Dark Angel by Mary Balogh

Author:Mary Balogh [Balogh, Mary]
Format: epub
Published: 2010-05-06T14:27:56.566000+00:00

Chapter 10

Sir Albert Boyle found his friend, the Earl of Thornhill, at home late in the afternoon of the following day. He was in the sitting room of his own apartments abovestairs, drunk. It was neither the place nor the time of day in which to be inebriated. And Lord Thornhill was not the type of man to let himself get thoroughly foxed. Especially at home alone during the daytime. Not that he was very obviously drunk. Apart from the slight dishevelment of his clothes and hair and his slouching posture and the fact that there were two empty decanters in the room, one on a desk and the other on the hearth at his feet, and an almost empty glass dangling from one hand, he looked quiet enough. He was not dancing on tables or roaring out bawdy ballads. But Sir Albert, waved to a chair by a careless hand—the one that held the glass—knew his friend well. He was drunk. "Well," the earl said. There was no slurring in his speech. "Is the deed done, Bertie? You have come here to celebrate? Ring for another decanter, my dear chap. These two seem to be empty." "She accepted me," Sir Albeit said. He did not approach the bell pull. He eyed his friend warily. "Of course." The earl refrained from adding that the girl would have had to be a blithering idiot to refuse. "My felicitations, Bertie. You are floating on clouds of bliss?" "She had tears in her eyes the whole time I talked with her," Sir Albert said, ruining his fashionably rumpled hair by running the fingers of one hand through it. "And she put her mouth up to be kissed when I was only intending to kiss her hand. She kisses prettily." He flushed. The earl regarded his friend through the inch of brandy left in the bottom of his glass. "Ah, the innocence of true love," he said. "So you have a slave for life, Bertie. That will be comfortable for you." Sir Albert got to his feet and crossed to the window, where he stood, gazing out. "I am terrified, Gabe," he said. "The tears. The look of surprise followed by hope followed by happines s and adoration. It was enough to turn any fellow's head. It is enough to make me conceited for life." "But you are terrified." The earl chuckled. "It is such an enormous responsibility," Sir Albert said. "What if I cannot make her happy? What if I come to take her for granted just because she was so easily won? What if she accepted me only because she cannot expect many such chances? What if—" The earl swore, using language so profane that there could be no further doubt that he was severely inebriated. "Bertie," he said, reverting to decent English, "if you cannot see the stars clustered about your head, old chap, you have to be blind in both eyes." "It is just the responsibility," Sir Albert said again. "The power we have over other people's lives sometimes, Gabe!" "Well.

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