A Convenient Fiction Read online

  “A baron, did you say?” Miss Talbot’s eyes flickered with interest. “Are French barons the same as English ones? Or are they—” She stopped short. “Ah! There’s Blodgett with the gig. And look, George, there is Miss Hayes, just as I told you she’d be.”

  A battered one-horse gig rolled up the drive, coming to a halt just ahead of them. The elderly driver was hunched over the box, a tweed cap pulled down over his face. Beside him on the box sat a young lady in a faded gray skirt and caraco jacket, a flat-crowned straw hat atop her head.

  Alex stopped with the others.

  And then he stared.

  Good God, it was his water nymph. The woman he’d rescued from the pond—or failed to rescue, as it were. But she didn’t look like a water nymph now. Rather the opposite. Her back was ramrod straight, her gloved hands folded primly in her lap, and her hair—that midnight veil that had been tangled with flower petals and leaves—was bound into a tight roll at her nape.

  “What are you waiting for, George,” Miss Talbot said under her breath. “Go and help Laura down.”

  Laura.

  There was nothing extraordinary about the name. It nevertheless sent a mild shock through Alex’s frame. Not a shock of heat—certainly not the kind of heat he’d anticipated feeling for Miss Talbot. This was something else. Something new and deeply unsettling. It was awareness. Some variety of…recognition.

  “Allow me.” He didn’t wait for Miss Talbot’s permission. He reached the gig in a few long strides.

  Miss Hayes saw him coming. Her eyes widened almost imperceptibly.

  And what eyes she had. Smoke blue, set under a pair of low, and uncompromisingly straight, ebony brows. He’d noted them when he pulled her from the water. That and…other of her attributes.

  She looked down at him, a sparkle of accusation in her glare. “You.”

  “The name is Archer,” he said. “And you, I presume, are Miss Hayes.”

  “I am.”

  He raised his arms to her. “Will you permit me to assist you down, ma’am?”

  She hesitated a fraction of a second. “If you please.”

  He felt her take an uneven breath as his hands closed around her corseted waist, lifting her from the gig and setting her gently on the ground. She was tall for a lady. A shade over five and a half feet, if he was to venture a guess. Her head came just above his chin. A rarity. He was used to towering over his women.

  But Miss Hayes was something different—in height as well as bearing.

  She wasn’t beautiful, not in the common way. Certainly not in the peaches-and-cream manner of Miss Talbot. But there was an arresting architecture to Laura Hayes’s face—an austere sort of balance between her high cheekbones, the straight bridge of her nose, and the firm line of her jaw. Only her mouth betrayed a hint of softness. It was wide and kissable.

  And it was frowning.

  His hands fell from her waist.

  The instant he released her, she stepped away from him to smooth her skirts. “Thank you, Mr. Archer.”

  “My pleasure, Miss Hayes.”

  “Laura!” Miss Talbot moved to join them. “I’m so glad you’ve come. And so grateful your aunt could spare you on my behalf. Can you believe that George has returned to us after all this time? And he’s brought his friend, Mr. Archer.”

  The coachman drove off in the gig, leaving the drive empty. Miss Hayes looked across it to where George remained standing, his hands shoved into the pockets of his plaid trousers. “Welcome home, George.”

  George inclined his head. His expression was sullen. “Laura.”

  Alex’s eyes narrowed. George had said Miss Hayes was a local woman of no account. A dogsbody, he’d called her. If that was true, why were the pair of them on a first-name basis? And why was George finding it so difficult to look at her?

  “How is your aunt keeping?” Miss Talbot asked.

  “Very well,” Miss Hayes said. “She sends her regards.”

  “And your brother? How is his health?” Miss Talbot glanced at Alex. “Miss Hayes’s younger brother is an invalid, sir. We’re lucky he’s still with us.”

  “My brother is well,” Miss Hayes said. “We’re all thriving, Hen, truly. There’s no need to fuss.”

