Regency Romp 03 - The Alabaster Hip

by Maggie Fenton

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE LADIES’ LEAGUE AGAINST LEWD AND LASCIVIOUS LITERATURE AND LETTERS RALLY . . .

  BETSY WATCHED AS her brother chased after Miss Jones and shook her head in exasperation. She didn’t know whether to feel more proud or embarrassed of his performance. What he’d done had taken courage, but public speaking had never been his forte, poor man. He’d been far more coherent than the poor, stuttering vicar, of course, but not by much.

  If she were Miss Jones, she’d probably have run away in mortification too. Grand Gestures, whether or not they were eloquently given, were fine for novels and epic poetry, but Betsy was not so sure they worked in reality, especially in front of this particularly contentious audience. Especially when delivered in such a spectacularly awkward fashion. Especially when Marlowe thought quoting Byron to a Misstopher was a good idea.

  What had he been thinking?

  Miss Jones and Marlowe slipped into the shrubbery bordering the mob, and this seemed to signal some sort of descent into total pandemonium around her. It was as if the mob had been holding its breath until the viscount—Christopher Essex! the biddies and Misstophers whisper-cried as he’d passed them by—was out of sight.

  Betsy slipped to the edge of the crowd and took stock of the scene before her.

  The duchess and her cronies stood on one side of the smoldering fire, looking smug at the rally’s total disruption. The vicar seemed to have jumped ranks, cowering behind the Astrid’s placard, clutching his books to his chest and sending an occasional worried glance across the fire.

  Betsy followed the direction of his concerned look and landed on a fuming Lady Benwick, who was staring daggers at the duchess. Lady Blundersmith was in the midst of a swoon beside her, and Davina was trying half-heartedly to hold on to the woman before she could tumble into the fire.

  The gaggle behind this vanguard looked vaguely confused, while their recalcitrant daughters gathered in a huddle near the abandoned stage, waxing poetic about Essex’s exotic brown eyes, Roman nose, and avant-garde taste in fashion.

  She snorted disdainfully. To think she had been one of them not so long ago. That was her idiotic brother they were mooning over.

  She spied Montford, who was standing on the periphery with the marquess and Mr. Soames, wrapped in Marlowe’s favorite red dressing gown, and she had an answer to her brother’s sudden transformation into a peacocking fashion plate. They must have traded coats in the hope that Marlowe wouldn’t look so ridiculous standing in front of this crowd in his banyan.

  It hadn’t worked. He’d still looked ridiculous.

  She was just about to turn her attention back to the ladies—Lady Blundersmith seemed to have finally tumbled atop Davina—when she noticed the fourth man standing in attendance to the duke. It was Dr. Lucas, looking much too somber beneath his whiskers. He’d probably be standing with Lady Emily’s bunch of moralists if he’d dared.

  She wasn’t sure why Dr. Lucas got her blood up so, but she was certain that it had to do with Miss Jones. If he thought he could interfere, then Betsy would have something to say about it. Her brother was an idiot, and he still couldn’t seem to get anything right when it came to Miss Jones, but she knew how much he truly loved the governess. After all he’d been through with the earl and Evander and that . . . that horrid, selfish Caroline, Marlowe deserved his happy ending, and Betsy was certain that was with Miss Jones.

  Dr. Lucas only confused the issue. And it wasn’t even as if he truly loved Miss Jones, not the way Evie did. The doctor was just too noble for his own good, blast him, wanting to do the right thing by his dead brother’s fiancée.

  Well, she’d be having none of it. He could take that nobility and shove it elsewhere.

  She started in his direction, determined to stall him in case he tried to go after Miss Jones and ruin everything, but a piercing cry from the center of the mob brought her up short. Lady Benwick had stalked over to the enemy’s side when Betsy wasn’t looking and was attempting to rip the placard from the duchess’s hands, apparently having abandoned all her dignity.

  Aunt Anabel’s dog, Mademoiselle Clare, had a vicious hold of the hem of Lady Benwick’s bombazine gown, growling fiercely in between tugs. Aunt Anabel herself seemed to be encouraging the beast in her assault.

  “How dare you engineer this ridiculous spectacle!” Lady Benwick was sneering at her niece.

  The duchess pulled at her picket and said, as pleasantly as she could through gritted teeth, “I am not the one who lit a fire in Hyde Park.”

