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“I’m at leasttwicethat much of a rascal!”
“Shh.”
If Alicia was anything other than tickled by this interjection, she gave no sign, continuing her inquiry to Laurence. “I’m certain you have a fair few stories of his exploits.”
Over James’ muttered protests and Mary-Anne’s encouragement, Laurence couldn’t help but finally crack a smile at Alicia’s request.
“Oh, certainly. James and I have known each other since we were children. His misadventures in these parts are the stuff of legends—legends he mostly spins himself down at the White Hare.”
“Legends,that’smy medium!”
It didn’t take more than a moment for Laurence to recall and begin retelling a sufficiently scandalous tale of a young James Barton’s brief dalliance with serving as an altar boy at the local church. By the time he got to the part about what James had done to the priest’s cassock, the whole room was in stitches, their supper largely forgotten.
“In my defence, I did tell Father Hamlin that the miraculous image of Saint Ives had just been a muddy imprint of my own face,” James sighed, finishing his last swallow of beer. “Eventually, anyway.”
“Not before he’d written the bishop about this ‘holy relic,’” Mary-Anne corrected him.
“That’s absolutely wretched!” Alicia laughed. “What a wonderful story…and very well told, I might add.” Laurence beamed at this praise, taking a heady breath of the warm summer air that suffused the dining room.
“But of courseyounever engaged in any such foolishness, Mister Gillingham?” Alicia asked with a coy smile. Laurence swallowed, disarmed once more by her long eyelashes and dimpled cheeks and—
“Laurence Gillingham? Foolishness? Hah!” James exclaimed. He leaned forward on his elbows as though sharing some secret wisdom. “Since before he could walk this one has been on a mission to put the rest of us to shame with his upright character.”
“I don’t—” Laurence began to say.
“Surely his character can’t be as perfect as all that,” Alicia laughed. “After spending so much time around the two of you?”
“Mister Barton does have a flair for exaggeration, as you might have noticed,” sighed Mary-Anne. “Though in this case he is depressingly accurate. Laurence’s boringness may be referred to as moral fibre with only some small stretch of the imagination.”
“It’s a small wonder he’s the most sought-after bachelor in the whole of Dunwood!” pronounced James as he rested a hand on Laurence’s shoulder. Laurence shook it off, making an expression that he hoped might demonstrate how preposterous this claim really was.
“Oh, deny it all you like, but I hear what all the girls say whenever they come by the White Hare,” James continued. “Always asking after Laurence Gillingham, wanting to bring him pies or ask him to some country dance or other.”
“I find it most touching that you make time to follow such matters, what with your ‘art’ taking up so much of your time,” said Alicia with a smile.
“Indeed, it is a sacrifice! But I bear such love for my friend Laurence that I’ll stay at the pub all day if I must do so to protect his sterling reputation.”
This last word was shot at Laurence with a sarcastic raised eyebrow, but Laurence barely heard it as he pushed his chair back, trying not to blush as the other members of the party laughed uproariously.
Leave it, Laurence, he doesn’t mean anything by it,he told himself as he rose to clear the dishes from the table.Some men just never get over their troublemaking ways. It’s just more of his usual nonsense—surely there’s nothing to it.
Nothing at all.
