Earls Trip

18 - Girls Just Want to Have Fun

18

Girls Just Want to Have Fun

“That was not nearly as horrible as I was expecting,” Olive whispered to Clementine. They were in the parlor in London, and Father was seeing Archie out. Their return had been anticlimactic—at least so far; Clementine had no doubt there was more to come. Archie’s leave-taking had been anticlimactic, too. Archie had merely bowed to Clementine—and to Olive, as if Olive and Clementine were interchangeable in his estimation—and taken his leave as if it were an ordinary day. As if they were ordinary friends.

Which, she supposed, they were.

He had given no indication, on the journey from Cumbria, that he thought of her as anything else. Of course, he could not have done otherwise. They’d all been on top of each other, both in the coach and in the inns they stayed in along the way. But Archie’s indifference, which had been so dismayingly convincing, left her wondering: Had all that occurred between them been a mere fever dream?

“All in all,” Olive continued, “it could have been much worse.”

“Oh, it will get worse,” Clementine said. “Mark my words.”

“You think so?”

“Once we are alone, yes.” Clementine leaned forward to try to see her way out into the foyer where Archie and Father were still talking in low tones.

“Hmm,” Olive said. “I wouldn’t have thought Father would censor himself around Archie, given all that Archie has done for us, but I suppose you are correct.”

“I am correct.” Clementine gave up her attempt at eavesdropping and slumped back on the settee. “Alas.”

Indeed, she was proven so not a minute later when Father reappeared, the graciousness and gratitude he had directed at Archie no longer in evidence. She braced herself as he sat across from them. She started to take Olive’s hand but stopped. They’d been holding hands so much lately, but was that another thing that was now only a fever dream? That last night at Quintrell Castle, when she’d given up Archie in favor of lying in Olive’s bed, holding her hand, and listening to her talk about Ralph—what was going to happen to all that had been said that night? Would it change things permanently between the sisters, or would they slip back into their old ways, pretending Olive’s confessions had not occurred?

When Father did not speak, when he merely pondered them—and not even grumpily—Clementine entertained the notion that perhaps she had been wrong. Perhaps the drama of Clementine’s botched engagement and Olive’s botched elopement had finally made Father see. He had embraced both girls—one arm for each—in an uncharacteristically sentimental display the moment they arrived. Perhaps that meant something. Perhaps things were going to change.

Clementine had been plotting how to roll out her plan, but she decided it was better to merely ask. To strike while the iron was hot, so to speak, and not dissemble. “Father, I should like to go to Hill House, spend some time there.” When he didn’t say anything, and in the name of not dissembling, she added, “A great deal of time. In fact, I should like to retire there.”

He regarded her for a beat, his face unchanged, before he said, “No. I forbid it.” He spoke with a calmness that unnerved Clementine. The anger she had expected had not materialized. He was just . . . blank.

“You shall both be under my thumb,” he said with more of that unnerving equanimity. “You shall be here in the house at all times, unless I am with you. You shan’t go out without me. Not with each other, not with a maid, not with any chaperone other than me. I shan’t let you out of my sight until I give you to your future husbands in front of the vicar. You, Clementine, may return to Chiddington for your wedding and not a day before.”

Stunned, Clementine considered voicing a challenge. Not so much to the content of what Father had said—not to the confinement he was imposing—but to the idea that her future would contain a wedding. She tried to reach back for some of the certainty she’d felt at Quintrell Castle, and even before that, on her flight after Olive and Theo. She had been so resolved, possessed of a quiet but firmly entrenched confidence that she would finally have it out with Father on the topic of matrimony, that she would make him see.

She was so tired. The journey had been long. Her body was sore.

Her heart was sore.

“Wash up,” Father stood, and he was speaking in that same unnervingly flat tone. “Confer with Mrs. Henning about this evening’s menu, for Lord Harcourt and his friends are returning to dine with us.”

“They are?” Olive exclaimed, and Clementine wanted to cry. The excitement in Olive’s tone was unwarranted. This would not be a dinner like any they’d had this past fortnight. It was to be merely a performance: of Father thanking Archie, and of Father shutting the door on Clementine’s cage. She consoled herself that at least she now knew about Olive’s motives in accumulating pin money. If Clementine had no other reason to live, at least she could help Olive in that quest.

“Yes, before they all scatter to the winds, I must thank them.” Father pursed his lips, confirming Clementine’s previous assessment. “For averting your ruination, Olive.” He turned to Clementine. “And yours.”

