Page 5 of A Perplexing Regency Romance (The League of Meddling Butlers #5)

Finella’s trunks of dresses had been tied to the back of the duchesses’ carriage and the coachman had been given direction. They were to see Madame Beaumont, a lady located on The Strand. As they’d traveled along, the duchess had described the dressmaker in both glowing and alarming terms.

Madame Beaumont was said to be all elegance and the most skilled dressmaker in Town. She was also described as being painfully direct and Finella was not to take any of her insults to heart.

As the carriage turned onto The Strand, the carriage jerked and men shouted. She peered out her window and saw an injured man who was being carried on a litter roughly falling to the ground. The carriage had stopped and she’d leapt out of it to provide what assistance she could render.

Her heart still pounded over the encounter. She’d held his hand. He was the Duke of Greystone. He was simply marvelous. His hair was the shade of dark toffee, his eyes were a deep blue shade and crinkled when he smiled.

He had smiled at her. The Duke of Greystone had smiled at Finella Fernsby. He’d said he did not regret holding her hand. It was a memory she would treasure all her life.

The duchess had not given her too much more time to reflect on it, as Finella had been hurried back into the carriage and they drove on to the dressmaker.

Finella found herself grateful that the duchess had warned her about Madame Beaumont’s insulting manner.

They had entered a small shop, or it seemed small from the outside.

It was narrow in width but very deep. It was filled with dressmaker’s forms and fabrics and ribbons and buttons of every description.

A woman of middle years wearing a spotless and starched apron and a measuring tape draped around her neck stared at Finella. It was clear enough that the lady had mastered the art of a haughty expression.

“Madame Beaumont,” the duchess said.

The madame slowly looked Finella up and down and clasped her hands together in prayer. Looking toward the heavens, she whispered, “Mon Dieu, Her Grace has brought Madame Beaumont pomme de terre boueuse.”

Finella’s French might not be entirely fluent, but she knew when she was being called a muddy potato.

“Yes, yes,” the duchess said, “The girl was just now kneeling in the mud, it cannot be helped. You will be further affronted when you have a look at the clothes she’s brought. The point is, we need it all fixed.”

The coachman had hauled in the trunks. The madame had opened one and pulled out a dress that was one of Finella’s favorites.

It was a blue silk that had been decorated round the bosom with blue sequined butterflies.

It had matching, but smaller, sequined butterflies round the cap sleeves and the hem.

The dark color of the blue made her seem narrower than she was and the sequined butterflies were the points of interest to draw the eye.

Madame Beaumont dramatically dropped the dress on the floor of the shop and held her arm out.

This, as far as Finella could understand, was a signal for one of her seamstresses to rush forward and support her to a chair.

The madame sank down into it and gently rested the back of her hand across her forehead.

“Never have my senses been so assaulted. I am vertigineuse.”

Finella was fairly sure vertigineuse was French for dizzy.

“Brava,” the duchess said. “Worthy of Drury Lane, Madame Beaumont. Now do collect yourself and advise us on what to do.”

Madame Beaumont, seeming to sense she would not get far with the duchess by way of histrionics, rose and snapped her fingers. Seamstresses of all descriptions came from every corner of the shop. She pointed one hand at the trunks and boxes and the other at the shop’s door.

These seemed to be well understood instructions.

Most of the seamstresses took to unpacking the trunks, making little sniffs of disapproval as they did so.

One dramatically held up the bonnet with the porcelain cherries as if it was evidence of a crime.

One of the seamstresses went to the door, closed the shade, and put a sign that said “closed” in the window.

Madame Beaumont, noticing Finella’s eyes drift toward the door, said, “I cannot allow a passerby to view this abomination. It will damage their eyes.”

The duchess patted Finella’s hand.

The dresses were unpacked and hung round the shop.

Madame Beaumont paced around, examining them.

She sighed, she muttered, she exclaimed when it seemed she was particularly affronted.

She even leapt back from a dress that had ruffles running down the middle of it as if it were a wild animal.

Her seamstresses stared at the collection with frowns.

The madame turned. “Your Grace, you have brought me what is almost une impossibilité. Almost.”

