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 whosawher.
What she didn’t know waswhenit 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 alwaysknewwhen 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 sheshouldmake “that” face, that sheshouldobject, 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, ifIwere 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 Houseispleasant,” 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 mostremarkablebird sewn on it, and I don’t know what’s happened to it. It’s simplygone.” 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 myfavoritehat, and I can’tbeginto 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 isnative to Scotland? La, that would give me something to converse with Mr. Macduff about, would it not?”
