Free My Lord Murderer by Elizabeth Mansfield

won’t keep to his bed for long, I know that. He does love to engage in sporting activities with his friends, so he’s bound to be up before long. And with the weather becoming worse…”
    “We shall get him better, never fear. Don’t worry so, my dear. I’ll go down to the kitchen right now and make him some of my special herb tea,” Lady Hazel said, rising and going to the door. With her hand on the knob, she looked back at Gwen with a sigh. “It’s too bad that Brockhurst House is no longer ours. A couple of weeks in the country would have been the very thing for Tom. The very thing. Oh, well.” And with another sigh, she left the room.
    At the Selby house in St. James Square, Wys was staring at Hetty across the breakfast table with considerable suspicion. “I don’t know, Hetty. Does Selby know what you’re plotting?”
    “I tell you, Wys, you are troubling yourself over nothing. Selby has been trying to wheedle me to agree to go to Suffolk these past two months. He says he’s neglected his duties at Stonehaven for too long.”
    But Wys was not taken in. It was clear to him that Hetty was hoping to avoid facing Selby with the details of this preposterous plot she was hatching. “That is not an answer to my question. Does Selby know whom you’re planning to invite?”
    “There is no point in telling him until she accepts the invitation, is there?”
    “Yes, there is,” Wys said firmly. “By the time Lady Rowle agrees, it will be too late for Selby to put a stop to it.”
    Hetty glanced at her guest mischievously. “I see you have a basic understanding of the situation,” she said with a giggle.
    “Hetty!” Wys said, rising and frowning down at her in disapproval. “How can you use Selby so! I won’t be a party to it.”
    “I’m not asking you to be a party to it,” Hetty declared vehemently, her smile fading into a petulant pout. “You’re behaving as if I were doing something reprehensible. I’ll have you know this is not at all the case. I am merely making plans to rusticate for a few weeks at the manor house in Suffolk—something Selby has been urging me to do for the past age—and I mean to ask a friend or two to join us there. I’m certain Selby will see nothing objectionable in that. ”
    “Yes, my dear,” said Wys, feeling quite uncomfortable at the thought that Hetty was sharing with him the very information she was withholding from her husband. “But tell him first.” He leaned toward her in earnest appeal. “I’ll do whatever you ask of me if only you’ll tell him first.”
    Hetty fixed her eyes on Wys coldly. “I’m sure you mean well, Mr. Farr, and I know you are an old and respected friend of the family—”
    Wys sighed. “Now, Hetty—”
    “But that does not give you the right to advise me on how to handle my own husband! Marriage is a subject about which you know absolutely nothing!”
    “Through no fault of my own, I assure you,” Wys murmured.
    “Of course it’s your own fault! I’ve put half a dozen wonderful young ladies in your way in the last few months. One was too shrill, and one was too plump, and one too silly, and one too bookish…”
    Wys colored. “We were talking of another matter, I think,” he suggested mildly, not any more willing to discuss his private affairs than he was to discuss Hetty’s silly plan.
    Hetty subsided. “You’re right, of course. We were. That is, you were interfering in my marital affairs.”
    “I beg your pardon,” Wys said amicably.
    Hetty got up and began to pace about the room. “You are a most irritating person to quarrel with, Wys. You never get angry.”
    “I have nothing to be angry about,” Wys said mildly. “May I have a bit more of this ham?”
    Hetty, realizing that he was trying to change the subject, pouted. “You’ll be as stout as Selby one day,” she muttered.
    “I suppose you’re right. Well, then, I’ll take my leave. If I remain here at the table, I shall be tempted to gorge