«Do what? You mean you didn't feel that? The pilot's putting on the air brakes—I think that's what they're called—because we're making our descent. I know, in my head, that he's probably dropping us down from a billion miles per hour to a million miles per hour, but it feels like we're stopping. Thirty-five thousand feet up, and the guy's slamming on the brakes like he's trying to avoid a deer in the road. I hate that.»
«Ah, the often too-fertile imagination of the writer. You're your own worst enemy, my dear.» Alex patted her hand. «Close your eyes, Maggie. Meditate. Think good thoughts. We'll be on the ground soon, and shortly after that we'll be at Medwine Manor, where you'll be feted and fawned over as the great talent you are.»
Maggie opened one eye, and glared at him. «Don't patronize me, Alex. I'm not going to get hysterical and start screaming or something.»
«Really? I cannot tell you how gratified I am to hear that. In that case, my dear—lean across me and see the great metropolis of London spread out at our feet. Glorious, isn't it? Like something out of a picture book.»
«Sadist.» Maggie groaned, and slapped her hands over her eyes.
Chapter four
One hand on the golden knob of a sword cane that in style and quality of workmanship greatly resembled the one his fictional self had purchased at the same small shop, Saint Just was a very happy, extremely content man as the limousine rolled out of London and, eventually, into Surrey.
It was raining, nothing out of the ordinary for England, and was rather gray and damp, also not unusual, but nothing could put a damper on Saint Just's enthusiasm. Or on Sterling's.
«Oh, look, Saint Just,» Sterling said now, his head half out of the window he insisted on keeping lowered, the better to take in the scenery. «That marvelous mansion, up there, at the top of the hill. The very picture of your family's estate in Sussex, isn't it?»
Saint Just leaned past Maggie. «Seventeenth century. The pediment is familiar, indeed. The same symmetrical flanking wings, most likely added in the eighteenth century. The unique bell tower. Good God, Sterling, I think you're right. That's Blake House. But here, in Surrey?»
In between them, Maggie slid down on her spine on the leather seat. «Is there a sign anywhere, Sterling? Something with the name of the place on it?»
«I don't—oh, there's an old fingerpost.» Sterling leaned even farther out the window. «It's… I can barely make it out… it's—got it! Peakely Manor. Why?»
Maggie sort of sucked in her cheeks. «Oh, okay. Thanks, Sterling.»
«Maggie?» Saint Just asked quietly. «Is there something you want to tell me?»
«Absolutely not. Nope. Nothing I want to say.» Then she sighed audibly and sat up straight once more. «Okay. I've never been to England until now, right? But you had to have a house, a bunch of houses. Other characters had to have houses. So… so I bought a few books. I think, I'm pretty sure, your Blake House is based on Peakely Manor. I just moved it to Sussex.»
Saint Just was actually finding it difficult to breathe. On one level, he understood what Maggie was telling him. Yet, on another, a more visceral level, he'd just been or-phanedj disenfranchised. Erased. Eliminated. «But… but it's my home. My family home.»
Maggie shook her head. «Oh, cripes. Alex,» she said, putting a hand on his arm as she spoke to him, quietly. «You're fake, remember? Fictional. You've never really been here. You're more real in New York than you've ever been here. I mean, you exist in New York. People see you, talk to you. You're evolving, just as you keep saying, and growing, and becoming more Alex Blakely, less Alexandre Blake, less the Viscount Saint Just. But I agree, this has to be a shock, seeing my imagination up against the real thing. I… I'm sorry.»
She was wrong. Maggie was wrong. He was Saint Just. He would always be Saint Just. His address had changed, that was all. This wasn't his England. His England had long ago disappeared, along with Brummell; and Byron, Shelley, and Keats; Prinney himself… even Carleton House.
The past was the past, and he was very much of the moment. To go back would be to disappear into the pages of Maggie's books. He and Sterling both, living again in the Regency Era, but never again living now . He could not, would not, allow that to happen.
There was no Blake House to return to, no mansion in Grosvenor Square, no hunting box in Scotland.
In a way, this was probably a good thing. He was becoming less fictional by the day. After all, he couldn't go back… not if there was nowhere to return to .
Saint Just took a breath, let it out slowly. «My goodness, Maggie, how you're looking at me. As if I might have an attack of the vapors or fall into a sad decline. I assure you, that is far from the truth. As you say, as I've said, Sterling and I are evolving. Blake House was drafty in the winter, in any case.»
Maggie was quiet for some moments before she spoke again. «You're pissed, right?»
«I am not—upset. I fully understand what you did, why you did it. However, even without home or fortune, I remain Saint Just. That, my dear, will never change.»
She saluted. «Yes, sir . Jeez, what a grouch. Sterling? Why aren't you being a grouch?»
Sterling smiled sheepishly. «I don't want to go back,» he said, then blushed. «Sorry, Saint Just, I hate to be disloyal, and all of that, but I really don't. I like Henry, and my motorized scooter, and Socks, and the television machine, and—»
«Yes, Sterling, we get the point,» Saint Just said as the limousine slowed and the driver made the very tight turn between stone pillars. He had turned onto a gravel drive that led downhill rather than up, then finally leveled as the leather seat. «Is there a sign anywhere, Sterling? Something with the name of the place on it?»
Sterling's, mumbling something about driving around to the back door to unload the luggage, then took a moment to inspect the foyer.
«I knocked, but no one came, and when I tried the door it was open,» Maggie told him, wiping raindrops from her face. «Oh, this is big, isn't it?»
Saint Just took inventory of the large foyer, at least forty feet square. An intricate black-and-white marble tile floor shone beneath a soaring ceiling painted to look like a summer sky dotted with fluffy white clouds. A wonderfully broad stone staircase rose slowly from the open hallway, and a gallery stretched around three of the four age-darkened white marble walls that had been carved to include columns and angels and goddesses, or some such romantic nonsense.
That last wall, along the stairs, was dominated by an immense mural stretching from the ground floor up to the top of the first floor, a creation that depicted a goodly number of dancing, frolicking ladies and gentlemen being attended by rosy-cheeked children.
«I can only sigh in relief to see that as you were thumbing through books and building my various estates, you didn't pattern any of them after the interior of this pile. The decor is rather… flamboyant.»
«Yeah, well, I think it's pretty neat,» Maggie said, her head back as she turned in a slow circle, looking at their surroundings. «No wonder they decided to film here. Wow.»
«The place is passable, I agree,» Saint Just said, amazed to find he was feeling more and more comfortable by the moment. Then again, after all, this was his milieu, real or imaginary. «Ah, and I may be wrong, but I do believe our host approaches now. He's not rigged out well enough to be a servant.»
They all watched as a fairly squat man dressed in hunting clothes that had obviously seen their share of hunts came lumbering down the stairs, one hand on the stone railing, his gaze directed at his boots, as if he'd taken a tumble once and planned never to do that again.
Not until he had safely navigated the stairs and stood on the parquet floor did the man raise his head and smile at Maggie. (Saint Just and Sterling could very well have been invisible.)