“I suspected you’d say something like it,” the duchess said.

Madame Beaumont disdainfully picked at a sequined butterfly. “These other London dressmakers, yes, they would say it is impossible. They are not France. Bien pour vous that you have come to me. Nothing is impossible for Madame Beaumont!”

“I will suppose that means you can do something with it,” the duchess said.

“We will need at least one dress ready on Wednesday, suitable for an Almack’s ball, and some of the day dresses fixed.

Further, make up six new day dresses and four gowns, you will understand the style I prefer.

The bonnets should be easily managed. Do send a message when you require us again. For now, I leave you to it.”

As they took their leave, Finella distinctly heard Madame Beaumont mutter, “She leaves us with this atrocité. Beaucoup de travail.”

Finella got back in the carriage rather downcast over Madame Beaumont’s very total disdain for her wardrobe. But then, she remembered she’d held the hand of the Duke of Greystone, and he’d smiled and said he did not regret it.

It had been something out of a Shakespeare play. The heroine comes to the aid of the wounded hero. Of course, Finella was not so delusional as to imagine there was anything else in it but a lovely memory.

Still, who could have imagined something like that would happen to her? She would hug that memory for all her life—the day she had held the duke’s hand in his desperate hour of need.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was the first of The League of Butlers meetings of a new season and Mr. Browning used his usual excuse for leaving the house on a Thursday afternoon.

He had, allegedly, six elderly aunts who had nobody else to depend on.

It was the easiest thing in the world to be required at their bedside for one reason or another—an apoplexy, a fall, a nervous condition, he’d even used a sudden bout of insanity last year.

There was no end of things that might happen to an elderly lady and with six of them stumbling round the town, his staff ought to be surprised he was not gone every day of the week.

What a few days it had been! Sir Edward, or Sir Idiot as the bargeman had very aptly named him, had brought back His Grace in a very wet condition.

They’d had to compensate the hackney driver for having to stop his business until the seats dried out.

The duke claimed there was not a thing wrong with him except almost drowning and he would just go upstairs and change his clothes.

Sir Henry was already awaiting him in his bedchamber and Mr. Browning was determined the duke must be prevented from casually brushing off the misadventure. He must be seen by the physician!

The butler had pulled out the ironclad argument that he used very sparingly and only when he had no other option. He’d deeply sighed and said, “I promised the duchess before she traveled to the great beyond that I would make certain you were always safe. I feel I have failed Her Grace.”

At the mention of his mother’s last wishes, the duke had sighed. “You won’t rest until I am seen by Sir Henry.”

“It would be impossible. Also, Sir Henry is in your bedchamber.”

The duke had trudged up the stairs to cooperate. Mr. Browning had never had a particular conversation with Her Grace about protecting the duke, but he could not think she’d be against it as she looked down from her heavenly perch.

He’d then turned to Sir Edward. In his best baritone, he simply said, “Sir Edward?” His words might mean any number of things.

It might mean he was asking if Sir Edward required refreshments.

Or, with the right tone applied to it, it might mean that he was denouncing Sir Edward as the most irresponsible person to ever cross the threshold of a Finstatten residence.

That fellow had hurriedly taken his leave, which indicated he had sufficiently understood Mr. Browning’s meaning at that particular moment.

Sir Henry had given the duke a thorough going over and was able to relieve Mr. Browning’s worry over broken bones.

There was not even a sprain. However, he had expressed concern over a lump on his head and the idea that the duke had likely swallowed water.

His head should be fine as long as he did not jostle it too much.

His stomach would probably be all right with the water, but Sir Henry claimed they must be watchful of the lungs.

If any of the Thames sloshed around the lungs, it could lead to various difficulties, some of which might be severe.

Severe! Mr. Browning had heard it as clear as a bell. The duke was in danger.

The duke had been advised to stay abed for twenty-four hours. He was very against it, but Mr. Browning had merely looked at the ceiling as if he once more apologized to the dead duchess for failing to protect her son. That had done the trick.

The duke proved to be an irascible patient, but he always had been. The household was well-prepared for the various shouts of “I’m bored” echoing through the corridors.