Chapter Nineteen
“Oh my God. What now?”
Max and Lord Benedict were walking toward the ducal residence when a long line of carriages passed them, all headed into Grosvenor Square. Beside him, Lord Benedict chuckled as they watched the entourage.
“I believe you’re about to receive a royal visit. Your father will kick himself for not being here to bend the regent’s ear, but I daresay your mother will appreciate not having contentious political discourse in her drawing room.”
Max sent him a reproachful glare. “Damn you for enjoying this. You and Chris are a pair.”
“On the contrary, Lord Christopher uses humor to distract from his desperate circumstances. I, on the other hand, am pleased as punch that you are the focal point of royal attention. It allows me to finish off Napoleon without interference. Pray continue to be as fascinating a diversion as possible. It makes my life much more manageable.”
“So happy to serve,” Max drawled, his tone heavy with sarcasm.
“I know you are,” Benedict said quietly, “but you need to expand your understanding of where and how you serve. London is as much a battlefield as France.”
There was a message here. An obvious one, to be honest, but Max couldn’t accept it. “I could make a difference on a battlefield.”
“Of course, you could, but you are being asked to serve here. And now I should make myself scarce.” They had reached the edge of Max’s property quickly, having used the servants’ path up to the back door.
“What? You can’t abandon me with Prinny. He’s here to demand answers I don’t have. The London office of the East India Company was barely helpful, and there hasn’t been enough time to hear from their offices in China.”
“Excellent!” Lord Benedict clapped his hands. “That’s good diplomatic training. You cannot imagine the number of times I’ve had to appease important people before I’ve any of the proper information.”
“But—”
“Best hurry. Prinny’s carriage has nearly arrived.”
Indeed yes, the Prince Regent’s ornate conveyance was nearly at Max’s front door.
Christopher, on the other hand, had apparently leaped off early and was rushing up the walkway with a harried look on his face.
Damn man ought to be panicked bringing a royal visit to his home without the slightest word of warning.
“Please,” Max begged Benedict. “Distract him for a moment while I get…” Max looked around. Damn it, where had Benedict gone? A hurried scan of the back path showed the man well out of earshot, his long stride covering the distance faster than some horses.
“Bloody perfect,” Max groaned, then he rushed up to the house and shouldered his way into the kitchen.
It was a madhouse. Obviously, the staff had seen their royal visitor coming, but no one had taken charge.
“Where’s Emmaline?” he asked the nearest footman.
“My lord! We d-didn’t know… How’d y-you…”
“Where’s Chiverton?”
“Right here, my lord,” came a voice from the cellar as the man in question topped the stairs. He looked harried and annoyed.
“Who is there to greet the prince? Under no circumstances is he to be allowed above stairs.”
“Er, well, as to that, my lord, I’m not exactly sure.”
Max gaped as his normally unflappable butler. “About what?”
“Thomas is above stairs. I’m afraid I was in the wine cellar at the time.”
“You weren’t at your post for a royal visit?
” Good God, what was happening? Not only his life but his entire staff was falling apart.
Chiverton started to answer, but Max held up his hand.
“Never mind. Who’s home? Has Mama been informed?
Is she even here?” He thought she was going on calls today, but he couldn’t remember.
“I’m afraid I’m not sure, my lord.” For all that his tone was even, the man was clearly sweating. “I was below stairs for—”
“A very long time, apparently. Very well, get upstairs. Serve the prince some good wine and tarts.” He pointed to a tray cooling in the corner. “Give me fifteen minutes. I can’t greet the prince dressed like this.”
He’d been tromping around London asking after some midwife that was of interest to Lord Benedict.
The man often gave him strange tasks that had diplomatic implications.
Max had once been sent to discover the parentage of a servant girl only to discover that she was a Russian spy.
He was never told the true reason until afterwards, and this was no different.
Fortunately, midwife Betty Gill did not appear to be a foreign spy, though she did have a mysterious past.
In any event, he couldn’t think about that now. He needed to change out of his tromping-about-London clothes and into something more appropriate to a royal visit.
“Right away, my lord,” Chiverton said before snapping his fingers at the stammering footman. The servants disappeared up the front stairs while Max climbed up the back. But in this he was stopped. The moment he stepped into the hallway, he came face to face with the prince regent.
