Free Martha Schroeder by Lady Megs Gamble

certainly be glad to see the captain and Lady Margaret.” With that final shot she rose and summoned her daughters to do likewise. As she turned to sweep out of the room, her magnificent exit was spoiled by Meg’s reappearance.
    “Oh, Mrs. Headley, I am so sorry you feel you must—
    “Far be it from me to give you advice. Not after the way you spoke to me the last time I thought to give you a hint to guard your good name. But some people take a great deal too much upon themselves. I would be careful if I were you of encroaching persons hanging on your sleeve for their own advantage!”
    “I beg your pardon, Mrs. Headley. I am afraid I don’t fully understand.” Meg looked at her visitor with bafflement.
    “I’ve said all I mean to on the subject. Come, girls!” And she swept from the room, her two daughters trailing behind her like smaller vessels after a ship of the line.
    James bowed over Annis’s hand. “That was bravely done, Miss Fairchild, but I fear you may have called down the furies upon your head.”
    “Never mind, Captain. She has never approved of me.” Annis attempted to shrug off the incident.
    But Meg was not to be left out. “Just what are you talking about? What could Annis possibly have done to send Madam Headley sweeping out of here like an insulted queen?”
    “It was nothing, Meg, truly. You know Mrs. Headley.”
    “It was Miss Fairchild’s attempt to throw herself on her sword to spare your reputation,” James said bluntly. Herecognized that although he viewed the entire scene as much ado about nothing, for unmarried young women who lived permanently in the neighborhood, the kind of gossip Miss Fairchild and Lady Meg were going to have to endure could be very painful.
    Meg refused to leave the topic until she knew exactly what had happened. Her reaction disturbed James. “Oh, lord, Annis, what possessed you to do such a harebrained thing? And in front of the biggest gossip in the county! Before the cat can lick his ear, the world and his wife will know that both of us are trying to ensnare the handsome captain!” She sank down onto one of the brocaded settees and put her head in her hands.
    “Now, Meg, it isn’t that bad. She won’t say a word about you. It’s my shameless behavior Mrs. Headley will condemn; you know that. She’s always thought you treated me too much as an equal, and this
    will—”
    “I know, I know,” Meg said. “That’s just the trouble, don’t you see? You are so pretty and so talented that most of the old cats around here are ready to cut you to ribbons anyway. This will be their chance! Oh, Annis! I don’t want you hurt!”
    The two young women exchanged looks that conveyed much more than words could. All the affection each bore the other glowed in their eyes.
    “My dear,” Annis said at last, her voice thick with emotion, “you know this doesn’t begin to repay you. Besides, after you marry, I will be gone from this neighborhood while you will remain. What can a little gossip do to me then?”
    At her words, an arrested expression came to Meg, and she looked at James in a way that made him wonder if he had forgotten to shave part of his face that morning. “That’s it,” she said, a smile breaking over her features. It was like the sun coming up, and James couldn’t help but smile back.
    “It? What is ‘it’?” he ventured after a moment of silence.
    “Don’t you see? We must protect Annis’s reputation.”
    “And yours as well, my dear,” Annis replied. “Calling the captain by his given name was really quite fast. She won’t let you soon forget it”
    “She will if James and I announce our betrothal at her dance!” Meg said triumphantly. “That will silence her. Then I will be perfectly justified in calling the captain James, and you will have simply showed him the affectionate kindness you would feel toward the future husband of your former pupil and present friend!”
    James stared at her, dumbstruck. Of all the cursed