“You’ll work it out in time,” Harry assured her.
“Have you received any word from Captain Garrow?” Meg inquired.
“Not yet,” Mrs. Garrow replied. “I was wondering whether or not to send the carriage back for him.”
“I wouldn’t,” Harry said unexpectedly.
Mrs. Garrow laughed. “Why, that was the conclusion I came to! I shan’t. At least not before tomorrow.”
*
In the end, there was no need to send the carriage, for Captain Garrow alighted from a hired chaise shortly after luncheon. Meg, once more as Martha, saw him from the morning-room window as she attempted to wrestle from the housekeeper what visits and entertainments had been planned for the next few days. With a sudden urge to protect Basil and Mrs. Garrow from her husband’s vengeance, she cut short her interview and hurried into the hall to greet him.
The front door was already open, and footmen were carrying bags up the front steps. But it seemed both Mrs. Garrow and Harry were before her in greeting the new arrival. Harry, it seemed, was protecting Aline, too. Which was odd, considering his suspicions. But then, he had been the one to knock Garrow out in the first place. Whatever he thought of Aline Garrow, they shared a past, and for some reason, Meg could not like that.
However, Garrow, stone-cold sober, was a model of perfect courtesy. Apart from a slight bruise on his forehead, he bore no signs of their previous encounter. Bright and cheerful, his wife by his side, he was shaking hands with Harry, as Meg descended the steps.
“And here is our hostess,” Harry said blandly. “Captain Garrow, Martha. I gather you have not yet met. Garrow—Lady Calvert.”
“How do you do, Captain?” Meg said warmly. “Welcome to Calvert Court. I do trust you have recovered from your sad indisposition.”
“Oh, quite, my lady. I should know better than to eat in the middle of the night, but when one is traveling…” He shrugged elegantly. “But how kind of you to invite us, Lady Calvert.”
“I am always happy to welcome Calvert’s friends. And now I discover you are also a friend of Harry’s. But why are we standing here? Come inside, Captain.”
In the end, Mrs. Garrow took her husband up to his bedchamber to refresh himself after his journey, leaving Harry and Meg to exchange speaking glances.
“Well, at least he is not drunk,” she observed. “I have to hope she was right when she said he was much more amiable when not in his cups.”
“He seems to bear no ill will for being abandoned.”
“You don’t look very happy about it,” she remarked.
“Oh, I’m happy enough about that. I just wonder what the devil they are doing here.” He turned to her, taking a step nearer. “How are you bearing up?”
“It is quite liberating, being Martha for a while,” she confessed. “I have just learned a great deal from Mrs. Hanning about running the house, too, though I keep thinking it’s only a matter of time until people notice that Meg and Martha are never together.”
“Perhaps we should have Meg go and stay with a nearby friend?”
“That would look even odder. Besides, all the friends close by will come to the wretched ball and give away the fact that I was never there! We just have to hope Martha comes back quickly. I shall be very glad to be proved wrong and welcome her back with Calvert tomorrow!”
*
Meg spent a large part of the rest of the day changing her clothes. As Martha, she welcomed the vicar and his wife, and also the squire’s wife and two daughters. But of course, everyone knew Meg was staying at the Court, and so Martha went off to find her.
To save time, she had installed Mathews in the nearby cloakroom, which contained a full-length looking glass. In a trice, she was out of Martha’s alluring day gown and into the green dress of this morning. She patted her cheeks to bring a little more color to them—the story was Meg had been out riding—while Mathews efficiently repinned her hair in a more careless style.
In this way, she rushed into the drawing room to greet her sister’s guests once more and was duly introduced to Captain Garrow, who could not help staring in some astonishment at her likeness to their hostess.
Genuinely breathless, Meg poured herself a cup of tea and whirled into a chair, asking questions of the Misses Knowles, the squire’s daughters, whom she had not seen for almost a year, and joining in lively conversation. But after barely ten minutes, she jumped to her feet once more.
“Forgive me, I must go and change before Martha discovers me so improperly dressed for tea!”
“Where is Martha?” Harry asked lazily.
She met his gaze sunnily. “Dealing with some servants’ emergency, but she will be back at any moment, so I must rush.”
She flitted off back to the cloakroom where Mathews waited to lace her back into Martha’s gown and change back her hair. The faintest brushing of powder calmed her complexion, and she took a moment to breathe in front of the glass, gathering Martha’s personality around her like a mantle.
This time, she strolled outside, which had the added advantage of cooling her flustered cheeks, and around to the drawing room via the open terrace door.
“So sorry to neglect you!” she exclaimed. “Meg has just gone up to change, but she should be with us shortly. It is most pleasant on the terrace if anyone would care for a turn. Nurse has Basil playing on the lawn, Mrs. Garrow.”
With some of the guests outside and some in, she hoped “Meg’s” continued absence would not be so obvious. Besides which, Basil was a delightful distraction, and Captain Garrow, completing his rehabilitation, played ball with the somewhat surprised child.
Only as they all gathered on the front steps while the visitors piled back into their respective vehicles did anyone remember Meg. And that was because Harry brought her up.
Waving to an upstairs window, he said, “I think Meg is on her way down to say goodbye.”
“Don’t feel obliged to stay for her,” Meg said at once as everyone glanced upward. “She is so forgetful. We all look forward to your card party, Mrs. Knowles!”
“That was a nice touch,” she breathed to Harry as they followed the Garrows back inside.
“I thought so. It’s a bit like battle feints and misdirection.”
“I hope the experience will aid your career,” she said politely.
“How can it not?”
*
When Meg, still as Martha, walked into the drawing room before dinner, Harry and Captain Garrow appeared to be reminiscing. Or at least Garrow did. Harry said very little.
“I never saw you after Toulouse,” Garrow lamented. “Where did you go?”
Harry shrugged. “Various hospitals and doctors. It’s all a bit of a blur, to be frank.”
“I never came across you in the ones I visited with the duke,” Garrow remarked. “Where did you end up?”
“Paris, where they poked and prodded me some more and eventually sent me home.”
“Will you stay on active service?” Garrow wondered.
“I haven’t decided. Will you?”
“It’s my career,” Garrow said simply. “Though to be sure, it won’t be the same without the French to fight.”
“And will you follow the drum, Mrs. Garrow?” Harry inquired.