Elegant, enigmatic Excellency engages elite earnest.

Entreaties, excuses evaded entirely, emphatically -

Erstwhile emancipator eagerly embraces error.

Elderly eccentrics endow encyclopedic erudition.

Everyone England-bound ere evening.

"My dear friend, Lord Ascot! How are you feeling?"

Hamish Ascot vaguely felt his head rising over the edge of the tub of exceedingly hot water - his skin had flushed red the moment he stepped into it. Muffling a groan and suppressing a shiver, Hamish whispered his answer into the sickly-scented air of his room.

"Your Excellency, what on earth are you doing here? I apol...apologize for being so dreadfully improper. I assure you, I am quite we - quite well at the moment."

"...I see. And Alice? How is my Champion faring?"

The younger Lord Ascot had taken a furious, fretful, frightened, and frustrated Alice Kingsleigh into Bombay proper earlier that day in a futile attempt to calm her down. He still was not sure how his failed fiancee and father's apprentice had learned about her sister's predicament, but it did not matter - Alice was on the warpath. With the imperiousness and...muchness... of the Queen Herself, the blonde woman had demanded passage back to England - her aim was to be with Margaret and her nephew before Lowell had the pleasure of kicking them out of their home.

"Alice is..."

Hamish, despite his ever-worsening ague, could still have told himself - well, his imaginary Excellency, to be perfectly exact - an Untruth. A small, tiny, little White Lie even. Something to quell the anxious emotion echoing each and every utterance she made. He was certain that she would not have minded. She might actually have preferred that.

"Alice is..."

Enraged? Exasperated? Envenomed? Ensorcelled by imaginary, embroidered effigies of her enemy ensanguined?

"Alice has...a family problem to address, your Excellency. And not a small one."

The silence was heavily weighted. It seemed to Hamish that he could clearly hear the ticking of the large grandfather clock in the common room below.

"Are you sure that you are both fine, Lord Ascot?"

The young man swallowed the aching scream of pain that built up as he removed his arm from the scalding water. The motion sent the air whispering along the exposed limb and, despite the sultry nature of typical Indian weather, he was forced to suppress a strong bout of shivering. His efforts failed, causing a frown to wrinkle her Excellency's high, noble forehead.

"Lord Ascot! You are suffering again from those..those Feverills again, are you not?"

If he'd had enough energy to feel abashed, Hamish was sure that his face would flush even redder. Unfortunately, he was struggling just to keep his body warm - far too much to care about the fact that her Excellency's hands were on his forehead, or the fact that his head was laying on her lap, or the fact that she was even existing in the same place as he.

Queen Mirana's skilful fingertips entangled Hamish's thoughts in ever-growing slumber. Eschewing caution, the young lord began to whisper out the events of the day.

"After breakfast...Lord, I am cold...yes, after breakfast, my father and I retired to the library to discuss the matter out of earshot - I must admit that I was quite appalled at the news myself... At any rate, Alice was supposed to be preparing herself for our trip into the city, but obviously she overheard us somehow, because when I came up to fetch her, she was positively livid..."

[~~~]

Hamish paused at Alice's doorway as he heard a string of heated gibberish float through the closed portal. The door itself seemed to be trembling from the force of the un-ladylike...stomping (for there was no other way to describe the loud thudding that traveled the length and breadth of the floor).

"Y'mightn't wants ta go in there jus' yet, g'vnur," the doorknob seemed to state in a nervous, conspiratorial manner. Hamish resolutely shook the cotton wool out of his mind and placed a firm hand on the timid knob, ready to knock and stop Alice's foolishness.

"Ali-"

Hamish paused. He never knew Alice's voice to be so... gruff. Looking down the corridor and the stairs behind him, Hamish proceeded to engage in an activity that he had often scorned and scolded his former intended for dabbling in.

He eavesdropped through the door, stooping low to plaster his ear to the keyhole.

He was certainly out of practice - it took him quite some time to distinguish the two separate voices, but eventually every noise evened out to make Alice's voice quite evident, as well as the muffled voice of a very evidently male entity.

