Harriet opened her mouth to protest, but then closed it. Her heart sinking, she realized they were right. It wouldn’t be long before the doorway darkened with all manner of people, all coming on some seemingly innocuous errand, but really thirsting for a glimpse of the captain. “Good God.”

“I know,” Stephen said. “I don’t like it either. But I’ve thought it through and we’ve really no choice.”

“There has to be another way,” Harriet said. “I simply do not like this plan.”

Sophia blinked. “Why not? I think it’s a perfectly good plan. And you have the best part of all! That of ‘fiancée in love.’”

“I don’t wish to be a ‘fiancée in love.’”

“There!” Sophia looked eagerly at their mother. “I told you Harriet wouldn’t agree to this! Perhaps we could tell people that the captain is really engaged to me all along and that I’m the one he really—”

“No,” Mother said firmly, eyeing Sophia severely. “I’ve already told you that would not work. We have to stick to the same story.”

Sophia sniffed. “Oh very well, though I doubt Harri can pull it off. She’s awfully stiff on stage. Remember when we asked her to play Falstaff last year? A perfectly delightful part, and yet she managed to murder it with every sentence. No one laughed a bit.”

Stephen snorted. “Harriet’s nothing compared to you. Remember how badly you mangled doing Lady Ophelia last Easter? That was a tragedy indeed.”

“I did a fine job! Even Mrs. Strickly said so, and she’s been to dozens of London plays!”

Harriet made an impatient noise. “None of that matters now! How are we going to do this?”

“Simple,” Mother said. “We will just restate a few set facts.”

“Such as?”

“The captain is here to see you. He has only come for a short period of time—two weeks, maybe less. He’s leaving as soon as his ship is ready.”

“And?”

Mother lifted her brows. “That’s more than enough.”

“What about what the captain told Mr. Gower in the sitting room today? That his ship was named…oh, something, I can’t remember—and that it was being repaired in Whitby? Should we mention that, too? Or that he injured himself in a battle with pirates?”

Sophia and Ophelia both gasped. “The captain is such a brave man,” Sophia breathed.

Harriet’s hand curled into fists. “He made it up!”

Ophelia nodded. “He’s so brave that he’s even willing to live a lie, all to help us. Although…I wonder if he is remembering something in earnest and just doesn’t realize it. Perhaps the captain really is a captain and—”

“For the love of—he isn’t real!” Harriet burst out. “There is no Captain Frakenham, no ship, and no pirates!”

A short silence followed this outburst.

“Really, Harriet,” Sophia said, eyeing her sister as though she’d just grown a third head, “there is no need for you to get so vexed.”

“That’s right,” Stephen said, trying to look like the man of the house, an irritating habit that seemed to be getting worse of late. “I think you owe Ophelia an apology.”