“Yes,” Braddon responded hastily, prodded by Madeleine’s elbow. “I have twenty-five thousand pounds a year. My estate is in Leicestershire, and I have houses in Delbington and London. I have good stables in Leicestershire,” he added, “thirty-four horses at last count.”

“Thirty-four! No great house has fewer than fifty horses,” Vincent Garnier snapped. Then he looked keenly at his future son-in-law. Too much inbreeding among English aristocrats. That was Slaslow’s problem. “And which earl are you?”

Braddon gaped. What on earth did the old fellow mean? “The Earl of Slaslow,” he stammered.

“No! Which number are you?”

“Oh,” Braddon replied. “I’m the second. M’father was made into an earl in the ‘60s.”

He watched Vincent scowl. It seemed even horse trainers knew that second earls were new earls. “M’great-grandfather was a viscount,” Braddon said defensively.

“Humph.”

“I wish to marry this man,” Madeleine said to her father, ignoring silly male fidgets over numbers of horses and numbers of earls.

“You may not marry him if he intends to take you to America,” her father stated.

“Then we shall stay in London and pretend that I am a French aristocrat,” Madeleine said practically. “Braddon’s friend will help me learn how to be a great lady. I shall go to a ball, and Braddon will pretend to fall in love with me, and there we are!”

Garnier’s mouth twisted. Clearly it went against the grain with him to countenance such a tricky scheme.

“And if someone finds out?” he growled at Braddon.

“I’ll marry Madeleine immediately,” Braddon said. “I’d just as soon get married now anyway. My family can’t do anything about it, and I don’t give a toss for my reputation among the ton.”

Garnier looked approving at that.

“You could be the daughter of the Marquis de Flammarion,” he said grudgingly to Madeleine. “You are the same age.”

“Oh, Papa,” Madeleine cried, “what a splendid idea!” She turned to Braddon. “My papa worked for the marquis and his family. I was too young when we left France to be able to remember them, but Papa has told me all about their estate in the Limousin, and the house in Paris, on Rue de Vosgirard. The marquis was rather strange and rarely went about, but his wife was very beautiful and elegant.”

“What about relatives, sir? London is crammed full of French émigrés, and they all seem to know one another.”

“No one knew the family of the marquis,” Garnier said. “He kept himself to himself. His wife, yes. She used to travel to Paris occasionally. But the marquis and his daughter were always at home.”

“That’s all right, then,” Braddon said with relief. “You don’t need to talk about it much, Madeleine. After all, if the marquis’s daughter was around your age during all the troubles in France, she wouldn’t remember much.”