La Petite Four Read Free Page B

Warburton.
    “Welcome home, your ladyship,” he intoned, his usual calm self in the face of the bustle around him. The footmen hurried past to fetch in the rest of her belongings. “His Grace was delayed in Whitehall, but he hopes to join you for dinner.”
    She almost crumpled at his feet in relief. Dinner with her father was just the opening she needed to discuss this business of Lord Robert. Surely His Grace could be made to see reason. She would never want to disappoint him, but he knew how much she longed to join the Royal Society.
    “Just see that you do not let Lord Robert Townsend near him,” she told Warburton and went upstairs to change.
    It was easy to guess which bedchamber was hers down the thickly carpeted hall. She merely had to follow the footmen carrying her things. As she paused in the doorway, she found herself rather pleased. The room was done in a Oriental theme, the walls adorned in painted silk showing white and black birds with tall crowns and long tails. The mahogany woodwork was trimmed in gold, and gold highlighted the tall window, dressing room door, and the spindles and headboard of the four-poster bed. Another time she might have been tempted to stretch out, but not when His Grace would be home so soon.
    She had to keep busy or she would go mad!
    She was instructing one of the footmen on how to set up her easel in an unused bedchamber across the corridor when she finally heard the front door. She left the fellow to hurry downstairs. With His Grace months at the Congress of Vienna, all Emily’d had were letters. She wanted to spend time with her father, hear his stories, tell him hers. Surely a few moments of his company, on her first night in London, was not too much to ask.
    But the wood-paneled study on the second floor was empty in the golden glow of candlelight, as was the stately dining room. The blue-and-gilt chairs of the withdrawing room waited expectantly. The other footmen had apparently retired to the kitchen to prepare for dinner, so she could not ask them where His Grace had gone. With a sigh, she went to check the sitting room, just in case her father might be entertaining a caller.
    It was the most formal room she’d seen. Heavy red, brocaded drapes with gold-tasseled pulls covered the bow window, and red velvet chairs with clawed feet squatted before the fire’s glow. She sucked in a breath when she sighted a gentleman standing next to them, then puffed it out as he turned and she recognized him.
    The young man from Barnsley stood there, his hair glowing like flames in the light of the fire. How could he have beaten her to London? And if he had, did that mean Lord Robert was here as well? “How did you get here?” she demanded.
    He offered her his wicked smile. “And good evening to you as well, Lady Emily,” he said as he bowed.
    Of course he knew her name. He’d obviously followed her. “Answer the question. How did you get here so quickly?”
    He shrugged. “The mail coach moves quickly enough. And surely I’m not the first to seek an audience with His Grace.”
    Not the first, but one of the first she’d seen kept waiting by himself. “Who let you in?” she asked suspiciously.
    “A busy footman. I thought it best to keep out of the way.”
    Emily gasped. “You sneaked in! Thief!” Small wonder his look had gone to her locket at Barnsley. Small wonder she hadn’t recognized him when they’d first met. She did not make a habit of associating with thieves.
    “Oh, there are thieves in London, all right,” he agreed. He waved a hand to encompass the room. “You’d better watch out or you’ll lose one of these fine paintings.”
    What fine paintings? His Grace owned any number of wonderful pieces from ages past, as well as some truly horrid portraits of their ancestors. She wasn’t sure which he had ordered brought to London to decorate the town house.
    But as she looked around the room, she recognized each painting as hers. The Battle of Salamanca hung