The Bolingbroke Chit: A Regency Romance (39 page)

As expected, Petrie launched into a narrative of his meeting with Mr. Trundle and rather than sit through another fifteen minutes of indignant consternation, which, to be fair, she knew the gentleman was wholly entitled to, Agatha sought out Addleson’s gaze, raised her right hand and tugged her left ear.

Immediately, Addleson, who was sitting tamely on the settee next to her mother, broke out into peals of laughter just as Petrie said, “The flies in this house are relentless, are they not? I’ve been meaning to raise the issue with Lord Bolingbroke, for I fear his inadequate storage of fertilizer is to blame.”

Before Agatha could rise to the defense of her father’s compost heap, Gregson announced the arrival of the Harlow Hoyden and her sister. At once, her ladyship leaped to her feet, forgetting all about the viscount’s inappropriate outburst—imagine laughing at Sir Irving’s gout!—to welcome the Duchess of Trent.

“What a delightful surprise,” Lady Bolingbroke said with a sideways glance at her daughter, whose engagement to a viscount had done little to improve her disposition. She still insisted on spending all her time in her ramshackle studio and she still refused to confide in her mother about the events in her life. Her courtship of Viscount Addleson, for example, remained a complete mystery to her.

With a hasty apology to Mr. Petrie for the interruption, Agatha greeted her guests, and although Lady Bolingbroke entreated the duchess and her sister to enjoy a cup of tea, Agatha insisted they did not have time.

“Do not have time?” her mother wondered aloud.

“Do not have time,” Agatha repeated firmly. “They are here for a planning session, Mama, not a social call. We have work to do.”

Lady Bolingbroke could not conceive what her daughter meant by a planning session. She was a gently bred young lady, not the keeper of Prinny’s daily calendar. “I’m sure that whatever your intentions are you will concede the duchess and Miss Harlow would appreciate a cup of tea.”

Agatha was not prepared to concede anything of the sort, for how could they come up with a plan for infiltrating the Royal Academy of Art if they were stuck in the drawing room making polite fiddle-faddle all day long? Addleson, however, was more amenable to her mother’s point and suggested she and her visitors could spare a few minutes.

“Oh, very well,” she said, sighing heavily as she sat down in an armchair that was several feet away from Petrie. Then she turned her piercing gaze on her fiancé. “You do realize, I hope, that you are now in direct violation of paragraph three, subsection five, of our contract, which clearly states that you are never to impose a social obligation at the expense of a professional goal.”

Although this transgression sounded quite severe to everyone else in the room—except the girl’s mother, to whom it sounded absurd—the viscount did not appear at all concerned. Indeed, the very idea of it seemed to please him immensely and he promised, in a tone far too warm and familiar for the drawing room, to accept his punishment later.

Naturally, Agatha blushed to the roots of her hair, but it wasn’t his words that caused her embarrassment but the look in his eyes. It was the same look he’d worn while drawing up the contract in the first place: smug, confident, devilish. He had known as he’d made his increasingly ridiculous list that he would overcome her objections, and it was this confidence, this unchecked self-assurance, that had ultimately swayed her, for he was clearly a man who knew exactly what he was getting into. He was no naïve schoolboy befuddled by the first rush of passion.

But, oh, what a rush it had been. She had never felt anything like Addleson’s lips on her breasts, the way she could have simply dissolved into a puddle of pleasure on the floor. It had been at once debilitating and empowering, for although it seemed as if her bones had turned to jelly, she felt as if she could accomplish any feat of great physical strength.

If anything, she had been the befuddled one, afraid that the intensity of her desire would corrupt her judgment, for how could something so powerful
not
undermine her commitment to art?And then Addleson was sitting at her table, quill in hand, adding items to the most outrageous contract ever written. She’d felt herself weakening even before he’d added a paragraph about the studio, but his inclusion of a light-filled atelier obliterated all her fears, for how could she resist a man who understood her so thoroughly—even down to the chair.

Years later, when she told the story to their children, she will say she married their father because of the forest-green leather armchair in her studio.

Now, however, neither Agatha nor Addleson volunteered further information about the contract, despite calls for elaboration, and her mother, appalled by the idea of having produced a daughter who would negotiate her own marriage settlement, quickly changed the subject to Miss Harlow’s forthcoming nuptials.

Agatha, of course, was very happy for her new friend, as it seemed she and her bridegroom were particularly well suited to each other, but listening to Vinnie give gracious answers to pointless questions regarding the time of the wedding (2 p.m.) and the color of her dress (silver) was excruciating. It was all so trivial. Who cared where the wedding took place? In Hanover Square or the Duke’s conservatory—it was still the tedious recitation of some boring vows before a doddering old clergyman. The event, though meaningful and felicitous to all those involved, did not warrant such intense scrutiny, especially when there were more important matters to discuss: campaign strategies, dossiers, Royal Academicians.

