Lady D’s cane came down squarely on his toes. “Not even close, my dear boy,” she barked, “and if you value your appendages, you shan’t blaspheme in such a manner again.”
“The Gospel according to Agatha Danbury,” Hyacinth murmured.
Mr. St. Clair flashed her a grin, which surprised her, first because she hadn’t thought he would hear her remark, and second because it made him seem so boyish and innocent, when she knew for a fact that he was neither.
Although…
Hyacinth fought the urge to shake her head. There was always an although. Lady D’s “finallys” aside, Gareth St. Clair was a frequent visitor at Danbury House. It made Hyacinth wonder if he was truly the rogue society made him out to be. No true devil would be so devoted to his grandmother. She’d said as much at the Smythe-Smith musicale, but he’d deftly changed the subject.
He was a puzzle. And Hyacinth hated puzzles.
Well, no, in truth she loved them.
Provided, of course, that she solved them.
The puzzle in question ambled across the room, leaning down to drop a kiss on his grandmother’s cheek. Hyacinth found herself staring at the back of his neck, at the rakish queue of hair brushing up against the edge of his bottle green coat.
She knew he hadn’t a great deal of money for tailors and such, and she knew he never asked his grandmother for anything, but lud, that coat fit him to perfection.
“Miss Bridgerton,” he said, settling onto the sofa and allowing one ankle to rest rather lazily on the opposite knee. “It must be Tuesday.”
“It must,” Hyacinth agreed.
“How fares Priscilla Butterworth?”
Hyacinth lifted her brows, surprised that he knew which book they were reading. “She is running for the cliffs,” she replied. “I fear for her safety, if you must know. Or rather, I would,” she added, “if there were not eleven chapters still to be read.”
“Pity,” he remarked. “The book would take a far more interesting turn if she was killed off.”
“Have you read it, then?” Hyacinth queried politely.
For a moment it seemed he would do nothing but give her a Surely You Jest look, but he punctuated the expression with, “My grandmother likes to recount the tale when I see her each Wednesday. Which I always do,” he added, sending a heavy-lidded glance in Lady Danbury’s direction. “And most Fridays and Sundays as well.”
“Not last Sunday,” Lady D said.
“I went to church,” he deadpanned.
Hyacinth choked on her biscuit.
He turned to her. “Didn’t you see the lightning strike the steeple?”
She recovered with a sip of tea, then smiled sweetly. “I was listening too devotedly to the sermon.”
“Claptrap last week,” Lady D announced. “I think the priest is getting old.”
Gareth opened his mouth, but before he could say a word, his grandmother’s cane swung around in a remarkably steady horizontal arc. “Don’t,” she warned, “make a comment beginning with the words, ‘Coming from you…’”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he demurred.
“Of course you would,” she stated. “You wouldn’t be my grandson if you wouldn’t.” She turned to Hyacinth. “Don’t you agree?”
To her credit, Hyacinth folded her hands in her lap and said, “Surely there is no right answer to that question.”
“Smart girl,” Lady D said approvingly.
“I learn from the master.”
Lady Danbury beamed. “Insolence aside,” she continued determinedly, gesturing toward Gareth as if he were some sort of zoological specimen, “he really is an exceptional grandson. Couldn’t have asked for more.”
Gareth watched with amusement as Hyacinth murmured something that was meant to convey her agreement without actually doing so.
“Of course,” Grandmother Danbury added with a dismissive wave of her hand, “he hasn’t much in the way of competition. The rest of them have only three brains to share among them.”
Not the most ringing of endorsements, considering that she had twelve living grandchildren.
“I’ve heard some animals eat their young,” Gareth murmured, to no one in particular.
“This being a Tuesday,” his grandmother said, ignoring his comment completely, “what brings you by?”
Gareth wrapped his fingers around the book in his pocket. He’d been so intrigued by its existence since Caroline had handed it over that he had completely forgotten about his grandmother’s weekly visit with Hyacinth Bridgerton. If he’d been thinking clearly, he would have waited until later in the afternoon, after she had departed.
But now he was here, and he had to give them some reason for his presence. Otherwise—God help him—his grandmother would assume he’d come because of Miss Bridgerton, and it would take months to dissuade her of the notion.
“What is it, boy?” his grandmother asked, in her inimitable way. “Speak up.”
Gareth turned to Hyacinth, slightly pleased when she squirmed a little under his intent stare. “Why do you visit my grandmother?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Because I like her.”
And then she leaned forward and asked, “Why do you visit her?”
“Because she’s my—” He stopped, caught himself. He didn’t visit just because she was his grandmother. Lady Danbury was a number of things to him—trial, termagant, and bane of his existence sprang to mind—but never a duty. “I like her, too,” he said slowly, his eyes never leaving Hyacinth’s.