* * *

The last thing Archie wanted to do was to dine with the Morgans, but he hadn’t been able to see his way through to declining Sir Albert’s invitation.

Well, he wanted to dine with one Morgan. Or perhaps two. He was fond of Olive.

Or perhaps even three, for he was . . . well, he wasn’t sure if he was fond of Sir Albert, but he did respect him.

Didn’t he?

Sir Albert was Father’s oldest friend.

He thought back to Mother’s games with the chairs. Sir Albert had been quite the enthusiastic player, if Archie recalled correctly.

All right, he was overthinking. What was this but a convivial dinner with the Morgans, and Effie and Simon?

It was not convivial.

The conversation before dinner was tense, and dinner itself was no less so. He watched Clementine, and he wasn’t sure if it was because she had just gotten home and had had no jurisdiction over the meal in the way she had previously described to him, but there was very little for her to eat. She picked at a few potatoes, and he watched Olive surreptitiously spear a slice of beef from Clementine’s plate that Clementine had not managed to turn down.

It was all very excruciating, and he thought it would never end.

He was shocked to life, though, when Simon said, “I thought I might pay a visit to Vauxhall Gardens tomorrow evening. Will any of you join me?”

Simon wanted to go to Vauxhall Gardens? Had the world turned upside down?

“No, I am for Highworth first thing tomorrow,” Effie said, confirming Archie’s thesis that the world had turned upside down. Effie’s refined tastes and his love of art had historically made him a devoted city dweller, though come to think of it, he had spent an awful lot of time at his family’s estate in Cornwall this past year. Still, Effie had never been one to eschew the fantastical fancies of Vauxhall.

“I am expecting a very important letter at Highworth,” Effie added defensively, almost haughtily. His tone did not go unnoticed by Simon, who turned a raised eyebrow to Archie. Perhaps Effie’s uncharacteristic geographic preferences of late had to do with his long-lost love. Archie so wished he could press him about that, but he had decided not to. He hadn’t been meant to hear that, and all he could only hope was that someday Effie would confide in him.

All he could do in the meantime was be Effie’s friend, his brother by all but blood. Be the salt to his lamb or . . . what have you. Hope that time, and loyalty, would yield the dividends that needed yielding.

He had been woolgathering long enough. “I’d been planning to return with Mother to Mollybrook in the morning, but Vauxhall sounds like a pleasant way to spend an evening, so perhaps we shall delay our departure a day.”

“Will Miss Brown join you?” Simon asked.

“Perhaps,” Archie said, wondering what it was to Simon. “If Mother wants to, and is in a state to go.” He turned to the Morgans. “Will you join us? May I collect you in my carriage?”

“Oh Father, yes, let’s!” Olive exclaimed.

“The last thing I want to do is drag these old aching bones through Vauxhall,” Sir Albert said.

“Mrs. Abernathy can chaperone,” Olive said, and to Archie she explained, “Mrs. Abernathy lives two houses down and was a dear friend of Mother’s. She often accompanies us to events when Father is indisposed.”

It was amusing—sadly amusing—to think that after all that had passed these recent weeks, the Morgan sisters needed a chaperone to be seen in public with Archie and his friends. This was the world that so chafed Clementine, and he couldn’t blame her.

“Of course you may not go, Olive,” Sir Albert said matter-of-factly.

“But, Father!” Clementine laid a hand on Olive’s arm and sent her a quelling look.

“They’re not to go outside at all,” Sir Albert said.

“I beg your pardon?” Archie asked.

“After the near-misses of the past fortnight, my daughters will remain at home unless they are going somewhere with me, somewhere I deem worthy of our time.”

Archie couldn’t have heard that right. “What about the park?” The park was not the forest, but it was better than nothing.

“The park is not worthy of our time.” Sir Albert paused with a bite of roast beef halfway to his mouth, and appearing to reconsider, added, “Unless, of course, one of the girls is invited to promenade by an eligible gentleman.” He smiled, as if pleased by the notion he’d conjured. The beef resumed its journey, and as Sir Albert chomped down on it with more gusto than necessary, Archie didn’t miss Clementine’s wince.

“Sir Albert.” Archie paused, gathering his thoughts. He needed to proceed delicately. “With all due respect, I must object. That is no way for . . .”

Clementine to live.

“. . . anyone to live. What you are describing sounds akin to incarceration.”

“It isn’t akin to incarceration,” Sir Albert said mildly. “It is incarceration.”

