The Scoundrel and I - Katharine Ashe Page 0,64

festivities only because I wrote a meager description of the crown that I might have overheard anywhere in London. Even had I attended the event, how do you imagine my face would be one you chose to look upon? Perhaps I was among the people pressing at the barriers along the route but shut out of the sacred ceremony itself. Then you would not have seen me, would you? For you have no interest in such people. If you ever even look upon the faces of your own servants, I would be astonished.

You are nonsensical and lost in adolescent fantasies. Are you a Man or, as I have often wondered, merely a Boy?

— Lady Justice

~o0o~

Dear Treasured Lady,

That you have wondered about me gives me every kind of hope. As for my manhood, you question it so often that I am beginning to suspect you would like to see it.

Somewhat breathlessly,

Peregrine

Secretary, The Falcon Club

~o0o~

Fellow Subjects of Britain,

While many of you have written begging me to publish that conceited aristocrat’s latest letter, I cannot satisfy you. With it he has descended into puerile taunt, and I publish only that which I hope will edify.

As to you, Mr. Peregrine, I will not blush, stammer, or shrink away from your teasing. I am no fragile flower to wilt over a salacious suggestion, rather the opposite. I am stronger than your wildest dreams.

I say to you, Mr. Secretary: bring it on.

— Lady Justice

~o0o~

Lady Justice,

You speak of my dreams. Know you, then, how often you appear in them? Take care, dear lady, for you are in danger of making me even more thoroughly your devoted servant.

Faithfully,

Peregrine

Secretary, The Falcon Club

~o0o~

Dearest Lady (without whose attention I languish, and without whose sweet condemnations—offered so generously—I would barely know myself a Cretin and instead be called, mistakenly, Man),

I write to you in dismay, for I have received news of a Most Distressing Nature: The last remaining member of my club is to marry. When marry, how, and to whom, I will leave to your journalistic perspicacity. Know only this, that in anticipation of the event I am bereft. For upon that day when bells chime in the church tower to announce the vows are said, I will be left alone. The Falcon Club that was once five will be only one in number: me.

And so I write to you with this plea: Do not abandon me as my companions have. Remain with me (in such a manner as you have allowed this concourse betwixt us), give me your counsel (as you are ever eager to do) to relieve my dejection, your wisdom (immense, quick, and astonishing) to calm my lonesome fidgets, and your bosom (metaphorically, of course) as a cushion for my cheek when I need the most simple comfort—the comfort of knowing that I am yet in the mind and heart of one inestimable Friend.

I claim this succor of you knowing that your generosity in giving it will only confirm in my breast that Profound Admiration that I have had for you these five years of our correspondence.

Ever Yours,

Peregrine

Secretary, The Falcon Club

~o0o~

To Peregrine, at large:

My cheeks are free of tears for you. No man who deserves friends has cause to fear their loss. Moping is the privilege of the pampered classes. Boredom that you inflict upon yourself is your true enemy. I recommend that you find some useful employment worthy of a Man rather than a Mobcap.

— Lady Justice

~o0o~

Dearest Lady,

I will make my case more plainly to you: I have lost my friends. Each of them, one at a time, has fallen into Hymen’s choking snare, and I mourn for them as well as for my loss of them. For marriage—as you, a lady of Violent Independence, must agree—is but a prison to subjugate both body and will to the whims of another. Woe to the ensnared whose betrothed in courtship is all charm, laughter, and generosity of spirit, but who after the vows are exchanged is revealed to be capricious, vain, and greedy for attention.

We all know, of course, that this is more common than not.

With great respect,

Peregrine

Secretary, The Falcon Club

~o0o~

To Peregrine, at large:

You have lost your senses, even those few that you might have previously possessed. That said, at long last I find myself in agreement with you on one matter: marriage is a prison. But not for men. The Law does not bind husbands; rather, wives. Even the sacred vows instruct a woman to love, cherish, and obey while a man must only love and cherish.