The Devil You Know (The Devil DeVere #3)(12)

When the trio rapped at the door, the footman only had to glance at their rich dress before shepherding them straight into the main reception room, hazy with pipe smoke, redolent of the free-flowing liquor, and resounding with raucous laughter and the rattle of dice boxes.

Ned heaved a great sigh as his gaze skirted the room. “I must say my sympathy is with Diana. All we can do now is serve her best interests by extracting the hapless sheep from the wolf’s den.”

Ned and Hew circulated the rooms in search of Lord Reginald while DeVere sought out the master of the house. He found his quarry, O’Kelly, presiding over the hazard table. He sketched the shallowest of bows. “A private word with you, sir?”

“By Jaysus,” O’Kelly exclaimed, slapping his thigh. “If isn’t his eminence the Viscount himself paying a call on his lowly neighbor!”DeVere ignored the sarcasm. “If I have been negligent, sir, I meant no slight. I am only just come down from London and have been much occupied with guests of my own, one of whom appears to have gone astray.”

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Victoria Vane

“Astray? An interesting choice of words, your lardship.”

DeVere’s gaze casually tracked the room.”Perhaps we could speak of it in a less public sphere?”

“Why, anything to oblige my neighbor, ” said O’Kelly with obsequious joviality. “Like any fine jontlemen, I have a study to conduct my business affairs.”

“Then pray, let us repair to it.”

Nodding to the groom-porter, O’Kelly gave up the dice box and beckoned DeVere to follow. They entered the man’s private study. “Perhaps you would care to have a drink with me, Lard DeVere? I’ll brook no refusal, you know. What will it be? Brandy?

Port? Madeira? I have only the finest in my cellar.”

“So I hear,” DeVere stroked the Irishman’s self-conceit. While impatient to be about his business, he knew he had to handle the adventurer with considerable tact. “A good brandy would not go astray.” Lounging in a large, leather chair, he accepted the glass and took an appreciative sip. “Fine brandy, indeed.”

O’Kelly nodded and with a grunt settled his considerable bulk into a chair opposite. “You came searching for someone?”

“Just so. And while I ascribe to the philosophy of letting each man go to the devil his own way, I tend to take exception when I must play host to said gentleman’s fretful wife.”

“Ah! A shrew-wife! It all becomes clear now. No wonder the man sought escape.”

“Is he here then? The Baron Palmerston-Wriothesley?”

“Aye, but I fear Lard Reggie has already wearied of my hos-pitality.”

“Wearied, you say? Mayhap it’s the exhaustion of his pockets that’s to blame?” DeVere remarked with a knowing smile.

O’Kelly returned a conspiratorial look and a great gap-toothed laugh. “It costs a great deal to keep such a great house and fine stables as these.”

“Indeed, it does,” DeVere agreed. “How much, O’Kelly?” he asked, the smile lingering on his mouth but disappearing from his eyes.

O’Kelly’s gaze took on a hard, calculating look. “That is a private matter between jontlemen, yer lardship.”

“I am sensitive to your honorable discretion in the matter, but the gentleman in question is kinsman to my closest friend. Thus, 33

I only endeavor to save embarrassment to all. Perhaps you might permit me to buy his vowels?”

“A fine and generous offer, but perhaps your lardship might wish to know the amount of the debt before making such a pledge?”

DeVere steepled his fingers. “It is so extensive?”

“I fear the jontlemen has no luck at all with the dice. Three thousand guineas lost at Hazard. Had to send to his banker. Some business about a deed as surety on the debt.” O’Kelly waved his fleshy hand in a dismissive gesture as if the money meant little.

DeVere knew better.

“Then I ask what would you require by way of incentive to allow me to buy the paper? Would ten percent suffice?”

“I raise my glass to you, my lard. It’s not often I find such like-mindedness in the nobility. I think we can do business for twenty.”

“While I am eager to assist my friends, sir, I don’t readily accept extortion. Twelve is my final offer.”

“Then twelve it is.” With a broad smile, O’Kelly spit on his hand and offered it to DeVere.

Diana rose from her

***

bed at the clattering sound of carriage wheels and iron shod hooves on the cobbles below. Drawing aside the velvet drapes of the second story window, she peered down to watch the trio pull Reggie’s slumped form out of the carriage. Shouldered between Ned and Hew, they half-carried and half-dragged him into the house. At first she deliberated going downstairs to meet them, but knew any conversation with Reggie in his current state of inebriation would be pointless.

As proof of her wisdom, only moments later, muffled curses and snatches of drunken song assailed her ears through the dressing room separating his and her bedchambers. Relieved that he had at least arrived safely, she shed her wrapper and climbed back into bed. Yet sleep eluded her. Diana lay there wondering morosely if this was all she had to look forward to for the next twenty or thirty years.

As a dutiful daughter, she had wed the groom of her father’s choosing, a genial country gentleman with a love of hunting and a strong penchant for claret, a man exactly like her own father. But 34