“No.” Philippa lifted the rescued book. “Poor Damaris is suffering in that ballroom. She’s putting on a brave face to honor a man who merits no such accolades. We do this here, tonight, in front of witnesses. Let the gossips write their own scandal columns. We end this now.”
Tommy raced to block the closed library door. “He will not be kind to you.”
“Let him be cruel.” Philippa lifted her chin. “Being a wallflower has been my protection for far too long. People dismiss me. They think bluestockings are boring and worthless.”
Tommy still blocked the door.
“We’renotboring. We’rebrave. We’re clever. We’re capable. Andwe’rethe reason that smug, lying plagiarist willnotbe crowned for someone else’s achievements.”
“Even if he tries to take you down with him?”
“He cannot take away who I am. I shall be the Venus flytrap of wallflowers. The bluestocking whose books reveal the truth and demolish fraud. And we’ll do it in front of those he most wishes to impress. The people he’s been lying to all along.”
Tommy considered this, then dropped her hand from the door. “All right, then. Let’s shatter illusions.”
The moment Tommy opened the door, her posture and manner transformed back to Great-Aunt Wynchester. She peered out of the cracked door in both directions, one trembling hand cupped above her squinting eyes, as though the sconces in the corridor were bright as the sun.
“I don’t see my dead husband anywhere,” she quavered loudly, and tottered into the hall.
Philippa kept her head down. She did not think the maids would ask further questions, but it was best to make haste.
After they passed the ironing room, they hurried down the corridor to the open doorway that led to the dancing.
Philippa strode into the ballroom as though she were the chivalric knight here to champion a lady in need.
Nobody turned to look. Sweeping about with an ornate, bejeweled, Elizabethan book in her hand made her no more interesting than any other day.
The thought of standing at the edge of the dance floor for the next quarter hour waiting for the song to end so that she could dramatically face down a fraudulent cryptographer was a depressing comedown.
“Should I feign an apoplexy?” Tommy whispered.
Philippa shook her head. She’d just caught sight of Captain Northrup. He was not dancing the reel, but rather, surrounded by a circle of sycophants between the musicians and the refreshments table.
Interrupting a round of loud bragging was notquitethe same as winning a jousting tournament or winning a kingdom.
But it would do.
“Follow me.” She led Tommy between the queue for the refreshments table and the edge of the dance floor.
“I can recall any number I hear, no matter how large,” Northrup was informing his profusion of admirers. “I’m told I was not only the best shot of my division, I also possess the strongest muscles. Due to my superior blood, of courseIwas the only one who could—”
He caught sight of Philippa, which she supposed was a minor miracle in itself.
When Northrup leered blatantly, she realized it was not her countenance that had animated him, but rather the thought of despoiling her upstairs in his bedroom while everyone else was engaged in a country dance. He was about to be disappointed.
His worshipers turned to see what had caught their deity’s attention.
Northrup’s leer faded at the sight of his ancestor’s manuscript in Philippa’s gloved hands. No. The manuscript belonged to his ancestor’s tenants, whose efforts Sir Reginald had claimed as his own.
Northrup patted his chest in growing horror.
Tommy held up the missing key and bellowed, “I believe you dropped this, pup!”
Now they held the attention of the entire refreshment queue, as well as the dancers closest to this edge of the parquet.
“I didn’t lose it.” Northrup stormed through his admirers, knocking them out of his way. “Youstoleit from me, you crazy old bat—”
“So you confirm that she is holding your key and that this is your manuscript?” Philippa asked archly.
