by Lynn Messina
Epilogue
Given her pivotal role in the creation of the great Adolphus Clemmons mystery, Lady Agatha felt obligated to listen yet again as Mr. Petrie struggled to comprehend what had transpired in his absence. In the twenty-seven hours since he had returned from Bath, he had raised the topic with her six times, which, she calculated out of boredom, averaged one conversation every four and a half hours.
“It’s simply inexplicable to me, for how could Clemmons change his appearance so radically as to alter the color of his eyes and where did he get a complete top row of teeth? More important, why would he make these changes? He has a perfectly presentable visage—a little rough, you understand, from all that boxing he did in his youth. The missing teeth, as I said, and the scar above his right eye and the misshapen ear that looks disconcertingly like a head of cauliflower. Certainly, sometimes he scares little children, but his able hand as a note taker and his excellent memory more than compensate for a few unexpected shrieks when you are walking home from a lecture late at night.” The American naturalist sighed and wrinkled his forehead. “And you are sure he did not come here looking for me? I am positive he had the address, as he made all the arrangements himself. The first thing he would do upon arriving to London would be to pay a call on the establishment at which I am staying. This is all so baffling.”
“He did not call here, I’m sure of it,” she said firmly, as she had a few dozen times before.
“It’s very confusing indeed. To alter his appearance and then appear at the horticultural society claiming to be under orders from me. I never instructed him to become familiar with the workings of the British Horticultural Society. Why would I? For years, various organizations have courted my membership and I have steadfastly denied them the pleasure because I believe organized horticulture ultimately stifles originality. Clemmons knows my opinion, so why would he make such an implausible claim? And then to simply disappear into thin air? What purpose can that serve? Perhaps he went to Bath to try to find me.”
At the mention of Bath, Agatha felt her sense of obligation weaken, for she knew what would come next: a protracted digression into Petrie’s disappointing exchange with Mr. Trundle. He had been so optimistic about the meeting, so confident that Worthy & Wormley Press was ideally suited to publish his collective works, that he couldn’t comprehend how he had been rejected—and on the grounds that his writing was familiar and derivative. Familiar and derivative!
This development presented Petrie with a second great mystery, for by what measure could his informative and inventive essays about the flora of North America be considered unoriginal? Who among the population of England had ever beheld Ammophila breviligulata in its natural habitat? Who among the inhabitants of this tiny island had the knowledge and experience to describe it as well as he?
The answer was nobody.
Agatha knew Petrie deserved an explanation. For all his boorish self-aggrandizing, he was still the innocent victim of a crime. Someone—and Agatha was not convinced it should be she—needed to sit down with him and give a detailed account of his assistant’s perfidy. The ideal person for the job, she rather thought, was Lord Bolingbroke, for it was he who had invited the American naturalist to their shores and exposed him to Townshend’s machinations. The only problem with her father telling Petrie the truth was he did not know the truth either. Sadly, the responsibility of enlightening that gentleman fell squarely on her shoulders, and she was happy to shirk it as long as possible.
As expected, Petrie launched into a narrative of his meeting with Mr. Trundle and rather than sit through another fifteen minutes of indignant consternation, which, to be fair, she knew the gentleman was wholly entitled to, Agatha sought out Addleson’s gaze, raised her right hand and tugged her left ear.
Immediately, Addleson, who was sitting tamely on the settee next to her mother, broke out into peals of laughter just as Petrie said, “The flies in this house are relentless, are they not? I’ve been meaning to raise the issue with Lord Bolingbroke, for I fear his inadequate storage of fertilizer is to blame.”
Before Agatha could rise to the defense of her father’s compost heap, Gregson announced the arrival of the Harlow Hoyden and her sister. At once, her ladyship leaped to her feet, forgetting all about the viscount’s inappropriate outburst—imagine laughing at Sir Irving’s gout!—to welcome the Duchess of Trent.
“What a delightful surprise,” Lady Bolingbroke said with a sideways glance at her daughter, whose engagement to a viscount had done little to improve her disposition. She still insisted on spending all her time in her ramshackle studio and she still refused to confide in her mother about the events in her life. Her courtship of Viscount Addleson, for example, remained a complete mystery to her.
With a hasty apology to Mr. Petrie for the interruption, Agatha greeted her guests, and although Lady Bolingbroke entreated the duchess and her sister to enjoy a cup of tea, Agatha insisted they did not have time.
“Do not have time?” her mother wondered aloud.
“Do not have time,” Agatha repeated firmly. “They are here for a planning session, Mama, not a social call. We have work to do.”
Lady Bolingbroke could not conceive what her daughter meant by a planning session. She was a gently bred young lady, not the keeper of Prinny’s daily calendar. “I’m sure that whatever your intentions are you will concede the duchess and Miss Harlow would appreciate a cup of tea.”
Agatha was not prepared to concede anything of the sort, for how could they come up with a plan for infiltrating the Royal Academy of Art if they were stuck in the drawing room making polite fiddle-faddle all day long? Addleson, however, was more amenable to her mother’s point and suggested she and her visitors could spare a few minutes.
