Page 28 of Lady Scandal
“Indeed? All this is from last night?” At Ricardo’s nod of confirmation, Delia thought again of Calderon’s set-to with the duchess, and she had a pretty fair idea of why the man had decided to embark on a bout of alcoholic excess afterward. It was also, she reflected in amusement, why he was feeling unwell today. “Poor fellow,” she said and had to bite her lip to hide her smile. “He seems to have accumulated quite a bill.”
“He and his friend were in the bar before dinner, and then they came back a few hours later and stayed the rest of the evening. I can’t be sure, but I believe they were still there when I departed at midnight.”
“Quite a night,” she replied, donning as grave an expression as she could manage. “But I’m not sure what the problem is, Ricardo.”
“He’s management, my lady. The hotel usually doesn’t charge management for liquor, as you know. I can’t imagine why Mr. Wells would even do up a ticket for it, but it was here with the other tickets when I came in this morning. And since Mr. Wells is not in yet, I can’t ask him about it.”
“Why don’t you just put the ticket through with all the others and let the bookkeepers sort it out?”
“I don’t know what Mr. Agostini will say about that, I really don’t.” As he mentioned the head cashier’s name, his frown of worry deepened, and Delia immediately knew what was needed.
“Put the ticket through and charge Calderon’s room,” she told him. “If Mr. Agostini questions you about it, tell him I told you to do it.”
“Thank you, my lady.” Clearly relieved to cede responsibility to a higher authority, he set the ticket aside. “What can I do for you this morning?”
“I need the reservation book.”
Ricardo pulled the volume in question out from behind the counter and placed it before her. Opening it, Delia began flippingpages as she reached for a pencil, but when she located the page for the seventh of June, her fingers froze.
Devlin Sharpe. Wedding banquet. Sixty guests. HMS Pinafore Room.
She stared at the page in disbelief, not only because the Savoy’s largest banqueting room had somehow been reserved without her knowledge, but also because of the name of the man who had reserved it.
“Devlin Sharpe?” she murmured, reading the entry again, hardly able to believe it. “Devlin Sharpe is getting married?”
“It sounds as if you know the gentleman, my lady.”
At the sound of Ricardo’s voice, Delia looked up. “Not really,” she said slowly and looked down at the book again.
It had to be the same man. The name was not a common one. So, Kay’s long-lost love, the scoundrel who had persuaded her to an underhanded elopement fifteen years earlier, then ruined her reputation when she changed her mind, was getting married on the same day she was, and he wanted the same banqueting room? It was such an incredible coincidence that Delia couldn’t help wondering if his choice was deliberate. She’d never met Sharpe herself, but from what she knew of the man, it would be just like him to try to throw a spanner in the works and hurt Kay’s plans. But how, Delia wondered, had Sharpe managed to reserve the same banquet room that she had promised Kay? The only people who were allowed to reserve banquet rooms were Ritz, Echenard, and herself. How had this happened?
“Ricardo?” She looked up again. “Echenard isn’t back from his holiday yet, is he?”
“No, my lady.”
And Ritz, she knew, was still in Rome. “Then who put this entryin the reservation book?” she asked, tapping the appropriate line on the page with her finger as she spoke. “Do you know?”
The young clerk leaned over the desk to glance at the entry. “Oh, that was Lord Calderon,” he said as he straightened.
Of course. She should have known. That man had his finger in every pie. Was it any wonder Ritz resented him?
“He came by here with Mr. Sharpe as they were going out to dinner and had me put the entry in the book. They seem to be quite old friends.”
The fact that Calderon would do something like this without consulting with her wasn’t a surprise, but that a man like Devlin Sharpe was his friend did take her aback a little. Calderon was so damned buttoned-down and straightlaced that having Devlin Sharpe as a friend seemed rather incongruous.
“Being he’s in charge now,” Ricardo went on, sounding anxious in the wake of her silence, “I thought it was all right. It’s for Mr. Sharpe’s wedding banquet. He’s marrying an earl’s daughter, I understand, and it’s to be a big affair. Sixty guests, I heard them say. That’s why Lord Calderon wants the HMS Pinafore.”
“Oh, he’ll get the Pinafore all right,” Delia muttered and slammed the book shut. “Over my dead body.”
“My lady?”
But Delia had already turned away, and as she headed back to her office, she realized that her current method of dealing with Calderon was just not going to work. Granted, it had been amusing to hand the outraged Lord Synby over to him and duck out, and an absolute delight to watch him face down the formidable Duchess of Moreland. But such pleasures, she appreciated with chagrin, were very short-lived and would not be at all helpful in solving her immediate problem. But what could she do? As she asked herself that, the words of Ritz’s telegram echoed through her mind.
Calderon wants to ruin everything I’ve built at the Savoy. Do not help him do it.
Easy for César to say, she thought in aggravation. He was a thousand miles away. She was here, and she had a problem that only Calderon could resolve. In this case, at least, her strategy of standing by while his policies backfired was untenable.
Kay’s wedding would be in the midst of the London season. By the time the consequences of Calderon’s other decisions came back to bite him, Kay would have been obliged to choose a different venue for her wedding banquet. Kay had been through hell at the hands of Devlin Sharpe. Allowing that man to cause her any more grief was a nauseating prospect and one Delia absolutely refused to accept.
