Amanda McCabe

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

About the Author

“O
h, Allen. What have you done
this
time?”

Though she’d spoken softly, Rosalind wanted to groan the words, scream them out, even throw something at her brother’s head as he lounged so casually in his chair across from her. She could not, of course. That would be highly improper, and it would never do if one of the teachers or, heaven forbid, one of the girls heard her make a fuss. So she folded her hands on the mahogany surface of her desk, clasping her fingers together until the knuckles turned white.

Besides, even if she
did
throw something at Allen, it would scarcely make a dent in his thick skull. This was a scene they had played out dozens of times, and it always ended the same way.

“Oh, now, Rosie, really that is unfair,” Allen protested. He crossed his booted foot over his buckskin-covered knee and jiggled it impatiently. Rosalind frowned as flakes of mud showered from the boot’s sole onto the freshly polished floor. “I have done nothing untoward! A man must pay his gaming debts, after all. It is a point of honor.”

Honor?
Rosalind’s head pounded as if a hundred
drummers were tattooing that word inside her brain. She should show him
honor
, the ignorant young pup!

Be calm
, she thought, pressing her fingertips to her temples.
Remember how your parents asked you to look after him.

Remember the rules.
Breaking his skull was assuredly against the rules.

She reached out for the frighteningly official-looking letter. “So you borrowed money from a bank?”

“It was only until I receive my allowance. I needed to pay Carteret right away, you see, or I could not have shown my face at the club. They were never supposed to bother
you
, Rosie. It’s dashed embarrassing to have them go to one’s sister! What if Morley, or one of the others at the club, found out?”

Morley again. Always the blasted Viscount Morley. Even the very name made Rosalind silently curse, which usually she would never dream of doing. Cursing was also against the rules. Morley was the one who led Allen, and no doubt other impressionable young men, into folly. Morley, and his club, were a terrible influence on Allen.

But Rosalind did not say that. Any time she tried to talk to Allen about Lord Morley and his questionable activities, to warn him, he cut her off. It was futile—as futile as urging him to concentrate more on his studies and less on the lures of Town.

“Your allowance would never have covered this amount,” she told him. “Not in a year. And the interest…!” Rosalind took a deep breath. “Allen, banks have ways of compelling people to pay. This is a legal debt. Do you have any idea what you have gotten yourself, not to mention this school and me, into?”

Allen’s face, so bored and careless-looking ever since he had come into her office, flushed a dull red. His foot slid off his knee to land with a loud thud on the floor and he pointed a shaking finger in her direction. “Now, see here, Rosie! I am eighteen now. I can’t stand for having my sister ring a peal over my head. I must live my own life, as a man.”

Rosalind had had just about all she could take of this scene. Her head was pounding as if it would explode, and she knew that nothing she could say or do would persuade Allen of the truth. These days, only
Morley
could do that.

“I must remind you that I am your guardian until you are twenty, along with Uncle Silas, though truly I do everything since he lives in the wilds of Yorkshire. Our parents wished it this way, and in any case they left neither of us much money. It is
your sister
who pays for your schooling at Cambridge, as well as your allowance, and it is
your sister
who pulls you out of the soup every time you fall in. Which has been more and more of late!” Her voice rose dangerously on those last words. Rosalind took another deep breath and folded her hands together again. She would
not
let this get the better of her. “We are not wealthy people. This school allows us to be quite comfortable, but we cannot be extravagant as Mo—as some of your friends are.”

Allen crossed his arms across his chest, still mulishly stubborn. “I am not
extravagant
, Rosie! I only need the necessities.”

“Such as gaming debts? Coats from Weston? New boots every week?”

“I told you, it was the—”

Rosalind held up her hand to stop his endless flow of protests and explanations. “I know. It was for your club.”

“Well—yes. It was. You must agree that a man must maintain his good name at his club.”

Rosalind sighed, and resisted the almost overpowering urge to sink back wearily in her chair. She wished she could take a tisane and crawl into her bed, to sleep and forget all this. But she could not. It was too early in the day, and she had far too many responsibilities. The parents of her pupils would be arriving soon to take their daughters home for the spring holiday, for the beginning of the Season in London.