Page 19 of Lady Ferocity (A Series of Senseless Complications #1)

F elicity had been grateful that her sisters had gone to bed early. Most of them, anyway. Grace and Patience had still been awake and reading in the drawing room, but she’d claimed she came home because of a headache and could not bear to speak. They sensibly let her be, though it would have tortured Patience to do so.

Mrs. Right had not looked particularly fooled, especially not with the glance her father had given the housekeeper, but that good lady always knew when one of them wished to talk or preferred to be left alone.

She awoke to an early dawn that promised a sunny day, which seemed a rebuke to her mood. Felicity had not slept much, her stinging feelings, which only served to fuel her temper, did not like rest and repose. They only wished to rage and shake the windows.

It did not help that she considered herself a first-rate idiot for falling for Mr. Stratton’s charms. Really, when she thought about it, he was charming to everybody. He’d even been charming to Valor.

It was the tiger that had pushed her over the edge of commonsense. He’d saved her from a tiger. She supposed she might have been anybody at all and Mr. Stratton would have done just the same.

Felicity gripped the bed sheets in a fist. She had been taken down a notch. She had been shown she was not all that alluring. Perhaps all along, Mr. Stratton had his eyes on Lady Mary—that lady of the frothy blond curls who was supposed to be the season’s diamond of the first water.

It was infuriating.

There was a quiet tap on the door, though it was still very early. Mrs. Right came in with a cup of tea in hand. “Extra milk, just as you like it,” the lady said. “I thought I might pop my head in before your sisters are up.”

“You can tell something has happened before even being told it,” Felicity said.

“It was as clear as day that something happened, though not at all clear what it was.”

Felicity poured out the story.

Mrs. Right sighed. “I did not take that gentleman to be a bounder, though I should have known.”

“Yes, you did say before we even left Yorkshire that they were all feckless.”

“So I did, and yet I thought…”

“It is no matter, Mrs. Right, I was just as fooled as everybody, and I spent far more time with that gentleman than you did. I suppose even Papa was fooled.”

Mrs. Right’s expression took a sudden turn. “Your father,” she whispered. “Heaven help Mr. Stratton with whatever the duke will send his way.”

Wishing to relieve Mrs. Right’s mind on that front, she said, “Oh, you are not to worry about anything of that sort. Papa did consider wringing Mr. Stratton’s neck, but I dissuaded him from it.”

Mrs. Right did not look as comforted as she imagined the lady would. “Well, let us hope he does not have any other ideas come to him,” Mrs. Right said.

Before Felicity could answer, her door was flung open and Grace, Patience, Serenity, Verity, Winsome, and Valor streamed into the room.

Piling on Felicity’s bed, Patience said, “I hope your headache is gone, we could not wait for you to come down. Valor was helping Charlie practice answering the door again and he told her something… well, it was surprising.”

Valor sat up straight, pleased to be the bearer of news. “Charlie said that our coachman has been sent to buy up as many chains of all descriptions as he can find and then he is to drop them at Mr. Stratton’s doorstep.”

Felicity leaned back on her pillows. She ought to have known that her father would not sit back and do nothing. She had convinced him not to wring Mr. Stratton’s neck, but she had not extracted a promise not to do anything else.

“What does it mean, Felicity?” Grace asked. “Why is Mr. Stratton to be in receipt of chains?”

“Because according to Mr. Wiles,” Felicity said, “Mr. Stratton has said many times that he will not be chained by marriage.”

“Not chained by marriage?” Patience asked. “What is he planning if he is not to be chained in marriage? Is he to live alone for the rest of his life?”

“That I do not know,” Felicity said. “He means to avoid matrimony for now and has tricked his father into believing that he prefers me, but that I prefer Mr. Wiles. I suppose that at some point, he will be bowled over by some lady, but that time is not now and that lady is not me.”

A tear rolled down Serenity’s cheek. “I am so sad I could cry, Felicity.”

“You are crying,” Winsome pointed out.

Felicity did not point out that she was so sad she could cry too, as she did not like to cry in front of people, not even her sisters.