Well. Archie cleared his throat, buying time, trying to think how to proceed. “Surely we can chalk up recent events to a surfeit of youthful indiscretion. Mr. Bull is no longer on English soil; everyone’s reputations remain unblemished.”

“My boy, what exactly are you arguing for here?”

“I . . .” He wasn’t sure. He didn’t have the right to argue at all, did he?

“The last thing I would wish is for you to think me ungrateful. You and your friends”—Sir Albert gestured toward Simon and Effie—“have gone to extraordinary lengths to help my family. But it’s my family, and I must do as I see fit. I have grown too permissive, and—”

“No.” Archie surprised himself by pushing back his chair and standing. The act shocked Sir Albert into silence, a silence that Archie filled. “Perhaps I haven’t any jurisdiction here, at least not of the legal sort, but I believe I do have a sort of moral jurisdiction. Miss Morgan is my friend. You can’t lock her up as if she were a common criminal with no allowance made for her wishes!” His voice had taken on a wild tone, and he paused to clear his throat. “And Miss Olive, too,” he added, regretting his initial omission of Olive.

He didn’t know what to say next. Debating wasn’t fraught for him in the same way reading was, but it was still far from his natural milieu. He had probably gone too far, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care. He blundered on.

“Clementine needs access to . . .” He’d been going to say Clementine needs access to the wilds. She needs to be free. But he would be better off reframing his argument. And of course he had erred by using her Christian name. “Miss Morgan needs access to fresh air. As does Miss Olive. All young ladies do. Fresh air is beneficial to the constitution.”

His delivery was as weak as his argument. It was difficult to explain in a way that would not expose him as having too much knowledge of Clementine.

What Sir Albert failed to understand, what seemingly everyone failed to understand, was that Clementine’s aversion to marriage was just that—an aversion. It was not a mere disinclination that would wear off with time and persistence. It was—

“My daughters will thank me later,” Sir Albert said, looking up at the still-standing Archie. A hint of pique had come into the older man’s tone, a contrast from all the smooth gratitude he had previously expressed. “When they are mothers, when they have their own children, they will understand.”

When they are mothers.

Clem wasn’t going to be a mother. Archie seemed to be the only person in the world who understood that. His fanciful image of Clementine setting out on a ramble with her children, was just that: a fancy. His mind had invented a pretty picture of her hopping over a stile and turning around to help a child, a child lucky enough to be hers, make the descent. It was hard to let go of that vision, though he wasn’t sure why, because he had heard Clem’s thoughts on the matter, and he respected them. He was—

He gasped, as it hit him. “Oh, dear God.”

Why hadn’t he seen this before? It was one thing to be less than clever, but he wasn’t completely daft. Or so he liked to think.

“Is everything all right, Lord Harcourt?”

That was from Olive, who was regarding him with concern. Everyone was regarding him with concern, suddenly.

There had been a man in these imaginings, a vague outline of a husband, a father. The man lifting Clementine’s child over the stile, handing him to her. The man listening to Clementine tell the story of the hunter made of stars who never caught up with the bear. The man carrying sleepy, dirt-mussed children upstairs to the nursery and smiling as their sticky fingers patted his face.

The man in his imaginings was him.

Or it could be. Those children could be his.

Could he . . . have that?

He fell into his chair with a thud.

“Archie,” Clementine said, a low urgency apparent in her tone. “What’s the matter?”

What’s the matter is that I’m in love with you.

He couldn’t speak. He was looking at Clem, dear Clem whom he loved, but she was growing fuzzy around the edges. She was not the kind of lady who swooned, she’d said, but apparently he was the sort of gentleman who did.

Thiswas why he had been so intent on taking her hunting with him, on getting her to understand what it meant to him. He had wanted her to love the thing he loved because he loved her.

And conversely, this was why it had been so easy, in the end, for him to give up hunting, for him to give up the eating of meat—both of which he realized were already done.

He loved her. He laughed out loud.

Whyhad he not realized it? All he could come up with was that he hadn’t allowed the possibility to penetrate his mind, given how continually and vociferously she went around objecting to marriage.

“Are you all right?” Clem pressed.

“I’m fine,” he managed, shaking his head to clear it. The edges of her face sharpened. “In fact, I am excellent. I am—”

No. That wasn’t right. He wasn’t excellent. He’d had a revelation, but he had been wrong about what it meant. The image he had, of what his life could be, was lovely. It was exquisite, almost painful, in its perfection. But the fact remained that Clementine did not want to wed. She did continually and vociferously object to the institution of marriage.

