Before Charlie could explain where Mr. Sykes-Wycliff was, the gentleman himself came storming into the hall. With a valise in hand.
“Get away from me! Don’t come near!” he shouted, though nobody had made an attempt to approach him. “I don’t need a reference and wouldn’t take one if you offered it. You can clobber somebody else with your midnight door-knocking and if you ever believed I would run round the moors while you chased me with large knives, you’ve another thing coming. Furthermore, you can tell Lady Marchfield I said so!”
Mr. Sykes-Wycliff threw the front doors open and jogged down the street. From Felicity’s viewpoint, he still was not very fast, despite all his jogging round the square of a morning. It was just as well that there was no such thing as a servants’ hunt, else he’d have been done in attempting to scrabble round the moors.
“From that pack of nonsense, I detect Mrs. Right’s hand in this,” the duke said, all jollity.
The footmen looked in different directions, so Felicity suspected their hands had been in it too. As had her and her sister’s hands. She supposed Mr. Sykes-Wycliff never stood a chance.
“Excellent,” the duke said. “Wait until I inform Lady Misery that her latest project has failed spectacularly.”
They proceeded out to the carriage and could just make out Mr. Sykes-Wycliff turning the corner and he was gone. Wherever that gentleman settled, he was bound to be happier. As they had all decided from the outset, Mr. Sykes-Wycliff’s respect for himself would blossom when he was somewhere he was wanted. He might not see it yet, but they had done him a kindness in driving him mad.
Felicity was helped into the carriage and noticed a large sack on the seat. “Are those the pence you asked for, Papa?”
He nodded and seemed very pleased about it.
“Dare I ask why you are taking them to a ball?” She would not put it past the duke to hand them out to people he found tedious. Naturally, Lady Marchfield would be in receipt of most of them.
The duke had taken a folded sheet of paper from his coat. “Look at this—a bill from Lady Albright. She claims we owe her nine pounds on account of her very expensive sofa being ruined by bloodstains.”
“That is outrageous!” Felicity exclaimed. “For one, she was the inattentive person who left the padlock off the tiger’s cage. For another, she left us out there to be torn to pieces. And for another, it was Mr. Stratton’s blood, not mine.”
“Just as I thought too. But do not fret over it. I’ve brought the payment in pence and added in a padlock for good measure. We’ll see how she likes it then!”
“Ah, so that’s why we left so early,” Felicity said, “we make a stop.”
“No pulling the wool over your eyes, eh?”
“As that is the case, I suppose it is a good thing my aunt makes her own way to the ball.”
“It is always a good thing when Lady Misery keeps her distance.” The duke rubbed his hands together. “I can’t wait to tell her I threw nine pounds worth of pence into Lady Albright’s house. Then, just as she’s staggering over it, I’ll hit her with the news that Mr. Why lost his faculties and ran off into the night.”
Felicity thought her aunt really would be staggered. She suspected Lady Marchfield had not quite regained her equanimity since the cyprian party. It was her understanding that it was talked about, and Lady Marchfield was advertising far and wide that it had been the duke’s doing. Her father did not care at all about being blamed. He was happy to be known as the author of what he deemed a “hilarious turn of events.”
The carriage proceeded to Lady Albright’s house. The duke said, “Stay here, Felicity, I may have to wrestle the butler. Watch out the window if it amuses you.”
Her father jumped down to the pavement with his sack of pence and jogged up to the front doors. Of course Felicity had every intention of watching from the window. She pulled back the curtain and peered out.
Her father gave the door a good pounding. Then another pounding. Lady Albright’s butler answered, clearly out of breath. The poor fellow must have run all the way up from the servants’ hall.
“Your Grace!” he said, “I am sorry, Lady Albright has gone out.”
“Stand aside,” the duke said in a commanding voice.
The poor butler did stand aside and there was no wrestling required. The duke took handfuls of pence out of his sack and proceeded to throw them into Lady Albright’s great hall as the shocked fellow looked on.
The duke poured the last of them out and said, “Do not sweep these up or I’ll come back with twice the amount in bricks! I want that confounded woman to see it just as I’ve left it. With any luck, she’ll slip on them and break her neck. You can tell Lady Lunatic, she’s been paid for her incompetence and disregard for her guests’ lives. Oh, and here is an extra padlock, since she has so much trouble keeping track of them!”
The duke pulled his arm back and threw the padlock through Lady Albright’s drawing room window. The glass shattered with a crash.
Gracious, her father was irascible. Felicity was not at all surprised that he’d showered Lady Albright’s great hall with coins, and quite right he do so considering the bill for the sofa. However, she had not expected him to break a window. She wondered if Lady Albright would try to send a bill forthat. Shehoped not, as there was no telling what her father would do about it. He might really return with a farmer’s cart of bricks if the lady were not careful.
The duke clambered back into the carriage very pleased with himself. Lady Albright’s butler stood horror-struck at her front doors. The duke’s coachman, being well used to his employer’s interesting personality, remained stone-faced as if nothing at all untoward had occurred.
The duke rapped on the roof and they set off—the duke waving a genial goodbye to Lady Albright’s butler.
“A job well done,” the duke said. “Lady Albright will not dare trifle with me again, I’ve made it too much trouble to do so. That is the trick with people—make it deuced inconvenient to cross you and they won’t do it, you see?”