“So Papa has heard of this idea that Mr. Stratton will not be chained and has sent chains to aggravate him,” Winsome said.

“A well-known insult in a case such as this,” Verity said.

“How would you know?” Winsome asked, narrowing her eyes.

“Everybody in the world knows it but you,” Verity said. “Why else would Papa have thought to do it?”

“I think Papa has been wonderful to do it,” Patience said. “Mr. Stratton deserved a good scolding and think how heavy all those chains will be to move. And move them to where, I wonder? It will be very inconvenient.”

“Mr. Stratton deserves more than an inconvenience, to my mind,” Mrs. Right said in a grim tone.

“Oh, do you think our father will do something else?” Grace asked.

“I’ve no idea,” Mrs. Right said.

“I wish I could send Mr. Stratton something terrible,” Valor said. “He tricked me into thinking he was a good person by talking about the weather so nicely.”

“We would all like to send him something terrible,” Winsome said.

“I think Mrs. Wendover might like to write him a very terrible letter,” Valor said.

Felicity was not certain what a letter from Valor’s stuffed rabbit would say, but she gave it little thought as she was certain Valor would never get around to doing it.

“What shall you do when you see him, Felicity?” Grace asked.

“I shan’t see him. I do not wish to go anywhere he might be. I will only go to small affairs where he is not likely to appear.”

“You do not go to the rout this evening, then?” Patience asked.

“Certainly not. I intend to have an evening in with my very genial sisters and shall be happy to do it.”

“And have an evening in with Mrs. Wendover,” Valor added.

Felicity nodded. “Of course, Mrs. Wendover.”

She supposed that would be her life now—having a night in with Mrs. Wendover.

*

Percy had not yet descended the stairs, as he’d been up very late thinking about Lady Felicity. It was after eleven o’clock in the morning and Radcliff was just now putting the finishing touches on his neckcloth when they heard a terrible shriek from downstairs.

“That sounded like your father,” Radcliff whispered.

“What now?” Percy asked.

The next half-minute was taken up with the viscount shouting a string of oaths.

“I’d best go and see, I suppose,” Percy said. “Perhaps his warnings to my mother have finally come to something and he’s very predictably ended on the wrong side of the stick. I’ve told him before, the viscountess will push back if pushed too far.”

“I’ll wait here,” Radcliff said.

“Coward,” Percy said, hurrying from the room.

What he found below stairs was an interesting scene. His father was holding one hand in the other and hopping, the front doors were flung open, and the front steps were covered in iron chains of various sizes.

Before he could inquire into what had happened, the viscount shouted, “I fell! I wished to step out for some fresh air and fell over on top of that heap of metal. My finger is broken, and my toe might be too!”

“Why is it there, though?” Percy asked. “Did you order it?”

“Why would I order all that? Do I look like I’m deranged?”

Percy did not answer, as the old soldier did look rather deranged at the moment.

“Of course I did not order it!”

“Then what is it doing there?” Percy asked.

“How should I know!” the viscount shrieked.

Just then, his mother came out of the drawing room. She looked about and said, “Gracious, why have you had that pile delivered to the doorstep? How are we to come and go with that in the way? Are we meant to jump over it?”

As his father began the predictable shouting, peppered with “I warn you,” Percy stepped outside.

It really was a significant amount of chains, in all sizes, some looking new and some well-used, all piled atop one another. He supposed that somebody had ordered such a conglomeration and it had been delivered to the wrong house. How odd that it would have been dumped at the front doors though. One might have thought the driver would have knocked and inquired or put it in the mews out of sight, at the very least.

As he stared at it, he noted a small paper folded up among the chains. He reached down for it, certain it would reveal the address this mess was supposed to go to.

He unfolded it.

You will not be chained, eh?

Percy fumbled and nearly dropped the note. It was obviously from the duke, as nobody but that gentleman used the term “eh” as much as he did.

Lady Felicity had told her father all about the ruse before he even had a chance to explain!

He would not be chained; he’d said so many times. And now, just as he’d changed his mind about chains, his words had come back to haunt him by way of a pile of chains.