He needed to talk to the boys. He stood again, the astonished faces of all assembled telling him that he was behaving very erratically indeed. “I just remembered.” He looked daggers at Simon, willing him to understand. “We were meant to be at that parliamentary. . . thing this evening.”

“That parliamentary thing?” Simon echoed, bewildered.

“Yes, of course,” Effie said. “That committee or what have you. You talked about it all morning.”

“Yes.” Archie turned to their host and deliberately did not look at Clem. He couldn’t. He needed to sort himself out first. “Sir Albert, I was so pleased to be invited to join you this evening that I quite forgot my responsibilities.”

Simon jumped in to embellish the clumsy lie, and they managed to extricate themselves. Inelegantly, but it hardly mattered. As Sir Albert had said many times today, he was in their debt. Clementine and Olive would rightly sniff out “parliamentary responsibilities” as the lie it was, but Archie couldn’t care right now.

“I’m not sure when we’ll see you again, my boy,” Sir Albert said, and Archie wished Sir Albert wouldn’t call him that. It reminded him of the way Father sometimes used to affect a kind of exaggerated jocularity that made Archie feel bad for reasons he couldn’t articulate. “You’ll return to Mollybrook, and we’re here in Town for the foreseeable future.”

Archie wanted to say that he would postpone his return to Mollybrook if need be. As much as he hated London, it was where Clementine—whom he loved—was stuck, therefore he felt he ought to endure the incarceration with her. But . . . how would he go about doing that? Would she even want him to? And what about Mother?

He needed to talk to the boys. That was what he kept coming back to. That was step one, and they’d help him sort the rest.

“I believe I am in love with Clementine,” he blurted once the three of them were back in his carriage.

“Of course you are,” Effie said.

Simon, for his part, merely laughed.

“Well, thank you very much,” Archie said.

“I’m sorry. We are being too glib,” Effie said, trying, Archie thought, to be soothing, but mucking it up by joining in Simon’s laughter.

“What am I going to do?” Archie all but wailed.

“Archie,” said Effie with sudden seriousness. “Do you remember our recent discussion when you came to us musing about taking your parliamentary role more seriously?”

“Well, it was less a discussion and more a monologue,” Simon, still snickering, interjected before Archie could answer.

“I remember,” Archie said warily.

“What did you say to us?”

He searched his mind. “I think I said I was ordinary.”

“You are an earl, man!” Simon objected.

“Yes, but I didn’t do anything to earn that title, or the benefits that come with it.”

“I, for one, believe you are anything but ordinary,” Effie said, “and I would believe that no matter your title or lack thereof. As previously discussed, you are among my favorite people on this earth.”

“So it is proximity to you that makes me not ordinary.” Archie smirked. If they were going to mock him, he was going to dish it back.

“No,” Effie said, “it is, also as previously discussed, your astonishing capacity for love and loyalty that makes you extraordinary.”

Archie felt his face heat.

“You were moaning about how you didn’t do anything of use,” Effie went on, “and we corrected you, establishing that you find people, and you love them. And if there’s anyone in this world who could use some of that love right now, it’s those Morgan girls.”

“I think what Archie is saying,” Simon said wryly to Effie, “is that his feelings for Clementine Morgan are quite a bit different from his feelings for Olive Morgan.”

“I know that, you dolt.” Effie turned to Archie, who was still bewildered—by this conversation and by his recent realization. “My point is merely that this is not the catastrophe you seem to think, Archie. In fact, what we have here is a situation where your exact skills are called for.”

“I . . . What am I going to do?” The question came out quietly this time, rather than wailingly, but he was no closer to answering it. Having a realization was one thing, knowing what, if anything, to do about it was quite another.

Effie raised his eyebrows. “Well, you’ll have to talk to her, I’d imagine.”

“I don’t suppose you’d write to her for me?”

“Oh, for Heaven’s sake.” Effie threw up his hands.

“I am in jest, Effie.” Archie was trying to lighten the mood, to give himself—all of them—a respite from the weight of revelation, a breath between unanswerable questions. “Even I know such a declaration must be original.”

“What sort of declaration are we speaking of?” Simon asked.

“What sort do you think, Simon?” Effie said irritably, swatting Simon’s shoulder. “Honestly, have you been paying attention at all?”

Simon deflected Effie’s continued swatting. “Yes, of course I have. I just want to hear him say it. I want to make sure he has been paying attention.”

