About the Author

JULIET LANDON’s keen interest in art and history, both of which she used to teach, combined with a fertile imagination, make writing historical novels a favourite occupation. She is particularly interested in researching the medieval and the problems encountered by women in a man’s world. Her heart’s home is in her native North Yorkshire, but now she lives happily in a Hampshire village close to her family. Her first books, which were on embroidery and design, were published under her own name of Jan Messent.

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A Scandalous Mistress

Juliet Landon

Chapter One

The steel of the younger man’s foil made an arc against the padded waistcoat of his opponent and sprang back into shape, its point lowered to the ground. Laughing at his own failure, the Marquess of Sheen threw up an arm to acknowledge the scatterred applause. ‘Well done, my boy,’ he called, passing his foil to the appreciative fencing master. ‘Am I ever going to beat you again, I wonder?’

‘Not if I can help it, sir,’ said Lord Nicholas Elyot, removing his mask. ‘It’s taken me long enough to get to this stage.’ He shook his father’s offered hand, admiring the agility of the fifty-two-year-old body as well as the strength in his fingers, the keen brown eyes, the quick reflexes. As usual, he failed to perceive their similarities in the same way that others did, particularly Mr O’Shaunessy, the proprieter, who could see in Lord Elyot an exact replica of his father at the age of thirty, tall and broad-shouldered, slender-hipped and lithe, with legs like a Greek god. The dark, almost black hair that tousled thickly about the son’s handsome face was, on the Marquess, as white as snow and still as dense, and the mouths that broke into sympathetic smiles would have stopped the heart and protests of any woman. As they often had; both of them.

They sat together to watch the next contestants, the Marquess leaning back against the wall, his son leaning forward with arms along thighs. ‘Not below par, are you, Father?’ said Lord Elyot.

There was a huff of denial. ‘Nay, I could claim that as an excuse but it ain’t so, m’boy. Never better. Top form. M’mind on too many things at once, I suppose.’ The Marquess glanced at his son’s strong profile. ‘Well, I have to make up some reason, don’t I?’

Lord Elyot leaned back. ‘Only this once, sir. Where’s the problem, Richmond or London?’

‘Richmond, Nick. You say you’re going back tomorrow?’

‘Yes, a few loose ends to tie up here first, then I’ll be off. It’s been almost five weeks. Time I was attending to things.’

‘Petticoat problems, is it? You still seeing that Selina Whats it?’

‘Miss Selena Whats it,’ said Nick, ‘departed my company weeks ago, Father. You’re way out of date.’ He began to unbutton his shirt.

‘By how many?’

‘Oh, I dunno. A few. Thing is, I think it’s time our Seton was taken back home before he strays into dun territory. No, don’t be alarmed, he ain’t there yet, but he soon will be if he stays here in London much longer. There’s plenty to keep him occupied in Richmond. He can do the rounds with me and the bailiff and the steward for a start, and get some good air into his lungs. I can find ways of keeping his hands out of his breeches pockets.’

‘You might want him to help you with a bit of investigating too, in that case. That may keep him busy.’

‘What’s to do, sir? Poachers again?’

‘No, nothing so simple. Some complaints from the Vestry about interference in parish affairs.’

‘By whom?’

‘Ah, well, that’s the problem, you see. They don’t know. Let’s go and get changed and I’ll tell you about it.’

As with other noblemen who took their role in society seriously, the Marquess of Sheen, whose ancestral home was at Richmond, in the county of Surrey, had several professional obligations, one of which was to King George III to whom he was Assistant Master of Horse, and another to the Bench where he sat as Justice of the Peace. The obligation to his estate at Richmond was administered in his absence by his eldest son, Lord Nicholas Elyot, who would have to perform those same duties sooner or later anyway, so had no objection to taking that particular burden off his father’s shoulders. Only a two-hour drive away from London, on a good day, Richmond lay further up the River Thames, and its parish council, the Vestry, was made up of stalwart citizens of good standing, including the church minister, the local schoolmaster, landowners and the squire, who was the Marquess himself. The Vestry’s purpose was to deal with matters like street-lighting and the maintenance of roads, fires, crime and poverty. Criminals, who were almost always poor also, were locked into the local pound until they could be sentenced, while other unfortunates were sent to the workhouse, which, although it provided shelter and food, usually did little else for their creature comforts. It was regarded as a last resort.

