Something About Emmaline (2 page)

F
or his first month home at Sedgwick Abbey, Alex found himself left in blessed solitude.

Instead of being there to greet him, his grandmother had decided to remain at her sister-in-law’s estate for an additional month, most likely unable to leave until they had caught up on every bit of family gossip. Therefore, his summer began with no pestering talk of heirs, no lengthy discussions of Emmaline’s continued ill health, just a continuation of his perfectly ordered life that Jack had the audacity to call “boring.”

But eventually his grandmother had decided she could no longer leave him to his lonely exile and had returned home like a whirlwind, her herd of pugs trotting in her wake.

Genevieve Denford, Lady Sedgwick, had been born in France, and the sixty-odd years she’d been in England hadn’t diminished her Gallic presence in the least.

His grandfather, another reluctant-to-be-wed Denford,
had taken a trip to Paris in his late sixties and had brought home (to the horror of his own heir apparent) a French wife.

Given his grandmother’s
joie de vivre,
Alex doubted his grandfather had stood a chance.

A lesson to all unmarried English gentlemen, he’d decided years ago. Never venture across the Channel.

Grandmère had greeted him merrily when he’d come in to breakfast and hadn’t stopped talking since. “And imagine Imogene’s shock when I told her…” she was saying from her end of the table, where she sat encircled by her dogs.

It had been quiet without Grandmère,
he mused as she barely paused between bites to regale him with tales of his great-aunt’s grandchildren—and, horrors, a few great-grandchildren. Heirs abounded in Aunt Imogene’s world, and he knew the next few months would see no end of hinting and prodding that he and Emmaline should be doing the same as well—producing the next Sedgwick baron.

He’d have to make a note to his solicitor to have his wife’s next letter from Emmaline detail a litany of female complaints that would unhappily prevent such an event. The more, the better. He hoped that would keep Grandmère sufficiently diverted through grouse season.

The door to the dining room opened and Burgess, their butler, entered, staggering beneath a large silver tray. Behind him, a footman followed with an even bigger tray, just as laden with papers and notes.

“My lord, a pouch from Mr. Elliott’s office arrived this morning along with the mail,” Burgess said, setting his burden on the dining table before Alex. “To be specific, there were three pouches.” His bushy brows rose. “Large ones.”

Alex stared up at the monumental pile, his knife and fork held in midair. “What the devil is all that?”

Burgess, being ever the diligent butler, replied, “The regular newspapers and periodicals for her ladyship, but the remainder appear mostly to be bills, my lord.”

“Bills?” Alex looked at the collection again. He’d instructed his London solicitor to take care of all his outstanding accounts. Besides, that pile looked like something Jack had run up, not him.

“Unlike Elliott to be so inefficient,” Alex muttered, as he began to sort through the mess. “Ah, here is the answer. Seems Mr. Elliott’s wife has inherited property in Scotland and they needed to inspect the place. His clerk is attending to all his business in his absence. I’ll have to speak to him when he returns—the fellow has obviously gotten my accounts mixed up with some wastrel client of his.”

“What is it, my dear?” his grandmother asked from her end of the table, where she was dropping tidbits to her dear dogs.

He waved his hands over the pile of bills. “Just the London papers and such.”

“The papers! Why didn’t you say so?” She rose and hustled down the side of the long table, her lace cap aflutter. Before Alex could stop her, she swept aside the neatly arranged piles to get to her most favorite thing in the world—the gossip column in the
Morning Post.
Separating the pages with the skill of a farmer’s wife plucking a hen, she had her quarry in her clutches in a flash and settled into the chair next to Alex to begin reading.

Hopefully not aloud,
he thought as he continued his sorting.

He was rewarded with a minute or so of silence before she couldn’t contain herself.

“Lady Vassar had a baby. A son, it says.” She sighed and
then shot him a significant glance. “An heir is so important, don’t you think, Alex?”

