Lying awake past dawn, he restlessly considered impossible schemes, but all of them would tarnish Melissa and Sophie. His frustration was so great that he rose at nine a.m. without having slept. The only remaining path left to him was to go to Oaksey and explain their situation, tell him the amount of Melissa’s dowry, and tell him he had a clear field to offer for her. It might not work. Oaksey might not want what Frank did not value.
Breakfasting at Brook’s, he waited impatiently for the hour to reach eleven o’clock, the earliest possible hour that the ton would receive morning callers. Having previously obtained the man’s direction and sending up a prayer to Providence, he took a hackney to Oaksey’s rooms on Half Moon Street.
“I’m here to see Lord Oaksey,” he told the man’s valet, handing him his card.
“I am afraid his lordship is not at home,” the man said.
Frank felt disinclined to accept this answer after a sleepless night.
“Pray tell me when he will return.”
The valet appeared to consider. “I am afraid I could not say. It might be a week, but then again it might be two.”
Frank lost his patience. Word was that Oaksey was badly dipped. “Devil take it! I’m not here to dun him!”
The valet took umbrage, and viscount or no, he closed the door in Frank’s face.
Returning home, Frank was inclined to think he had lost his last chance. After sitting in his library, staring at his bookshelves for an indeterminate period of time, he set off for his club once more in extremely low spirits.
When he saw Lord Donald Aldridge’s face light up at his entrance, he nearly turned and walked back out.
“Lord Trowbridge,” the excited young man said, bearing a wide grin and sparkling eyes.”Let us take a stroll. I have news I think will interest you.”
Taken aback, Frank allowed Lord Donald to steer him back out through the club’s front door. When they had advanced only a matter of five hundred feet, he said, “This morning at breakfast, there was a note from my sister. You’ll never guess what she has done! Eloped to Scotland with that Oaksey bloke! You are off the hook!”
Frank closed his eyes and felt himself sway a bit. He took a deep breath.
Free, Free, I am Free! Then a horrible thought. “Your father did not take after them?”
“Are you joking? Oaksey is an earl. You’re only a viscount!”
Frank took off his beaver hat, tossing it in the air with a cry of victory. Clapping Lord Donald’s shoulder, he said, “You are a splendid chap!”
Sleeplessness vanished, Frank stepped out in the street to hail a hackney.
{ 39 }
SOPHIE WAS MASSAGING HER KNEE when Sally came into her dressing room. “Pardon me, miss, but Lord Trowbridge is below stairs. Mr. Perkins said how I was to tell you that it’s urgent.”
She had not slept well and found herself hoping that Frank was perhaps here with some hare-brained scheme to carry her off. She straightened her gown, looked briefly in the mirror to assure herself that her coiffure was intact, then scurried down to the morning room.
When she entered, Frank turned around and she stopped dead. His eyes were alight, his face wreathed in smiles.
“Yes, I will elope with you,” she said. “I do not care what anyone thinks. If you can bear the censure, then so can I!”
He stepped quickly to her and kissed her soundly. “No need, my love. It is Lady Melissa who has eloped. With Oaksey. He would seem to be her true love. And earl, you know. Her father is said to be pleased.”
Before the words could do more than startle her, Frank had picked her up and was twirling her around the room, singing, “What shall we do with a drunken sailor? What shall we do with a drunken sailor? Earlay in the morning …”
Into this lively scene stepped Buck, recently returned from Kent. “It is you who are drunk, Frank. Put the gel down.”
Sophie had been about to join in the ditty, finally comprehending that her fate was wholly changed. Instead, she ran to Buck and kissed his cheek. “Tell Fan! Frank and I can get married, after all! Melissa has eloped with Lord Oaksey! An earl, you know. Her father is said to be pleased.”
Buck grasped Sophie in an enthusiastic hug. “Drunken sailor, indeed!”
He went off up the stairs, whistling the sea ditty.
Sophie’s eyes welled with happy tears. “I cannot believe it, Frank. I have been quite melancholy, thinking there could be no way we could be together!
“I will obtain a special license,” he said. “We can be married tomorrow if we like.”
Sophie summoned a stern look. “While that should be very agreeable, I would like a terribly long honeymoon, and you are forgetting my musicale. The invitations have gone out and the Carstairs are counting on me.”
“I have always wanted to be married by special license,” he replied firmly. “So we shall simply marry and leave the day after your concert.”
“Leave for where?”
“That is my secret,” Frank said, kissing her forehead.
Fanny must have flown down the stairs. Her hug and ecstatic cry of “Sophie, I am thrilled!” finally penetrated Sophie’s heart.
It is really happening! I really am going to marry Frank! Our dream is really coming true!
{ 40 }