Free Maggie MacKeever by Lady Sweetbriar

your knees!” she hastily remarked. “We have had this conversation before, I think. Nothing has changed in the interim. I cannot reconcile myself to the idea of marriage with a man who favors his stepmama over me.”
    They had reached that same impasse? Lord Sweetbriar sighed. “But I don’t favor Nikki!” he protested. “Most of the time I’d like to wring her neck.”
    “So you say.” Lady Regina’s voice was sad. “Myself, I hold that actions speak fairer truth than words. So far none of your actions, sir, have betokened a preference.”
    “Then you may blame yourself.” Rolf’s own patience was wearing understandably thin. “You’re the one who keeps preventing me going down on my knees!”
    Lady Regina forbore to explain that she wished a more tangible token of esteem than the sight of her admirer engaged in a ridiculous posture. Silently she gazed at the opposite box, wherein Mr. Thorne had joined Nikki. They were laughing and joking together like the greatest of friends, Regina thought. And so they might! Were Rolf’s suspicions correct, more than friendship lay hidden in their mutual past. It occurred to Regina that Mr. Thorne’s return to London might be used to her advantage. Precisely how, she was not certain, but given Lady Sweetbriar’s flirtatious nature, and Mr. Theme’s way with the fair sex, and the excellent terms on which they stood—Lady Sweetbriar might even be persuaded to remove from London, were her betrothal broken off.
    Lady Regina turned to Lord Sweetbriar, who was deep in a fit of the sulks. “I have been behaving very badly,” she confessed. “Pray forgive me, Rolf. The truth is that I am a little envious. Your stepmama always seems so happy, while I—” She sighed. “I will not equivocate! You know how it is with Papa.”
    “Indeed I do.” For all his self-absorption, Lord Sweetbriar had a good heart. “Drunk as a wheelbarrow,” he added, in demonstration of the fact that good hearts are not inevitably accompanied by tact. “You know, it’s queer that you should dislike Nikki so much when your own papa is worse! At least Nikki ain’t a drunkard. Oh, Lord, I didn’t mean—that is, I did mean it, but—”Anxiously Lord Sweetbriar wracked his brain one final time, lest he be denied all further opportunities to converse with his beloved, let alone prove his devotion, as from her grim expression threatened to be the case. “Tell you what! If I make you a present of Nikki’s jewels, then will you stop saying I ain’t sincere?”
    “Oh, Rolf!” Lady Regina was far too clever to display triumph. “I had not expected—you must not imagine— yes, I rather think I would.”
Chapter 7
    Not only Lady Regina Foliot took note of the enjoyment Lady Sweetbriar appeared to derive from the company of Mr. Thorne during Mme. Catalini’s rendering up of Mozart at the King’s Theatre in the Haymarket. Miss Clough had also been present, and had paid considerably more attention to the drama being enacted in the Foliot box than the entertainment underway onstage. Clytie thought, from what she saw, that Mr. Thorne had delivered Lady Regina a set-down before he joined Lady Sweetbriar’s party. Of course he had not noticed Clytie. Foolish to think he might. The impudent Mr. Thorne was distinctly profligate. It was this suspicion which prompted Miss Clough to seek out her father at the British Museum.
    Miss Clough passed the armed guards at the cupola’d entry, nodded to the porter, and then went into the museum, which had once been a private dwelling, Montagu House. Built on the lines of a Parisian hotel, the structure was famed for its magnificent staterooms, frescoes, and parquetry floors. Pondering what she was to say to her papa—even to Clytie, Sir Avery was an enigma, and she could not anticipate how he might react to a suggestion that Lady Sweetbriar had in some arcane manner interfered with the orderly working of his mind.
    Miss Clough paused in the entrance hall.