“Yes, of course,” he agreed, his gaze stopping on one of the bills before him. Four hundred pounds for carpets. Another expenditure listed furniture for one hundred and fifty pounds. Bills for drapers, carpenters, painters, and that was only the start. Why, it appeared the poor sot for whom these notes had been intended had outfitted not only a new house, but a wife and stable of mistresses, what with the unending collection of milliner, modiste, glover, and lace bills.

“And finally a mention of our dear girl,” his grandmother was saying. “Listen to this:
Lady S. was seen shopping diligently with the assistance of Lady R., who has taken her new friend under her wing. Lady S., so long from town, is a delight and sure to be the prized guest next Season.
” She pursed her lips. “About time she was mentioned. But what an odd thing to say. Why would they think her so long from town when she has lived there all her life?” She tossed aside the paper and began once again upsetting Alex’s carefully wrought piles with her rustling.

“Madame!” He rose up from his seat and covered the bills with his arms to protect them from her marauding. “What has gotten into you?”

“I just want to see some more recent columns.” She cocked her head and eyed the collection again. Before he could stop her, she spied her prize and caught hold of another paper, tugging it free and settling into her chair with a speed that belied her eighty-some years.

“I think you’ve gone mad,” he muttered. Though with her nose buried in another edition of the
Post,
he doubted she
heard him. “Didn’t you get enough of that prattle while visiting Aunt Imogene?”

“Imogene doesn’t take the
Post,
” came the frosty reply.

That had to be the eighth wonder of the world, in his estimation, right behind the Tower of Pharos. He didn’t know anyone more addicted to gossip than his Great-Aunt Imogene—that is, save his grandmother.

He turned his attention back to the bills at hand, tossing aside the ones that were obviously not his and the few that needed his attention.

His grandmother shook out the pages as she searched for her beloved column. “I knew it!”

And he knew she’d continue to interrupt him until he replied, so he said, “Knew what?”

“Knew she’d be mentioned again. But I don’t know if I should read it to you. You’ll be in a dither for the rest of the week.”

Alex gave up all hope of having a decent morning meal. In peace. “Go ahead,” he told her. “Or you’ll be huffing and puffing until I relent.”

“I never puff,” she said in a voice that sounded remotely like a huff. “But if you insist:
It is a good thing there are so few people in town, for Lady S. creates a stir wherever she is seen. One wonders what the baron is thinking sending such an Original to town without his watchful eye about.
”

He held out his hands and shrugged. “And how is that supposed to put me into a ‘dither’?”

She held out the paper for him as if the answer were as clear as the printed words before his eyes. “Don’t you see? It’s Emmaline they are talking about. Your wife. Our dear girl.”

“Emmaline? Preposterous.” he scoffed. “Grandmère, there are a dozen or more ‘Lady S.’s’ gadding about town on any given day. I assure you, that is not our Emmaline.”

“And whyever not?”

“Because Emmaline would never comport herself in a manner that would be of any interest to a gossip column. ’Tis absolutely impossible.” Alex had never issued a statement with more confidence.

But that was the problem with confidence, occasionally it needed to be shaken, and Baron Sedgwick was about to be rattled right down to the roots of his illustrious, as well as fictional, family tree.

“Then why does it go on to say the following?
From the amount of tradesmen seen coming and going at Hanover Square, it is said traffic has become a nuisance.
” She glanced up at him. “Hmmm. How many ‘Lady S.’s’ reside on Hanover Square these days, Alex? For I can only think of one.” She shook her paper again and went back to her reading.

His mouth opened to argue with her, but he couldn’t get the words past his suddenly dry throat.

Tradesmen on Hanover Street? Near his residence? Enough to cause traffic problems?

His gaze shot to the pile of errant bills and he grabbed up the first one he could put his fingers on.

If his throat was dry, his heart nearly stopped as he spied at the top of the bill the telltale evidence to support his grandmother’s outlandish theory.

No. 17, Hanover Street.

How had he not noticed this before? Of course, why would he? Imaginary wives did not go on shopping sprees capable of beggaring an Eastern prince.

He shuffled through the notes before him, and to his horror they all had the same delivery address.
His
London address. And every single one was addressed as being the purchase of
The Right Hon. Lady Sedgwick.

