Page 66 of Better Off Wed

“Yes. Exactly. Freshen up before luncheon.”

Jeremy looked agitated, as if he could not make up his mind whether he wanted to hear what his mother had to say, and Laura parted her lips to refuse to leave, ready to stay and support his spirits as he had supported her body. But before she could speak, he gestured toward the door with his chin, urging her to follow his sister.

Wrapping her fingers around the knob of her walking stick and drawing a determined breath, Laura rose and left the room.

Thankfully, the stairs were not steep, though that also meant that the ceilings on the upper floor were low. Jeremy surely could not have stood upright. The cottage had only two rooms upstairs, one on either side of the house, tucked under the eaves. Laura was both eager to sit down again and rest her ankle, and sorry to see Julia direct her to the room on the right, rather than the one above the sitting room, where it might have been possible to overhear some of the conversation between Mrs. Addison and her son.

“This is my room,” Julia explained. “If you’ll be spending the night, and it seems you may, then you can sleep here, and I will go with my mother across the landing.”

“You are too kind. I am sorry to put you to any trouble.”

“It’s no trouble,” she insisted, as she began to gather two small piles of nightclothes, one to take to her mother’s room and the other for Laura, as it was obvious she had not brought a bag other than her reticule. “There are fresh linens and a comb on the washstand, and books on the bedside table, if you wish something with which to amuse yourself.”

As Jeremy’s sister worked, Laura did her best to make herself comfortable on the cushioned bench at the end of the bed, stretching out her injured limb along the seat, at Julia’s urging, and arranging one of the low bolsters at her back. “I understand from your brother than you like the theater.”

“I do indeed.” Julia placed a folded shift on one pile. “Above all things. If it weren’t so scandalous, I would like to become an actress.” She tilted her head and looked thoughtful. “Why is it scandalous, do you suppose?”

Laura said nothing. The theater had a long history of disrupting boundaries between the various ranks of society, hierarchies that those most benefited by them were adamant about keeping in place. The assumption that actresses were but a half step from prostitutes, selling the spectacle of their bodies, was merely one part of it. All of it, as far as Laura was concerned, was ridiculous. If the theater provided respectable entertainment for ladies, why should it not also provide a respectable living for them?

But it was hardly her place to speak of such things to Jeremy’s younger sister.

“Really,” Julia went on, “when one considers how every moment of a woman’s life is a performance for someone’s benefit, I fail to see why acting on a stage should be regarded more severely than acting interested in a gentleman’s opinions in a ballroom or acting pious at church.”

Laura could not hide her smile. She liked Julia very much. “Well said, Miss Addison. I agree. Women are expected to play roles that offer them no advantage, and far too often without any remuneration at all.”

“Wouldn’t it be lovely not to have to think at all about money matters?” Julia said with a sigh. “We could do as we pleased then. I could be an actress and not have to consider my reputation and the opinions of future suitors. And my brother could—well.” She turned away to rummage through a drawer, giving the distinct impression she had almost said too much. “I suppose he could do a great many things.”

“Such as leave the army? Or marry?”

Julia glanced over her shoulder, her expression a mixture of sheepishness and surprise at Laura’s forthrightness. “I’m sorry he and Mama have chosen today for another of their conversations about the matter. They’ve surely discussed it fifty times already, always to no avail. He has such an overblown sense of duty, to my way of thinking of it. Determined to pay off debts that aren’t even his. I really thought Mama had given up trying to talk sense into him, but I suppose when you arrived…” She sighed again as she turned back to the drawer. “He has never even mentioned a lady’s name, either to Mama or to me. Did not want to get our hopes up, I suppose. That’s why I first started teasing him about the Lady Sterling in the papers. And then I began to assume that his interests must lie…elsewhere.”

Laura was surprised to hear a young woman speak of such matters so frankly.

“Have I shocked you, Miss Hopkins? Mama says it’s what comes of reading novels and going to plays. I suppose she isn’t wrong, but I—I just want my brother to be happy.” A pause, as she stood and gathered a small bundle into her arms. “Is your brother equally obstinate, Miss Hopkins?”

“Comparatively speaking, I think mine is far worse. Your brother has been excessively kind and thoughtful.”

“That’s easy enough to explain.” She stifled another giggle as she moved to the door to carry her things to her mother’s chamber. “He likes you—and I, for one, am very glad to see it. Though I suppose the more important question is, do you like him?”

Laura’s first instinct was to deny it, though it would be a lie.

Deception is protection. It had been her guiding philosophy for so long, she had refused to see the danger in it. It was one thing to fib to keep her aunt from worrying overmuch, or to play a part to lure men like Penhurst and Thornton into giving up information that could destroy them.

But when it came to her feelings for Jeremy, she was ready to be done deceiving herself. She wanted more than a pretend marriage with him, more than a few stolen hours in a rattling coach.

Having posed the question, Julia had not waited for an answer. When the door opened briefly as she slipped out of the room, the soft murmur of voices rose up the stairwell, though their words could not be heard. Would Jeremy’s mother have any better luck this time convincing him that he could afford to seize happiness?

Despite what Julia had insisted, Laura sensed that Jeremy’s hesitation toward marriage had to do with much more than money. What secret was he still keeping?

Or what secret had been kept from him?

Chapter 19

Jeremy lowered himself into the chair his sister had vacated. “I’m not sure this is the best time for a tête-à-tête, Mama.”

“I only hope it’s not too late,” she replied, more acerbically than was her nature. “Jeremy, my dear, anyone can see from her expression that Miss Hopkins is smitten with you—”

Was it true? “I wouldn’t say—”