  Aunt Emily tugged back. “You set up that . . . that disreputable viscount to undermine everything.”

  “I assure you, I had no idea he would come here today. But it was a smashing performance. I’m sure your daughter loved it.” Tug.

  “You leave Davina out of this!” Tug.

  “My cousin has the good sense to appreciate Essex’s genius. It is such a departure, considering her abysmal taste in clothes, that I want to support her.” Tug.

  “By undermining me, her mother, and encouraging her to fill her head with filth!” Tug, tug.

  Davina, who had finally managed to unearth herself from beneath Lady Blundersmith, glared at her mother’s back.

  “How you ever maneuvered your way into matrimony with a duke—and your sister into my son’s bed!—is quite beyond my ken,” Lady Benwick huffed. “You were embarrassment enough at Rylestone Green. Now you make fools of us all in London. I rue the day my sister, God rest her soul, eloped with a drunkard like Aloysius Honeywell. Not even in death has she stopped shaming this family.”

  Well, that seemed a bit harsh.

  Astrid agreed, for her careful composure seemed to crack a little under her aunt’s verbal assault. She looked heartsick and in enough distress that her husband seemed to sense it even at a distance. Montford began to rush to her side, looking a bit unsteady on his feet, but he didn’t manage to reach her before the fight seemed to go out of her completely. Her grip on the placard’s wooden post went slack just as Lady Benwick gave a massive yank.

  To Betsy’s eyes, though, the timing looked a bit suspect on the duchess’s part.

  Lady Benwick stumbled backward in surprise and tripped over Mademoiselle, who was still busy making mincemeat out of her hem. Both the dog and Lady Benwick squealed in distress, and as the lady brought up her arms in an effort to regain her balance, she smacked Aunt Anabel’s cane right out from under her with the placard’s long wooden handle, sending the poor lady’s russet wig flying into the ether.

  Things escalated rather quickly from there. Lady Benwick fell on her arse and somehow simultaneously managed to smack herself in the nose with the sign, sending blood cascading from her nose. The duke, who had been rushing to his wife’s aid, caught sight of Lady Benwick’s blood-streaked nose, turned the same color as Davina’s chartreuse gown, and fell face forward onto the lawn.

  Aunt Anabel, disoriented by the loss of her wig and hampered by the heavy weight of her ancient gown and one too many inches on her heeled slippers, began to tilt toward the open flames of the bonfire, the stiff whalebone underpinning of her paneled skirts the only thing slowing her descent.

  Thankfully, the Marquess of Manwaring, trailing after the duke, caught Aunt Anabel just before she could go up in flames. The crowd sighed in collective relief and, in the case of the Misstophers (and most of the rest of the females in attendance), a bit of envy. Betsy couldn’t blame them, for who wouldn’t want to be saved from a fiery death by the handsomest man in London?

  Aunt Anabel, apparently, for the old lady swatted the marquess with her cane as soon as she’d been set upright once more.

  “I’m a married woman!” she blustered out, seemingly oblivious to having been seconds from immolation. She wagged her cane at him threateningly. He staggered back a few steps to avoid it and nearly tripped over the duke. “You had your chance, boy. If you want a bit of slap and tickle, I ain’t available any longer.”

  The marquess
looked as queasy at this insinuation as Betsy felt.

  Aunt Anabel’s rant was interrupted by yet another high-pitched yelp. This one issued from Davina, who was pointing toward the side of the fire where Aunt Anabel had nearly met her doom. An excruciatingly expensive bejeweled dog lead trailed toward the flames, and something reddish-brown and fluffy smoldered on top of a charred stack of The Hedonist.

  “The dog!” Davina cried. “It’s burning!”

  The crowd shrieked in collective horror. Somewhere in the background, Lady Blundersmith collapsed once more. Dr. Lucas, who had just finished staunching Lady Benwick’s bloody nose, sighed, his shoulders slumping in resignation, and made his way over to the fainted woman.

  Betsy could only watch, sick to her stomach, as the marquess and Mr. Soames managed to fish the burning creature out of the flames with the fallen placard’s handle.

  Aunt Anabel stood at the sidelines demanding to know what all the fuss was about. With Davina and half the crowd calling out Mademoiselle’s name and Lady Blundersmith looking peaky once more, it should have been obvious. But it seemed that Madame la Duchesse was as deaf as she was bald.