Perfectly aware of her impatience, Addleson watched her with an amused glimmer in his eyes, and just when it seemed as if Agatha would jump out of her seat with impatience (“And what about your bridal trousseau?”), he tugged his own ear. Immediately, Petrie, whose disinterest in wedding matters exceeded even Agatha’s own, flailed his arms in front of him as if trying to dispel an insidious cloud of smoke.

“Flies,” he said snappishly. “I am bedeviled by flies. They are everywhere.”

Swallowing a ferocious urge to giggle, for the gentleman looked as mad as a hatter swatting the empty air, Agatha nodded with sympathy and stood up. “Yes, they are indeed everywhere. Here, let me help you,” she said, picking up the
Morning Herald
from the side table, rolling it up and thwacking the flailing naturalist on the head. Then she peered closely at the gray tufts of hair on the top of his head and announced her mission a success.

It was impossible to say who was more shocked—her mother or the American—and before either one could gather their wits, Agatha shepherded her visitors to the door and explained her intention to remove them to a safer location. What location in particular, she did not say. “Given the fly infestation in the drawing room, it’s my duty as hostess to save my guests from suffering a vicious attack similar to the one poor Mr. Petrie has just endured. I trust, Mama, that you can handle the matter in here in my absence” she said, carelessly tossing the useful broadsheet onto the settee, where it slowly unfurled to reveal a new illustration by Mr. Holyroodhouse. Despite his very sincere and very public resignation, the famous caricaturist felt compelled to do one final drawing. In it, Lady Agatha Bolingbroke, her eyes shaped like hearts, her lips curved in a smile so wide it bordered on grotesque, stared devotedly at Viscount Addleson with such worshipful adoration, anyone looking at her could not help but be appalled. Underneath the drawing in big block letters it said: Lady Agony indeed!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lynn Messina is
the author of twelve novels, including the best-selling
Fashionistas,
which has been translated into 16 languages. Her essays have appeared in
Self, American Baby
and the Modern Love column in the
New York Times,
and she’s a regular contributor to the
Times
Motherlode blog. She lives in New York City with her husband and sons.

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CHAPTER ONE

Miss Emma Harlow
was so intent on her task that she did not notice the gentleman in the leather armchair. She didn’t see him lower his book, cock his head to the side and examine her with interest.

“I say, is that the best way to do that?” the gentleman asked after a moment.

Emma, whose feathers were never the sort to ruffle easily, even when she was behaving improperly in a place she didn’t belong—in this case, with her fingers around the stem of a prize
Rhyncholaelia digbyana
in the Duke of Trent’s conservatory—calmly turned around. Her blue-eyed gaze, steady and sometimes intimidating, met with an amused brown one. “Excuse me?”

The gentleman closed the leather-bound edition, taking care to mark the page, and stood up. “Snapping the stem will ill serve your purpose,” he said, approaching.

Emma watched him stride across the room, taking in his handsome features—the long, straight nose, the chiseled jawline, the full lips—and neat appearance. The unknown gentleman was tall, lean and given to easy grace. She liked the way he was dressed, simply and without affectation in buckskin breeches, shiny Hessians and white lawn. His shirt points were without starch and his shoulders without padding. Of course, she readily noted, his broad shoulders precluded the necessity of such foppish enhancements. His hair, a deep rich brown color that well suited his dark complexion, was cut short in the fashionable mode. “My purpose?” she asked when he was within a few inches of her.

“Given the situation, I can only assume that you were overcome with admiration for this lovely and rare flower and sought to take it home with you to show off to all your friends in the horticultural society.” He didn’t wait for her to confirm or deny his theory but continued in the same conversational tone. “Surely as a member of that esteemed institution, you know that the only way to ensure that the flower lives is to cut it at the bulb through the rhizome.”

At these words, Emma dissolved into delighted, unguarded laugher, and several seconds passed before she could respond intelligibly. “You must be the visiting country cousin the duchess spoke of!”

A faint curve touched the gentleman’s lips. “I must?”

“Yes, of course,” she insisted. “Who else in town would bandy about the word
rhizome
?”

“Your logic is irrefutable. Indeed I must be the visiting country cousin. And who are you?”

“Nobody.”

“Come! You are standing here in the conservatory with me, as corporeal as I am. You’re hardly a ghost. Surely you wouldn’t have me believe such a whisker.”

“No, not that sort of nobody,” she explained. “I’m nobody of importance. You needn’t bother asking my name because you will only forget it in a minute or so and then I will have to remind you, which will be a dreadful embarrassment for the both of us. Now do show me where the rhizome is so I can return to the party. I told Mama I would be gone only a minute and now it has stretched into five. Mama brought me here as a favor—she and I rarely socialize together—and I’d hate to do anything that would distress her.”