Con Masquerade

Her shoeless feet dashed fleetingly over the dew-drenched carpet of grass, the green-lit backwaters was resonating with the pious, cantankerous echoes of early birds_ Poet’s glee, that didn’t seem quite that musical to Lady Constance this morning. A small cloud of dim mist still hovered over the lake, like haunts of the night returning to their abode deepwater, waiting to merge into the cold, greenish lake-water that was rank with errant little fishes and tetchy lotus weeds. Swan was gliding over the water prettily, sharply_ like no blade under surgeon’s finger can cut through skin.

A dog barked somewhere, probably in the front yard of the grand manor and Constance nearly tipped down the lake from the mere scare of it!

Oh, they certainly could not wake up so early! Not before she had found out the wayward little notebook of hers that she had managed to mislay in the backyard last evening. She remembered having dropped it aside_ blasphemy! Not aside, precisely_ but beneath the bench, when an unexpected party of two ladies and four gentlemen had wandered her way. She remembered laughing and talking to Elizabeth about the drab, same old subject of court scandal which had left the tons agog, she remembered pretending to listen. And that was only fortitude! Had the diary been not lying in the grass, like a flat hen nestled on her flatter eggs, concealed barely by the flare of her skirt_ Constance would have tossed her head, harrumphed and walked away haughtily!

The chatter only led her to an insistent invitation for joining them into Tea. And no matter in what way Constance deflected their proposal_ noble-folks had never been know for reading through subtle hints. Lord and Lady Barnwell stepped ahead of her, on the lane to manor, Elizabeth at her side, the three gentlemen following; Constance could only do so much as to push the diary under the bench in one swift kick.

Rest was obscure.

A very disconcerted affair of tea, and she had to- Constance had to sidetrack the notion of what she had left behind by the thought of what she was to face now.

“Constance!” Elizabeth grasped her and jerked her into a small assemblage. “Harris here thinks you have forgotten him…”

Constance unfocused mind narrowed down on the faces of three gentlemen from earlier, her gaze dallying on each for an equal proportion of times.

Floyd Everett. Intelligent, dark eyes and such well made cravat. Positively, the man was a picture of utter primness. His smile to Constance was polite, but limited. He was her brother’s school friend, yet to Constance_ nearly a stranger.

Archie Bernadette_ a solicitor now, with striking amber eyes. Distracted appearing, like Constance, but Constance understood that his distress was by far taken to a more quixotic matter. Archie was always elsewhere involved, but now, he particularly seemed besotted to Elizabeth, following every simple gesture the girl made with keen eyes.

Harris Grover, then, her childhood bully. His fair head was a clean mess and added to his roguish look. But what truly enhanced him, brought his blue eyes out better was the small, simple grin that he rewarded Constance, with something very clever screened under it.

“You, Constance, have changed.”

“Haven’t.” She gave him a haughty look, he smiled louder. “Look beyond your nose Harris.”

Post tea, Constance rushed to the backwaters first thing, yet, not to find the pages in which her heart beat, only to find her worst fear manifested.

The diary was not there!

***

Sun had soared up the silver sky and lifted with it, the wafting scent of sweet magnolias and lemon-grasses by the time Constance had ragged herself wild in search of the diary. The haze now withdrawn, the garden was stark with colors, ready for the reception of morning guest_ a dire, dismal news, for Constance hadn’t found her diary yet and god forbid! _had someone found it by now…