“I did, Your Grace. It’s just that—”
“What, damn it?”
“Her Grace and Lady Georgiana took the coach, Your Grace.”
Grey stopped. “Took it where?” he enunciated, his jaw clenched.
“They didn’t say.” Hobbes pulled at his neck-cloth. “I would assume they went to the Academy, Your Grace.”
“So would I.” Grey cursed.
“I’m having one of Her Grace’s coaches prepared, if you care to wait a mo—”
“Saddle Cornwall. I don’t have time to wait.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
Yanking open the door, Hobbes hurried out into the rain, Grey on his heels. Damn the duchess, anyway. Was she trying to delay him, to take away any chance he would have to defend Emma? If that was her plan, it was going to fail. He had a few plans of his own.
The girls, Isabelle, and Miss Perchase trailing behind her, Emma reached the bottom of the stairs and turned up the corridor toward the dining hall. A different kind of dread had settled in her heart; one that had nothing to do with the loss of her reputation and her Academy, and everything to do with the thought of never seeing Grey Brakenridge again. Never hearing his voice, never seeing his face, never feeling his touch, ever again. She might as well be dead. She’d wanted independence; well she had it now.
The sitting room door opposite her opened. “Miss Emma.” A tall, willow-thin woman with silvering dark hair stood in the doorway, her dark-eyed gaze on Emma.
Starting, Emma faced her. Her mind scattering in a hundred different directions, she curtsied. “Your Grace.”
“I wasn’t sure you would remember me, considering that you were unconscious for the majority of our first meeting.” The elegant duchess looked her slowly up and down, while the girls began whispering behind her.
“Yes, I remember. I…thank you for your assistance.”
The duchess’s mouth tightened. “Considering that my remarks were what caused you to faint, I find your thanks to be overly generous.”
Lizzy stepped forward. “You made Miss Emma faint?” she demanded.
“Hush, Elizabeth. It was a misunderstanding.”
Frederica Brakenridge lifted an eyebrow, the expression reminding Emma painfully of Grey. “A misunderstanding,” the duchess repeated. “That remains to be seen.”
“Your Grace, I would appreciate if we might continue this discussion at a later time,” Emma suggested. For heaven’s sake, she had too many other things to worry about right now. Interpreting insults—and the duchess’s presence at the Academy—would have to wait until she had more time. “If you’ll excuse us, I’m afraid we have a very full schedule to—”
“Yes, you do. This, however, will only take a moment.” Frederica stepped aside, motioning Emma into the sitting room behind her.
“I—”
“If you please, Miss Emma.”
All she needed was for Grey’s mother to call her a whore in front of the girls. “Very well. Ladies, please wait for me in the hall.”
The Duchess of Wycliffe followed her inside the room and closed the door behind her. “You’ve created quite a stir, my dear.”
“I have participated in a wager which has unfortunately garnered more attention than I had anticipated,” Emma corrected, trying to keep from hunching her shoulders. “A great deal of the blame for which falls on my shoulders.”
“But not all the blame.” Frederica Brakenridge crossed the room to sit in one of the overstuffed chairs beneath the window. She didn’t invite Emma to join her.
Emma preferred being close by the door, anyway. She wasn’t quite certain what the conversation was about, or why the duchess had taken over the sitting room as though she owned it, but for goodness’ sake, the woman might have had a little compassion. She was nervous enough, already. “No, not all of the blame is mine. At the moment, though, all I can do is lament my poor judgment and attempt to salvage what I can of the Academy’s reputation.”
“And what of your own reputation?”
“I have no illusions where my reputation is concerned. I simply don’t want what I may—or may not—have done to reflect upon my students or upon this school.”
“And which is it? May? Or may not?”
She tried to stop her sudden scowl, and thought she’d managed to hold back everything but a twitch in her left eye. “As I said, that doesn’t signify today, Your Grace.” The personal questions began to annoy her. “And if I may be so bold, Your Grace, why does my folly interest you so much?”
