He’d declared her a capital good sport and gone frolicking off to France. Or the grouse moors. Or Brighton. Or God alone knew where. Harmonia had coped as best she could, developing skills appropriate to a future marchioness and taking lovers when her mood was particularly low.

One of the skills she’d found indispensable was the ability to eavesdrop on the marquess. Stapleton had his fingers in many a pie, from mining ventures to legislation that protected his mining ventures to trysts with his current mistress, and all manner of political intrigues. For Stapleton, socializing was an ancillary activity to manipulating politics for the betterment of himself and his titled cronies.

When Tertullian, Lord Fleming, strode up the walkway apparently intent on paying yet another call on Stapleton, Harmonia decided to have a listen. Fleming was heir to an earldom and had a dull, dutiful view of life that might recommend him to Stapleton, but Harmonia found Fleming’s company tedious. He wasn’t a bad fellow, but he was already going a bit portly about the middle, and he smelled of bay rum. Bay rum, according to Mama, was a sure sign that a man lacked imagination in bed. Harmonia had tested the theory on three occasions, and, alas, Mama had been right.

A fit of pique had inspired Harmonia to mention remarriage to the marquess, and that had been a mistake. She would not put it past Stapleton to choose her next husband, and make marriage a condition of remaining part of Nicky’s life.

Blast all meddling men to perdition anyway.

Harmonia took herself to the pink parlor and lifted the carpet that covered a vent in the ceiling of Stapleton’s office. The vent kept the office below cooler in summer and afforded a view directly down onto Stapleton’s enormous desk all year round. Champlain had showed her this spy-hole and several others, may he rest in peace amid well-endowed nymphs.

“I tell you, she was on the arm of Lord Stephen Wentworth,” Fleming nearly shouted. “I know Miss Abbott at sight by now, and Lord Stephen is hard to miss. He can’t walk proper, and he’s even taller than she is.”

Stapleton remained at his desk, fingers steepled, while Fleming paced before him. Papa-in-Law was a small man in both senses of the word. He’d married a lady whose stature exceeded his own, and Champlain had taken after his mother’s side of the family. Stapleton remained seated as much as possible, wore heeled slippers even when dancing and lifts in his boots.

“How did Miss Abbott get from York down to London without your men spotting her en route? She rather stands out in a crowd.”

“She was doubtless in disguise,” Fleming said, pausing before the portrait of the late marchioness. “She does that sort of thing. She might have been hobbling along bent over like an old crone or even have been dressed as a man.”