“I review your sisters’ books quarterly, now that the properties are in hand.” A few years ago, the picture had been very different.

“They have nothing better to do for much of the time than take an interest in their neighbors and the local society, such as York boasts of society. I correspond with them as a dutiful brother should.”

Unease joined the general misery of Ellie’s day. “Say your piece, my lord.”

“Lady Althea has a particular ear for scandal, and she has heard mention of a decent family brought low by a talented painter’s attempts to dabble in forgeries. What had been a gentlemanly reputation was ruined overnight.”

He recited Grandfather’s history, but not the whole of that history. Very few people knew the whole of it.

“What has this to do with me?”

“I recall your family dimly from my tragically blighted boyhood. Your grandfather could sketch anything.”

Grandpapa had done so to amuse the neighborhood children, and he’d also sat in the local pubs doing caricatures and portraits in pencil for small change.

“Many people have artistic talent.” Jack certainly did, not that he’d put it to any useful purpose.

“I don’t. I see how things operate, like you see how finances work, but I can’t make art.”

You can make me anxious. Ellie held her peace rather than admit as much. The dratted man probably enjoyed making her worry. If his objective was blackmail, she hadn’t much personal wealth to give him. Though she did have access to the bank books, and now to Elsmore’s books.

Oh, dear. “Earning a living as an artist is difficult,” Ellie said. “You have other talents.”

“Talents like wasting your afternoon when you’d rather be snuggled up with Elsmore’s books?”

His lordship’s smile put her in mind of a wolf contemplating a fricassee of lamb. “My lord, I do have work to be about, as do you.”

“Jane adores you,” he said, “and I adore Jane. I do not always adore Jane’s husband.”

The last squabble Ellie would involve herself in was sibling rivalry in a ducal family. “His Grace employs me at generous wages. Discredit him at your peril.”

Lord Stephen shifted his chair back, farther from the hearth. “Oh, for God’s sake, settle your feathers. I don’t always like Quinn, nor is he unrelentingly fond of me, but we are loyal to each other. The point of this digression is to make you aware of several facts.”

Don’t tell me to settle my feathers, you arrogant popinjay. “I do enjoy being lectured, my lord, particularly in my own home by a man who knows me but little. One might even say the trait is amusing.”