A Royal Kiss and Tell

She nodded, her curls bouncing gaily around her face. “Hollis told me all about him. He went to America to make his fortune, taking all the money from his estate that wasn’t otherwise entailed. All of it. Can you imagine? Apparently, he meant to make a fortune in trading tobacco. But his first ship ran aground. The crew was rescued, but the ship was scuttled and the cargo lost. All that investment sitting at the bottom of the ocean.” She shook her head.

“That’s unfortunate,” Leo said sincerely.

“A terrible tragedy that my dowry could possibly repair. Unfortunately for him, as he’s just come back from America, Lady Katherine Maugham, otherwise known as the Peacock—”

“Pardon?” Leo asked, smiling.

“The Peacock. Do try to keep pace, Leopold. Hollis and Eliza and I gave Lady Katherine that name because she is a peacock, always showing her feathers.”

He choked on a laugh. “Isn’t that a bit of the pot calling the kettle black?”

“Well, yes, but I’m genial about it,” she said, her eyes dancing with merriment. “She’s just there, with my aunt, do you see?” she said, nodding to a point across the room.

An attractive woman a head shorter than Caroline was in conversation with her aunt.

“Katherine has set her sights on the viscount, and she will not lose him to me.”

“Is she in a position to decide?”

“You may trust me it would be war if he were to seriously pursue me. Oh! There’s another potential suitor,” she said, leaning slightly forward to look to Leo’s right. “Mr. Bishop. Don’t look.”

Leo turned to look.

“Don’t look!” Caroline said, giggling.

“How am I to know who we are speaking about if I don’t look?”

Caroline stole another look. “All right. But do it quickly. He’s tall and thin with fine blond hair that is thinning on the crown.”

“That describes half the men in London.”

“But only three of the gentlemen here tonight. Now.”

Leo looked. He spotted the man in question and turned back to Caroline. “I’ve spotted him, I’ve seen his thinning hair and his height. What does Mr. Bishop lack as a suitor?”

“Oh, nothing. He’s very kind and has no debts to speak of. Unfortunately, he aspires to the clergy.”

“Oh dear,” Leo said with a smile.

“Exactly,” she whispered. “I can think of no one less suited to being the wife of a vicar than me. Can you?”

“Not a single name comes to mind,” he agreed.

Caroline laughed. “Prince Leopold, I think you know me better than I allow. Look, here comes Lady Debridge. Supper will be served soon. She will have sat you as far from her as possible and say only a lowly footman may serve you.” She winked. “Enjoy your supper, Your Highness,” she chirped, and walked away, pausing to speak to a couple who were bent over an open book.

A moment later, Sir Walter announced supper was served.

Caroline was right—Leo found himself seated at the very end of the table next to Sir Walter and across from Mr. Franzen, a German banker. On Leo’s right was an elderly woman whose name he never could quite decipher. She curled over her food like a question mark.

Caroline was in the middle of the table, surrounded by all the youth and beauty in the room. Or at least it seemed that way from where Leo was sitting. Ladley was on her right, his attention to her every need. On her left, another gentleman Leo had not met but who also seemed captivated by Caroline.

Or maybe it just seemed that way to him because he was captivated by her, too. Perhaps more than all these gentlemen combined. Too captivated. His enchantment had all the signs of potentially getting in the way of his goals and his duties.

He would have been content to sit quietly and contemplate these thoughts, but Sir Walter was very keen to delineate for Leo all the things he’d done in his life, and desiring, apparently, to compare them to experiences Leo might have had. Sir Walter had excelled at archery. Had Leo?

“Ah...well, I was certainly taught the art, but I must admit my brother was better.”

“And riding, sir? I’m sure you are an expert rider. I suspect princes are trained from an early age to ride.”

“I am a passable rider.”

“What of your military service? I myself spent four years in Her Majesty’s Royal Navy. Best four years of my life.”

“Yes,” Leo said. He was bored with this game. “I was four years in the navy.”

“Four years! Admirable, Your Highness,” he said, as if congratulating a boy on the cricket field. “And you’ve been in England now for...how long, is it?”

Leo sipped his wine. “A very long time, as it happens. So long, in fact, that the time has come for me to return to Alucia.”

Mr. Franzen chuckled. “The time does come to put away childish things, does it not?”

Leo didn’t know if this was a comment on the life he’d led in England, or merely an observation, but he could feel the heat rising beneath his collar nonetheless. He used to laugh about his dissolute life, but now it seemed sad to him to be a man of nine and twenty years and have nothing to show for it. He thought about the Weslorian women and what they’d had to endure while he’d lived so carelessly.