“Your Majesty!” he cried, startled. Damnation the man was already upstairs! He must have bowled past the young footman and headed straight upstairs. Behind him, Chris was babbling as he clearly tried to slow down the royal.
“Oh good,” Christopher cried. “Max is here. What are you wearing? I’d like a glass of good wine. You must want one too, Your Majesty. It was a long drive from Carlton House. And I hear that Max’s chef is a wonder with tea cakes—”
“Tarts,” Max corrected.
“Tea tarts! What a capital idea! Let’s go back downstairs.”
It might be, but the prince was having none of it. “Lord Christopher has been keeping us apprised,” the prince intoned. “Now we should like to see the lady’s feet.”
Two steps behind the royal, Chris threw up his hands. “I informed his majesty that the lady is feeling better.”
Prinny huffed as he pointed at Christopher.
“And created a discussion regarding the strength of her medicine. Dr. Morton claimed she was at death’s door.
We should like to see the condition of her feet and judge for ourselves.
” So saying, he boldly opened the door to the yellow—er, now green—bedroom.
Yihui was not in there, of course. She was down the hall.
But when the prince threw open the door, they found a different woman there.
Emma sat on the bare floor. Her head jerked up when the door was flung open, and though there appeared to be nothing wrong with her, there also was no explanation as to why she was sitting on the floor. And while everyone stared at her, she slowly recognized that the prince regent stood before her.
She scrambled to her feet. “Y-your Royal Highness?”
Chris took a step forward. “Emma?” he said but was stopped by the prince’s ample bulk in the doorway as he tried to back out of the room.
“Lady Emmaline,” Prinny said. “My apologies. Are you quite well?”
“Yes, Your Highness,” she said. “I, um, twisted my ankle and was merely resting it.” A lie if there ever was one. “It’s quite well now.”
“Hmmm,” Prinny said.
“May I assist you? Brandy perhaps? I believe there are fresh tarts.” She gestured down the stairs, and for a moment, Max hoped that the ploy worked. Unfortunately, Prinny was determined.
“Thank you, Lady Emmaline,” he said. “But we are here to see the Chinese woman’s feet.”
Emma blinked in confusion. “Her feet? But your highness, that is not appropriate!”
And that was not the right thing to say to a royal. Prinny stiffened. “What is not appropriate is to declare a miracle Chinese medicine and offer no proof. We are here—”
“Your Majesty,” Max intervened. “You must understand. The Chinese believe a woman’s feet are as private—as sacred—as we think of a woman’s, um, breasts or other intimate areas. No man except her husband may view a lady’s feet.”
“If it is so sacred, then why do they deform them? That makes no sense, and we begin to suspect that we have been lied to.” He turned to glare at Lord Christopher.
“Your Majesty!” Chris objected. “You have two worthy men of medicine who have testified to the brutality of the lady’s injury!”
“She was hurt!” Emma snapped. “Most dreadfully. But that does not change the private nature of her situation.” For Emma to stand so boldly and chastise the prince shocked Max to his core.
His sister was normally the most rational person in any room, but today her temper was clearly overruling her sense of decorum.
And it was no surprise that the prince did not take well to the chastisement. “We do not need to see her ankles,” Prinny huffed. “Just her feet.”
Before Emma could respond, Max stepped straight in front of her. “Of course, I understand your interest. Chinese medicine is a fascinating subject. But to ask to inspect something of such intimate nature is—”
“It’s her feet!”
“Which is the same as asking about her breasts! Or her…” He dropped his voice. “Or her cunny. You asked me to understand her details. I have spent the last week studying everything I can about China. This foot binding business is very strange to us, but it is their custom.”
This was a very precarious position for Max. The prince had clearly come here with a mission—one no doubt triggered by Chris’s ability to create dramatic tales out of the most trivial nonsense—and now he was angry at being denied. Max might keep the prince away, but he would pay a cost.
He smiled as gently as he could. “This standing about in hallways is exhausting. Shall we go downstairs and discuss—”
“Your Majesty?” a low voice squeaked from Yihui’s bedroom. A moment later, the words were repeated louder by a voice he recognized. “Your Majesty!”
“Lady Kimberly, what are you doing here?”
A good question. Max hadn’t seen her for several days now and felt extraordinarily anxious at the idea of her becoming the subject of the prince’s ire.
“I brought Lady Emmaline home. She has been staying with me while the bedroom was being repapered.”