“Of course not. I tried to assist him to stay on his feet, and he cowered away from me so violently he nearly overset himself again.”

“You are a good man, Neville. If His Grace has taken leave of his senses, that is not your fault. I heard he tried to attend services and made a complete hash of it.”

The brandy was working its magic, as was Phoebe’s sense of calm and good sense. “How can one make a complete hash of attending services, short of a loud case of the wind during the sermon?”

“Neville, I despair of your humor. Rothhaven arrived at the last minute, said not a word to anybody, and left before the organist had concluded the final hymn. He looked neither left nor right, greeted nobody, and kept his coach waiting right at the foot of the steps. Very odd, if you ask me.”

Very pragmatic. The biddies in the churchyard would gabble until sunset with a new duke to torment.

“He was pale,” Neville said, thinking back over a situation that would not leave his mind. “Rothhaven, when he tried to get up. Looked like a shade.”

“Clearly, attending services was the limit of his ability, and then those women had to drag him all the way into York, parading him about as if he’s some sort of oddity. What can you expect from a family of bankers?”

As bankers went, His Grace of Walden had a spotless reputation. Quinn Wentworth hadn’t been among the cabal that had financed Napoleon’s Hundred Days, for example. Another set of London bankers had helped the fledgling United States buy the Louisiana Territory from Napoleon, providing an enormous infusion of cash into the emperor’s coffers.

In Neville’s opinion, most bankers were economic parasites. They made money off of other people’s hard work or misfortune. Solicitors might not be gentlemen in the strictest sense of the word, but at least they earned their coin fairly and in exchange for honest services rendered—in theory.

“Lord Nathaniel arrived as His Grace’s fit was passing,” Neville said, taking a fortifying sip of his brandy. “He seemed to know what to do.”

Phoebe set aside her cordial. “And that makes it better, that the same brother who all but imprisoned Rothhaven was abetting His Grace’s public torment today? First, poor Rothhaven is kept hidden away like some disgusting secret. Then they drag him around to the Wentworth entertainments. Now they force him to attend services and haul him clear to York. Of course Rothhaven’s wits went begging. It’s a wonder he didn’t strike you with his walking stick or flail at you with his fists.”

Phoebe fell silent, hands folded in her lap. She didn’t often lose her temper, but in this case, she had a point.