“We are speaking of a declaration of love,” Archie said quietly, “and not the fraternal kind we’ve been talking about this past fortnight. Love.” As the carriage rumbled to a halt in front of his house, a kind of muted but righteous certainty began flowing through his veins. He was sure about this path, but also terrified. “What if she doesn’t feel the same?” He paused as the answer to his own question rose in his mind. “I can’t control that, can I? All I can do is tell her how I feel and try not to make a muddle of it. I’ve got to leave the rest to her. Her answer will be her answer, but to get it, I must first ask the question.”

“There’s a good man,” Simon said, at the same time that Effie said, “See? You’re very good at this sort of thing.”

“The problem is how?” The certainty Archie had felt a moment ago was starting to fray at the edges. “I’m liable to make a hashof such a declaration at the best of times, and this is not the best of times. And I feel as if the declaration requires a certain degree ofpanache. I wish Sir Albert would allow the girls to travel to Hill House, where I might have some hope of speaking to Clementine outside, where we can both breathe.” He was going to have to approach her in London, on account of her imprisonment, and thinking about trying to talk to Clem, to really talk to her, in that small, closed drawing room, made his breath go shallow.

“What am I going to do?” There was no more certainty now; it had been crowded out by panic. “Show up in Sir Albert’s drawing room and make a stumbling speech in front of both Clementine and him? I suppose the logical answer is to ask his permission first in order to secure a few minutes alone with Clem, but I can’t do that, because he is certain to give it.”

“And that would be bad because . . . ?” Simon asked, his brow knit.

“Because if Clementine doesn’t want me, then I’ll have effectively forced her hand. It would be as good as abducting her!”

“I think it highly unlikely that Miss Morgan won’t want you,” Effie said.

“She doesn’t want to get married!” He should have led with that. “She has said as much, frequently and forcefully.”

She had suggested an illicit arrangement, one he’d rejected out of hand, but if that was all he could get, he would take it. But how was he to secure that type of arrangement if he couldn’t speak to her alone? How were they meant to . . . execute that type of arrangement?

Was he ever going to see her again outside the watchful eye of her father?

He let loose a very unmanly whimper and bonked his head back against the squabs.

“Poor Archie.” Effie patted his arm. “What a trying evening you’ve had. I almost want to write a poem about your doomed love.”

“It isn’t doomed,” Simon said firmly.

“Quite right. Perhaps we should call it a love at the edge of doom,” Effie said with a flourish. “A love flirting with doom.”

“You needn’t solve it forthwith,” Simon said. “Take your mother home. Get her situated with Miss Brown, and come back to Town. When you’re back, we can invite Sir Albert and his daughters somewhere he can’t reasonably refuse to attend, and come up with some kind of distraction that will allow you to speak to Miss Morgan alone.” He turned to Effie. “Can your very important letter at Highworth wait? A journey there and back would take so long I fear Archie might expire in the interim.”

Effie nodded. “I daresay things are about to take a turn for the dramatic here, and I shouldn’t want to miss that.”

Archie sighed. A turn for the dramatic sounded like a terrible idea to him. But what choice did he have? “All right. I’ll go home tomorrow, settle Mother, and aim to be back by the end of next week.”

“All right, then,” Simon said. “For now, let us part ways. Having been on holiday, I have mountains of work to attend to.”

“And I am going to work on an epic poem to be read at your wedding to Miss Morgan,” Effie said.

“She’s not going to—”

Effie talked right over Archie. “And as for this nonsense about being ordinary, I can think of many ways to be extraordinary, but none so much as to marry a vegetarian.”

* * *

That night, in bed, Clementine was reading—well, no, she was brooding whilst holding a book—when Olive appeared. She crossed the room silently, pulled back the covers, and settled herself next to Clementine as if this was something they did.

Perhaps it was. They’d shared a bed of necessity in the posting inns on the way home from Cumbria, but they’d also shared one at Olive’s request that last night at Quintrell Castle.

The night Clementine had given up Archie in favor of Olive.

She would do it again, but not seeing Archie that night, together with the odd way he’d left them in the middle of dinner earlier, had her fretting.

“Did you think it odd that Archie suddenly had parliamentary responsibilities this evening?” Clementine asked Olive. “Responsibilities so apparently urgent that he had to leave that very moment?”

Olive waved a hand dismissively. “Oh, that was surely a lie.”

“It was?”

Of course it was. Clementine just wanted it . . . not to be.

“Yes. He couldn’t get out of here hastily enough.”

“That’s . . .” Devastating.

