How to Catch a Duke (Rogues to Riches #6) - Grace Burrowes Page 0,34

shoulder. “Plainness can become vanity. When people use a lack of ornamentation to call attention to their own piety rather than to the world’s vanity, the exercise takes on the wrong significance. I choose subdued fashions the better to blend in and not call attention to myself, also because I want my clothing to last.”

Stephen brought the horse to a halt, because the alley was blocked by a phaeton that canted off to one side, its left wheel cocked at an angle.

“You have no personal objection to wearing colors?” he asked.

“None at all, other than valuing modesty generally. I doubt I would wear jewels even if I could afford them, though.”

Alas, no bracelets or earbobs. But then, bracelets and earbobs showed a dreadful lack of imagination. “What do you have against jewels?”

“Jewels are a means of hoarding wealth and being ostentatious about it. When veterans beg in the street and children must toil in the mines to avoid starving, such displays are unseemly.”

The owner of the phaeton was standing beside his conveyance, arms akimbo, whip in hand. He was young—Stephen would put his age at less than twenty—and he had a perfectly matched pair of dappled grays in harness. No tiger was on hand to hold the horses, though perhaps the tiger had been sent to retrieve a wheelwright.

“You’ve lost a cotter pin,” Stephen said, drawing his gig closer to the disabled vehicle. “Not a difficult repair.”

“Beg pardon,” the fellow said, bowing and tipping his hat to Abigail. “I’ve lost a what?”

“The cotter pin,” Stephen said, wrapping his reins around the brake so he could gesture with his hands. “It holds the wheel to the axle without impeding rotation. If you have something of stout metal, about four inches long and half an inch thick, you can make do well enough to get back to your mews.”

The young fellow looked glum. “I haven’t any such thing, and my brother will kill me. This is his phaeton, and I didn’t precisely ask permission before taking it out. Why does nobody fix the potholes in London’s streets?”

“That would cost money,” Stephen said. “Miss Abbott, might you surrender your parasol?”

She passed it over and Stephen unscrewed the handle from the shaft. “This might do,” he said, brandishing the handle. “You will have to hold the phaeton steady so the wheel isn’t bearing weight when you thread the pin through the axle.”

The young man looked baffled, which meant Stephen would have to climb down and show him, an awkward undertaking with no groom to hold the horse, pass Stephen his cane, or otherwise prevent a fall.

“Miss Abbott, might you take the reins?” She was a competent whip, at least in the wilds of Yorkshire.

She studied the damaged vehicle and stepped down from the gig. “I believe I can manage, my lord.” She stripped off her gloves and left them on the seat.

Stephen passed her the parasol handle, which had a good four inches of straight steel shaft above the curved end.

“What is she about?” the young man asked.

“She is making sure you live to see your majority.”

“This will work,” Abigail said, peering at the axle. “Let’s be about it, sir. I will lift the phaeton, and you will hoist the wheel onto the axle. Then you slip this”—she held up the length of steel—“through the holes in the axle.”

The repair took less than a minute, with Abigail holding the phaeton just high enough off the ground that the owner could fit the wheel on straight and thread the parasol handle through the hole bored in the axle.

“We still need something to stabilize the makeshift pin,” Stephen said. “If the axle wobbles too much it can shear off the pin, and you’re stranded all over again.”

Abigail climbed into the gig unaided. “Your cravat is made of silk, my lord, and silk is exceedingly strong. If knotted tightly…”

“I cannot go about in public without my neckcloth, Miss Abbott.”

She gestured at the youth standing beside his conveyance. “If linen will do, then why not use his?”

“Good idea. Lad, knot your neckcloth around the axle and the parasol handle so the lot is snug, and then walk your cattle—and I do mean walk—back to their stable. Do not put the weight of your fashionable arse upon the bench—walk your horses like a groom would walk them. If anybody asks, you tell them the nearside gray is going a bit off.”

“That is a capital notion.” He tipped his hat to Abigail again, and bowed to Stephen. “My thanks to