Greetings of the Season and Other Stories (16 page)

“Perhaps Phillipa could go by herself. Your mother is adequate chaperone, of course. It’s time I saw how the renovations are going to Hutchison Manor.”

“What, go off by yourself to have Christmas alone in a moldering old pile under construction? Are you dicked in the nob?”

No, she was just afraid to spend any more t
ime in the viscount’s presence.

7

Johna opened the ball with Selcrest as her partner. Let the tongues wag, Johna had decided, she was going to enjoy her last night among the ton. In three days, Selcrest was escorting all of them to Suffolk. Johna had agreed, in return for Phillipa and Denton agreeing not to become engaged before they left London. An understanding between them was obvious. Phillipa, glowing like a sunbeam in her primrose gown, danced with the handsome young officer, so proud in his scarlet regimentals. Johna couldn’t deny them their last few weeks together.

She was adamant, though, about not having a formal announcement. That way, for one thing, Phillipa could change her mind, or Denton could. The looks they shared, the adoring gazes, the thread that seemed to connect them even when others were present, didn’t make such an occurrence likely, no matter how long he was off fighting. But, too, Phillipa would not be plunged back into mourning if, heaven forbid, Denton did not return from the war. Johna prayed nothing would happen to break her sister’s heart.

It was too late for her own. Going to Merle’s home in Suffolk was what she wanted to do, of course, but what she positively knew she shouldn’t do. The more she saw of Selcrest now, the more she’d hurt later. There was no later for them.

Johna saw the way Merle resigned himself to his mother’s foibles, the way he fretted over his brother’s welfare. He’d even hired a squad of Bow Street Runners to watch over her and her household. His own mother might call Selcrest a twiddlepoop for his fastidious decorum, but Johna knew better. The man was genuinely kind. He wouldn’t mean to break Johna’s heart, but he would. He wasn’t going off to die for his country; he just wasn’t going to offer for her. When she and Phillipa went home to Berkshire after Christmas, Phillipa would wait for Denton to come back. Johna would wait for Merle to come to his senses. One sister had hope; the other, none.

Johna was sure he liked her and cared for her, beyond feeling responsible for her well-being. Even Sir Otis had a favorite pointer in his kennel. Selcrest might just be coming to love her. Lud knew he was attracted to her, and had been right from last summer in Brighton. He would never be happy with all her fits and starts, however, the legacy from her husband and father. It would be torturing him with another Original like his mother. Johna wouldn’t have a spouse like her own parent, so she couldn’t blame him, but no matter what she did, scandal was always a hairsbreadth away, it seemed.

But, oh, it felt good to be in his arms for this dance! Later she’d remember the dreams she’d had, dreams that had all fallen short. Her sister’d had her pick of all the eligibles—and had chosen a hot-spurred second son. Johna’d fought for her legitimate place in society—and found it was not worth holding when she couldn’t hold this man. Where she thought she’d never marry again, now she felt she’d never be whole again.

She was glad that the ball was a success, at least. There’d been thirty to dinner earlier, and that too had been superb, with compliments to her on the menu, the service, the urns of flowers everywhere. The company enjoyed the extra remove or two that she hadn’t recalled ordering, so she did not fret over the meal. She’d been too nervous to do more than nibble at anything herself. Perhaps Cook had trouble with the preparations or ingredients and had to make substitutions. Johna well knew that good cooking had to be a flexible art form.

*

That dinner was about as flexible as cooking could be: eel in aspic—and arsenic; carrots with caramel sauce and castor oil; ipecac in the poached perch; mouse poison in the mousse.

Mousse? Johna assumed Gunther’s had made an error. She’d never have ordered such a dessert, not after— No, she wouldn’t think about it!

Unfortunately Lord and Lady Throckmorton couldn’t stay after dinner for the ball; his gout was acting up. Princess Lieven and the dyspeptic Russian ambassador left early too. Everyone else stayed to greet the rest of Johna’s nearly two hundred guests. Her ball was not quite a squeeze, there still being room to sit or stand, but it was definitely a success. Long after the receiving line had been dispersed so that Johna could open the dancing, the butler was still announcing names. Every title, every prominent honorific, was a sonorous declaration of Johna’s social standing. The only one missing was the Prince Regent himself. That would have put the seal on Johna’s triumph, but she couldn’t have everything, she allowed.

