The duke crossed his arms, glaring most ferociously. “Are you quite finished?”
Ana attempted to match his ferocity. If only she had a stepstool, she’d climb higher than he and glower down from a great height, show him how it felt. She jutted her chin, staring him down. “Just getting started, Your Grace.”
She was brave. She didn’t back down easily. He respected that. “Don’t you want to make your debut?”
“It won’t work. I’m ill-suited to London society. I’ll stand out like a sunflower in a rose bed. I’m hardly the modest, sheltered young lady society demands. I’ve had to learn hard truths about the world.”
He winced. “And that is entirely my fault. I mean to make reparations. You may not be the daughter of a titled gentleman, and you may have had several years outside of society, but as a duke’s ward, you’ll attract the notice of all, especially when they learn about your dowry.”
“In other words you’re going to bribe someone to marry me.”
“Don’t view it as such. I’m giving you an appropriate sum that will signal your worth to a society that places much value on such things.”
“I shall attract only fortune hunters then. And they’ll know I’m not an innocent debutante. I’m not the girl Papa left at the finishing school. The girl who wore ribbons in her hair and had a head full of sentimental dreams.”
“I read your letters. I know what those hopes were. I can’t bring back your father, but I can see that the rest of your dreams come true.”
“I’ll bring my father back. If there’s even the slimmest of chances that he may be alive, I must attempt to find him. If you are set on paying for my way in the world, I will accept those funds in order to place advertisements in the papers for any news of my father’s whereabouts. I shall interview the men who fought alongside him, perhaps even travel to Belgium to search for news of him—”
“Those men are dead.” He hadn’t meant the words to be so cold, so harsh, but there was no other way to communicate the truth. “Your desperate hope that your father is still alive is dangerous. It could make you the target for unscrupulous charlatans.”
There was no gentle, kind way to say this. She must abandon this false hope. “I’m very sorry, Miss Crewe, but there’s no way your father survived his injuries.”
“The official report says he’s missing in action and his body was never recovered.”
“It’s true that he was never found. Many were not. We had to... dig shallow, hasty graves. Men were piled into them. We had no time to erect grave markers or make lists of names to sendhome.” He winced at the memory. As long as he lived, that tumult of limbs and faces being steadily swallowed by dirt would never fade from his mind’s eye.
“And yet you didn’t actually see him die,” she said stubbornly.
“I staunched his chest wound with a cloth. He’d lost too much blood. He’s gone, Miss Crewe.”
“You have no imagination, that’s the problem. Some kind villager found him and dragged him to safety. Nursed him back to health. He lost his memory. He can’t even recall his own name.”
“Impossible.”
“It’s not,” she insisted, her cheeks gone pink with emotion. “I’m going to find him and then I’ll set about restoring his memory using the things he used to love. I’ll read him his favorite poem—Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”—we’ll play a game of whist, and I’ll feed him his favorite dessert—flummery.”
“Flummery?”
“A lovely custard flavored with almonds and rosewater. I’ll make it for you sometime. I must keep in practice so that I might produce it in an instant upon his return.”
He raised his hand to touch her shoulder, then dropped it at his side. How could he make her see? “You can’t cling to this mad hope. I’m telling you that he’s gone. So many are gone. It’s better to mourn him. Honor his memory by making him proud of you by marrying a gentleman he would have approved of.”
She stifled a sob. “You don’t know what’s best for me,” she said in a wobbly voice, biting her lip.
“I’m your guardian. He entrusted you to my care. I take my duty very seriously. I will see you happily settled.”
“My debut will be no success. People will ask questions about why I didn’t make my debut earlier. Where I’ve been.”
“We’ll tell them the truth—you were companion to Lady Claridge, there’s nothing objectionable about that.”
“It’s true, there was nothing objectionable about it—until she was gone and unable to protect me from her nephew. She was such a kind lady, taking me in and allowing me to be her companion. She was like a family member to me. I learned so much from her. But her nephew...” A shadow crossed her face. “If I enter society too boldly, Lord Claridge is apt to spread vicious rumors to ruin me, all because I spurned his horrid advances.”
Dex’s jaw clenched. “Lord Claridge will never mention your name again.”
“How can you be sure of that?”
“I have my methods.”