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“From the expression on your face, it was quite dire.”
Charlotte seethed. Louisa continued to gaze at her, flabbergasted.
“But it’s not as though I know anything much about the world of the mystic,” Jeffrey continued, lending a shrug.
“You find the entire thing silly,” Charlotte said.
“As does Charlotte,” Louisa interjected once more. “At least, that’s what I always assumed.”
Again, Charlotte cast Louisa a dark look. When she turned her eyes back towards Jeffrey, she found him studying her. There was something amiss about his gaze, something that told her that he was hiding something.
“So you just happened to walk through town at precisely the same moment I was,” Charlotte said. “And you walked past precisely when I banged a hand on the previous space of said mystic.”
“Yes.”
“And now, we run into you here. At the ball, only a day later.” Charlotte made a tiny, irritated noise in her throat. “What a funny thing, isn’t it?”
“Quite,” Jeffrey agreed. “But I’ve never been one to question the nature of the universe.”
“Perhaps you’d better speak with a mystic, then,” Louisa said. The brightness returned to her eyes. “She informed me of a great deal to come. I no longer feel such fright regarding my future. She’s given me such peace.”
Jeffrey gave Louisa a slight smile, one that seemed to translate how simplistic he felt this view to be. Then again, Charlotte could have very well been projecting this concept onto him.
It was difficult for her to say.
“Whatever did the mystic say?” Jeffrey asked, surprising Charlotte.
He seemed somehow honest in his question, as though he wanted to illustrate how invested in the conversation he was.
Charlotte was continually smitten with those who gave Louisa the time and energy she deserved.
“I don’t care to say,” Louisa said. “I worry that it removes a bit of the power, in the telling.”
Jeffrey nodded, his face giving over an air of earnestness. “I understand that. I feel the same way about secrets, sometimes. That if I tell them, I give away a piece of my soul that I can never get back.”
“That makes sense,” Louisa affirmed. With a slight glance towards Charlotte, she added, “Although I must admit, I can’t remember the last time I kept a secret from Charlotte. We’ve been in one another’s ears for so long that I find it difficult to remember where I end and she begins.”
The conversation bumped along after that. Charlotte was astonished at the handsomeness of the man, how occasionally, she felt as though his handsomeness and his straight-forwardness built up a sort of belief. She supposed this was why handsome men and beautiful women got away with murder. One had only to look at them and swoon. Everything was eternally forgotten.
Charlotte returned to her pessimism not long after this realization. She built up a thicker boundary between herself and this strange man, guarding herself against whatever potential evils he’d cooked up. Although it was assuredly possible that he’d “just been walking through town” at the same time as her trek to the mystic’s, it was entirely too strange for Charlotte to believe—especially given the bizarre nature of the rest of the week.
After nearly twenty minutes, perhaps thirty, Charlotte drummed up an excuse. She latched her fingers around Louisa’s and said, “Louisa, don’t you remember? We promised my dear cousin a conversation. Shall we make our way?”
Louisa furrowed her brow. It seemed clear that she’d enjoyed the conversation a great deal and didn’t wish to be tugged away. Still, she wasn’t the sort to back away from such a signal.
“Of course,” she said. “Jeffrey, will you excuse us?”
Jeffrey bowed his head. “It’s been a unique pleasure to meet you both. Terribly sorry for having taken up so much of your evening.”
Charlotte muttered something as she dragged Louisa away. The girl seemed like a dead weight. They burst through the crowd and hustled towards the far corner, where Louisa sprung round, gripped Charlotte’s shoulders, and cried, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so anxious! Not in all my years of knowing you. How long has that been, now? Six years?”
Charlotte pressed her lips together. The sound of the string instruments, no more than ten feet away, swirled through the air, making it hardly possible to think a clear thought.
“I don’t know if we should trust him,” Charlotte stated.
Louisa chuckled. “What’s got into you? You’re white as a sheet.”
“I saw him. In town. It was strange, Louisa. It wasn’t like any other encounter.”
