Of Moths and Butterflies (25 page)

Mrs. Montegue looked up, a curious expression on her face, that look that challenged one to think beyond the bald facts. “You said, I believe, that Sir Edmund had an unnatural interest in her.”

“Yes, Gran,” Claire answered. She knew her grandmother’s feelings regarding her cousin were even stronger than her own, for she knew him better and therefore had more reasons to regret the connection. “Yes, but what could he want with her, truly? He is to marry Mrs. Barton, and Archer must marry a fortune.”

“Will you go?”

No doubt Claire would be allowed what freedoms she deemed necessary to her happiness and peace of mind. She always had been, and yet…

“I don’t know, Gran. Perhaps I’ll wait and see.”

“You mean you wish to speak with Dr. Martin. What good will that do? He’ll tell you I’m an old woman and I need looking after. I could tell you that myself without the fuss of ringing for the servants and sending the messenger. Go to London. Go see your Miss Shaw. You know you won’t be satisfied until you do.”

“We’ll see, Gran,” she said with a forced smile and read the letter once more.

T WAS NOT
long after Roger’s visit that Julia came to call. The doorbell rang, and determined, this time, to get the better of the housekeeper and her sister’s unreasonable obstinacy, Julia prevailed. No, she would not wait to see if Muriel was in. No, she would not remain in the entrance hall. She, entered, forcing her way into the sun-bleached and threadbare parlour.

Muriel stared at her in wide-eyed shock before adjusting her features to the challenging and stoic expression that usually served her best.

“I’m here to collect my niece,” Julia said. “She cannot recover herself hiding away as though she were some shame-faced and irredeemable disrepute.”

“It might possibly be better for her if she did.”

“Better for you, you mean. But I’ll not have it.”

“And where will Roger be, this evening?”

“Roger will be where he chooses. I don’t put a leash on my dependents, Muriel. It usually works contrary to one’s desires. You do realise that Imogen is all the more likely to choose Roger for your keeping her holed up here, reminded constantly of how small her chances are and faced daily with the prospect of remaining the subject of your condemnation.”

“I have not condemned my niece. She has done that herself.”

“You condemn her by keeping her at home when she should go out, and by refusing to acknowledge or support her in her efforts when she does. You are ashamed of her and everyone knows it.”

“What is it you mean to gain by forcing her to go with you now? Roger will no doubt be wherever it is you propose to go.”

“I have little doubt of it. You do know he’s made her an offer of marriage.”

Muriel was struck by this, but quickly masked her displeasure. “She has not accepted him.”

“How can she refuse him, considering the alternative? Where is she?”

Muriel didn’t offer an answer, but neither did Julia wait for one. She went to her niece’s room, where she prepared her to go out. And while she did, so too did Muriel prepare herself. Imogen would not go where she could not keep an eye on her. That Roger had proposed should not have surprised her. It was that he had been given so little opportunity. He knew better than to waste his time, it seemed. Muriel had been foolish to underestimate him. She would not make the same mistake again.

*   *   *

The party at which Archer arrived that evening was a musical affair. Much sitting and listening would be involved, no cards, no dancing. This suited him well enough. He had come, once again and at his uncle’s command, having escorted Mrs. Barton.

As far as these evening entertainments were concerned, Archer no longer resented his uncle’s orders. He came quite willingly—anxiously, even—hoping for the opportunity to improve his acquaintance with Miss Everard. Weeks had gone by since he had last seen her. What he lacked in patience, he made up for in determination. He was not to be disappointed this night.

He saw her nearly at once, at the opposite end of a crowded room, examining carefully a tropical plant, one of many which had no doubt been brought in especially for the occasion. As if a rope tied them together, and which they both resisted, Miss Everard and Mrs. Ellison stood back to back, their respective interests pulling them in opposing directions. Miss Everard admired the plant, and leaning in to appreciate it better, she lifted, very delicately, one of the great blossoms to her nose. The effort was in vain, for hibiscus has no scent, but the picture was lovely in any case. At the same time, Mrs. Ellison was engaged in animated chatter with another woman and quite oblivious of her niece. This was to his advantage, and he seized the opportunity.

Archer approached. She saw him and the tether that held Miss Everard to her aunt suddenly snapped. The younger woman moved away, placing herself out of sight of the elder, yet in a position more convenient to receiving him without the complication of interference. Her manner, almost welcoming, inspired in him a sudden sense of elation. A quick glance in the direction of Mrs. Ellison assured him that she too had moved off an equal distance, so that it was now quite safe to follow where Miss Everard might lead.

Within an alcove along the nearest wall of the ballroom—now turned concert hall—and from which vantage point the orchestra could be seen, he joined her.

“Mr. Hamilton,” she said and the sound of his name in her voice was music to him, while the tuning of the instruments, their cacophonous anti-melody, did little to soothe his tightly-wrought nerves.

“Miss Everard. I’m very pleased to see you. I had begun to fear I might not have the pleasure again.”

“Yes,” she said without hesitation, and coloured. “That is, I had begun to fear it too. That I might not be allowed to go out again, I mean.”

“Why should you be kept from Society? You are not quite a pariah, are you?”

“Well, yes. I think I must be, but that is not the only reason.”

“Why then?”

