Free A Scandalous Plan by Donna Lea Simpson

people.”
    “Why do you care if I buy Meadowlark or not?” he asked, taking her arm and strolling with her up one walk near a row of neat shops. He wasn’t sure why he asked, nor what he hoped she would say, but what she did say was a disappointment.
    “I just would like to see that house better cared for. An absentee landlord is never a good thing. Once the owner died and it passed into the hands of distant relatives, there was no one to care for the house. That’s a shame.”
    What had he expected her to say? he chastised himself. That she liked him and wanted him to stay? Absurd.
    They went to several shops and stopped at a tiny, quaint tea shop, where the proprietor, a Mrs. Smythe-Blessing, gave them personal service and watched them avidly from her chair in the corner.
    “Why is she staring at us?” he whispered to Lady Theresa.
    “Perhaps it is just that you are a very good-looking man!”
    He let out a great shout of laughter and realized that it was not the first time in her company that he had laughed so heartily. Before meeting her he couldn’t remember the last time he had laughed. “My lady, that is the most absurd thing I have ever heard.”
    She grinned. “Is it absurd that you are good-looking, or only that a woman of Mrs. Smythe-Blessing’s discrimination should find you so? I assure you, she has excellent taste.”
    He watched her eyes, the silvery light in them glittering with laughter. For one heart-stopping moment he realized with a sickening lurch that he would quite like to see that light and those eyes often, every day, even. His fault was a tendency to take life too seriously. The blows he had been dealt had left him cautious and serious. But in her presence he felt buoyed, like a weight was lifted from him.
    She shared his concerns and gladdened his heart.
    He pushed away such thoughts. He knew the differences in their station, and he knew that though eligible, his fortune and his name were tainted with the stain of trade. He was a cloth manufacturer and a merchant. It was a sobering thought.
    “Do you think we shall have rain soon?” he asked, sitting back in his chair and taking a sip of his tea. He damned himself for a cold-natured idiot as he saw the silvery light die in her eyes, but things were how they were. Better he did not start thinking of her in that way, as an important part of his daily life. Even aside from their differences in situation, he would likely kill that joyousness in her nature, as he had just killed her smile.
    “I think we shall. The clouds are building today,” she replied.
    They left the tea shop and continued their slow perambulation of the village, finally stopping at the butcher shop so he could thank Mrs. Butcher, Lady Theresa said, for the excellent preparation of the beef tongue he enjoyed so much.
    They climbed the three deeply grooved stone steps up to the shop; conversation stopped as they entered. Seven pairs of eyes were fixed upon them. He felt Lady Theresa tense and she took in a deep breath, as if she were preparing for battle. She fixed her attention on one woman, an older, stout lady dressed in black and gray.
    “Mrs. Greavely,” she said sweetly. “I would like to make known to you Mr. James Martindale.”
    “Mrs. Greavely,” he said, nodding to her. “Good day to you, ma’am.”
    Her stern manner thawed just a fraction and she said, “Good day, sir.”
    Tension broke in the butcher shop and Mr. Butcher himself came forward, wiping his hands on his apron and bowing obsequiously to James. They had an odd conversation about beef tongue and his preferences in meat cuts, something of which he rarely thought. He felt as though he had passed some test of which he was not even aware. Conversation resumed, though there was a great deal of whispering and pointing. He supposed he was a novelty in so small a village. He and his family had only been in residence a month or so. But he occasionally heard Jacob’s name and a sharply indrawn