  “I’m not fussing. It’s only that it feels like an age since you were last here. I must know everything you’ve been up to.” Miss Talbot took Miss Hayes by the arm. “Let’s go inside and have some tea before our walk, shall we?” She cast a look at George as the pair of them headed back to the house. “Miss Hayes will not admit to any infirmity, but we must take care to look after her, mustn’t we?”

  Miss Hayes’s face was an impenetrable mask.

  As for George, he said not a word.

  Alex walked along with him after the ladies. “‘A local woman of no account,’” he murmured.

  George’s face reddened. “It’s the truth.”

  “Is it?”

  “She’s nothing,” he said in a low voice. “No one.”

  Alex didn’t believe it for a moment. “Things aren’t as simple here as you would have had me believe.”

  “They are. Or they would be if Miss Hayes didn’t always contrive to make herself the center of attention.”

  “Is that what she’s done?”

  “Isn’t it obvious? But you need have no apprehension. I shall separate them at the first opportunity. And then you may go about making yourself agreeable to Miss Talbot—or whatever it is you intend to do with her.”

  “I believe you know what I intend to do with her.”

  George looked away from him. “Yes,” he said tightly. “I know.”

  Laura stole another glance at Mr. Archer as she walked beside him down the path that led to the Edgington Park wilderness garden. He looked different than he had before. Not only was he dry—with his suit freshly pressed and his dark hair combed into meticulous order—but he appeared to have shaved, as well.

  And the scent of him…

  Her stomach performed a queer little somersault.

  He smelled of polished leather and lightly starched linen. Of bergamot and spices and clean male skin.

  At Talbot’s Pond, she’d thought him handsome. Now, she thought him something rather more than that. He was dashing, was what he was. The kind of loose-limbed, devil-may-care hero who graced the pages of penny novels, fighting off evildoers and rescuing damsels in distress.

  George Wright looked rather insipid in comparison.

  He walked ahead of them with Henrietta on his arm, paying her every solicitude, just as he had in the Edgington Park drawing room during tea.

  Laura wondered what Henrietta would think if she knew how improperly her golden-haired lad had behaved on his last visit home? It had certainly come as a shock to Laura. Until then, she’d thought George was her friend. She’d even cherished hopes that he felt something more toward her. That he might, in fact, be on the verge of proposing marriage.

  More fool her.

  She hadn’t told anyone about George’s shameful proposition. Not Henrietta, not the vicar, and certainly not Aunt Charlotte. It would only have upset them—and the delicate equilibrium of the village. No one who had known George in his youth would have believed him capable of such behavior. It would have been Laura who was blamed for his rashness. Laura who was ostracized from the small corner of society she’d managed to cultivate in Lower Hawley.

  In the end, she’d dealt with the matter all on her own. Just as she dealt with every problem that came her way. She hadn’t the luxury of a champion. In the absence of one, she’d learned to champion herself.

  “Have you known Miss Talbot and Mr. Wright very long?” Mr. Archer asked.

  She resumed looking ahead. George and Henrietta were whispering together, sharing secrets as they often used to do. “Since we were children.”

  “Y
ou grew up together?”

  “In a manner of speaking.” Laura hesitated before asking, “What about you, sir?” Tea had been a brief affair, dominated by George’s tales of his travels. And by Henrietta, who had clucked over Laura more intensely than was usual. There had been little chance to learn anything about Mr. Archer. “How long have you known Mr. Wright?”

  “A year, or thereabouts.”

  “He’s never brought a friend home with him before.”

  “No?”

  She shook her head. “I’ve often suspected that the friends he was making during his travels weren’t the sort to merit an introduction to the residents of Lower Hawley. Certainly not to his father.”

  “You wonder that he’s found me worthy of the privilege.”

  “No, but it is rather curious. It makes me question just what sort of friend you are to him.”

  He flashed her a wry look. “I might ask you the same, Miss Hayes.”

  A surge of embarrassment caught her unaware. “You haven’t told him, have you?”

