Kate Noble (38 page)

“I beg your pardon, Miss Gail, but do you happen to have a key to Evangeline’s room?”

“A key?” Gail repeated, confused. “No, Evangeline’s door is never locked.”

“It is now,” Will replied.

Gail and Max crossed the hall with Will. Gail tried the knob.

“Well, it certainly is locked,” she said grimly.

“Gail?” Evangeline’s small voice came from the other side of the door.

“Evie!” Gail cried. “Can you open the door from the inside?”

“No, I can’t find the key.”

Gail knelt and looked through the keyhole, meeting Evangeline’s similarly prying eye.

“Mr. Holt and Max are here to take us away,” she said.

“I know,” Evangeline replied, the corner of her eye crinkling with what must have been a smile. “William was telling me just now.”

“Evie, tell me one thing—do you love him?”

“Yes,” Evangeline’s reply was clear as a bell. “I truly do.”

“For heaven’s sake, why did you let me ramble on and on about Max this afternoon, and you never said a word! No, you just sat there smiling enigmatically while I—”

“Uh…Gail,” Max said from behind the crouching form of his soon-to-be-wife, “while I’m sure this discussion is of the utmost importance, do you think it could wait until we find a way to open the door? Do you happen to have a hair pin?”

“I have more hair pins than God.” Gail stood. “Can either of you pick a lock?” At the negative shakes of their heads, Gail rolled her eyes. “And I was so hoping one of us might have had a misspent youth. Can you get in her room like you got into mine? From the window?”

Again, Will shook his head. “The front of your home is a sheer face. There is no way to scale that.”

“Then,” Max replied, “we’re back to the key. Evangeline, you didn’t happen to put it somewhere and then forget about it? In a box or a reticule or some such thing?”

“No,” was the muffled reply. “The key is normally in the keyhole. I never touched it, I don’t have it.”

“Then who does?” Gail asked.

“I do.”

Romilla’s voice floated from the end of the hall.

WILL
, Max, and Gail froze in the middle of the hallway, watching as Romilla, dressed in a wrapper and bearing a candle, approached with unearthly calm.

“Honestly, the three of you are the least stealthy people in the world. You could not have made more noise if you brought an orchestra.”

For the space of a minute, no one breathed, no one made a sound. Gail was certain that Romilla was going to raise a hue and cry and then Max and Will would be taken to prison as trespassers and then they’d be sent to Australia—she and Evangeline would be locked in a tower at their country estate, until one day they managed to escape and sneak aboard a merchant ship and search the entire desolate Australian continent of thieves and murderers for their beloveds and…

Then Romilla did the strangest thing. Calmly, she parted the crowded hallway, walked to Evangeline’s door, and to everyone’s surprise, unlocked it.

Evangeline might have been the most surprised of all, but she did not hesitate in removing herself from her cage. She had already thrown on a day dress, cloak, and shoes. Warily, she edged past her stepmother to stand beside Will, who took her hand.

Romilla shut the door. Turning, she found she had the rapt attention of the hallway’s occupants.

“Madam—” Evangeline began, but Romilla interrupted.

“You have special licenses?” she addressed the gentlemen of the party.

“Uh, yes, ma’am. Right here.” Max brandished two pieces of paper from his breast pocket. Romilla gave them a cursory glance before nodding.

“Good. Elopement is one thing. Abduction is quite another,” she said sternly.

“Yes, one involves burlap sacks.” Gail couldn’t help the little quip from slipping out.

Romilla turned her steady, unsmiling eyes to Gail. “Gentlemen,” she said, her gaze immobile, “perhaps you should go and see to the carriage. I assume there is one? Good. I should like a word alone with my daughters.”

Max and Will refused to budge, until Romilla rolled her eyes, and with an exasperated “Oh heaven’s sake!” handed the key to Evangeline.

“There,” she said. “I cannot lock her back in if she has the key. They will be down in a moment. I certainly cannot stop young fools in love from living their lives, so I refuse to try.”

“It’s all right.” Evangeline squeezed Will’s hand. “We will join you shortly.”

