The Counterfeit Lady

“Sir Broderick sent me over to fill you in and to ask if you need any help. I’m not to meet with Jacob again until the day after tomorrow.”

“You’ll have to come to our house in Mayfair. We’ve been summoned to begin that part of the investigation this afternoon,” I told him.

“What reason do I give for calling at a house in Mayfair?” Sumner asked.

“Play the role of my gentleman caller,” Emma said. “I think Phyllida and Georgina will be lenient employers, as long as I get my work done.”

I nodded. “Good idea.”

Emma and Sumner gri

The bell over the shop door rang and, seeing Frances was busy, I went to greet our new customer. When I glanced over a few minutes later, Sumner and Emma were carrying on a hushed conversation, using hand gestures for emphasis. I couldn’t tell what they were discussing, but Emma did not look pleased.

We’d finished with our customers by the time Phyllida reappeared with a holdall. Frances wished us well and told me she could handle the rest of the day in the shop by herself. Emma took Phyllida’s bag and they walked outside. After hurried last-minute instructions to Frances, I followed them and flagged down a hire carriage that looked reputable. The inside had been swept recently and the seats weren’t torn, so we wouldn’t look out of place when we arrived in Mayfair.

The house the duke and Phyllida had chosen was on a quiet side street, its brick front measuring four windows wide on the floors above the entrance. We walked up the three front steps rising over the kitchen entrance, Emma taking the holdall. The front door was opened by a young man in livery. “Welcome, your ladyship.”

Phyllida smiled at him. “Thomas, our cousin Mrs. Monthalf has arrived. Georgina, this is our footman, Thomas. You’ll meet the rest of the staff shortly. Emma, if you’ll take the case upstairs to Mrs. Monthalf’s room. Second door on the left. I hope you’ll like it, Georgina.”

“I’m sure I will. Everything’s been a bit overwhelming since I arrived.”

“Prepare to be even more overwhelmed. We’re attending Lady Francis’s musical evening tonight, and her entertainments are always inspiring.”

All this conversation in front of the staff was a trial if you weren’t born to that world, and I wasn’t. At home, I never had to deal with cleaners and tradesmen, because Phyllida handled all that for me while I was in the bookshop. Now we’d have servants around all the time. What did the wealthy do during the day if they weren’t working, while their servants kept busy around them? “May I see the house?”

“Of course.” Phyllida took me on a guided tour of the ground floor (dining room and morning room) and the first floor (main parlor and back parlor/study), and then we climbed to the second floor. Her bedroom was next door to mine, also facing the street, but smaller. Mine had the dressing room that led to the back room where Emma would sleep. This high up, with all the bedroom doors and windows open, we were blessed with a little breeze.

“Both our rooms have sea chests,” Emma whispered, “where our clothes from Madame Leclerc’s are packed. Give me a hand in unpacking.”

We did, while Phyllida kept a watch out for any servants. One of the toughest things I’d face was hiding my lifelong habit of jumping in and helping at whatever task needed to be done.

I couldn’t resist ru

One part of this investigation would be a pleasure. I’d had neither the money nor the reason to dress in finery before.

Before we were half finished, carters arrived with two more sea chests, one carried up to Phyllida’s room and one to mine. I tipped the two men, and a maid showed them out. We opened them to find more silks, more colors, and new shifts and petticoats and nightgowns in soft, cool cotton. My hands slid over everything, reveling in the freshness while the rest of London felt stale.

We’d almost finished when we heard a jangle like my shop doorbell. A moment later, we heard male voices and then footsteps on the stairs. A maid stood in the doorway to my room, a silver tray in her hands.

Phyllida reached out and picked up the calling card on its shiny surface. “Well, well. The Duke of Blackford has come to call.”

CHAPTER FIVE

PHYLLIDA and I walked downstairs to find Blackford waiting for us in the parlor. He rose when we walked into the room decorated in dark purple and light blue. I curtsied and then walked over to the first window and shoved the draperies back as far as possible to get more light into the room. Then I opened the window.

“You don’t like the house?” Blackford asked.

“It’s by far the nicest leased house I’ve ever seen. Right now, I hope to get a breeze through the room.” I opened the draperies in the second window and tugged until the sash rose a few inches.

“What have you learned so far?”

“I have customers who will cheat me if they deal with Sir Broderick in my absence.” I shoved the third window drapes back and tugged on the wooden frame. It was stuck. “I also learned this afternoon I’m going to Lord and Lady Francis’s musical evening tonight.”

“You sound upset.”

“I wish you would tell me things before the last moment.” I yanked on the window. Still stuck. “Is Phyllida also invited?”

“Yes. But you’re the one who needs to flirt with me so we can begin our affair in record time.”

Affair? Record time? I jerked on the window and it flew up. I set the lace curtains to rights and turned to face the duke. “Aren’t you supposed to flirt with me?”

“I will, Mrs. Monthalf, but you have to flirt back. From the look on your face, I’d say that won’t happen.”

“What kind of a woman do you think I am?” I didn’t think wealthy Mrs. Monthalf would fall for a duke so quickly.

Phyllida looked from one to the other of us and slipped from the room.

The duke walked over to me and cupped my face in his hand. He didn’t squeeze my cheeks or hurt me in any way, but I couldn’t have moved if I tried. And I didn’t want to try. Standing so close to him I could smell old leather and older whiskey. “I think you’re a woman who was in love with me when we were younger, but I failed to ask for your hand and Mr. Monthalf did. You left and I never saw you again. You’re back in my life now, and I won’t make the same mistake twice.”

He held my gaze with his dark, mesmerizing eyes, and I felt the power of his declaration. For an instant, I thought he was talking to me. My heart soared. Then I remembered I was middle-class, he was a duke, and he was talking about the woman I was pretending to be. The duke’s primary interest was the fate of an empire, which rested on finding the plans for a warship.

Blast.

After I recovered from my deflating realization, I asked, “Where did we meet, Your Grace? Here in London?”

“Too many people would wonder why they couldn’t remember you. I spent time in India. You could have been living with your British army officer father. Then you married Monthalf and moved to another colony, and I came home.”