Chapter 16 #2
“I thought so. And she’s proved resourceful, too. She escaped from the brothel on her own, and scratched the bully boy on the way out. He’ll bear a scar.”
Effie’s mouth curved with satisfaction as she set her hand on the doorknob. “Striking a blow for all womankind. I like this Miss Brent already.”
“Do you think Mr. Royce will be able to locate her?”
“If he can’t,” Effie said, “then no one can.”
· · · · ·
The Belwoods’ tall, white stucco town house in Brook Street was at the heart of fashionable Mayfair.
On Nell and Effie’s arrival, a liveried footman admitted them into a lavish drawing room decorated in shades of apple-green silk and antique gold brocade.
Massive gilt-framed portraits of generations of grand-looking lords and ladies in powdered wigs and lace adorned the walls, an oil-and-canvas testament to the Belwoods’ esteemed pedigree.
They had not been waiting long when Lady Belwood swept into the room.
She was a handsome blond woman of passing middle age, attractively plump and impeccably dressed in a striped-silk afternoon gown with a box-pleated hem.
An anxious line marred her fair brow as she crossed the thick carpet.
“Mrs. Royce,” she said. “I was not expecting you.”
Nell stood, along with Effie, from the velvet-tufted settee.
She stared at Lady Belwood, feeling the oddest sense of recognition.
Nell had never met the woman before. Of that she was certain.
Yet, there was something strangely familiar about her.
The austere beauty in the turn of her countenance, perhaps.
Or the peculiar way she had of swishing her skirts behind her as she came to meet them.
The twinge in Nell’s breast told her that she’d seen it before.
That she knew that face. That figure. That impatiently sashaying walk.
“Lady Belwood,” Effie said, dropping a flawless curtsy. “May I present my friend, Mrs. Quincey?”
Lady Belwood turned her attention to Nell for the first time. She gave her a civil nod. “Mrs. Quincey.”
“My lady.” Nell curtsied as elegantly as she’d been taught to do in the deportment classes she’d taken at the Academy as a girl.
“Mrs. Quincey is the wife of Mr. Miles Quincey, editor of the London Courant,” Effie said. “You’re familiar with their gossip column, I presume?”
Lady Belwood motioned for them to resume their seats. “I read it on occasion,” she said, taking a chair across from them. She arranged the folds of her skirt. “You will forgive me, Mrs. Quincey, but you have caught me unaware. As Mrs. Royce knows, my receiving hours don’t begin until one o’clock.”
“I thought it best not to risk involving any of your other callers in the business we’ve come to discuss,” Effie said.
Lady Belwood tensed. “Business? What business?”
Effie smiled. “We were hoping you might tell us more about Lord Amstead’s house party next month.”
“What about it?” Lady Belwood asked.
“When it takes place, for one,” Effie said.
“Saturday next,” Lady Belwood replied. “The third of September.”
Nell’s heartbeat quickened. It was the same date mentioned in Mr. Cowgill’s notebook.
“It’s a shooting party more than a house party,” Lady Belwood said. “Country parties during the first weeks of September generally are.”
“Will you be going?” Effie asked.
“I will,” Lady Belwood said. “I confess, I am not well acquainted with the new baron. His family rarely emerges from Hertfordshire and they keep no house in town. However, my husband, Sir Walter, was a longtime correspondent of Lord Amstead’s late father.
They shared a passion for genealogy through the post.” She looked to Nell.
“My husband is an invalid, Mrs. Quincey, with a formidable ancestry. He’s presently working on a lengthy family history. ”
Effie’s eyes lit with interest. “Sir Walter is attending the house party with you?”
“Certainly not,” Lady Belwood said. “His health won’t allow the journey. He’s asked me to attend in his place. Which is convenient for Lord Amstead. I understand his party is short of ladies, many of his gentlemen friends being bachelors.”
Nell seized on the fact. “Is that so? You encourage me to ask a favor of you, my lady.”
