A Lady’s Lesson in Scandal Read Online Free PDF

across her. “Darling, I’ll admit it: I have never felt so envious of confections.” He plucked a walnut from her navel.
    “Don’t stop there,” she purred. She had pretty, dark eyes, tilted like a cat’s. “You can have them all, you can. And maybe something else for dessert.”
    “Charming,” he murmured. Alas, he didn’t play with the help. And now—he laughed again—he couldn’t afford to do so anyway. “Some other time, perhaps.” He lifted her hand for a kiss, then turned on his heel for the exit.
    As he passed into the hallway, a nearby clock began to chime the midnight hour, and a startled bellow came from below.
    It seemed Harcourt had caught up with Dalziel.
    His laughter welled up again from nowhere, suddenly, and with such startling force that he had to stop and lean against the wall. He had no idea what set him off, but the hilarity expanded to encompass more and more, to encompass it all: Dalziel shrieking below; old Rushden selling off manuscripts like a merchant; grouse hunting, for God’s sake, and little debutantes in white dresses, demanding repentance; Simon’smother’s disgust when she heard all these tidings from her comfortable summer home in Nice; and the intensity of his own delusions, his
grand musical talents
, a youth misspent pursuing them, all for nothing, now, as the clock rang so insistently, though it made no bloody difference whether or not anyone knew the time, not really; it kept on moving whether one was informed of it or not.
    He wiped tears from his eyes. As his mirth ebbed he became conscious of a curious sensation in his stomach. It felt like an ache, not a pressure as much as a sort of hollowness, expanding, cold, like the dull blue deepening of twilight.
    Alone in this hallway, he suddenly felt … like the only person in the world.
    Lady Swanby was waiting. The thought made him draw a long breath and push off the wall. Yes, God forbid he keep Lady Swanby waiting for him. What an inconvenience it would pose her to have to find someone else with whom to pass the night.
    Like billiard balls bashing around the table, he thought. How randomly we smash into and away from each other.
    He shook his head at himself. Heard Harcourt below and put a smile on his face. As he started down the stairs, he threw in a salute to the clock for good measure. “Time waits for no man,” he murmured.
    But every day, it certainly ran out for someone.
    A girl got to thinking after her mother died. Some people were born saintlike, and Nell’s mum had been one of them: righteous, holy, with a pale, thin voice made for muttering prayers in some hushed alcove where nobody could overhear. At the wake, people hadsaid she’d been beautiful once, but Nell couldn’t imagine it. Beauty was a broad grin, a loud laugh, the water beating up on the Ramsgate sands—things that would be here tomorrow, that didn’t give a damn.
    Mum had always given a damn. Anxious, worn by it. Even her silences had offered reproach.
Did you? Would you? Will you? Oh, devil’s child, what am I to do with you?
Furrows in her forehead, bruises beneath her eyes, trembling hands permanently stained by the tobacco she’d handled—Jane Whitby had been anything but lovely, and Nell wouldn’t think of her.
    Nor would she cry again, blast it. She was done with weeping. Mourning was a luxury for the rich, a duty for the righteous poor. Nell was neither.
Self
-righteous, maybe. Poor, without doubt. But there it ended. No need for tears.
    She forced a smile onto her face in the darkness. Oh yes, she knew her faults very well. No grace in her. No forgiveness. What modesty she had came of shame. And in her heart no piety swelled, no compassion or patience. Resentment was what fueled her now.
Rage
.
    She was the one who belonged in jail, not Hannah. Hannah’s only fault had lain in the company she’d kept. But the ladies at GFS hadn’t cared for the truth.
I am very sorry for your friend
, Mrs. Watson had said.
But we cannot