An English Lord's Love Affair

Chapter 15.2. Unknown Ethers

   "I'll get the person," Aunt Penelope said in excitement, her silver-streaked curls disheveled. "Come with me. No. On second thought, stay here. Guard him."

   "Guard whom?"

   "The ghost!?"

   "What ghost?"

   "The ghost right in front of your face."

   "How can I guard him if I can't see him?" Charlotte asked.

   At that moment Benedic stepped forward, dramatically, his cloaked figure overshadowed by the gatehouse. "Madam," he addressed Aunt Penelope, "she cannot hear or see me. Do not waste precious breath."

   Aunt Penelope glanced at Charlotte from the corner of her eye, murmuring, "Incredible."

   Benedic inclined his head in a grave nod. "Quite."

   "Why, you poor tragic man—er, ghost," the older woman said anxiously. "Are you having difficulty on your passage to the other side?"

   "The other side of what?"

   "Oh, dear," Aunt Penelope said nervously. "It never occurred to me that he might be trying to go up when he's meant to go down." She cleared her throat. "Lord Strathmere, I must warn you that I am a married woman."

   Benedic looked blank. For an awful moment Charlotte thought he would burst into laughter. "Married?"

   "Married as in faithful to my husband. I cannot consort with you, my lord."

   "Consort with me?"

   "I know of your reputation for seducing women in parish," Aunt Penelope said in a tremulous voice. "Tempt me not."

   "To do what?" he asked, in genuine confusion.

   "It was not my daughter at all, was it?" Aunt Penelope said with a gasp of understanding. "It was me you sought."

   Benedic was edging back into the shadows. Charlotte could only be grateful that because of their evening out, the gate had not yet been locked. He would be able to escape before her aunt grabbed him, too, and found out he was no apparition.

   "I must leave you now, madam," he said with a melodramatic wave of his cloak.

   "Leave me?" Aunt Penelope cried. "But I do not know why you came or what help you desire from me."

   "Well, I . . . " Charlotte enjoyed the look of uncertainty on his handsome face. "I have to go. I have tarried too long as it is."

   Aunt Penelope put her hand to her mouth. "Then does this mean—my Lord, please tell me, does our meeting mean you have been successfully laid?"

   "Ah, madam," he said as he squeezed out of the gate. He shot a wry glance in Charlotte's direction. "Alas, that is too personal a question to answer."

   He vanished into the trees.

   Aunt Penelope stood shaking her head in disbelief. "He's gone. Our ghost is gone."

And Charlotte could not have been more relieved. Of course since she had not "seen" him, she had to pretend continued bewilderment. "Are you sure, Aunt Penelope?" she whispered, staring up at the sky as if somehow Benedic's spirit had taken flight.

   Her aunt followed the direction of her gaze and frowned. "I don't think he has floated up to heaven, my dear," she said in irritation.

   Charlotte glanced down questioningly at  the ground. "Then—"

   The woman sighed. "Apparently he has not disappeared down there either, although one might understandably conclude that Hades would be his most likely abode."

   Charlotte paused. "Where do you suppose he went?"

   "It would seem, Charlotte, that the afterlife is more complicated than the human mind can comprehend. Where did he go?" Aunt Penelope waved her hands back and forth in the air. "He went neither here not there. Into the unknown ethers."

   "What unknown ethers?" Charlotte could not resist asking.

   "If I could answer that, then they would be unknown, would they?"

   "I suppose not."

   "Bah. I shouldn't expect one of your tender experience to understand the mysteries of life." She gazed hard at Charlotte. "Under the circumstances, perhaps it is best if we do not reveal this encounter to anyone else. We must not tell anyone that we saw him."

   "But I didn't see anything," Charlotte said.

   "Exactly. And if he is to come to me again, then he must feel he can trust me."

   Charlotte glanced into the woods where Benedic was presumably hiding. "Do you want to see him again? It seems rather a frightening thing to befriend a ghost."

   "My dear, if that is the sacrifice I must make to protect you, Paulina, and the other ladies of the parish, so be it."

   "It shall be our secret," Charlotte said stoutly.

   "Very well." Aunt Penelope cast a sharp glance around the quiet garden. "I must admit I am puzzled by one thing, Charlotte."

   Charlotte's heart began to race again. Had she really thought to escape so easily? "What would that be?"

   "What were you doing in the garden at this hour, Charlotte? What brought you down here, if not his lordship's ghost?"