“Oh, very well,” she said, sighing heavily as she sat down in an armchair that was several feet away from Petrie. Then she turned her piercing gaze on her fiancé. “You do realize, I hope, that you are now in direct violation of paragraph three, subsection five, of our contract, which clearly states that you are never to impose a social obligation at the expense of a professional goal.”
Although this transgression sounded quite severe to everyone else in the room—except the girl’s mother, to whom it sounded absurd—the viscount did not appear at all concerned. Indeed, the very idea of it seemed to please him immensely and he promised, in a tone far too warm and familiar for the drawing room, to accept his punishment later.
Naturally, Agatha blushed to the roots of her hair, but it wasn’t his words that caused her embarrassment but the look in his eyes. It was the same look he’d worn while drawing up the contract in the first place: smug, confident, devilish. He had known as he’d made his increasingly ridiculous list that he would overcome her objections, and it was this confidence, this unchecked self-assurance, that had ultimately swayed her, for he was clearly a man who knew exactly what he was getting into. He was no naïve schoolboy befuddled by the first rush of passion.
But, oh, what a rush it had been. She had never felt anything like Addleson’s lips on her breasts, the way she could have simply dissolved into a puddle of pleasure on the floor. It had been at once debilitating and empowering, for although it seemed as if her bones had turned to jelly, she felt as if she could accomplish any feat of great physical strength.
If anything, she had been the befuddled one, afraid that the intensity of her desire would corrupt her judgment, for how could something so powerful not undermine her commitment to art?And then Addleson was sitting at her table, quill in hand, adding items to the most outrageous contract ever written. She’d felt herself weakening even before he’d added a paragraph about the studio, but his inclusion of a light-filled atelier obliterated all her fears, for how could she resist a man who understood her so thoroughly—even down to the chair.
Years later, when she told the story to their children, she will say she married their father because of the forest-green leather armchair in her studio.
Now, however,
neither Agatha nor Addleson volunteered further information about the contract, despite calls for elaboration, and her mother, appalled by the idea of having produced a daughter who would negotiate her own marriage settlement, quickly changed the subject to Miss Harlow’s forthcoming nuptials.
Agatha, of course, was very happy for her new friend, as it seemed she and her bridegroom were particularly well suited to each other, but listening to Vinnie give gracious answers to pointless questions regarding the time of the wedding (2 p.m.) and the color of her dress (silver) was excruciating. It was all so trivial. Who cared where the wedding took place? In Hanover Square or the Duke’s conservatory—it was still the tedious recitation of some boring vows before a doddering old clergyman. The event, though meaningful and felicitous to all those involved, did not warrant such intense scrutiny, especially when there were more important matters to discuss: campaign strategies, dossiers, Royal Academicians.
Perfectly aware of her impatience, Addleson watched her with an amused glimmer in his eyes, and just when it seemed as if Agatha would jump out of her seat with impatience (“And what about your bridal trousseau?”), he tugged his own ear. Immediately, Petrie, whose disinterest in wedding matters exceeded even Agatha’s own, flailed his arms in front of him as if trying to dispel an insidious cloud of smoke.
“Flies,” he said snappishly. “I am bedeviled by flies. They are everywhere.”
Swallowing a ferocious urge to giggle, for the gentleman looked as mad as a hatter swatting the empty air, Agatha nodded with sympathy and stood up. “Yes, they are indeed everywhere. Here, let me help you,” she said, picking up the Morning Herald from the side table, rolling it up and thwacking the flailing naturalist on the head. Then she peered closely at the gray tufts of hair on the top of his head and announced her mission a success.
It was impossible to say who was more shocked—her mother or the American—and before either one could gather their wits, Agatha shepherded her visitors to the door and explained her intention to remove them to a safer location. What location in particular, she did not say. “Given the fly infestation in the drawing room, it’s my duty as hostess to save my guests from suffering a vicious attack similar to the one poor Mr. Petrie has just endured. I trust, Mama, that you can handle the matter in here in my absence” she said, carelessly tossing the useful broadsheet onto the settee, where it slowly unfurled to reveal a new illustration by Mr. Holyroodhouse. Despite his very sincere and very public resignation, the famous caricaturist felt compelled to do one final drawing. In it, Lady Agatha Bolingbroke, her eyes shaped like hearts, her lips curved in a smile so wide it bordered on grotesque, stared devotedly at Viscount Addleson with such worshipful adoration, anyone looking at her could not help but be appalled. Underneath the drawing in big block letters it said: Lady Agony indeed!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lynn Messina is the author of twelve novels, including the best-selling Fashionistas, which has been translated into 16 languages. Her essays have appeared in Self, American Baby and the Modern Love column in the New York Times, and she’s a regular contributor to the Times Motherlode blog. She lives in New York City with her husband and sons.
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What good is a libertine
if he won’t seduce your sister?
1d
f
Book One in the
Love Takes Root series
Available now!
