckle.
“You’ll find out shortly,” Charles promised, and he strode from the room.
Hollingsford chuckled, as well. “I like a chap with confidence.” He studied his glass, turning the stem this way and that with fingers as pointy as his nose. “If I may, my lord, I thought you had similar fire when we met this afternoon. But somewhere along the way you lost your spark. Is something troubling you?”
Whit regarded him. His head was cocked so that the candlelight gleamed on his balding pate, and his craggy brows were drawn down. He seemed sincerely perplexed and ready to offer support and guidance.
It had been a long time since Whit had seen such a look, not since his father had called him to his bedside fifteen years ago to tell Whit he’d soon be the earl. What would his father have said about this mess Whit found himself in?
What would Hollingsford say?
“I have a house full of guests to entertain,” Whit replied. “You heard them. They have little interest in seeing the sights, visiting the neighbors. I find myself wondering what I should do with them.”
Hollingsford grinned. “It’s not the sights or the neighbors they came for, my lord. I think you know that. They came here for you.”
The very idea made him want to stalk from the room, dive into the river and let it wash him out to sea. “I am unused to being the sole entertainment.”
“Now, then, it’s not so bad,” Hollingsford said, hitching himself higher in his seat as if he intended to deliver a speech. “You have three lovely ladies before you. It shouldn’t be so difficult to determine which you like best.”
Why had he even considered having this conversation? “I wasn’t prepared to begin serious courting,” he tried. “I haven’t given the matter much thought until recently.”
“No need to think,” Hollingsford insisted. “You take this lady for a drive, that one for a walk. You talk to them, ask them what they like, sound out their opinions, see how they relate to their Maker. Then, when you find one you like, you let her know and arrange for the banns to be read.”
Whit laughed. “You make it sound easy.”
“It is easy,” Hollingsford declared, reaching for the decanter the footman had left to pour himself another glass. “Courting is supposed to be fun. It’s the marriage part that takes work.”
Perhaps that was what concerned him. Surrounded by requirements, was he now to add the responsibility for a wife? He knew his duty to his family to marry and have an heir. It was a duty he took far too seriously to rush into a hasty marriage, especially now when he already had enough on his hands!
Besides, he couldn’t help remembering his father, sitting at this very table, staring at a painting of Whit’s mother that had then hung on the paneled wall. His gaze had never strayed to the food, as if she alone sustained him. He’d never even attempted to court again after her death. That, Whit couldn’t help thinking, was true love, that unbridled devotion, that all-consuming emotion. Having seen such a love, how could he settle for anything less?
“It’s not so bad, you know,” Hollingsford said, offering him the decanter. Whit waved it away. “Marriage can be a blessing. Someone to care about you, to encourage you. I still miss my Janey, and she’s been dead a good fifteen years now.” He took a deep draught from his glass, and Whit saw that his hand shook.
It seemed even Hollingsford had been touched by the tender feelings of love. Was it possible Whit might find it here at the Lodge, with one of these women?
Chapter Three
Whit wasn’t sure what to expect when he and Ruby’s father entered the withdrawing room a short while later. He had rather hoped Charles would prove true to his word and wrap Henrietta Stokely-Trent, at least, around his little finger. Whit had seen any number of ladies succumb to his cousin’s charm. Charles found it easy to converse, easy to smile. He found duty harder to swallow. Sometimes Whit thought they were exact opposites.
However, Charles had focused on Ruby Hollingsford, the two of them in close conversation as they sat across from each other in armchairs by the doors to the veranda. The candlelight from the brass sconce glowed in his cousin’s hair; his gaze was aimed directly at the feisty redhead.
But Miss Hollingsford seemed barely to notice. Her attention had wandered toward the door to the withdrawing room, and when her gaze lit on Whit, her lips curved.
For some reason, Whit wanted to stand a little taller.
“Looks as if you have a clear field, my lord,” Mortimer Hollingsford chortled as he passed Whit to stroll into the room. Whit blinked and quickly tallied his other guests. Instead of hanging on his cousin, Miss Stokely-Trent had discovered the ancient spinet he’d forgotten rested on the far wall and was tapping at the keys while her parents looked on and Lady Amelia sat expectantly on the sofa with her mother.
“How kind of you to join us,” Lady Wesworth said as if Whit had kept them all waiting. She glowered at her daughter. “Amelia was just saying how much she wanted to sing for you.”
Lady Amelia’s elegant brows shot up, and she visibly swallowed. If she had wished to sing, she now very likely wished herself elsewhere. Even though he could see her shyness, duty required that he encourage her, and the other gentlemen followed suit. But it was Ruby Hollingsford’s voice that won the day.
“I imagine you have a lovely voice, Lady Amelia,” she said, her own voice warm and kind. “I hope you’ll share it with us.”
Lady Amelia rose with a becoming blush. “Well, perhaps a short tune. I wouldn’t want to inconvenience Miss Stokely-Trent.”
The other woman eyed her as she approached the spinet. “I didn’t realize you’d require accompaniment. Don’t you play, Lady Amelia?”
The blonde’s blush deepened. “Not as well as you do, I fear.”
“Nonsense,” Lady Wesworth declared, but Henrietta Stokely-Trent appeared mollified enough that she agreed to accompany Lady Amelia. While they put their heads together to confer about the music, Whit drifted toward to his cousin and Ruby Hollingsford.
“I must say,” Charles was murmuring, leaning closer to the redhead as if to catch the scent of her hair, “that though your father may be a jeweler of some renown, he surely had his greatest gem in you, my dear Ruby.”
Whit couldn’t help frowning. How had Charles managed to gain the right to use her first name so soon? And what was this about a jeweler? Was that the source of his other guests’ disapproval? Were they so arrogant they looked down on a lady for having a father in trade?
Ruby Hollingsford shook her head at his cousin’s praise, hair catching the light. “You’ll have to do better than that, sir, if you hope to win one of these women.”
So she’d taken his cousin’s measure already. Whit tried not to smile as his cousin promised her his utmost devotion. Ruby just laughed, soft and low, a sound that met an answering laugh inside Whit.
Just then, Henrietta Stokely-Trent played a chord,