  The smoldering mass of fur finally rolled to a stop right at Aunt Anabel’s feet. She squinted at the ball of fire and poked at it with her cane. Her expression collapsed as she touched her bare scalp, as if just realizing the loss of her wig. She shook her cane in Lady Benwick’s direction.

  “That were imported all the way from Gibraltar, Emily. Pure thoroughbred horsehair.”

  Ah. It was only the wig. Betsy heaved a sigh of relief, as did the rest of the crowd.

  “But where is Mademoiselle Clare then?” Davina cried.

  Betsy followed the abandoned lead away from the fire to the hem of Lady Benwick’s skirts, where it disappeared underneath. Something lumpy moved in the pile of bombazine, and moments later, a furry head emerged, peered around the gathered throng, and barked.

  Lady Benwick, still half reclined on the ground and clutching a handkerchief to her nose, looked even more mortified underneath all of the blood on her face. She kicked out the interloper with her boot heel, much to Aunt Anabel’s indignation. Mademoiselle retaliated by nipping at Lady Benwick’s ankle until the stocking ripped, then bounded away toward her bald mistress.

  (Mr. Soames tucked Mademoiselle’s jeweled lead into his coat pocket when he thought no one was looking, whistling innocently and imagining all the red waistcoats he could buy off the proceeds.)

  With all of the pandemonium underway, Betsy almost missed the ruffian carrying Miss Jones over one shoulder through the shrubbery, but luckily she looked up at just the right moment to catch him in the act.

  Betsy had heard a rumor that the Duke of Montford had abducted Astrid Honeywell to Gretna Green in a similar manner, but the man carrying Miss Jones was too thin and too blond to be the viscount. Betsy hardly thought her brother would gag and bind Miss Jones’s hands, either, even if he had decided to abscond with her to Scotland. Evie was frequently infuriating and had made epically poor choices when it came to his awkward courtship of Miss Jones, but some lines not even her brother crossed.

  But if it were not Evie stealing away with Miss Jones, where the devil was he?

  She broke away from the crowd and followed after the ruffian, just to make sure she’d not imagined it. She stopped at the edge of the maze of shrubbery and peered around the corner to see the stranger depositing Miss Jones into the bowels of an old coach. She caught sight of her brother slumped unconscious on the seat next to her just as the villain slammed the door shut. Before she could decide whether to go after them, however, the ruffian bounded into the driver’s seat and whipped the cattle into motion, tearing off down the lane in a haze of dust.

  This could not be good.

  Heart in her throat, she rushed back toward the bonfire, but just as she rounded a corner, she ran straight into a wall of starched linen, gray superfine, and salt-and-pepper whiskers. She shrieked and jerked backward so violently she nearly sent herself sprawling.

  Dr. Lucas caught her arm with a surprisingly capable grip and steadied her on her feet. He stared down at her in consternation through his much too serious, much too beautiful, blue eyes. Not for the first time did she think it a crime to waste such incredible eyes on a fuddy old doctor. Or that handsome countenance lurking beneath those atrocious whiskers, come to think of it.

  “Lady Elizabeth . . .” he began.

  “Someone’s taken them!” she cried, for she had no time for the lecture about running off alone that he was sure to deliver if given half the chance.

  His brow furrowed, and she wanted to groan. Even his confused look was far too attractive for her peace of mind. “What are you talking about?”

  “Miss Jones and my brother. Someone has abducted them!”

  Without waiting to see if he believed her, she rushed toward the bonfire. Fortunately, the worst seemed to be over. Most of the crowd had begun to retreat to their carriages. The duke was just coming around in his wife’s arms, and the marquess and Mr. Soames had taken it upon themselves, along with the rest of the Bow Street officers, to douse the bonfire’s flames with buckets hauled up from the Serpentine.

  And Mademoiselle was in the midst of a strategic assault upon the smoldering remains of Aunt Anabel’s wig.

  Once Betsy managed to wrangle Montford’s and the others’ attention, she told her tale, and then again when Aunt Anabel tapped her shin with her cane. “Speak up, gel, I ain’t a mind reader.”

  “Are you sure you saw your brother in that coach?” the duke demanded after the second telling, though his authority was severely undermined from his position languishing on the lawn in his wife’s arms.

  Betsy wanted to scream. “Yes. He looked unconscious.”