CHAPTER ONE
Miss Emma Harlow was so intent on her task that she did not notice the gentleman in the leather armchair. She didn’t see him lower his book, cock his head to the side and examine her with interest.
“I say, is that the best way to do that?” the gentleman asked after a moment.
Emma, whose feathers were never the sort to ruffle easily, even when she was behaving improperly in a place she didn’t belong—in this case, with her fingers around the stem of a prize Rhyncholaelia digbyana in the Duke of Trent’s conservatory—calmly turned around. Her blue-eyed gaze, steady and sometimes intimidating, met with an amused brown one. “Excuse me?”
The gentleman closed the leather-bound edition, taking care to mark the page, and stood up. “Snapping the stem will ill serve your purpose,” he said, approaching.
Emma watched him stride across the room, taking in his handsome features—the long, straight nose, the chiseled jawline, the full lips—and neat appearance. The unknown gentleman was tall, lean and given to easy grace. She liked the way he was dressed, simply and without affectation in buckskin breeches, shiny Hessians and white lawn. His shirt points were without starch and his shoulders without padding. Of course, she readily noted, his broad shoulders precluded the necessity of such foppish enhancements. His hair, a deep rich brown color that well suited his dark complexion, was cut short in the fashionable mode. “My purpose?” she asked when he was within a few inches of her.
“Given the situation, I can only assume that you were overcome with admiration for this lovely and rare flower and sought to take it home with you to show off to all your friends in the horticultural society.” He didn’t wait for her to confirm or deny his theory but continued in the same conversational tone. “Surely as a member of that esteemed institution, you know that the only way to ensure that the flower lives is to cut it at the bulb through the rhizome.”
At these words, Emma dissolved into delighted, unguarded laugher, and several seconds passed before she could respond intelligibly. “You must be the visiting country cousin the duchess spoke of!”
A faint curve touched the gentleman’s lips. “I must?”
“Yes, of course,” she insisted. “Who else in town would bandy about the word rhizome?”
“Your logic is irrefutable. Indeed I must be the visiting country cousin. And who are you?”
“Nobody.”
“Come! You are standing here in the conservatory with me, as corporeal as I am. You’re hardly a ghost. Surely you wouldn’t have me believe such a whisker.”
“No, not that sort of nobody,” she explained. “I’m nobody of importance. You needn’t bother asking my name because you will only forget it in a minute or so and then I will have to remind you, which will be a dreadful embarrassment for the both of us. Now do show me where the rhizome is so I can return to the party. I told Mama I would be gone only a minute and now it has stretched into five. Mama brought me here as a favor—she and I rarely socialize together—and I’d hate to do anything that would distress her.”
Unaccustomed to orders and amused by the novelty, the gentleman complied. “The rhizome, my dear, is the stem usually under the—”
“Sir, you are very kind to try to edify me on the topic of rhizomes, but I assure you I have little interest in learning about plants.”
Feigning a look of disappointment, he said, “Very well. We will need a knife for the operation. I don’t suppose you brought one with you?”
Emma laughed, a pleasant trilling sound that made the gentleman smile in appreciation. “Sir, I did consider smuggling
a knife out of the kitchens, but a gently bred lady cannot wander the streets of London with a knife in her reticule. It’s just as well, of course, since my sister-in-law keeps very close watch over the family silver and I couldn’t bear it if a scullery maid was turned off because of my lack of resourcefulness.” Emma examined the room, considering the situation. Her gaze settled on the desk. “Perhaps you should search the drawers for a letter opener. Yes, that would be just the thing!”
“Rifling through my host’s drawers is a very sad sack way of repaying his hospitality,” he observed.
Emma stared at him for a moment before saying, “You make an excellent point, sir, and far be it for me to corrupt the newly arrived country cousin. Since I’m the one lacking in any sense of propriety, it’s best that I do my own dirty work.” The drawer was unlocked and glided easily open. “There,” she said, taking the long silver object in hand, “now we shall cut the rhizome and return to our separate occupations. No doubt Mama is wondering what happened to me.”
The gentleman accepted the letter opener and was about to apply it to the plant when his hand halted in midair. “You know, Miss Nobody, I am suddenly struck with a vulgar bout of curiosity. What do you plan to do with this lovely flower after I finish cutting it?”
“I will stick it in my reticule and return to the party,” she answered.
The gentleman smiled. “And then?”
Emma stared at the gentleman’s hand and tried to think of a convincing fiction. However, even as she closed her eyes and told herself to concentrate, nothing came to mind. “Then I will hand it over to my sister, who’s a great cultivator of orchids.”
“If your sister is so great a cultivator of orchids, I wonder why she sent her sister to steal one of the Duke of Trent’s Rhyncholaelia digbyana.”
Emma laughed at the thought of Lavinia sending anyone to do her evil bidding. It was almost too ridiculous. “You misunderstand the situation, sir. My sister has no idea I’m here. Indeed, if she did, I imagine she’d be quite horrified.”