  The glint of humor in Mr. Archer’s gray eyes disappeared. Perhaps it had never been there. “Told him what?”

  “About our encounter in Talbot’s Wood this morning.”

  “Ah. That.” He paused. “Should I have?”

  “Not if you value your freedom.” She explained, “It’s just the sort of thing that would give rise to gossip. The locals hereabouts love nothing more than spinning harmless interactions into scandals. One word, and they’ll have us standing up in front of the vicar.”

  “Is that all it takes in Lower Hawley?”

  “I fear it is.”

  His mouth curved into a slow smile. “I shall keep that in mind.”

  The fine hairs on the back of Laura’s neck stood up. She cast a discreet glance from Mr. Archer to Henrietta and back again. He wasn’t obvious in his admiration for her friend. He didn’t stare at her unduly or insinuate himself into her conversation with George. But during tea, Laura had more than once observed Mr. Archer look at Henrietta in a cold and faintly calculating manner.

  Was that why such a man as he had come to their village? Not as the hero of the story, but as the villain?

  There was certainly something dangerous about him. Something hard and predatory. It was part of what made him so thrillingly handsome. That edge of subtle menace. Rather like a feral wolf.

  Was he hunting in Lower Hawley?

  Her mouth pressed into a frown. She didn’t know Mr. Archer. Even so, she’d thought better of him. He’d seemed different somehow. A rare and mysterious creature in their midst.

  But he wasn’t different at all. He was—if her instincts were correct—nothing more than a garden-variety fortune hunter.

  She’d seen enough of them over the years. Gentlemen in reduced circumstances who came to pay court to Henrietta and her inheritance. They were the impoverished nephews and second cousins of the county gentry. Men who were ill-equipped to snare a wealthy wife on the London marriage mart, and who believed they’d have better odds with a vulnerable country heiress.

  Henrietta had always dispatched such predatory gentleman with ruthless efficiency. She was certain to extend the same courtesy to Mr. Archer once she realized what he was up to.

  Or so Laura hoped.

  “Do you have a profession, Mr. Archer?” she asked.

  He was silent for a long moment, the fall of his boots on the hard-packed earth the only sound as they entered the wilderness garden. “Are you asking me if I work for a living?”

  The path narrowed, curving through trees that bowed inward into an arch, providing a leafy canopy against the blazing afternoon sunshine. “Do you?”

  “I’m not obliged to.”

  “You’re a gentleman of independent means?”

  “I’m a gentleman,” he said. “A gentleman doesn’t soil his hands with labor, Miss Hayes. Independent means or no.”

  The path grew narrower still, necessitating that she walk even closer to his side. It was entirely by design. Henrietta had once confessed that the landscape artist her father had employed so many years before had dreamed up the wilderness garden at Edgington Park as a trysting place for lovers. Every step through the trees brought one closer to the object of their affection.

  Laura wished that Henrietta had chosen somewhere else for their walk. Through the rose garden, perhaps. Or along the drive that led down to the village. Anything other than the intimacy of the wilderness garden path. With every brush of her full linen skirts against Mr. Archer’s trouser-clad leg, Laura’s heart beat a little more erratically.

  “An outdated precept,” she replied.

  “You believe so?”

  “Wholeheartedly. It’s been the ruination of many gentlemen who might have otherwise saved themselves, and their families, from ruin.”

  “You speak with some authority on the subject.”

  “I do. My father was such a one.”

  Mr. Archer’s expression sobered. “Forgive me. I didn’t realize—”

  “I’m not ashamed to own it. Had he exerted himself…” Laura couldn’t bring herself to finish.

  The truth was, if Papa had exerted himself, it wouldn’t have changed anything in the end. He’d still have died and left them all. But perhaps there might have been some money to soften the blow of his loss. Some value left in the Hayes’s name.

  “What I mean to say,” she continued, “is that a gentleman shouldn’t refuse to work merely because he’s a gentleman. The idea is as foolish as a man who can swim refusing to save himself from drowning. What does pride matter if the alternative is death or ruination?”

