Escapade Read Free

she said angrily. “I never heard of Kant till you mentioned him."
    “Wise young girl.” He touched her cheek with one finger. “You reached his immutable laws all by yourself. You knew your duty a whole two years ago and acted in a manner that would be to the best advantage of your family. I am really abominably slow. I didn't find it out till I happened to come across Kant a few weeks ago. Barely in time to avoid making a dreadful mistake."
    “But you came to make me an offer. You know you did."'
    “I will be eternally grateful that you reminded me of my duty.” He bowed and swept majestically out the door. The impish smile on his face led the hovering butler to believe that all was well. He even dared to enquire roguishly if the duchess would like him to summon her mama when he went to the drawing room a moment later.
    He was confounded when the young lady stamped her foot at him and said she never wanted to hear such impudence again. As this was followed shortly by a childish outburst of tears, he refrained from pursuing the matter.
    * * * *
    The duke was in a pensive mood as he tooled his yellow curricle down the street to the Park. He had most certainly gone to Park Lane to make Miss Artley an offer. He was no longer a young sprig and felt vaguely that he ought to marry, as he had no brothers to inherit if he should by mischance die young, as Joseph had done. He was accustomed to thinking himself in love with Miss Artley. Clearly she was desirous of marrying him, so why had he shied off at the last minute? It was some latent resentment that rankled, he supposed, at her former refusal. The sure knowledge that since he had come into his late brother's honors, he was sought after by one and all. Hadn't more than two words to say to him when he was Lord Patrick. Each one wanted to be a duchess—that was the sum and total of it. Damned if he'd satisfy ‘em. He had gone too far in goading Miss Artley, though. That had been unhandsome and uncalled for. He would see no more of her dimples after this day's work.
    In less than twenty-four hours, he realized he had miscalculated the degree of his insult. Miss Artley's mama, when she discussed the visit with her daughter, decided that Arabella had set the duke's back up by alluding to former times, but felt it must be only a temporary fit of pique and sought to reawaken his interest. New gowns were fitted and great pains taken to discover where Clare might have the chance of seeing them and rekindling his passion, but the flame was well and truly extinguished.
    She was replaced by a bevy of anxious beauties in the following season. There were the Misses Twitchwell, one blonde, one redhead, who refused to take offence at his never being able to tell them apart. When this joke palled on him, they were superseded by Miss Legg, famous for her killing eyes that slew a score of suitors a week. But Clare sustained no mortal wound. At a month's end he cast her off, and when she persisted in hounding him, he took to addressing her as Miss Arm, Miss Foot, or any other part of the anatomy that occurred to him.
    It was reported by Miss Prattle that His Grace, the D—e of C——-e, would not be Legg-shackled after all and was once more running in the London Open, as she had dubbed the marriage race. This and other interesting morsels were to be read in her gossip column entitled ‘Miss Prattle Says.’ It was to the third page of the Morning Observer that all members of the ton turned while having their morning chocolate, to see what scandalous and near-libelous gossip they might pick up from Miss Prattle to enliven their daily chatter. For three seasons now she had reigned supreme as the Queen of Gossip, and to add mystery to mystique, she was still unknown after all that time, in spite of strenuous efforts to learn her identity. Certainly a member of the very inner circle of society, for she knew everyone and everything. During her first year of writing, she had hit on Clare as her