Seven
Elyse fumed as she slammed the heavy door on the heels of the servant who'd delivered the message from Jerrold.
Swirling into the parlor in a wave of crackling, sea green silk, she flounced into a chair, wincing painfully. She looked up, meeting her grandmother's bemused gaze.
"Was that Jerrold's man, Chivers, at the door?"
"Yes! Honestly, he has some nerve!" Elyse crumpled the elaborately scrawled note, at the bottom of which Jerrold had signed his initials with a flourish.
"Chivers?" Regina Winslow looked up from her cup of morning tea, unable to comprehend why a meek toad of a man such as that amiable servant had sent her granddaughter into such a fit of ill temper.
"No, of course not!" Elyse bounded out of the chair to pace the width of the parlor with restless energy. It was preferable to sitting; she was still smarting from that fall she'd taken in the Woods two days earlier. Actually, she'd taken two falls. And St. James was responsible for both of them. Now this! She waved Jerrold's note through the air like a banner.
"We were supposed to attend the opera tonight!"
Lady Regina set down the delicate bone-china cup, giving her granddaughter a long look. "I take it, that you're speaking of Jerrold."
Elyse looked up. "Of course." She resumed her agitated pacing.
"I seem to remember you sending round word yesterday that you didn't feel up to attending any social functions," Lady Winslow reminded her.
Whirling about in front of the fireplace, Elyse tapped a foot in frustration.
Quimby had done his work well. He'd managed to find out a few very interesting things about the Sir William St. James. Just that morning she'd sent Jerrold a message stating that she wanted to see him about something important, and now his return note informed her that he was attending his private club that evening, with none other than St. James.
"I take it Jerrold has canceled your plans for the evening," Regina said.
"He's invited the man to attend his private club." Having unfolded the message and read it for the second time, Elyse tore it into tiny pieces that she scattered on the cold hearth.
She'd learned from Katy's excursions at the market that St. James was staying at the London town house of Lord and Lady Vale. Supposedly, he was related to them. But of even more interest was the information Quimby had acquired at the docks. It seemed that St. James had arrived only days earlier, and though his ship was flying a Portuguese flag, there was something very peculiar about an entire crew that spoke not a trace of that language. The harbormaster was unable to provide any further information except that theRevengecarried a cargo of wool which had been brought ashore and was now stored in warehouses at the docks.
"I think it's very generous of Jerrold to be so hospitable to the man. After all, he is newly arrived. And I did find him to be such a charming man," Lady Regina confessed.
"Charming?" Elyse replied incredulously, remembering the episode on the veranda. "The man is nothing but an arrogant, rude, ill-mannered..."
"Yes?" Her grandmother watched her skeptically. "You were about to call him something?"
"Impostor!"
"Impostor? My dearest Elyse, I can name several things he is, but impostor is not one of them. Why, anyone can see that the man has exceptional breeding. His manners are impeccable. I have it on good account that he speaks several languages including French, which you refused to learn, my dear," she pointed out.
"And you cannot deny that he cuts a dashing figure with that eye-patch covering one eye." She tapped a bejeweled finger against her chin. "I wonder how he came to lose the eye. Quite exciting, don't you think?"
Elyse rolled her eyes heavenward. Please, not her grandmother, too. Ever since the night of the party, it seemed every woman in London was quite taken with the mysterious, Sir William St. James. The man was an impostor! And she was determined to prove it.
"What do you think?" Elyse turned from the mirror at the dressing table in her friend's bedchamber. She put the finishing touches to the makeup she'd artfully applied. It was late afternoon and she'd just been to the costumer's shop that provided clothes for actors at the theatre.
Lucy's house had been her second stop of the day. Fixing her friend with a coolly disdainful look, she tried to smother a fit of laughter.
"Do you want the truth?" Lucy shook her head, a skeptical expression at her face.
"Of course."
"I think you've absolutely gone round the bend," Lucy informed her.
Elyse choked back laughter. "Do you mean I'm addle brained?"
"The question is, my dear," Elyse fastened her friend with an expression of pure devilment, "Canwepull it off?"