“He was very stiff, didn’t you find?” Olive asked, stealing one of the pillows propping up Clementine and punching it into her preferred shape. “Not at all his usual easygoing self.”

Thatwas certainly true. He had been awkward, and at times, downright agitated. “He couldn’t even look at me when he left.”

“Yes. I noticed that.” The punching continued. If Olive was so particular about her pillows, Clementine didn’t know why she hadn’t brought her own. “He avoided you much of the evening, in fact, and when he finally took his leave, he bowed over my hand and smiled very prettily at me, whereas with you he was standoffish and looked at the floor.”

Well. Clementine felt positively deflated. She hadn’t thought her entanglement with Archie would end like this. If anything, given the ardency of their encounters those last few days in Cumbria, she’d have thought they might have trouble saying goodbye. She’d never imagined a scenario in which her old friend couldn’t even stand to look at her.

“I’ve come to plot.” Olive stole another pillow—or tried to. Clementine grabbed one end in an attempt to prevent its abduction.

“To plot?” she echoed as she stood her ground with the pillow.

“Yes.” Olive stood hers, so they were apparently having a tug-of-war. “I’ve rethought my aversion to Hill House. We must make Father take us. We need to spend a good long stretch there, the both of us.”

Clementine was so shocked she let go of the pillow. “What? Why?” Why was everything so confusing?

“Yes.” Olive smirked and began punching pillow number two. “I will admit that the prospect of repairing to the country is terrifying. But is it going to be any less so next week? Next month? Now that I’ve told you my sordid secrets, it feels as if they have a less firm hold on me. I think I should like to look for Ralph’s grave. Well, not like. That’s the wrong word entirely. But I think I ought to.” She finished her pillow arranging and leveled a plaintive look at Clementine. “Will you help me?”

“Oh, Olive, of course.”

“But that’s not the main reason we’ve got to go.”

“What’s the main reason?” Clementine started to reach for one of her pillows back.

Olive swatted her hands away. “The main reason is Archie, silly. You’ve got to tell Archie you’re in love with him.”

“It doesn’t matter if I’m in love with Archie, because we’re never going to marry,” Clementine said unthinkingly.

“I notice you didn’t dispute the fact of the matter.”

“I . . .” Clementine hadn’t noticed that. Oh. Oh dear.

She burst into tears.

How mortifying. That was supposed to be Olive’s signature maneuver.

“Oh, Clemmie.” Olive tugged one of Clementine’s hands into her own. “It’s going to be all right.”

“I’m not in love with Archie,” Clementine tried. “I’m just confused.” She ordered herself to stop crying.

“We need to get the two of you together in one place, and I definitely think that place should be Mollybrook or Hill House, or more specifically, outside Mollybrook or Hill House.”

“It’s been a very trying few weeks, and my mind is muddled.”

“I’ve hatched a plan. I shall pretend an interest in a gentleman in Chiddington,” Olive said. “If Father thinks I’m genuine, he will allow us to remove to Hill House. The question is, who?”

“And we were observing country rules at Quintrell Castle,” Clementine said. “Things were exceedingly relaxed. So if I gave you the impression that—”

“The question is, who?” Olive repeated. “Help me think of someone plausible. He must be—”

“Are you even listening to me, Olive?”

“No, I am not, because you’re speaking nonsense.”

“I am not in love with Archie?”

“Is that a question?”

“No.”

“Say it as if you mean it, then.”

“I am not in love with Archie?” Dash it. That second attempt hadn’t come out sounding any different from the first.

“Do you want to go to Hill House or not, Clemmie?” Olive huffed a frustrated sigh, but she handed back one of the pillows. “Here.”

“I do want to go.” She did, regardless of this whole accidentally falling in love with Archie business.

“Then help me think of someone I can pretend to fancy!”

* * *

Watching Olive manipulate Father now that Clementine knew what was going on beneath the surface was amusing. It provided a temporary respite from the reeling of her fevered mind.

In love! With Archie!

She still was not sure how that had happened.

Well, no, that was not true. It was, she supposed, the natural outcome of spending time with someone so kind and handsome. Someone who listened to her and respected her. Someone who saw her.

What she didn’t know was when it had happened. In novels, heroines were often struck by love as if it were lightning. Love seemed to be something that happened to one, suddenly and sometimes violently. It was never a thing that was just . . . there. There quietly but so decidedly that one wondered if it always had been.

And in novels, the heroines always knew when they’d fallen in love. They did not require a sister to point it out.