Not the gloating dowager peering over the top of her newspaper as she watched him come to the conclusion he’d pompously told her was impossible. But the current Lady Sedgwick.

Emmaline.

“This can’t be right!” he said, grabbing the paper out of her hands and reading the entry for himself.

“Oh, Alex, do settle down. A lady is entitled to make some changes to her home from time to time. I’ve always thought that house on Hanover Square was a veritable mausoleum. If your grandfather hadn’t been so tight-fisted, I would have—”

But her words fell to a stop as she glanced up and realized she was talking to an empty chair.

Alex, it seemed, had departed.
One would hope,
she mused,
for London.
Back to his wife.

“Right where he belongs,” she said to the closest pug, scratching the dog indulgently.

His trip to town most likely set a record, if Alex had been of a mind to consider such things. He’d been far too occupied envisioning the scenes of complete and utter disaster awaiting him in London.

Emmaline? Impossible, he kept telling himself. But there she was in the
Post
and the
Times.

Someone had let slip his secret. But who? It couldn’t have been Elliott or his wife, or Simmons, his London butler. All three of them owed him their very livelihoods.

So that left only one suspect.

Jack.

It would be just like his puckish friend to think that bringing Emmaline to life would be a good jest.

Yet that left so many other unanswered questions. Such as, how had she gotten into the house? Simmons, having served the family for over forty years, would never allow such a calamity to sully the Sedgwick name.

Then, after that, he had to consider who else had seen this imposter. He shuddered to think if any of his extended family had come to call after seeing the accounts in the paper. Or, worse yet, had come to London and used the Sedgwick town house, as was the custom. He’d always been generous about extending the house to family during the off season and knew that his cousins and aunts and uncles often took advantage of this standing invitation.

And right now this person was living in
his
house, sleeping in
his
bed and passing herself off as
his
wife. Possibly even entertaining his family.

He buried his head in his hands. Lord, he could well imagine the type of doxy Jack would hire to impersonate Emmaline.

Entertaining his relations
took on an entirely new meaning.

When his carriage turned the corner onto Hanover Square just after one in the morning, to his relief he found that his toplofty neighborhood looked much as it had when he’d left it a month or so ago. Dignified and proper. And Number Seventeen appeared just as it should, the house of a respected member of the
ton.

Hard to believe that inside, catastrophe awaited him.

The carriage pulled to a stop and he bounded out and up the front steps, running through the list he had compiled.

First he was going to toss this imposter into the streets. After that was completed, he was going to hunt up Jack and give him a thorough thrashing.

Then he was going to get very drunk. And make his former friend pay for every bottle, if he had to pay for it with his confounded flesh.

When he got to the door, it didn’t open immediately as was the case when he was in town for the Season. Since he kept only a limited staff in London during the summer months, the door was locked, even to him.

He pulled the bell, then rapped on the panel with his walking stick as if every moment counted.

Well, it did.

He heard Simmons coming up from the back. Actually it was his muttering complaints that echoed forth.

“Who is it?” Simmons called out from behind the barred portal.

“Open up, it is Sedgwick.”

“Sedgwick, indeed,” Simmons shot back. “His lordship is in the country. Go on with you, and play your tricks elsewhere.”

And then, much to Alex’s chagrin, the candle that had lit the entryway began to retreat back into the house. He pounded on the door anew. “Simmons!” he bellowed. “Open this door at once or I’ll tell your wife about your Thursday night card games.”

The retreating light came to a fast halt. “My lord?”

“Yes, Simmons, ’tis me. Now open the door.”

There was a shuffle near the door, a rattle of the latch and then it opened wide.

“My lord, what are you doing here?”

Alex swept inside. “Why do you think I’m here? She’s here, isn’t she?” He knew he was bellowing, but demmit, it wasn’t every day one met his wife.

And had the rare pleasure of getting rid of her.

The butler glanced up the stairs and put his finger to his lips. “Sssh, my lord, or you’ll wake her ladyship. She had a rather long day and retired early.”