Minton was already sorting through the bags. Sending Clarissa ahead with Mimms and the housekeeper, Sophie came to her aunt’s other side. Together, she and Horatio supported a rapidly wilting Lucilla up
the stairs and along a dim and drafty corridor to a large chamber. Mimms was in charge there; the bed was turned down, the housekeeper dispatched for a warming pan. A fire was cracking into life in the grate.
They quickly helped Lucilla to bed, laying her back on the soft pillows and tucking the covers about her. Once installed, she regained a little colour. She opened her eyes and regarded them ruefully. And sniffed. “This is terrible. I’ve organized it all—there are twenty-seven people on their way here. They’ll all arrive before dinner. And if the rain persists, they’ll need to be entertained for the next two days.”
“Don’t worry about anything,” Horatio said, patting her hand. But even he was frowning as the ordeal before them became clear.
“But you haven’t a hostess.” Lucilla put her handkerchief to her nose, cutting off what sounded like a tearful wail. She blinked rapidly.
Sophie straightened her shoulders. “I’m sure I can manage, with Uncle Horatio and Great Aunt Evangeline behind me. It’s not as if you were not in the house—I can check any details with you. And it’s not as if there were no chaperons. You told me yourself you’ve invited a number of matrons.”
Lucilla’s woeful expression lightened. Her frown turned pensive. “I suppose…” For a moment, all was silent. Then, “Yes,” she finally announced, and nodded. “It just might work. But,” she said, raising rueful eyes to Sophie’s face, “I’m awfully afraid, my dear, that it will be no simple matter.”
Relieved to have averted immediate catastrophe, for if Lucilla broke down, that would certainly follow, Sophie smiled with totally false confidence. “You’ll see, we’ll contrive.”
Those words seemed to have become a catchphrase of her Season, Sophie mused as, an hour later, she sat in the front parlour, off the entrance hall, the guest list in her hand.
After assuring themselves that Lucilla was settled and resigned to her bed, she and Clarissa and Horatio had gone to pay their respects to Aunt Evangeline. It had been years since Sophie had met her ageing relative; the years had not been kind to Aunt Evangeline. She was still ambulatory, but her wits were slowly deserting her. Still, she recognized Horatio, even though she was apparently ineradicably convinced that Clarissa was Lucilla and Sophie her dead mother, Maria. They had given up trying to correct the misapprehension, concentrating instead on explaining their current predicament. Whether or not they had succeeded was moot, but at least Aunt Evangeline had given them a free hand to order things as they wished.
Nevertheless, the prospect of having to keep a weather eye out for an old dear who, so the housekeeper had gently informed them, was full of curiosity and prone to wandering the corridors at all hours draped in shawls that dragged their fringes on the floor, was hardly comforting.
A sound came from outside. Sophie lifted her head, listening intently. The wind was rising, whistling about the eaves. Rain fell steadily, driving in gusts against the windows, masking other sounds. Then came the unmistakable jingle of harness. Sophie rose. The first of her aunt’s guests had arrived. Girding her loins, she tugged the bell-pull and went out into the hall.
From the very first, it was bedlam. The Billinghams—Mrs. Billingham and both of her daughters—were the first to arrive. By the time they had descended from their carriage and negotiated the steps, their carriage dresses were soaked to the knees.
“Oh, how dreadful! Mama, I’m dripping!” The younger Miss Billingham looked positively shocked.
Mrs. Billingham, if anything even damper than her daughters, was not disposed to give comfort. “Indeed, Lucy, I don’t know what you’re complaining about. We’re all wet—and now here’s a to-do with Mrs. Webb ill. I’m not at all sure we shouldn’t turn round and return to town.”
“Oh no, Mama—you couldn’t be so cruel!” The plaintive wail emanated from the elder Miss Billingham.
“Indeed, Mrs. Billingham, there’s really no need.” Smoothly, Sophie cut in, clinging to her usual calm. “Everything’s organized and I’m sure my aunt would not wish you to withdraw purely on account of her indisposition.”
Mrs. Billingham humphed. “Well, I suppose with your uncle present and myself and the other ladies, there’s really no impropriety.”
“I seriously doubt my aunt would ever countenance any,” Sophie replied, her smile a trifle strained.
“We’ll stay at least until the morning.” Mrs. Billingham cast a darkling glance out of the open door. “Perhaps by then the weather will have eased. I’ll make a decision then.”
With that declaration, Mrs. Billingham allowed herself to be shown to her chamber.
Hard on the Billinghams’ heels came Lord Ainsley. His lordship had unwisely driven out in his curricle, and he was soaked to the skin. He tried hard to smile, but his chattering teeth made it difficult.
Sophie was horrified, visions of guests catching their deaths whirling through her mind. Issuing orders left and right—for hot baths and mustard to ward off chills, for the staff to make sure all the fires were blazing—she turned from the sight of Lord Ainsley’s back disappearing up the stairs to behold a bedraggled Lord Annerby on the doorstep.
And so it went, on through the afternoon, while outside a preternatural darkness descended.
Belle Chessington and her equally cheery mother were amongst the last to arrive.
“What a perfectly appalling afternoon,” Mrs. Chessington remarked as she came forward with a smile, hand outstretched.
Sophie heaved an inward sigh of relief. The Marquess of Huntly, another who had unwisely opted to drive himself, was dripping all over the hall flags. Her little speech now well rehearsed, Sophie quickly made Lucilla’s indisposition known, then smoothed away their exclamations with assurances of their welcome. Horatio had retreated to the main parlour to play host to those gentlemen who had already descended, looking for something to warm themselves while they waited for the dinner gong.
The Chessingtons and the marquess took the news in their stride. They were about to head upstairs when a tremendous sneeze had them all turning to the door.
Mr. Somercote stood on the threshold, a pitiful sight with water running in great rivers from his coattails.
“My dear sir!” Belle Chessington swept back along the hall to drag the poor gentleman in.