Stephen remained silent, urging his horse back up to the trot. That Stephen would let the matter drop proved nothing. Rothhaven might be a genius at spotting lucrative investments. Stephen, of a certainty, could smell trouble in the wind. That he would subject himself to not one but two courting swains and a duchess on the nest suggested trouble was indeed approaching.

“His Grace of Rothhaven is no more insane than you are, Philpot,” Cranmouth said. “One doesn’t accuse a duke of mental incompetence and come away unscathed.”

“One does not,” Neville replied, taking a sip of excellent claret, “unless the duke is incontrovertibly afflicted. Then one is taking on a thankless and necessary public duty.” Phoebe’s words, though they had sounded more convincing when she’d spoken them.

Neville had chosen to have this discussion with Cranmouth over a superb rare steak at the club frequented by most of the solicitors and men of business in York. The Dalesmen premises weren’t as busy at midday, and thus the conversation was private.

“Rothhaven is my client,” Cranmouth retorted, leaning across the table. “I cannot be seen to betray the interests of my client.”

Neville refilled Cranmouth’s wineglass and topped up his own. Reasoning with Cranmouth was thirsty work.

“Now there you raise an interesting question, Cranmouth. Is your client the man—Robert Rothmere—or the duchy of Rothhaven as embodied in that man? If your client is the duchy, then a duke who cannot manage his own affairs is a threat to his own duchy, wouldn’t you say?”

“You know nothing,” Cranmouth muttered. “The old duke—Duke Alaric—nearly ran the whole business into the ground. Mistresses, hunting parties, royal court pomp, and Paris fashions. He was old-school, if you know what I mean. Papa used to dread his summonses, and not because it meant a journey into the countryside. The old duke had no head for business, and he wasn’t willing to be educated.”

“True of most dukes, from what I gather.” Not that Neville truly knew any dukes.

“The old duke died, and the surviving son—the fellow we thought was the only surviving son—Nathaniel, stepped into his shoes. Immediately, matters began to come right. Expenses slowed to a trickle, the foolish investments stopped, the books were brought up to date.”

Neville took another bite of excellent beef and made a do-go-on gesture with his fork.

“Shortly thereafter, a year or two at most, I began to receive more detailed guidance regarding the investments. Sell this, buy that, ship the other. Some of the instructions were quite odd—buy nails, in quantity, tons of them, for example. After Waterloo, the Birmingham gunmakers stopped consuming every available ton of iron and steel. The nail manufactories were thrilled to have a bulk order from any quarter, and the Continental markets were eager to buy those nails at very competitive prices.”