Free How to Dance With a Duke by Manda Collins Page A

Cecily said with disgust. “Even the Times has written of it today. It’s like something out of Walpole.”
    “We are a superstitious people,” he said with a shrug, helping himself to bacon from the sideboard and taking his usual seat to the left of her. “It helps to explain things that have no explanation.”
    Not wishing to dwell on the matter, Cecily changed the subject. “I take it you have been up to see Father? How is he this morning?”
    “Well enough,” Lord Geoffrey said, taking a sip of tea. “I believe he must have recognized me today. At least, I hope he did. When I spoke to him he squeezed my hand in a manner that up until now he has only done with you or Violet.”
    His eyes darkened with grief. “I cannot tell you how disheartening it is for me, Cecily, to see your father in such a state. I almost think it would have been better if the apoplexy had carried him off that first day.”
    An invisible hand gripped Cecily’s heart. Though she and Violet had spoken of just such a possibility in the early days of her father’s illness, it was jarring to hear her father’s dearest friend in the world voice it. Perhaps the public were not the only superstitious ones.
    “I do not say that I wish for it to have happened,” Brighton went on. “Indeed, I would not wish such a fate on him for anything. But I do know that your father values his mental acuity above all else. And I cannot think that he would ever have imagined himself living in such a condition. Alive, but unable to do any of those things that make life worth living.”
    “I do understand you,” Cecily said, thinking of how vibrant and full of life her father had been before his attack. “I don’t know that he would have wished for such a thing, but surely the fact that he still lives gives us hope that one day he will be able to live his life with the same passion he did before.”
    “You are right, my dear, as always.” He reached out to grasp her hand. “I do know this. He would be unspeakably proud to see you now, finally allowing yourself to cast off your cocoon and flap your wings like the glorious butterfly you are.”
    “Butterfly, indeed.” Cecily laughed. “And you know very well that Papa would be heartily displeased at my continued academic pursuits. Though I do believe he would be pleased to see that I’ve finally accepted Violet’s assistance with my wardrobe.”
    “Oh, I think you do yourself and your father a disservice, Cecily. Your father has always been proud of you. Even when he was railing about your stubbornness. He’s terribly proud of you. Just as proud of you as he was of your mother, God rest her soul.”
    The mention of her mother made Cecily’s smile fade. “Yes, I suppose he was proud of her. Though I wish he hadn’t taken her death as a sign of why ladies should never pursue any sort of academic activities. It wasn’t her translation work that drove her to her death, but a stubborn refusal to rest properly when she was taken ill with the lung infection. Knowing my own restlessness, I suspect that having her books around her would have helped her survive the tedium of the sickbed.”
    “He took your mother’s death hard, my dear,” Lord Geoffrey said. “Indeed, there was a time when I feared that he would do the unthinkable … but he resisted. For your sake, I think. And eventually he married Violet and all was right again.”
    But Cecily knew that was only a partial truth. All might have seemed right, but she knew that Lord Hurston had never been the same after her mother’s death. And when she had shown the same skill for languages that her mother had possessed, Lord Hurston had tried every means at his disposal to ensure that his daughter would not become as enthralled with her studies as his wife had been.
    But Cecily had persisted, and over his objections, with the help of her godmother, she had become a well-regarded scholar in her own right. Or, as much as was possible for a lady of