“So you see, Father,” Olive said as she poured tea, “it isn’t only Clementine who wants to go to Hill House.” She leaned in as she handed him his cup and said, sotto voce, “I realize she is the elder and, let’s be frank, the more desperate case.” She turned to Clementine. “Now, Clemmie, don’t make that face. Don’t object, for you know it is true.” Contrary to her words, Olive seemed to be telegraphing a silent message to Clementine that she should make “that” face, that she should object, and soon.

“I say,” Clementine tried, attempting to play her assigned role. She was, after all, a mere puppet in the presence of a master. “That was rather hurtful, Olive.”

“I know, Clemmie, but we must face facts, mustn’t we? The stink of the broken engagement, even though it will be accepted that you’re the one who cried off, will take a while to fade.” She turned back to Father. “However, if I were to wed first, that would only help Clementine’s cause, do you not agree?”

“Hmm.” Father took a sip of his tea. “Tell me this chap’s name again?”

“Mr. Ozymandias Macduff,” Olive said with a smoothness and confidence that Clementine would never have been able to muster given that Mr. Ozymandias Macduff was entirely fictitious. After going through the eligible gentlemen of their acquaintance last night, the sisters had decided to invent a suitor for Olive. The only flesh-and-blood men in Chiddington who were of a suitable age and situation to seem credible were sufficiently known to Father that the sisters couldn’t be certain their ruse wouldn’t end in an actual engagement. And Olive had had quite enough actual engagements of late.

Hence was born Ozymandias Macduff, Ozymandias after the eponymous poem by Shelley that apparently Olive was fond of thanks to Lord Featherfinch’s having introduced her to it, and Macduff because inventing a Scotsman brought to mind Macbeth, and as Olive pointed out, “Macduff is one of the few left standing at the end, and he gets to brandish Macbeth’s severed head. I imagine marrying someone like that would at the very least be not-dull.”

The name made Clementine want to giggle. She forced herself to remain implacable as she said, “Apparently Mr. Macduff inherited that big old house near Croftly Lane.”

“I thought that house belonged to an absent duke. Which one?” Father sipped his tea and stared out the window as if the missing duke was due to appear. “Devonshire? No.”

“I think that’s a myth,” Olive said. “You know how the house has taken on an almost legendary status.”

That part was true. There was a great old abandoned house not too far outside Chiddington, and it was the source of much fascination and speculation. Clementine thought the rumor about it belonging to a duke was entirely plausible. If anyone was going to lose track of an entire house, it would be a duke. But for their purposes, the mystery house belonged to one Mr. Macduff. It was even surrounded by a rusting iron fence with spikes that would do nicely for displaying the severed heads of one’s enemies.

“Lord Harcourt told us he heard that Mr. Macduff is from a landed family near Glasgow,” Olive said, daintily stirring sugar into her tea.

“Why hasn’t anyone been to claim the house in generations?” Father asked.

“I can’t imagine,” Olive said. “But I’m sure I would like to find out.”

The sisters had, in fact, invented an entire backstory for Mr. Macduff, but they’d agreed not to trot it out unless they absolutely had to. It would be better for Mr. Macduff to remain a vague figure. That way, when he disappeared again, it wouldn’t seem too suspicious. All they had to do was get Archie to corroborate the rumor they were claiming he’d heard.

“And”—Olive lowered her voice—“I have heard it told that Mr. Macduff is descended from Robert the Bruce.” One final stir of her tea and she lifted her cup and sipped, triumphant.

Clementine coughed to cover a laugh. They had not discussed that embellishment.

“Autumn at Hill House is pleasant,” Father said, “and I suppose we could all do with a bit of country air.”

Olive squealed and jumped up and embraced Father, who looked almost his old self as he patted her shoulder fondly.

“I don’t suppose there is anyone there for your sister,” Father said, “if we all put our minds to it?”

Olive winked at Clementine over Father’s shoulder. Whatever else happened, how lovely it was to be in cahoots with Olive. “Oh, no,” Olive said breezily. “Clementine is a lost cause until next Season. You may as well let her loose in the woods when we get there. The outdoors always has a restorative effect on her. Then we can regroup on that front next Season. And when I am a respectable married lady, I can sponsor her.”

Father grumbled something that sounded like assent, and Clementine’s heart soared. Not because of Archie, but because she was going home. Well, all right. Perhaps a little because of Archie.

Perhaps a lot because of Archie.

She resolved to think on it all later, when she was let loose in the woods as Olive had said.

