Page 13 of The Paid Companion

She cleared her throat. “As it happens, I have been saving every penny I can afford to put aside in order to invest in a certain business venture.”

“Indeed? What sort of venture would that be?”

She pondered briefly and then decided that there was no reason not to tell him the truth. “I hope you will not be too terribly shocked, sir, but my goal is to go into trade.”

“You are going to become a shopkeeper?” he asked in an astonishingly neutral manner.

Braced for strong disapproval, she felt almost light-headed with relief when he did not condemn her scheme out of hand. In the view of well-bred people, going into trade was a dreadful move to be avoided at all costs. In the eyes of Society it was preferable by far to scrape by in genteel poverty rather than become the proprietor of a business.

“I realize that my plans must strike you as beyond the pale,” she said. “But as soon as I have obtained enough money, I intend to open a bookshop and a circulating library.”

“You do not shock me, Miss Lodge. As it happens, I have made my fortune through various investments. I have some skill when it comes to business.”

“Indeed, sir.” She gave him another polite smile.

He was being very gracious, she thought. But they both knew that the gulf between a gentleman’s business investments and the notion of going into trade was vast and deep in the eyes of Society. It was all very well for a person of quality to purchase shares in a shipping venture or a housing construction project. It was another matter altogether for a well-bred individual to become the proprietor of a shop.

Nevertheless, the important thing was that St. Merryn did not seem the least bit put off by her plans. Then again, she thought, he had made it clear that he was not in a position to be choosy.

He inclined his head in somber acknowledgment of her intentions. “Very well, then, do we have a bargain, Miss Lodge?”

The generosity of his terms completely dazzled her, as he had no doubt intended. She had one remaining qualm about the post she was accepting, but she crushed it down quite ruthlessly. This was the first turn of good fortune that had come her way since that dreadful day when her stepfather’s creditors had arrived on her doorstep. She would not risk losing a golden opportunity simply because of a petty uncertainty.

Scarcely able to contain her delight, she smiled again.

“We do indeed, my lord.”

St. Merryn stared at her mouth for several seconds, as though riveted. Then he gave his head a slight shake and frowned slightly. She got the impression that for some reason he was annoyed, not with her but with himself.

“If we are to achieve our objective of projecting an air of intimacy about our association,” he said dryly, “I think you must learn to call me Arthur.”

That would not be easy, she thought. There was a forbidding quality about him that would make such easy familiarity difficult.

It was not until she was outside in the street, hurrying back to Mrs. Egan’s townhouse to give her the good news, that the qualm she had squelched earlier rose up once more to plague her.

It was not the earl’s formidable temperament or his bizarre plan to parade her in front of Society as his fiancée that worried her, she thought. She could deal with those things.

What made her uneasy about this too-good-to-be-true post was the fact that she was almost positive that St. Merryn had not told her the whole truth.

He was keeping secrets, she thought. Her intuition warned her that St. Merryn’s scheme involved something far more dangerous than a plan to put together an investment consortium.

But his private affairs were none of her concern, she concluded with rising excitement. The only thing that mattered to her was that if she successfully carried off the role St. Merryn had assigned to her, she would be well on her way to realizing her dream by the time he brought his little drama to a close.

4

It is just barely possible that my streak of extremely bad luck is about to come to an end.” Elenora sank gratefully into the depths of the wingback chair and smiled at the two women perched on the sofa across from her.

She had first met Lucinda Colyer and Charlotte Atwater six months before, in the offices of Goodhew & Willis. The three of them had arrived on the same day, seeking employment as companions. After a particularly trying afternoon of interviews, Elenora had suggested that they all go to the tea shop just around the corner and commiserate.

As it happened the three of them were quite different in temperament, but that fact paled in comparison to the things that they did have in common: They were all in their mid-twenties, well past the age when a good marriage was still a viable option. They were all from respectable backgrounds; well-bred and well-educated. And due to a variety of unfortunate circumstances, all three found themselves alone in the world and without resources.

In short, they shared the common bonds that drove women such as themselves into the paid companion profession.

That first afternoon tea together had become a regular Wednesday affair. After they had obtained posts, Wednesday was the one day of the week that each of them had free.

For the past few months they had been meeting here in the parlor of Lucinda’s elderly employer, Mrs. Blancheflower. It was not an environment calculated to lift one’s spirits, in Elenora’s opinion, and she knew the others did not find it particularly cheerful either.

The atmosphere was one of intense gloom due to the fact that Mrs. Blancheflower was dying somewhere upstairs. Fortunately for Lucinda, who had been hired to keep the lady company in her remaining days, her employer was taking her time about making her transition to a higher plane.

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