‘He is,’ replied the Marquis.
‘Well, it is very odd of you to threaten to throw your friends out of the window, I must say,’ remarked Juliana.
He smiled. ‘Not at all. It is only my friends that I would throw out of the window.’
‘Dear me!’ said Juliana, finding the male sex incomprehensible.
His lordship picked up her fan, a delicate Cabriolet with ivory sticks and guards, pierced and gilt, and rapped her knuckles with it. ‘Attend to me, Ju. Do you mean to have Comyn, or not?’
‘Good gracious, what in the world do you mean?’ exclaimed Juliana.
‘Answer, chit.’
‘You know I do. But I don’t at all understand why –’
‘Then you’d best stop flirting with Bertrand.’
Miss Marling flushed. ‘Oh, I don’t – flirt!’
‘Don’t you?’ jibed his lordship. ‘I beg your pardon. But whatever it is that you do, stop. That’s a kind cousinly warning.’
She tilted her chin. ‘I shall do as I please, thank you, Vidal, and I’ll not be lectured, and scolded by either of you.’
‘Just as you like, Ju. Don’t blame me when you lose your Frederick.’
She looked startled. ‘I shan’t lose him!’
‘You’re a fool, Ju. What’s the game you’re playing? Trying to make him jealous, eh? It won’t work.’
‘How do you know it won’t?’ demanded Miss Marling, stung.
He looked down at her with lazy affection. ‘You’ve chosen the wrong man for these tricks of yours. What is it you want?’
She began to pleat the stiff silk of her gown. ‘I do love him,’ she said. ‘I do, Vidal!’
‘Well?’
‘If only he would – be a little more like you!’ she said in a rush.
‘Good God!’ said the Marquis, amused. ‘Why the devil should he be?’
‘I don’t mean that I want him to be really like you,’ explained Miss Marling. ‘It’s merely that – oh, I can’t tell! But supposing you loved me, Dominic, and I – well, flirted, if you must use that horrid word – with another man: what would you do?’
‘Kill him,’ said the Marquis flippantly.
She shook his arm. ‘You don’t mean it, but I think perhaps you would. Vidal, you’d not let another man steal the lady you loved, would you? Do answer soberly!’
The smile still lingered on his lips, but she saw his teeth shut hard. ‘Soberly, Ju, I would not.’
‘What would you do?’ inquired Miss Marling, momentarily diverted by curiosity.
His lordship was silent for a minute, and the smile faded, leaving his face strangely harsh. A tiny snap sounded under his fingers. He glanced down at them, and the grim look left his face. ‘I’ve spoiled your fan, Ju,’ he said, and gave it her back. Two of the sticks were broken at the shoulder. ‘I’ll give you another.’
Juliana was looking at him in considerable awe. ‘You haven’t answered me,’ she said, with an uncertain laugh.
‘What I might do is – happily for you – not in the least like what Comyn will do,’ he replied.
‘No,’ she said sadly. ‘But can you understand that I wish it were?’