A look passed between Gail and Max, the former giving the latter similar assurances. Once the gentlemen departed with last backward glances, Gail and Evangeline were left alone with their stepmother.

“Where’s Father?” Gail asked before Romilla could begin the dreaded lecture.

“Locked in his bedchamber.” Romilla gave a little smirk. “Evangeline’s is not the only key in my possession.”

“Ma’am,” Gail began, “I know our actions are—” but Romilla held up a hand.

“I have put a good many things together in the past few hours. I should have seen this outcome long before, but I can only think that while I had my suspicions, I refused to see a depth of feeling that now is so plain.” She turned to Evangeline. “Your father did not listen to what you were saying today, for that I’m sorry.” Then she turned to Gail. “I fear I have not listened to you for quite a while, and for that I can only beg forgiveness.”

Gail and Evangeline began to shake their heads, but again, Romilla refused to hear their murmurs of denial. She reached up around her neck and removed an intricate garnet necklace, handing it to Evangeline.

“For your wedding,” she said, as she removed a matching garnet ring and handed it to Gail. “Each of you will require something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue. These are quite old, and it would be an honor if you would borrow these from me for the occasion.”

Gail, stunned, numbly took the beautiful ring from Romilla’s outstretched hand. Evangeline had silent tears streaking her cheeks.

Romilla addressed both girls then, but peculiarly, kept her eyes on Gail.

“I know I’ve muddled some things—stepmotherhood is not easy, but I shouldn’t imagine stepdaughterhood is either. But please know, that underneath everything”—the tears in her eyes broke the brim, and fell—“I wished the most for you to be happy.”

Unable to hold themselves apart any longer, both Gail and Evangeline gathered Romilla into a fierce embrace. When finally they released their stepmother, all three were smiling through profuse tears.

“Mother, please know…the scandal…we wish it didn’t have to occur,” Evangeline stumbled over the earnest words.

Romilla simply waved this away with a watery laugh. “Bah! Gossip isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.”

“But,” Evangeline replied with a frown creasing her brow, “gossip is said, not printed.”

“Exactly.” Romilla smiled.

Down the hall a great banging broke the simple honesty of the exchange.

“Romilla!” came their father’s voice. “Why am I locked in? Drat it all! Morrison! Mrs. Bibb!”

Romilla wiped away an errant tear, as she turned back to her daughters. “Now, as to your father…” The banging continued loudly. “Come back in a fortnight, and I think you’ll find that you’ve had his consent and blessing all along.”

Gail squeezed Romilla’s hand one last time. “Thank you, Mother.” Romilla had to shoo the girls down the steps before she began crying again.

Once the girls were out of sight, Romilla returned to her husband’s door and seated herself in a chair placed for that purpose outside the door.

“Darling, stop pounding, you’re giving me a headache.”

“Romilla!” came Sir Geoffrey’s relieved voice. “Let me out of here.”

“Not quite yet,” she replied. “You and I need to have a chat about the girls.”

“The girls? Are they all right? Where are they?”

“They are fine, dearest. And they are gone. When you next see them, they shall each be wed. And not to whom you’d expect.”

“What!?” Sir Geoffrey cried.

“Dearest you simply must stop that infernal banging. I assure you it is fruitless. Now, listen. Yes, listen. I have noticed that since we came to London, your ability to pay proper attention to your family has gone into rapid decline. Listening to your daughters, in particular, seems to have been forgot. However, I have high hopes it is a skill you can regain without much injury.”

Inside the master bedchamber, Sir Geoffrey banged against the door with all his strength.

Outside, Romilla sighed and rolled her eyes. It was going to be a long night.

GAIL
and Evangeline emerged from Number Seven at a near run. The large black carriage sitting in front of Number Seven swung open its doors, and Max and Will each exited to take the hand of their chosen lady.

“Thank God,” Max said to Gail, “any longer and we should have come back in with swords drawn to take you by force.”

“Max, do you even have a sword?” Gail asked wryly.

“Well, a metaphorical sword.” Once inside the carriage, Will rapped on the ceiling, signaling to the driver to drive at a breakneck pace out of the city.

“Where are we going?” Evangeline asked.