‘Somebody,’ said the Marquess, ‘is playing a deep game, bribing the workhouse staff to release two young women in the family way who’ve only just been admitted.’

‘And the Vestry don’t know who it is?’

‘Nope. Mind you, they’ve been pocketing the blunt fast enough and not asking too many questions, but it’s got to be stopped, Nick. Apart from that, one or two debtors and a child have been sneaked out of the pound at night, and nobody knows who’s responsible. No law against paying a debtor’s debts to get ‘em released, as you know, but it has to be done through the proper channels, not by forcing the padlocks or slipping a fistful o’ town bronze to the night doorman. It’s got to stop,’ he repeated.

‘So you want me to find out who’s behind it. Could it be a member of the Vestry, d’ye think? Someone with a grudge?’

‘I doubt it. The Vestry have complained to me, so what I’m after is some juicy background information on whoever it is, enough to…er…persuade them to go and do their good turns somewhere else. I don’t want to raise the hue and cry about it, just a little discreet blackmail will do. A threat of prosecution, if you like. It is an offence, after all.’

‘Is it?’ Nick smiled.

‘Oh, yes. Abduction,’ said the Marquess, airily. ‘And perverting the course of justice, too.’

‘Coming it a bit strong, Father?’

‘We…ell, maybe. But I can’t have the Vestry upset. They run the show while I’m here, you know. Special headquarters on Paradise Road. They like to be seen to be effective.’

‘Which I’m sure they are, sir. I’ll look into it immediately. Shouldn’t take long. I’ll let you know.’ Nick shrugged his substantial shoulders into the immaculate dark grey morning coat and allowed the valet to adjust the lapels, the cuffs, the waistcoat and snowy neckcloth with fastidious care. Looking down at his glossy black Hessians, he indicated a speck of dust on one toe. The valet dropped to his knees to attend to it, then stood to hand Lord Elyot a beaver hat, a pair of soft kid gloves and a polished cane with a silver knob.

‘Shall we see you at St James’s Square for dinner?’ said the Marquess.

‘I’m not sure, sir. Shall I let you know later?’

‘Of course. And don’t forget your sister’s birthday this month.’

‘Heavens! Is it August already?’

‘No, m’boy, it’s been September these last two days.’

‘Really? How old is she?’

‘Lord, lad! How should I know? Ask your mother at dinner.’

They parted with a bow and a look that was not nearly as serious as their mutual ignorance of family birthdays would suggest.

Within the shining reflective precincts of Rundell, Bridge and Rundell on Ludgate Hill, the atmosphere was hushed, even churchlike, where white-aproned black-vested assistants spoke in reverential whispers, bowed, smiled and agreed with their well-heeled patrons who could afford not to notice the price of the wares. It would have been of little use to pass the doorman if money was a problem, for Rundell’s was the most fashionable goldsmith in London where nothing came cheap and where, if it had, none of their customers would want to buy it.

That much Lady Amelie Chester had gathered from the pages of the Ladies’ Magazine, and she had made a point of not returning from her first visit to the capital without seeing for herself what all the fuss was about. She had kept her barouche waiting for the best part of an hour while her coachman had driven the length of Ludgate and back several times so as not to keep the horses standing too long, and still there were choices to be made and the wink of a jewel to catch her eye. The ridiculously brief list she had brought had long since been discarded. She smiled at her two companions who hovered nearby, clearly not as enamoured by the Aladdin’s Cave as she was.

The plainly dressed one holding a Kashmir shawl over one arm smiled back. ‘Miss Chester is getting a bit fidgety, my lady,’ she whispered, glancing at the girlish frills and bows disappearing behind a glass cabinet.

Miss Caterina Chester, the bored seventeen-year-old niece of the avid purchaser, had at last seen something she liked, which could best be observed through a display of silver candlesticks and cruets. Two men had stepped into the shop to stand quietly talking long enough for her to see that they were related, that one was perhaps nearing thirty, the other his junior by a few years. Both, without question, were veritable blades of distinction, the best she had seen all day. And she had been looking, almost without let-up.