The duchess sat back, stretching her hands along the chair’s arms. “You interest me, Emma Grenville. Something about you has intrigued my son enough to keep him in Hampshire for a month.”
“Are you certain it was me?” Emma asked, trying to keep from blushing.
“Reasonably so. He has been known to tire of Society and disappear for a week or ten days with his friends and his…entertainment, until they bore him as well and he returns. Obviously, though, this time my son has not returned to London. The question becomes why. Or rather, why not.”
For all Emma knew, he might be on his way back to London at this very moment. She swallowed. This had been easier when they’d been discussing her reputation. Poor as the day looked to end up for her, she didn’t want to begin lying; not now, and not to Grey’s mother. Misdirection, though, was another matter entirely. “His Grace did make a wager. I gathered that he dislikes the idea of losing.”
The duchess nodded, a brief smile softening her expression. “So he does.”
Down the hallway, the dull murmur of voices in the ballroom abruptly became more audible. Emma jumped. She didn’t want the girls confronted by their parents without her present to serve as a buffer. “Excuse me, Your Grace, but as you know, I have several things to take care of today.”
“Of course.” The Duchess of Wycliffe stood. “Despite what my son might say, I am not nearly as obtuse as he thinks. Nor am I as hard-hearted as he likes to tell himself. You inspire trust, Emma. It is a pleasant surprise.”
Emma blinked. “I’m afraid I still don’t understand the reason for this conversation, Your Grace.”
“Well, you only have a short time to figure things out. Allow me to point you in the right direction. You are well born, are you not?”
She hated this line of questioning, but she’d been asked it often enough by parents of prospective students that at least she knew how to answer it without hesitating. “I am, Your Grace. My parents died when I was young, though, and I was raised by my aunt.”
“At Miss Grenville’s Academy.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“An educated woman,” Frederica murmured, so quietly that Emma wasn’t certain whether she was meant to overhear. “Another pleasant surprise.”
Emma’s head was swimming. Clearing her throat, she gestured at the door. “I beg your pardon, Your Grace, but—”
“Yes, I know. The wager.” Frederica pulled open the door, looking over her shoulder at Emma as she did so. “Thank you for speaking with me, Miss Emma. I think you’ve been misjudged.”
“I…thank you.”
The duchess smiled. “Don’t thank me yet.” With a last look she vanished down the hallway in the direction of the dining hall.
What in the world had that been about? If the duchess was looking for a clue as to her son’s uncharacteristic behavior, Emma didn’t have any insights to offer. She’d expected—and needed—Grey to be at the Academy today, so at least she would know that she wasn’t completely alone.
Obviously, though, she was alone, and even the presence of her students and of Alexandra and Vixen couldn’t change that. Everything was up to her, and it was time to stop putting it off.
Shaking from head to toe, Emma rejoined the girls to lead the parade into the dining hall. “Good morning,” she said as they entered the room, and the roar of accusing voices began.
Grey bent his head against the heavy rain. Even with his greatcoat on he was likely to
be soaked to the bone by the time he reached the Academy. But that didn’t matter, so long as he got there in time to step between Emma and the wolves.
He would have looked more respectable if he’d been dry and in his coach, but he was willing to settle for merely being intimidating. The plan he and the girls had come up with was a good one, provided Emma would play along, and he ran through his part again as he rode.
Something in the glade to his left caught his attention. He looked in that direction just as a heavy tree branch swung around with the force of a catapult and slammed him in the face. Stunned, he lost his balance and tumbled backward off Cornwall, landing hard enough to wrench his shoulder and knock him out cold.
It must have been less than a minute before he blinked his eyes open in the driving rain. Dazed, Gray lay where he was for a moment, trying to pull air into his lungs. When he finally managed to sit up and put a hand to his head, it came away bloody. The rope that had held back the branch hung a few feet behind him.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered.
This had been a deliberate ambush, but no highwaymen or assassins emerged from the trees. Nothing but himself and the rain.
And no horse, either. Shaking his head to try to clear it, he caught sight of a horse and rider vanishing far ahead along the curving road, Cornwall’s backside retreating beside them. He couldn’t make out anything of the rider but a dark lump, but he recognized the horse.