“A small church on the outskirts of London,” Max replied to his future sister-in-law. “The vicar is an old friend of ours from school days.”

Pleased with this, Evangeline settled back into her seat next to Will, content to be able to whisper sweet nothings at each other, a pleasure too long denied. Max looked to Gail, who had grown unusually quiet.

“You have grown unusually quiet,” Max said softly, eliciting a small smile from his intended. “Are you thinking about your stepmother? What did she say to you? I promise, she will never be able to interfere in your life again.”

Gail turned and smiled at the concern and protectiveness in Max’s eyes. Then she saw that Max’s question had drawn her sister’s attention as well.

Gail and Evangeline shared a look, and a contented smile.

“She wished us to be happy,” Gail said, fingering the garnet ring on her right hand. Evangeline placed a similar hand over the necklace around her throat.

Max and Will looked to each other and then to their future brides.

“And are you?” Max asked, taking her hand, lacing their fingers. “Are you happy?”

Tears shone in Gail’s eyes.

“More than words can say.”

IT
would be a happy thing indeed to say that nothing resembling a scandal occurred. However, that would be a fib. It was the grandest scandal the Ton had ever seen—for about a month. When the announcement of the nuptials of Maximillian Fontaine, Earl of Longsbowe, to Miss Gail Alton hit the papers, Mayfair was in chaos. Lady Hurstwood repaired immediately to Lady Alton to inquire if the papers had misprinted the name.

She was told the papers were correct.

Lady Alton had no less than twenty callers that morning before ten-thirty, all asking to stay for her famous early teas and to be told how such an outrageous elopement took place.

Indeed, only a few people were less than shocked.

Mr. Ellis at the British Museum glanced at the announcement, smiled to himself, and then returned to his filing.

Lord Ommersley was heard in White’s sniggering that he’d known it all along, and if his mother allowed him to place wagers he would have bet his inheritance that it was Miss Gail Lord Longsbowe preferred, not Miss Evangeline. But since Lord Ommersley was not terribly well liked, no one paid him much heed.

Lady Charlbury went so far as to tie a leash to Old Tom and exit her house. She went directly to Lady Jersey’s drawing room, where she proceeded to crow in triumph.

Count Roffstaam, who did not receive the
Times
in Barivia, was uninformed on the matter until he received two letters some three weeks later, the first describing a madcap plot to abduct a gentleman. The second told of its modification and success. He smiled and laughed (most unlike a Barivian) as he read, but nothing pleased him more than when he saw the signature of Gail, Countess of Longsbowe.

However, the vast majority of the Ton was agog at the affair. A few of the matrons began making disparaging remarks about Miss Evangeline now that she had been compromised and thrown over for her sister…until they chanced to read farther down the page and found Miss Evangeline was now Mrs. Holt.

And when the pair of couples returned to town in the prescribed fortnight, Sir Geoffrey was first in line to embrace them. Literally. As Gail and Evangeline knew, the man had the strength of a bear when engaged in an enthusiastic hug. Max and Will, however, were a bit surprised.

Romilla and Sir Geoffrey still find themselves constantly in demand in London. Scandal now seems to slip off them like water off a duck’s back, a lesson learned when their daughters married and they had to deal with the fallout. The easiest way, it seemed, was to not care. Many matrons have been frustrated by this newfound breeziness, and yet many still court their favor.

Evangeline and Will settled at Will’s family estate and are said to be disgustingly happy. She had seasons upon seasons to paint her beloved new home, and half a dozen children to pepper about the vistas.

The Earl and Countess of Longsbowe spent the first few of their many years together at Longsbowe Park, becoming acquainted with the estate, and much more acquainted with each other. After finding and training an eminently trustworthy steward (not surprisingly, Mr. Merriot’s son was as adept as his father), Max took his wife and young sons to Italy, where that Lady was determined to add a practical fourteenth language to her list, and no longer rely on the dubious Pig Latin to round it out. It was whispered by those in society, accompanied by a wink and a nudge, that her desire to grasp the language was so desperate, the Earl and his Lady would retire during the hottest hours of the day, every day, for an Italian lesson.

But honestly, who listens to gossip?