'A man? In Alice's chambers?' Hamish all but screamed to himself, his nerves and Properness shouting out in alarm. Yet, the young lord did not feel the overwhelming compulsion to fling open the door and rescue Alice from whatever...knave...lingered so presumptuously inside a lady's chambers. No, for some reason, he had the distinct impression that he would be the one in need of rescue if he were to enter now. Shaking his head, Hamish dismissed the (briefly) entertaining notion of saving Alice, of all people, and tried to bring his mind back to the conversation going on inside the room.

[~~~]

"A man, you say?" her Excellency murmured as she bathed his face with the warm water. "Mayhaps a...mad man?"

"O-o-oh mo-most assuredly, your Excellency," Hamish replied within a shiver. "The man had somehow gotten the notion that Alice was married, as far as I can gather! After that, I'm not sure what exactly was said, but his...propositions...certainly did not seem to be the most sane."

"Oh dear. Yes, this certainly explains everything. Could you continue to elaborate, good Lord Ascot?"

Something about the way she said his name made him shiver again. Harder. He sank a bit deeper into the water before continuing.

[~~~]

"A-Alice?" Hamish began timidly after silence had reigned behind the doorknob for quite some time. Annoyed with the tremulous quality of his voice, the young Ascot began again, prefacing his entrance with an enthusiastic knock on the door.

"Alice Kingsleigh! I say, are you ready yet?" Hamish began again, quite proud of how his voice had returned to its normal timbre. He alowed himself to knock briskly on her door - a quick rapping that never failed to raise her ire.

Expect that this time, it did.

Hamish frowned at the door, puzzled as the silence stretched even further - well past the time that Alice would normally throw open her door and scold him roundly for annoying her as he brushed off her existence. Caution and trepidation filled his veins with ice, even as he raised his knuckles to rap on the door again...

"Yes!" Alice cried, her face flushed quite red, her hair still in damp disarray. Hamish stumbled back from the forceful thrust of her door, opting to peer around her slight frame and into the room behind her.

"I say, are you alright?" the younger Ascot began, now reviewing Kingsleigh's young heiress with an eagle eye and blunt intrigue. "I could have sworn that I heard you speaking with a man just now!"

Alice's eyes widened for a moment.

"A...man?" she began, her voice unusually uncertain. Hamish began to feel rather uncomfortably in the brief silence. Surely Alice Kingsleigh couldn't - wouldn't - allow a man into her chambers unchaperoned. Or at all, for that matter-

"I fooled you, Lord Ascot?" Alice suddenly replied in an excited tone. "Excellent! I've been trying my best to adopt a 'manlier' tone for my unseen business correspondences - stodgy old men never seem to trust a high-pitched voice! I thought that I should try talking like a man to get into that more 'masculine' frame of mind, so that my writing would be less suspect and 'dainty' and-"

"Enough!" Hamish chuckled, pleading surrender with both gloved hands before offering an elbow to his eccentric new 'cousin.' From her explanation, it seemed more likely that she had planned to unman her foul brother-in-law using pen and paper. He could hardly disapprove.

"Enough of your madness, please! Let us escape any thoughts of business exchanges and indulge in the wonders of the city instead. Father has had our good hostess engage the services of an elderly, well-versed guide to the city, all to entertain you while he books our passage back to England for this evening."

"Back?" Alice cried out in quite an unladylike manner. Hamish smoothly ignored her lack of social grace with practiced ease as he led her down the stairs. "But I thought we were to meet with the Parsis-"

"No, not any longer. They deal in opium - quite extensively, to be honest. After viewing the dens in China, Father is rather reluctant to continue working with them. At any rate, I think that this hasn't come soon enough!"

Hamish paused somewhat dramatically to critically eye his new 'cousin,' then sniffed as disparagingly as possible - a gesture that was largely meaningless given the good-natured twinkle in his light-blue eyes.

"You, Miss Kingsleigh, are in desperate need a goodly dose of re-taming - some of your language up there was quite colorful. I assure you, you are only communicating with gentlemen in business, not brigands!"

