Free Phantoms In Philadelphia by Amalie Vantana Page A

some
piteous looks from my friends. Most of my friends avoided Mrs.
Campbell like she was a plague trying to attach to them and rob
them of their lives or bachelor status. For some, it was the same
thing.
    There was some stir amongst the men as they edged
their way toward the door or elbowed each other, smiling. Then I
saw why. My heart gave a startling lurch and began beating like it
wanted to escape my body as my eyes locked with the hyacinth eyes
of the woman from the Inn. Jolts of energy were dancing along my
spine as a smile formed on her pink lips. My chest tightened in a
way that was both painful and foreign. It felt like someone had
sucked all the air away from me, but yet I felt more alive than I
had in the past seven years of missions, espionage, and battles of
the war.
    Something solid bumped into me shattering the
moment. I drew my eyes away as I caught Elvira about the waist,
trying to keep us both upright. Something akin to an apology flowed
from her lips, but she cast an imploring look at her aunt. I
offered an apology of my own when the music faded.
    As I looked toward the door, my stomach clenched
tight as heat crept up my neck. The young woman from the Inn was
covering her mouth with her fan, but I could see the laughter in
her eyes. She looked away as a group of men surrounded her.
    A tug on my arm brought me back to
where I was, standing in the middle of the floor with Elvira. I
begged her pardon and escorted her to her aunt. The woman scowled
at me, but I excused myself without apologizing to her. She did not deserve an
apology.
    An army of men was surrounding the woman from the
Inn when I reached them. I could only stand at the back of the
group.
    “Greetings, John,” Thomas one of my friends said to
me in his good natured voice.
    “Thomas, good evening,” I replied as I shook the
hand he held out to me. Thomas was the most unruly of all my
friends. It did not matter where we were, whether it be at a card
party or an elegant evening soiree, you could count on two things.
One; that Thomas’s appearance, from his yellow hair to his loose
fitting attire, would be in disarray, and two; that he did not care
in the least.
    “I see that you have noticed the newest beauty in
our midst.”
    “Who is she?” I asked, as I tried to get a view of
her through the ten men hovering over her.
    “Miss Clark. Newly arrived last month and staying
with a chaperone. It is said that she has come to find her legal
guardian, but I know no more.”
    “Will you introduce me?” I asked, hope rising inside
me.
    Thomas smiled impishly. “Let us see if we can
squeeze through this den.” Thomas’s smile faded, and he became all
business, pushing his way through the men. “Look out, coming
through. Master of the house coming through. Stand aside.” I
followed Thomas as we pressed our way through the men, most of whom
I knew well. I stood behind Thomas, allowing his tall frame to
block me as he greeted Miss Clark, and then he stepped aside.
    “Miss Clark, allow me to present my friend and the
master of this house, Mr. John Martin.”
    I bowed before her, and when I looked into her eyes,
she smiled. She was poetically beautiful. Her auburn hair was piled
atop her head, her purple-blue eyes unmatched in any other person I
had ever seen, and she had a dimple in her right cheek when she
smiled.
    “I do hope that no more discomforts have plagued
you,” I said as I straightened.
    Her eyes lit up. “It is you, I was sure that I
could not be mistaken.” Upon Thomas’s look of inquiry, she
explained. “Mr. Martin rendered me a service yesterday. He was
quite gallant.”
    Thomas looked from her to me in disbelief. “What,
Saint John, our proud poet, the knight gallant? Surely you
mistake.”
    “Saint John? I had not heard that epithet, but I have heard of you,”
she said.
    “Lies, I assure you, if it was from this lot here
that you heard my name.”
    Thomas and a few of the others cried against my
words, but I ignored