“Now, Father,” Olive said briskly as she pulled away and sat back down next to Clementine. “I have almost everything I need in my quest for Mr. Macduff, but I badly damaged my most fashionable hat in the midst of all the . . . unpleasantness of late.”

“Did I not give you funds for the milliner not a month ago?”

“You did, but this hat had the most remarkable bird sewn on it, and I don’t know what’s happened to it. It’s simply gone.” Olive kicked Clementine under the table, and Clementine finally lost the battle with the laughter that had been threatening. No one noticed, though, as Olive kept talking. “It was my favorite hat, and I can’t begin to tell you how many compliments I received because of it.” Olive’s voice had risen several octaves, and begun wavering, too. “I suppose I must count it as part of the wreckage of this unfortunate business with Mr. Bull.” She suddenly gasped, and Clementine was startled even though she understood this was all pretense. “Oh! I’ve just had the most marvelous idea! What if I were to commission one just like it, but ensure that the bird perched on it is native to Scotland? La, that would give me something to converse with Mr. Macduff about, would it not?”

“I must admit that’s a clever idea.” Father got up and went to his desk, and after rummaging around, came back with a handful of coins for Olive, who practically had a fit of the vapors as she expressed her thanks.

“Now, now, there’s a good girl,” Father said, peeling Olive off him.

“Clementine must come with me to see the milliner,” Olive declared, once she’d “recovered.” “She knows all kinds of things about birds and the like and can help me explain my vision.”

“Yes, quite,” said Father. “I shall leave you girls to make the arrangements for our journey.” Father had a tendency to remove himself abruptly after an outburst of emotion from Olive, but since they were in his study, he was, effectively, dismissing them.

With a final flurry of effusive thanks from Olive, the girls found themselves in the corridor. Olive sniffed, smoothed her hair, raised her eyebrows at Clementine, and made a show of pocketing the money she’d extorted from Father.

Clementine raised her eyebrows back and clapped her hands in a silent gesture of applause.

They didn’t speak until they were safely around the corner. The laughter came then, from both of them.

“That was impressive,” Clementine said.

Olive shrugged with false modesty. “Now we’re off to Hill House, and you can speak to Archie.”

“I don’t know about that part. I don’t think there’s anything to say. But I do appreciate your having sprung us from Town.”

“There is plenty to say, Clemmie. And you’re going to have to go first, because he won’t. He’s too upstanding for that.”

“What do you mean?” She was bewildered.

“He’s only heard you say a thousand times that you refuse to marry, that marriage would kill your soul or some such nonsense. Archie isn’t the man to kill anyone’s soul, least of all yours. So you shall have to start the conversation. You must tell him what is in your heart.”

“Why would I do that? Assuming there is anything in my heart”—there was, but she wasn’t ready to admit it, even to Olive—“what does it matter if there isn’t anything in his?”

“Do you remember our evening conversations at Quintrell Castle?” Olive said as she mounted the stairs.

“Of course,” Clementine said, following, as confused as ever.

“One night we were talking about Archie, and you said he was a pacifist.”

“Yes,” Clementine said, struggling to see Olive’s point.

They had come to Olive’s room. Olive put her hand on the latch and said, “Lords Marsden and Featherfinch disagreed with your characterization. They said Archie could be quite combative when defending the people he loves.”

“Yes. It was gratifying to think of him sticking up for his friends so loyally back when they were children. That’s Archie for you, though, isn’t it? I still fail to understand what you’re on about with him not wanting to kill my soul?”

Olive sighed theatrically. “Clementine. Think back to dinner last night. Before Archie was lying his way out of our house, before he was not looking at you, what was he doing?”

“I . . . don’t know.”

“He was defending you.”

Clementine gasped. “No!”

“Yes! He was defending you, and quite forcefully, too. He kept making these impassioned speeches in support of you, and as they wound down, he’d append my name to them, as if he’d only just remembered his logic ought to apply to me, too.”

Clementine’s skin felt tight, as if she’d fallen asleep in the sun and awakened to find it burnt. She had to force herself to mind Olive, who was still talking.

“Now, Clemmie, I’m going to work on my embroidery for a while, but I’m coming to your room to sleep tonight, for once we’re at Hill House, I suppose I must give up having you as a bedfellow.” Olive waggled her eyebrows at Clementine and shut the door in her face.

Clementine was left standing in the hallway gaping like the poor sun-addled creature that she was.

People that he loves.

Could she possibly be so lucky?

Could she possibly be so brave?