“Freddie damned Mayburne,” he murmured, wiping blood and rain from his eyes.
The lad had an even more nasty, devious streak than he’d realized. And he was quite a bit more intelligent, too. With Emma ruined and Grey not there to defend her, Freddie could swoop in, imply that the girls’ reputations were destroyed as well, and generously offer for Jane’s hand despite that—because he so deeply loved and admired her.
Her father wouldn’t like it, but the Marquis of Greaves was a supremely practical man. Who would want an unmarriageable daughter cluttering up the house when an offer had been made?
Eyeing the muddy, rutted road grimly, Grey staggered to his feet, shook as much mud from his greatcoat as he could, and started on toward the Academy at a head-jarring lope. They’d all just run out of time.
“I would like an explanation as to why you allowed the Duke of Wycliffe onto Academy grounds at all, much less permitted him access to our daughters.”
The Marquis of Greaves stood in front of Emma, hands folded over his chest and his eyes glinting with fury. He’d obviously been appointed spokesman for the parents, though that didn’t keep the rest of them from muttering and glaring at her.
Emma kept her chin high. For the sake of the girls, she could face anything. “The Duke of Wycliffe proposed a wager, the conditions of which were completely proper. He was constantly supervised, and the students never left alone without a chapero—”
“And why, Miss Emma, did you agree to participate in a wager in the first place?”
Alexandra and Vixen were standing to one side with their husbands, but Emma kept her gaze steadily on the marquis. “It was quite simple, Lord Greaves. The winning of this wager would have afforded the Academy the opportunity to sponsor a number of less fortunate young ladies, giving them the means to better their futures.”
Hugh Brendale, Henrietta’s father, joined Greaves at the front of the mob. “Less fortunate young ladies don’t belong at this Academy. I didn’t send my daughter here so she could associate with orange girls and milk maids. And that doesn’t even begin to explain your own conduct.”
Emma felt her cheeks burning. “Whatever has been alleged about me is insignificant, so long as you understand that your daughters and their reputations have not been injured in any way.”
“Of course it’s significant. You’re the headmistress.” Greaves stepped forward, taking Jane by the arm. “My daughter debuts in London next year. And what will everyone be saying? That she was instructed by that Jezebel in Hampshire who ran a bawdy house disguised as a girls’ school.”
“That is completely untrue! I have never—”
“Don’t say that!” Elizabeth shouted.
“Lizzy,” Emma hissed.
“Miss Emma taught us never to be rude to one another,” the youngest student continued. “And you are being very rude.”
“This is how you teach females their place in Society? I am a marquis, girl, and you are an…infant. You do not speak to me unless it is to answer a question directly.”
“Seems to me the infant makes a valid point,” Lucien Balfour drawled, his expression cold as icicles. “Let’s keep this civilized, shall we?”
Greaves scowled. “I think we passed civilized the moment I opened that letter detailing eyewitness accounts of Miss Emma Grenville engaging in fornication with the Duke of Wycliffe and Viscount Dare.”
“Oh, mon dieu,” Isabelle said softly. Miss Perchase gasped and fainted.
“The problem is even more serious than that, ladies and gentlemen.”
Emma whipped around as Freddie Mayburne strode into the dining hall, Tobias on his heels and looking angry enough to chew nails. The boy looked somewhat windblown and disheveled, but if he’d gotten past Tobias, it hadn’t been without some sort of confrontation.
“Freddie!” Jane gasped, paling.
“Frederick Mayburne,” he acknowledged, sketching a bow to the marquis. “You must be Lord Greaves. It is an honor to meet you, my lord.”
“I tried to stop him, Miss Emm—”
“It’s all right, Tobias,” she whispered back at him. “Please return to your post.”
“Aye, Miss. Blasted whelp.” Muttering under his breath, the handyman retreated to the front gates.
Freddie stuck out his hand, and after a moment Greaves, looking even more angry, shook it. “This is how you protect your students, Miss Emma? By allowing strange men on Academy grounds at their whim?”