Everyone was eating and drinking, laughing and gossiping. The talk was mostly about Johna and Selcrest, not Johna and the Black Parrot. Speculation reached a new high when he stood by her side after the opening set, greeting latecomers instead of fleeing to the card room. He had to know they were feeding the rumor mills, so she didn’t bother to mention the lapse, not when it seemed the most natural thing in the world to have him next to her.

Then one of Phillipa’s friends got sick. Johna had to escort the girl to the ladies’ retiring room where her own maid could tend the chit until her mother could be found.

“Too much excitement, don’t you know,” that lady declared. “Silly twits starve themselves, then sneak off to the punch bowl. They’ll learn,” she added as another green-tinged female entered the room. Johna went back down to find Selcrest waiting at the foot of the stairs, with his mother accepting farewells in Johna’s stead as another couple left. “Lady Cheyne’s not feeling at all the thing,” she told Johna. “An interesting condition, I’d guess.”

It might be interesting, but she wasn’t alone in the condition. More gentlemen were visiting the necessary out back, more ladies were needing to lie down. More guests were leaving, with regrets.

“Won’t you stay for supper, Lord Alvanley?”

“Sorry, another function to attend. Press of invitations, don’t you know.” That and the pressing pain in his midsection.

“Did you happen to have the truffled grouse at dinner, Jo?” Selcrest asked as they bade another guest good-bye at the door to the ballroom.

“No, I was too tense to eat anything. Why? Did you?”

“No, I never cared much for it. It’s always been one of Denton’s favorites, though.”

“Yes, that’s what Phillipa said, so I put it on the menu.” She was looking around, searching through the thinning crowds. “Oh dear, I don’t see either one of them. And they promised not to go off alone.”

“Don’t worry, Denton is out in your garden, wishing he were already in Spain eating army food. And I believe one of the footmen carried Phillipa up to her room.”

“And you think the grouse was tainted? Good heavens, how could such a thing happen?”

“It happens all the time, cream gone rancid, oysters out of season.” Selcrest was patting her hand for reassurance, but he was frowning, scanning the row of gilded chairs where the chaperones and companions sat. They were almost all nodding off to sleep or fallen over in their seats. “But not all of these people were at dinner. I don’t understand what’s going on.”

Neither did Johna, when they returned to the hallway and she saw her head footman, not the butler, handing guests their hats and canes and cloaks. “Where is Jenkins, William? It’s not like him to be away from the door.”

“Mr. Jenkins took ill, milady. Just sort of keeled over, he did, right into a potted fern. But I can manage things here, and the new cook says he’s got the late supper in hand, so there’s nothing to worry about, ma’am.”

“Nothing to worry about when my guests are falling like— What new cook?”

The footman looked at her as if she’d sprouted another nose. “The cook who arrived this morning, saying you sent for him when his cousin Alphonse came down with the influenza.”

“That explains the changes in the menu, but I never sent for anyone—and Alphonse doesn’t have a cousin!” Johna and the viscount looked at each other and simultaneously shouted, “Marcel!”

“Damn, I had all those Runners and guards trying to protect you from someone who was already here!” Merle turned to leave her. “I’ll gather them up and go find that hell-spawn. This time he’s not getting away.”

“Wait! We have to tell everyone not to eat any more of the food!”

“I don’t think you have to tell them.”

Guests were filing past Johna and the viscount with barely courteous farewells. It was not quite a panic, more a hurried exodus. Then Johna heard some mutterings about the Black Widow. “Oh, my Lord, they think I’ve poisoned them!”

Someone heard the word “poison.” There was a stampede for the door.

*

Marcel was having a grand time. He meant to destroy Lady Otis, not necessarily kill her guests, but if they died,
c’est la vie.
Or
la morte.
Revenge was sweet, and so was the syrup of poppies he’d been pouring into the champagne bottles as fast as that so-proper butler ordered them opened. Marcel had seen how Jenkins tasted each bottle before letting the footmen serve it. Jenkins didn’t have his nose in the ear now.

Marcel should have left, but he was having too much fun watching all the servants scurry around for basins and bowls and clean towels. When he heard Selcrest shout, “To me, men, secure the kitchen,” he didn’t bother trying to flee. He’d seen all the guards outside. Instead he pulled a pistol from under his apron.