Alice had the good grace to blush slightly as they emerged in the foyer where the elder Lord Ascot was waiting for them. She did not, however, have enough grace to avoid pinching her escort's arm as fiercely as she possibly could.

[~~~]

"Oh yes - I believe you will find that Alice is not domesticated at all!" her Excellency laughed, her voice tinkling through Hamish's chilled head like so many tiny, silvery, pealing bells. The sound reminded him of warm summer days, for some odd reason.

"But I gather that it would be very hard to confuse our Alice with any sort of man, in voice if not in attitude. You did not believe her," the comforting monarch continued as she gently rubbed her patient's shivering hand. The bath water was definitely cooling towards tepidity.

"I chose to believe her - at least, for that moment. She sounded quite distraught when she first emerged from her chambers - the whole idea of this city charade had been to keep her calm.," Hamish carefully clarified, determined to make his position known. "At any rate, our guide proved to be an erudite old fellow, who quickly engrossed Alice in the history and beauty of the city. That took her mind off of matters - for a few moments. However, not even the excitement of exploring could take her mind off of her sister's dilemma. Eventually, I sat her down and spoke with her at length. Unfortunately, there is nothing we can do until we reach London."

"Then you have done your best, good Lord Ascot. That will surely be more than sufficient. Unfortunately, I too must now do my best. Please, give my regards to Alice - remind her than this burden is no heavier than that of Jabberwocky-slaying. Or Hatter-taming, for that fact.

Her Excellency's comforting hand briefly rested on his shoulder before her presence faded completely. Despite her crystalline appearance, her hand was heated on his frigid skin, radiating through the stiff joint most pleasantly. The sensation made Hamish think carefully over his own interactions with the old Indian gentleman.

[~~~]

"I see that the two of you are quite close," a silky, well-learned voice intoned from behind the impending Lord Ascot's left ear. Hamish froze, one hand reaching for the small pistol he kept in his waistcoat as he mentally cursed and made sure that Alice was out of harm's way by the vendor's stall. This was, after all, the Indian sub-continent, not England. If London could have the festering sore on humanity known as Whitechapel, who knew what existed in the tiny, winding by-streets of a strange, eastern city...

His tension visibly lessened as the old man stepped up next to him. Letting out an uncharacteristic growl of frustration, Hamish calmed his quivering nerves before quietly rounding on his guide, who allowed the young Lord to berate him soundly for a few moment.

"Please, forgive me, Ascot sahib. I did not mean to startle you," the obviously well-educated Indian gentleman began, his hands splayed in an open, non-aggressive manner. "I merely wanted to congratulate you on your engagement to such a fine memsahib."

Hamish reeled under the unintended mental blow. Unbalanced, his hand replaced the pistol as he began to sputter out denials. Eventually it appeared that he made himself understood - or at least,better misunderstood, as the aged guide now seemed to believe that Alice was his little sister.

"However, dear sir, am I wrong in saying that there is someone that you have developed...a certain type of feeling for? Affection, as I believe you may call it?" the white-haired guide continued, pressing the matter in an unusually forward manner. Hamish's fair skin flushed to a bright red in his cheek, his mind still flustered by unwanted images of himself and Alice engaged - for all that he loved his mother, that had not been her most brilliant match-up. The young lord, noting that Alice was almost finished in her perusal of a nearby vendor's goods, quickly gave in to the guide, if only to get this embarrassing ordeal over and done with before he began to resemble a rose in bloom.

"Let's us say that I am at the stage that where a fellow begins to look seriously at long-term companionship and that I have someone in mind. What interest would my affairs in such delicate matters be to you?"

The answer - written in surprisingly good English and far too detailed to be spoken about in respectable discussion - lay in the bottom of Hamish's trunk, currently being taken downstairs, where it joined other luggage and a large, ornate, slightly blue-stained mirror.

[~~~]

Author says:

I am so very sorry to keep people waiting for this for so long! To say that Life has been giving me a swift kick up the rear is putting it mildly, to say the least. Please enjoy this small morsel of Hamishness as I work on the rest of the alphabet.