A Dash of Scandal Read Online Free PDF

was very nearly brought to dueling over a story published in one of the columns.
    There was nothing he would like better than to know the identity of the person who spied on unsuspecting people and wrote those wretched things.
    He couldn’t deny the debauchery of his late youth and his enjoyment of it, free from responsibilities, but recently his carefree lifestyle had lost its appeal. He had slowly, confidently let go of his wild days.
    Chandler had finally admitted to himself, but to no one else, that his mother was right. It was time for him to take a wife and beget a son to carry on the Dunraven title.
    He didn’t want his friends to know he was searching for a bride. They would badger him without mercy, and the matchmaking mamas would be lining up to parade their innocent daughters before him. No, he had long ago realized he had no desire for a giddy girl right out of the schoolroom.
    Chandler’s mother had not held a party in their town house since his youngest sister married. This year she had broken her vow of staying in Kent and had hosted one of the first parties of the Season, hoping to encourage her son to pursue thoughts of a wife.
    The morning after the party Chandler was stunned and outraged when his housekeeper had informed him that the Mad Ton Thief, as the London papers had dubbed the robber, had stolen his family’s priceless heirloom, the golden raven, from its place of privilege on the tall mantel in Chandler’s library.
    Thoughts of finding a wife had vanished. His mother had announced she was taking up residence at their home in Kent, and she intended to remain there until he became serious about choosing a wife.
    He was serious about finding a wife. It just wouldn’t consume him until he caught the Mad Ton Thief and reclaimed the golden raven for his family before it was sold or melted down.
    The sound of billiard balls smacking together broke Chandler from his reverie. He sipped his drink. The only thing his mother’s party had done was allow the Mad Ton Thief entrance into his home to rob him. He had not seen one woman, innocent or widow, who caught his eye. No lady had enchanted him like the young lady last night since his brief but fervid affair with the beautiful Lady Lambsbeth.
    As the tittle-tattle had indicated, he was damned unhappy about his unsuccessful meeting with Mr. Percy Doulton of the Bow Street’s elite Thief Takers, who were investigating the rash of thefts in London’s finest homes. But how had the scandal writers known that?
    Doulton was Bow Street’s number-one member of Thief Takers and so far he and his Runners had made no headway in finding the Mad Ton Thief. All they had succeeded in doing was making most of the members of the ton feel as if they were under suspicion by inappropriate and inane questions about the stolen artwork and jewels.
    Chandler agreed that it was most peculiar there had been a theft at three different homes and that not one person had admitted seeing anyone who remotely looked suspicious. But as he reminded Doulton, one seldom saw a pickpocket nab a man’s coin purse.
    Criminals were skilled at such behavior. The strange and difficult thing was that almost all the guests who attended the parties were known to someone in Society. Few, if any, strangers attended the private parties of the Season. That meant there was a robber among them passing himself off as a gentleman.
    â€œGood. You’ve ordered a bottle. But what’s this? Only one glass? Did you forget I was joining you? How quickly we neglect our friends.”
    Chandler looked up into the dark brown eyes of his longtime friend John Wickenham-Thickenham-Fines, better known in Town as Lord Chatwin. Fines was a tall, handsome fellow with thick hair as dark as his eyes. Like Chandler, his friend was broad in the chest and shoulders. He carried himself with just the right amount of self-importance, and he had a smile that made all the ladies