Percy slipped the note into a pocket, turned round, and went back into the house. His father had calmed somewhat, or at least as calm as he ever was. The viscountess had made arrangements for someone to climb over the pile of chains to fetch a doctor and she’d poured the viscount a glass of brandy.

“I’ll get to the bottom of whose idea of a joke this was,” the viscount said.

“What is the joke, though?” the viscountess asked.

The viscount did not answer, as he was too worn out to even warn his lady.

“I’m sure it was simply delivered to the wrong address,” Percy said. “While we wait to be informed of the rightful owner, we can have the grooms move it to the mews.”

The viscount nodded his consent to the idea, the brandy going a good way to soothing him.

Before Percy could make that arrangement, a young man appeared on the other side of the pile of chains. A young man in the duke’s livery. A young man who Percy recognized as the duke’s footman.

“A message for Mr. Stratton, sirs,” the lad called, holding out folded paper.

Percy hurried out. It seemed the duke was not satisfied to leave a note in the pile of chains but had written him a letter too.

He reached over the pile of chains, took the letter, and tipped the boy a coin. Percy slipped it into a pocket along with the other note.

“What is it? Who is it from?” the viscount asked querulously.

“Oh, from Magnon,” Percy said casually. “He said he would write about… a matter. Well! Everything seems to be in good order here, I’ll just go above stairs—Radcliff is not finished fussing with my knot.”

Percy took the stairs two at a time, leaving the viscountess to manage her viscount. He hurried into his room and shut the door behind him. Radcliff stood staring expectantly.

“The condensed version of events downstairs is that the Duke of Pelham has had chains of all sorts piled high on our doorstep, my father fell over them and broke his finger and probably his toe, there was a note tucked into the pile that said, ‘You will not be chained, eh?’ and then the duke’s footman arrived with a letter addressed to me. My father does not know about the note or the letter, did not recognize the duke’s livery, nor yet guessed where the chains came from.”

Radcliff looked as bowled over by the report as was to be expected. It was not everyday that one’s doorstep was piled with chains and one’s father broke appendages falling over them.

Percy pulled the letter out of his pocket, dreading what it would say. He hoped the duke did not plan to call him to a green for insulting his daughter, even though he was well aware that the gentleman had a habit of not turning up at the appointed hour for such meetings.

He broke the seal and slowly unfolded it, not failing to notice that Radcliff had casually moved next to him to read over his shoulder.

Mr. Stratton,

We are very dispointed disappointted disappointed in you. We thought you were nice but you are mean! Everybody knows being mean is very bad. You are a terrible person. We hope my Papa wraps you in chains and throws you in a lake.

Lady Valor Nicolet and Mrs. Persephone Wendover

“Valor,” Radcliff said, “she is the youngest.”

“Yes.”

“Who is Mrs. Wendover?”

“Her stuffed rabbit,” Percy said.

“Well now, that’s a rather murderous stuffed bunny,” Radcliff said with a snort. “I suppose you ought to be grateful the duke left the chains on your doorstep, rather than take Lady Valor’s advice to wrap you in them to drop you in a lake.”

“Now the whole family is against me, even the youngest of them and the inanimate among them.”

“What will you do?” Radcliff asked.

Up until this moment, Percy had not been sure what he would do. He had a vague plan of finding Lady Felicity at the rout this evening and explaining himself.

However, Valor had done him a service. She had left him an opening. She had written to him, so he could write her back. Whatever he wrote, he was certain Lady Valor would show it to Lady Felicity.

“Get me my writing things. Lady Valor deserves a timely response to her heartfelt letter.”

*

Mrs. Right did not often find herself ready to explode with anger. Mostly, she was amused by the things in her view. Even a butler needing to be driven out of the house had its amusing moments.

What did not amuse her, though, was any attack or insult to one of her girls. That, she had discovered long ago, really set her off.

She remembered as if it were yesterday the grim denouement with a farmer down the road in Yorkshire. That fellow claimed her girls were disturbing his sheep by firing off their fowling pieces at all hours. Helder, that was his name, had gone so far as to name them heathens and claim they ought to have more feminine dignity if they were to go round announcing themselves as ladies.