  “But who the devil would abduct them?” the marquess asked, his beautiful face fraught with concern.

  The duchess proposed they investigate the Ladies’ League Against Lewd and Lascivious Literature and Letters, in case one of them was so enraged by Christopher Essex’s public unmasking that they’d decided to abscond with him.

  Only Astrid’s husband dared contradict her theory, pointing out the fact that Lady Benwick (who was making a strategic, if slightly bloody, retreat to her carriage with her daughter and an extremely unhappy-looking vicar in tow) had been breaking her nose at the time of the abduction.

  The duchess then pointed out that a woman capable of organizing a mass book burning was more than capable of hiring a ruffian to abduct the viscount. The duke then pointed out that Lady Benwick could have had no idea the viscount was Essex, much less that he would appear here today. The duchess then retorted that it wouldn’t be the first time her aunt’s crusade against Honeywells had seemed supernatural in its scope.

  Aunt Anabel blamed the Essex-mad Misstophers—until Betsy pointed out the abductor had definitely been a tall, male ne’er-do-well and not a gaggle of sixteen-year-old girls—while the marquess wondered if Barming could be behind it.

  It was Soames, of all people, who hit upon the most likely perpetrator, for it seemed as if a certain poxy duke had arrived back in London just a few days ago, in spite of the viscount’s ultimatum.

  “What the devil is Poxley doing back in the city?” the marquess demanded. “And why did you not inform us sooner, Soames?”

  Soames had that same shifty look he’d worn when he’d had his eyes on the Countess’ diamonds the night of the ill-fated dinner party. “I were going to as soon as I ’ad collected on a few of his outstanding debts,” he hedged.

  “Of course,” Montford said dryly. “If the viscount or Miss Jones has come to harm while you were busy extorting the duke, I will throw you on a boat bound to New South Wales myself. I’ve done it before, and I’ll do it again.”

  Mr. Soames wisely kept his mouth shut and stayed a sizable distance from Montford after that.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  IN WHICH A VILLAIN IS CONFRONTED

  A SHORT WHILE later, the du
ke and the marquess were packing off the women in the duchess’s coach and piling into Montford’s open barouche with Dr. Lucas and Mr. Soames, intent on their mission to extricate Marlowe and Miss Jones from Poxley’s clutches.

  Betsy discontentedly watched the barouche leave in a haze of dust. She turned back to the duchess and Aunt Anabel, who was pulling a spare wig from underneath the seat and fixing it on her bald head at a jaunty angle. Mademoiselle happily chewed on the remains of the old wig at their feet.

  “I can’t believe they’re sending us home. Just like that. He’s my brother, and I’m the one who saw what happened to them,” Betsy muttered.

  Astrid smirked. “Who says we’re going home?” She tapped on the carriage roof and directed Newcomb to Oxley’s residence. Newcomb, who was always agreeable to any plan that might vex the duke, was more than happy to oblige. “My husband is as mad as Aunt Emily if he thinks to leave me out of this excitement.”

  Betsy privately thought her brother’s abduction a much more serious matter than a mere “excitement,” but she held her tongue, since Astrid’s goal was roughly the same as hers.

  It was doubtless indicative of the sort of marriage the duke and duchess led that Montford didn’t even look surprised when Astrid’s carriage pulled up behind the barouche at Oxley’s palatial London residence just as the men were stepping down into the street.

  He helped his wife from the coach with a long-suffering look. She swatted at his arm. “Don’t give me that look. This is the most fun we’ve had in years. I refuse to sit at home and knit, or whatever dutiful little wives do while their husbands are out having an adventure,” Astrid said.

  “Never fear,” he muttered. “No one would ever mistake you for a dutiful wife.”

  She swatted his arm again, and Betsy hoped that one day she could find a husband as resilient as the duke.

  The duke wisely said nothing more and offered his wife his arm, leading the charge to Oxley’s front door.

  The footman who answered Montford’s rather pointed knocks was as handsome and conceited as was typical of the breed, with a well-turned ankle, gold-buttoned livery, and snowy-white wig. He looked unsurprised to find seven people and a dog on the doorstep . . . but then again he was employed by Oxley, and Betsy didn’t even want to imagine the things that went on under this roof. The footman obviously recognized Mr. Soames, however, from the look of disdain he sent him.