As soon as Selcrest came through the door, Marcel fired. The distance was too great and Marcel’s aim too uncertain for the ball to find its intended target, but it did hit a stack of dirty dishes, sending food scraps and china fragments in every direction.

“Stop,” Marcel ordered, “or I shoot again. This time I don’t muss.”

This time Selcrest was so close that Marcel couldn’t miss, if he had another shot. He fired. Nothing happened. The Frenchman stared at the gun. “I told that oaf I wanted a reporter!”

A slim, bespectacled fellow with a pad and pencil stood up. “That’s what you wanted, a repeater? You, monsieur, are a jackass. But I thank you. What a story I got. ‘Bellyache at the Ball’? ‘Misery on Albemarle Street’?”

Now Selcrest had two maggots to dispose of. The reporter was in his way, so he tossed him aside first.

Johna was right behind him, wielding a heavy skillet from the cookstove. “You ruined my ball! You poisoned half the haut monde, and you shot at us! I’ll see you in—”

Marcel made a grab for her. Perhaps he intended to take Johna hostage, or just to finish the job he’d started earlier. But he forgot about the broken crockery and splattered foodstuffs all over the floor. So he slipped and skidded, right to her feet—so Johna bashed him over the head with the iron skillet. Runners and hired guards and footmen and grooms from the stable, armed with pitchforks, rushed into the kitchen. In short order they had Marcel trussed like the Christmas goose, ready to be dragged off to Newgate. In all the commotion, the reporter made his escape.

*

“It will be in all the papers.” Johna whimpered into her lemonade—made with her own hands from fresh ingredients.

Merle was beside her, dusting cobwebs from his once-elegant evening attire. He’d been down in the wine cellars unearthing unopened, unadulterated, vintages to serve the few remaining guests. “Yes, but such a juicy tidbit would have made the
on-dits
columns anyway, with so many prominent people involved. It likely would have been mentioned with the criminal proceedings, too. Now, at least, if that reporter does his job, everyone will know that you had nothing to do with the whole mingle-mangle.”

“They’ll also know I had something to do with Marcel. It will all come out now, the entire sorry mess. My reputation will be destroyed. They’ll hold me responsible, anyway, those old tabbies. You know they will.”

“So what? You’re still the same person, so your friends will understand. And remember, no one was seriously injured. Bow Street found all sorts of bottles and packets, but just small amounts of various poisons. You’ll have to throw away anything that dirty dish might have touched, but other than that, you are quite lucky, my dear.”

“Lucky?” That wasn’t the word Johna would have used.

“Indeed, with a great deal to be thankful for.”

“You should be thankful I don’t still have the skillet in my hands.”

Merle laughed. “Truly, Jo, you can be thankful the Prince didn’t come. Poisoning him would be treason.”

8

They’d all recover, the diners, the drinkers, and the denizens of Albemarle Street. Cook was found tied and gagged behind the tavern he frequented, and Jenkins submitted his resignation, for such a lapse in good butling.

Lady Selcrest chose to be amused. “The polite world can use a good purge now and again. They’ll get over it by the spring Season. You wait and see, you’ll be welcomed back to London with open arms.” Open or shut, Johna wasn’t coming back. She’d stay on in Berkshire and raise roses and rabbits, like Lady Selcrest. No, she’d get herself a little dog and name it Sunshine, so she’d have a ray of brightness in her long, empty days.

For now, she couldn’t wait to be gone. The knocker was already off the door; they were just waiting for Phillipa to regain her energy before leaving for Selcrest’s Suffolk estate. A month in his company, though, might prove more torturous than staying to face the censure of society.

He hated her, that’s all she could think. Why else would he leave for the country without them? Selcrest had left her alone to write the hundred notes of apology, to face the hundred curious columnists wanting to see the scene of the crime. At least Jenkins agreed to stay on to keep the onlookers at bay.

Selcrest said he had to go get things ready, as if the man didn’t have an army of servants to see to his every comfort and that of whatever guests he might invite. Selcrest said Denton would be escort enough, as if the silly mooncalf had eyes for anyone else but Phillipa. Selcrest said he was looking forward to having Johna at his family home— Hah! Johna didn’t believe a word the two-faced peer said. He’d been bumped and bruised, almost stabbed, almost shot, and almost poisoned—all on account of her. Now his name was on everyone’s tongue again, connected to a lurid, ludicrous, hideous hobble. He hated her, and she couldn’t blame him.