Very naturally, Mrs. Right had been forced to put an end to it. What frightened sheep more than gunfire? Wolves. Though there were no wolves left in England, it had been built into their instincts to fear them, handed down from one generation to the next. Anybody could see a sheep’s reaction when faced with a large, rangy, dark dog with pointed ears. If that dog happened to show its teeth, expect a stampede.

Mrs. Right had got to work with needle, thread, stuffing, two black buttons for eyes, and some masterful strokes of paint. She fashioned a wolf’s head and attached it to a tree by the gate the farmer used to move his sheep into his far field to graze. She positioned it as if the wolf was cagily peering round the tree, hiding in wait. The coloring of it was very similar to the tree bark it was attached to. It could easily be overlooked. Except overlooked by a herd of sheep—they were attuned to danger, always on the lookout for it, and it only took one of them to notice and send out the alarm to the rest of them.

The farmer could not reason out why the sheep had to be forced through that gate, and neither could the herd dogs. For some weeks, he spent vast amounts of time wrangling them through it, the bleats of panicked sheep carrying a half mile.

Even after he got them into the field, they huddled together far away from the gate and did not eat as much as they should have. Then he had the further trouble of bringing the herd through it again.

Then one day, the farmer discovered her fashioned wolf’s head, ripped it from the tree, and came marching over to speak to the duke.

Mrs. Right had answered the door, gave him a severe dressing down, took the wolf’s head from his hands, beat him over the head with it, and slammed the door in his face.

When that devil went to the vicar to complain, Mrs. Right simply asked for the evidence, which could not be produced because she’d taken it from him and promptly thrown it into the kitchen fire. She’d slipped on her best affronted matron demeanor and asked the vicar how it was to be believed that she would have sewn a wolf’s head and attached it to a tree. Perhaps Mr. Helder was losing his wits.

Not a word of complaint was ever again spoken about the girls’ fowling pieces.

Now, though, what could she do? Managing a farmer was easy work. Punishing Mr. Stratton for toying with Felicity’s heart was a bit trickier.

She would think of something, though. Mr. Stratton would pay dearly for hurting her girl. Mrs. Right would see to it.

*

The day had passed slowly and Felicity began to wonder if time would always go so slow, now that she was in possession of disappointed hopes.

Her sisters had rallied round her and did their very best to cheer her. Her father had been surprised that she did not wish to go to the rout that evening, but he had not pressed her over it. Rather, he had ordered her favorite dinner, which everybody knew was a baked chicken with potatoes quartered and roasted until they were just shy of burned, a simple greens salad, rolls with ample butter, and berry tarts for dessert. He further attempted to cheer her by ordering up one of the good Canary wines from the cellars.

Over dinner, Patience had posited that Mr. Stratton was not worth worrying over. Felicity would meet some gentleman far superior and find herself glad to forget all about a gentleman who proved himself so unsteady.

Serenity counseled rising early to view the sunrise, as it would teach her heart that a new day had dawned.

Grace hoped that Felicity would recover her spirits in time, and that time was hoped to be a short time.

Verity announced that the time that was very usual to recover from such things was six days.

It was not a surprise to anyone that Winsome challenged that idea. For all Verity knew of it, she said, it might be five days.

Valor had brought Mrs. Wendover to dinner and told Felicity that her friend was very disappointed in Mr. Stratton, and had taken steps.

As Felicity did not know what steps could be taken by a stuffed rabbit, she chose to simply appreciate the sentiment.

Her father poured her an extra glass of the Canary and said he’d answered Mr. Stratton’s insult and hoped that young idiot fell over his answer.

“Fall over the chains, Papa?” Valor asked.

“That’s right,” he said nodding.

“Maybe he broke his neck,” Valor said in a gruesomely hopeful tone.

The rest of her sisters agreed with that sentiment and nodded. Sisterly loyalty could really be very touching.

The family eventually made their way into the drawing room and Mrs. Right joined them after supervising below stairs. They played lottery tickets for a while and then lapsed into desultory conversation.

They were all mightily surprised when they heard the door knocker smartly rapped.