He had not explained, however, what he meant by that word, which had more meanings than perhaps any other word in the English language.
“When you find it,” he had said, “you will know.”
What Avery did know was that men feared him even while they believed they despised him. He knew they did not understand their fear or even openly admit it. He knew women found him attractive. He had learned to surround himself with the weapon that was himself like an invisible aura, while inside he observed his world with a certain cool detachment that was not quite cynical and not quite wistful.
Lady Anastasia Westcott, he suspected, did not find him either fearful or irresistibly attractive, and for that he admired her too. She had even called him absurd. No one ever called the Duke of Netherby absurd, even though he frequently was.
“When a gentleman walks with a lady,” he said as they approached the park, “they make conversation. Shall we proceed to do so?”
“About anything at all?” she asked. “Even when there is nothing to say?”
“There is always something to say,” he said, “as your education will soon teach you, Anna. There is always the weather, for example. Have you noticed how there is always weather? It never lets us down. Have you ever known a day without weather?”
She did not reply, but around the hideous brim of her hideous bonnet he could see that she was almost smiling.
Carriages and riders were making their way in and out of the gates. Their occupants glanced Avery’s way and then returned for a harder look. He turned off the main carriageway to cross a wide expanse of green lawn in the direction of a line of trees that hid the streets beyond from view. He did not intend exposing her to the curiosity of large numbers of the fashionable world today. There was a path through the trees where one could expect a measure of solitude.
She did not choose the weather, even though there was weather happening all around them in the form of sunshine and warmth and very little breeze. Those three subtopics could have kept them chatting for five minutes or longer.
“You must have known my father,” she said.
“He was the duchess, my stepmother’s elder brother,” he said. “And yes, I had an acquaintance with him.” As little as he possibly could.
“What was he like?” she asked.
“Do you wish for the polite answer?” he asked in return.
She turned her head sharply in his direction. “I would prefer the truthful answer,” she said.
“I suppose in your world you can conceive of no other, can you, Anna?” he asked her.
She was small with a minimum of curves. She was small breasted. Her hair, even without the bonnet, was severely styled and heavy. Yet something came into her eyes for a moment, a certain awareness that he did not believe was fear, and somehow it flashed from her eyes into his body, and for a brief moment it did not seem to matter that the only physically appealing thing about her was her Madonna’s face. It was an extraordinary moment. It was almost sexual.
“Why ask a question,” she said, “if one does not want a truthful answer?”
Ah. Now he understood. He liked her. That was extraordinary enough, but it was easier to understand than sexual awareness.
“Anna,” he said by way of reply to her question, “have you never asked a man if you look beautiful? No, foolish question. I do not suppose you have. It would not occur to you to go on a fishing trip for a compliment, would it? Women who ask that question certainly do not want the truth.”
She was still looking directly as him. “How very absurd,” she said.
He suspected that was going to become one of her favorite words in the days and weeks to come.
“Quite so,” he said. “I believe the late Riverdale to have been the most selfish man of my acquaintance, though admittedly I did not know him well. He was, or so I have heard, wild and expensive as a young man. He married the lady his parents had chosen for him when his debts were such that he had no choice but to do whatever it took to restore the flow of funds from which he had been cut off. Apparently that included bigamy and the hiding away of his legitimate daughter. When his father died not long after his marriage and he became the earl, he continued his profligate ways for a while, and then suddenly saw the light, so to speak, and changed completely. It was not a religious epiphany that had assailed him, however. No divine light struck him down and made a penitent of him. According to my father, who knew him well, though reluctantly so as a brother-in-law, he had some extraordinary luck at the gaming tables, invested his winnings in a wild and improbable scheme, made a fortune from it, and turned suddenly and eternally wise. He found himself a brilliant financial adviser and became obsessed with making and hoarding money. He was extremely successful at both, as I discovered when I became Harry’s guardian, and as you will have discovered from your consultations with Brumford.”
“I suppose, then,” Anna said, “it was his dire need for funds that drove him to marry someone else when my mother was still alive. I wonder why she allowed it. Though she seems to have been living with her parents and apart from him at the time. And she was dying.”
“If someone you had met in Bath disappeared from your life and came to London and married and had children,” he said, “would you know about it? Ever?”
“Probably not,” she said after giving the matter some thought.
“Your mother and her parents lived in a rural vicarage,” he said. “It is unlikely they would know of the bigamy unless they had acquaintances who frequented London and were familiar with the aristocracy and knew of the connection between your mother and the man who soon became the Earl of Riverdale. It is even possible he did not ever use his courtesy title in Bath.”