“I did not allow—”
“If you’ll excuse me, my lord,” Freddie interrupted, “I do not make a habit of calling on the students here. The circumstances today, however, are unique.”
“I would say so,” Hugh Brendale agreed.
“I have long been a supporter of this Academy,” Freddie continued, casting a contemptuous eye in Emma’s direction. “In light of the rumors—which were a complete shock to me, I assure you—I contacted several sources in London looking for some sort of confirmation.”
“You’re a big liar, Freddie,” Lizzy spat.
“Be quiet, Elizabeth,” Emma warned her. Not many schools offered tuition-free positions; if this Academy closed, Lizzy’s education—and her hopes of becoming a governess—would be dashed beyond recall.
“To my surprise,” Freddie continued, undaunted, “I discovered that even before her most recent lapse, Miss Emma has been less than a model citizen.”
“Explain, Mr. Mayburne.”
“With pleasure. Miss Emma Grenville, it seems, spent several months in a work house.”
Alexandra covered her eyes, while Vixen gasped and had to be restrained by her husband. Emma wanted to do nothing more than join Miss Perchase in a dead faint. Only the thought of the girls kept her on her feet. She could run away and become a hermit when this was over; she had nothing to look forward to, anyway.
“My youth was not the most fortunate, no,” she said quietly. “I don’t see how that has any bearing on my teaching abilities. Up until now, my term as headmistress of Miss Grenville’s Academy has met with approval and success.”
“Not so,” Greaves spat. “You have been headmistress for two years. In that time, none of the graduates you instructed has made an advantageous marriage. Even the Duke of Wycliffe can’t be bothered to be present and defend you as anything more than a high-reaching lightskirt. Whatever prompted this…wager, he obviously felt even he could do a better job of instructing them than you could.”
And she had thought she couldn’t possibly feel any more guilty and less significant. The smug, offended faces of the parents, a
nd the shocked and angry looks from her friends hurt, but it was nothing compared with the expressions on Jane’s and Mary’s faces.
The younger girls looked angry and confused, but Jane and Mary knew. The exchanges between Grey and her, the looks, the arguing—they knew. Today was a farce, because all of the rumors and accusations were true.
“I’m so…” A tear ran down her cheek. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“Miss Emma?” Lizzy said, tears welling in her own eyes. “Please don’t let them talk to you like that.”
Freddie cleared his throat, his gaze dismissive. “I would like you to know, Lord Greaves, that despite this despicable happenstance, I find Lady Jane to be a model of perfect female behavior. In fact—”
“How dare you?” Emma shrieked, white fury and the knowledge that she had absolutely nothing left to lose, making her put her stupid propriety aside. “You…fortune hunter! You’ve been hounding Jane for a year, and now you think this entire…disaster means nothing except an opportunity for you to—”
“Miss Emma,” Lord Greaves interrupted, “you’re not helping anything.”
Tears blurring her vision, Emma jabbed a finger in Mayburne’s direction. “Whatever you think of me, please do not believe that this man has anything but the most base reasons for pursuing Jane.”
“You have no right to pronounce judgment on anyone else’s actions, Miss Emma. You are nothing if not a poor examp—”
“Perhaps you’ll listen to me, then.” To Emma’s surprise, Grey’s cousin Georgiana stepped forward. “I was present when Wycliffe confronted Mr. Mayburne, warning him to stay away from this institution.”
“He did?” Emma stared at Lady Georgiana.
“Another female,” Brendale growled.
The dining hall door slammed open again. “Mayburne!”
If not for his size and the sound of his roar, Emma wouldn’t have recognized the Duke of Wycliffe. Soaking wet, his greatcoat covered with mud and leaves, and blood trickling from a deep cut on his forehead, Grey charged into the room, making straight for Freddie.
Mayburne only had time to utter a faint gasp before Grey hit him. They went down in a muddy, thrashing heap. Grey got to his feet first, and yanked Freddie up by the collar.
A Matter of Scandal Page 28