  “Did your father leave you in very straitened circumstances?” Mr. Archer asked. “Or is that too impertinent a question?”

  It was an impertinent question. As a rule, one’s personal finances were never discussed in polite company. It simply wasn’t done.

  But she’d been the one to broach the subject.

  She supposed it was a consequence of how they’d met. Much like the darkening wilderness walk, it gave the illusion of intimacy to their conversation. As if the two of them were acquaintances of long standing.

  “We’re not in straitened circumstances,” she said. Her conscience gave a sharp pang of protest at the falsehood. “That is, not entirely.”

  There was no point dissembling. He’d seen her in her twice-mended underthings, for pity’s sake. She nevertheless couldn’t shake the last remnants of her pride.

  “For a time, my family was quite well known in the world of fragrance. Perhaps you’ve heard of Hayes’s Lavender Soap? Or Hayes’s Lavender-Scented Powder?”

  Mr. Archer gazed down at her, the whole of his attention fixed on her face. “I can’t say that I have.”

  “What about Hayes’s Lavender Water? It was in all the shops four years ago. A purely respectable fragrance. You might have given some to your mother once—or to a sweetheart.”

  “The sweethearts I had four years ago weren’t the sort to wear respectable fragrances. As for my mother…”

  “Let me guess. You’ve never given her such a frivolous gift.”

  “I might if I’d ever known her.”

  She inwardly flinched. Good heavens. His mother was dead. Long dead, if Laura inferred correctly. She met his eyes, thoroughly chastened. “Now it is I who must beg your forgiveness.”

  Mr. Archer returned her gaze without animosity. “Freely given.”

  “I lost my mother at a young age, too,” she said.

  “Did you?”

  “She succumbed to a wasting disease when I was but six years old. I don’t remember much about her, except…I know that she loved the water. She was the one who taught me to swim.”

  “A pleasant memory.”

  “You must have some of your own.”

  “Not a solita
ry one.” They walked several steps in silence before he spoke again. “Was your father a perfumer, then?”

  “He didn’t call himself such. He considered it only a hobby. But we had a factory in London, and a distillery in France. They’re shuttered now, but once…”

  “What happened?”

  “He grew bored with lavender products. He was set on trying something new. Fashionable perfumes, made with exotic spices and animal oils—musk and so forth. He sank all of his capital into the venture. Regrettably, it didn’t have the same mass appeal as lavender water.”

  “And that was enough to ruin him?”

  “Not on its own. Had he lived, he might have rallied. But a year later, an outbreak of scarlet fever came to Lower Hawley. Papa was gone within a day. I nearly lost my brother, as well.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it.”

  “Yes, it was a very dark time. I still think of it often, wishing things had transpired differently. A futile exercise.”

  “It’s a miracle you didn’t contract the fever yourself.”

  “Oh, but I did, Mr. Archer. Indeed, it tried very hard to take me, too.” Her mouth lifted in a fleeting smile. “I was simply too stubborn to let it.”

  Alex returned Miss Hayes’s brief smile with a faint one of his own. Farther down the path, George and Miss Talbot walked arm in arm. When they’d set out, Alex had fully intended to accompany Miss Talbot himself. George had seemed agreeable to the idea. But as they’d descended the steps from the house, Miss Talbot had caught George’s arm. After that, George had made no effort to extricate himself.

  In any other circumstances, Alex would have been angry. He had only a month, after all. Not nearly enough time to achieve his ends. Every minute counted. Every second.

  But he wasn’t angry.

  He was—much to his astonishment—scarcely thinking of George Wright or Henrietta Talbot at all.

  “Is that why you were strengthening your lungs in Talbot’s Pond?” he asked, gazing down at Miss Hayes’s face.

  A blush tinted her cheeks.

  No doubt she was thinking of how he’d pulled her scantily clad form from the water. He couldn’t help but think of it, too. Not only for the pleasurable memories it conjured, but for those that were decidedly less so.