Oliver inclined his head in greeting.
“I’ve been tasked with seeing to Hapford’s introduction,” Bradenton explained. “He’ll be sitting with the Lords next month, and none of us were expecting that.”
Hapford had a black band around his arm; his clothing was dark. Maybe there was a reason the house seemed cold and somber after all.
“I’m sorry to hear of it,” Oliver said.
The new earl straightened and glanced over at Bradenton before responding. “Thank you. I intend to do my best.”
That glance, that deference paid to the other man… That was why Oliver was here. Not to recall school-era friendships that had gone tepid over the years. Bradenton was the sort of man who nurtured new entrants to Parliament. Nurtured them, and then did his best to keep them as part of his coterie. He had quite a collection now.
“I’d wish for a little more time to prepare you, but you’re coming along.” Bradenton gave his nephew an approving clout on the shoulder. “And Cambridge isn’t a bad place to conduct the exercise. It’s a microcosm of the world out there. You’ll see; Parliament is not so different.”
“A microcosm of the world?” Oliver was dubious. He’d never met a coal miner at Cambridge.
But Bradenton didn’t take his meaning. “Yes, there is rather a bit of the riffraff here.” He glanced over at Oliver.
Oliver didn’t say anything. To a man like Bradenton, he was riffraff.
“But the riffraff usually manage themselves,” Bradenton continued. “That’s the point of an institution like Cambridge. Anyone can aspire to a Cambridge education, so everyone who aspires chooses to start here. If you do it right, by the time they’ve finished their degrees, the most ambitious ones have become just like us. Or at least, they want to enter our ranks so badly that the next thing you know, all their ambition has been subsumed into the greater glory.”
He gave Oliver a pointed nod.
Once, Oliver would have been annoyed by such a speech. The sly implication that Oliver didn’t belong, the even slyer one that he’d been subsumed into Bradenton’s goals instead of being a person in his own right…
When he was thirteen, he’d knocked Bradenton down for committing precisely that sin. But now he understood. Bradenton reminded him of an old farmer, walking the perimeter of his property every day, testing the fences and peering suspiciously at his neighbors, making sure that his side and their side were clearly delineated.
It had taken Oliver years to learn his lesson: keep quiet and let men like Bradenton test the fences. It wouldn’t do them any good, and if you were careful, one day you’d be in a position to buy their whole damned farm.
And so Oliver held his tongue and smiled.
“The ladies will be arriving shortly,” Bradenton said, “so if you’d like to start with a brandy…” He gestured off the entryway.
“Brandy,” Whitting said decisively, and the party moved to a side room.
Bradenton had an entire room reserved for nothing more than this—a sideboard with glasses, a decanter of amber liquid. But at least the chamber was smaller and therefore warmer. The marquess poured generous splashes into tumblers. “You’ll need this,” he said, passing glasses to his nephews first and then to Oliver.
Oliver took the spirits. “Many thanks, Bradenton. Speaking of this coming February. There is something I wanted to talk to you about. The voting reform act, in this coming parliamentary session—”
Bradenton laughed and tipped up his glass. “No, no,” he said. “We are not going to discuss politics yet, Marshall.”
“Well, then. If not now, perhaps we might speak later. Tomorrow, or—”
“Or the next day or the one after that,” Bradenton finished with a gleam in his eye. “We have to teach Hapford how to get on before we teach him what to get on about. Now is not the time.”
That, apparently, was not an attitude shared by all. Hapford had looked up with interest when Oliver started speaking; at this, he frowned and turned away.
Oliver could have argued. But then…
“As you say,” he said mildly. “Later.”
A man like Bradenton needed to receive deference. He needed a neighbor who stopped five feet from the fence instead of challenging the property lines. Oliver had swayed the man before, and he knew how it was done. Bradenton could be directed, so long as nobody penetrated the illusion that he was in charge.
Instead, Oliver let the conversation meander to the subject of mutual friends, the health of Oliver’s brother and his wife. For a few moments, they could pretend there was nothing to this but a cozy, intimate environment. But then Bradenton, who stood by the window, raised his hand once more.
“Drink up,” he said. “The first lady has arrived.”
Whitting looked out the window and let out a whimper. “Oh, God, please no. Never tell me you invited the Feather Heiress.”
“Blame your cousin.” Bradenton lifted an eyebrow. “Hapford wants a few minutes in the corner with his fiancée. And for whatever reason, Miss Johnson insists on having her invited.”
“Speaking of whom,” Hapford said, with a quiet dignity that looked out of place on his boyish features, “I would prefer that we not slander my fiancée’s friends.”
Whitting let out a puff of air. By the grim look on his face, Oliver would have imagined that he had just been sentenced to three years of hard labor. “Spoilsport,” he muttered, and then edged up to Oliver. “Someone should warn you,” he muttered.
“Warn me about what?”
The man leaned forward and whispered dramatically. “The Feather Heiress.”
“Her wealth comes from…goose down?”
“No.” Whitting didn’t look at him. “It’s originally from transcontinental steamers, if you must know. She’s called the Feather Heiress because being around her is like being beaten to death by feathers.”
He looked utterly serious. Oliver shook his head in exasperation. “You can’t beat someone to death with a feather.”
“You’re an expert on it, are you?” Whitting raised his chin. “Shows how much you know. Imagine someone starts beating you with a feather. Imagine that they never stop, until one day, the constant annoyance of goose feathers pushes you over the edge. In a fury you strangle the person who has been beating you.” He demonstrated this with a wrench of his hands. “Then you hang for murder. You, my friend, have been beaten to death by feathers.”