Lady Belwood regarded Nell down the length of her perfectly sculpted nose. “You presume a good deal on so brief an acquaintance, ma’am.”
“It’s in a good cause, I assure you,” Nell said.
She knew full well that this way lay danger. But she couldn’t think of that now. And she couldn’t think about whether or not Miles would approve. The house party was but a week away. Time was too precious to let such an opportunity pass.
“Would it be within your power to secure an invitation to the party for me?” she asked Lady Belwood. “Seeing as how Lord Amstead is short of ladies, my presence is sure to be welcome.”
Lady Belwood was incredulous. “Do you know his lordship?”
“Not yet,” Nell said. “Perchance you can provide an introduction?”
Her ladyship turned a frosty look on Effie. “I cannot begin to imagine why you and your friend would think that I should ever allow myself to be imposed upon—”
“Mrs. Quincey is one of my sisters from Miss Corvus’s Academy,” Effie interrupted. “Did I not mention it?”
The color drained out of Lady Belwood’s face. Her gaze jerked to Nell’s. “You?”
Nell gave her an apologetic smile. “Until yesterday, I had the honor of being deputy headmistress.”
“A teacher? That’s all?” Lady Belwood’s rigid features relaxed a fraction, as though the information was some little relief to her. “And now you’re married to a newspaperman?”
“He will, of course, be accompanying me to the house party,” Nell said.
“Will he indeed,” Lady Belwood replied acidly. “And just how will that help the balance of ladies to gentlemen?”
“It may not,” Nell conceded. “But I will still be there. And my husband’s presence is essential to me. Though I’d prefer we leave any mention of his occupation out of it.”
The villains who had murdered Mr. Cowgill had sent his tongue to the editor of the Courant. Nell didn’t intend to risk anyone at the house party learning that that gentleman was Miles. Not if she could help it.
“You might simply say that Mr. and Mrs. Quincey are family friends,” Effie suggested helpfully. “That you require Mrs. Quincey’s companionship in order to attend. Ladies are left alone all day during shooting parties, are they not? You wouldn’t wish to be bored.”
Lady Belwood’s bosom swelled with indignation. She surged up from her chair. “Will the demands of this woman never cease?”
“Miss Corvus,” Effie whispered to Nell in explanation as the two of them rose from the settee.
Nell understood. She stepped forward to Lady Belwood, setting a gentle hand on her silk-clad arm. “Not a demand,” she said. “A request. And it’s me making it, not Miss Corvus.”
Lady Belwood glared at her. “The last time I sponsored one of your number, I was made party to the ruination of a good and decent gentleman.”
Effie gave an indelicate snort. “Lord Compton was neither good nor decent.”
“And now I must trust that you won’t embroil me in some further scandal?” Lady Belwood lifted her chin. “If I do this, I must have your word that it will be an end to whatever imagined debt I owe that woman.”
“It’s not within my power to discharge your debt to Miss Corvus,” Effie told her.
“No,” Nell said. “But it’s within mine.”
She may not be deputy headmistress any longer, but she flattered herself that she still held some influence at the Academy. Surely, Miss Corvus would respect the bargain Nell was making.
She pressed Lady Belwood’s arm. “See that my husband and I are invited, and you may consider your debt repaid.”
Lady Belwood held Nell’s gaze. After a pointed moment, she nodded. “I shall send Lord Amstead a note.” She turned in a swish of silk to go to the gilded writing desk in the corner. The action stirred up a cloud of her ladyship’s perfume—a singularly unique blend of jasmine, tuberose, and honey.
Nell remained frozen where she stood as Lady Belwood walked away from her.
She had the sensation that time had stopped.
No, not stopped. Rather, it was running in reverse.
Taking her away from London, all the way back to that little house in the country with the two aged servants.
The house where the perfumed lady had visited her one final time eighteen years ago.
It was the last occasion Nell had smelled that fragrance.
Until today.