She turned her attention, almost pointedly, in the direction of the non-music.

“Please don’t say it was my doing. You are not being punished for speaking to me?”

“Why should I be punished for speaking to you, Mr. Hamilton?” she answered, but her colour was not right, nor was her manner that which he most preferred, at ease and comfortable. How to help her? He was swimming upstream against the elements.

“Your aunt was not happy to find us conversing as we were. I saw it quite plainly.”

“You are not the only one whose attentions I am dissuaded from encouraging.”

“Mr. Barrett?”

“Yes,” she said, meeting his gaze but briefly.

Archer cleared his throat. It was quiet now, and in the silence that anticipated the start of the music, he wondered once more what he was risking by speaking to her. And what he risked by delaying.

“Barrett has told me he’s offered to you.”

The music began in earnest now. A young gentleman, a baritone, had taken the floor. Imogen seemed not to have heard his question. He knew she had.

“You are considering?” he pressed.

While she waited for the baritone to begin, Archer waited for her to answer.

“Yes, of course,” she said at last and looked a little pale.

“You are going against your family’s wishes, I believe. It is a risk, and in more ways than one.”

“There are any number of difficulties in the way, Mr. Hamilton,” she said, still refusing to look at him. “I will of course cut my family, but that is no great loss. Roger, in consequence, will be shunning Society, lowering himself, and throwing away all the opportunities my aunt Julia has so painstakingly provided for him.”

“Why do you say he should lower himself? He is family. He too was raised from modest circumstances—”

“But not shameful ones, Mr. Hamilton.” She glanced at him. “There is a great difference. And his character will be in shreds as much because of me as for the fact that, were I to accept him, he must give his current paramour the brush. Society does not take such things lightly. Nor do I.”

“I trust by your remark that you are aware that your beloved Mr. Barrett has been somewhat less than devoted to you in your absence.”

“I’m not sure that he has been.”

“Of course not,” Archer said, frustrated by her seeming indifference to Roger’s infidelities. But then she could not know of the half of them.

“What I mean is,” she said, lowering her voice, “I am aware that he has faults. But Roger is my best friend, very nearly my only friend. He may be inconstant in his dealings, but he has always been true in his heart.”

“I was never aware you could separate the two, Miss Everard.”

She seemed to chafe at this, but he had not finished.

“Your cousin’s recent proposal was not his first.”

Her brow arched high in response to this. “No,” she said.

“He asked you before?”

“Yes.”

“And instead of accepting him then, when you might quite easily have done so, you chose to run away.”

Looking full on him now, she opened her mouth and closed it again.

“Am I mistaken?”

She did not answer.

“And so I am left wondering what would make his offer acceptable now? He has convinced you he will change?”

“No,” she said, boldly meeting his gaze.

“He has convinced you then that what he does and how he feels are indeed two separate things.”

She blinked very hard. “I don’t know.”

“Miss Everard,” Archer said more earnestly, “if I may be permitted to speak openly?”

He waited once more for her encouragement. It did not come. Quite suddenly, she turned and left him. Was it outright rejection? Or did she wish for him to follow her once more? He could not be sure, but to take the safest course would be suicide to his hopes.

Archer took a deep breath. He dared not follow her directly, but he watched, and when at last he deemed it safe, he made his way by degrees and as surreptitiously as possible until he found her quite alone in a deserted corridor and staring out a window situated at the very end of it. Upon his entrance she looked at him, but then turned again to the scene without. The house looked directly out onto another, and so it was impossible for her gaze to be arrested by what she saw through it.

“Miss Everard,” he said. “I’m sorry if I’ve said something to cause you distress. It was not my intention to disparage Roger Barrett. Truly, I have no doubt of his regard for you.” He paused a moment before going on, for he must go on. If this should be his only chance… “But my concerns remain. If, as you say, you are aware of his faults, then how is it you can so easily reconcile yourself to them?”

“Reconcile myself?” she said, turning on him quite suddenly and with a determination he had never before thought possible in her. “You speak as if there were an alternative. It’s because I can see them that I can reconcile myself to them, they not being hidden from me. I can’t pretend to be blind to them. Nor would I, in such a case, have to figure them out for myself after years of blissful ignorance, which thing I could never assume anyway.

“Roger is no saint,” she went on. “But you must believe that he is the best man I know. It’s impossible for him to keep his secrets from me. I don’t profess to know them all, nor do I wish to, but neither is it possible for him to hide them entirely. And he does not try. That is why I can trust him. That is why I can believe in him. Men claim the power of being able to keep us in the dark. I say it’s because we choose to live with the lights out. Such women are either very good or very stupid. I’m neither.”

He stepped nearer her and the look in her eyes as she gazed up at him caused him pain. Just what sort of life had she been forced to live? Recalling what she knew, or thought she knew in respect to his own history, he endeavoured to enlighten her.

“You speak as if all men have something to hide.”

“You don’t like it that I’m aware of it; that’s all.”

“I don’t believe we do, all of us, have such pasts to bury.”

“It’s not the burial I object to.”

“To conceal then.”

“If it were the past alone, I suppose that might be forgivable,” she said a strange lilt of hope ringing in her voice. “I’m sure I’ve made mistakes of which I’d like to be forgiven.” She glanced up at him but looked away again.