Her practised young eye knew exactly what to expect from a pink of the ton; nothing flamboyant, everything perfectly cut, clean, stylish and fitting like a second skin over muscled thighs and slim hips and, although there would be some gathering at the top of the sleeves, there must be no hint of padding or corseting. These two were true nonpareils.

They were a comely pair, too, she told herself, comparing them. The elder one with the more authoritative air would have been in the army, she guessed, while the other, like herself, would be thinking that he could find more interesting things to do than this. Of one fact she was sure, however: neither of them would be in Rundell, Bridge and Rundell’s unless they had wealth.

It was inevitable, she knew, that their attention would veer like a weathervane towards her aunt, Lady Amelie Chester, who had turned so many heads that day it was a wonder they had stayed on shoulders. No matter where she went, or did, or didn’t do, for that matter, men would stare, nudge and whistle rudely through their teeth at Aunt Amelie. Envious women looked for weaknesses in her appearance and gave up in disgust that the dice could be so heavily loaded in one person’s favour.

Watching them carefully, Caterina saw the younger man’s lips form a pucker, putting his hand to the quizzing-glass that hung upon his buff waistcoat and dropping it again at the three quiet words from his companion. Then, like cats stalking a kill, they moved nearer.

Lady Chester had come to a decision and, in a state of near euphoria, was oblivious to all else. Having recently rid herself of an old-fashioned teapoy on a leggy stand, she was delighted to have found a small silver caddy made by the Batemans, topped with an acorn finial and handled with ivory. Before the enraptured assistant had finished praising her choice, she spied a beehive-shaped gilt honey pot with a bee on top. Her gloved fingers caressed its ridges. ‘This,’ she said, ‘is perfect.’

‘Paul Storr, m’lady,’ the assistant smirked. ‘We hope to acquire more of his work in the future. It came in only yesterday.’

‘Then I’m sure it will be happy in Richmond,’ she said. ‘Add it to the others, if you please. I’ll take it.’

The elder of the two men moved forward. ‘Richmond?’ he said. ‘I thought I knew everyone in Richmond. I beg your pardon, ma’am. We have not been introduced, but pray allow me to take the liberty of performing my own introduction, since there is no one else to do it for me. Nicholas Elyot at your service. And my brother, Seton Rayne.’

The assistant intervened. ‘My lords,’ he said, bowing.

‘Amelie Chester.’ Amelie dipped a curtsy of just the correct depth while Caterina moved round the glass case to watch, fascinated and not too proud to learn a thing or two about how Aunt Amelie caused men to vie for her attention. One day, she would do the same. Her aunt neither smiled nor simpered as so many women did to gain a man’s interest, Caterina noticed, watching the graceful incline of her head. A soft-brimmed velvet hat covered the rich brown hair escaping in wayward spirals around her ears to accentuate the smooth peachy skin over high cheekbones. Her eyes were bewitchingly dark and almond-shaped, her brows fine and delicately arched, and there was no feature, thought Caterina, that needed the aid of cosmetics.

On the verge of leaving half-mourning behind her, Lady Chester’s pelisse was of three-quarter-length pale violet velvet with a swansdown collar worn over a silver-grey silk day dress. The edges of the velvet sleeves were caught together at intervals with covered buttons, and a capacious reticule of matching beaded velvet hung from one arm. The only ornament on the rather masculine hat was a large silver buckle into which was tucked a piece of swansdown, and the effect of all this on the two men, Caterina thought, was as much a sight to behold as her aunt’s classic elegance. Surreptitiously, she removed the fussy lace tippet from around her shoulders that she had insisted on wearing and passed it to Lise, her aunt’s maid.

The brothers removed their tall hats and bowed in unison. ‘You are staying here in London, my lady?’ said Lord Elyot.

His voice, she thought, was like dark brown chocolate. ‘No, my lord. Only to shop. We must leave soon, now the days are shortening,’ she said.

‘Indeed. You’ll need all the light we have left. Have you been long in Richmond? How could we have missed seeing you there?’

A smile lit up the almond eyes at last with the lift of her brow. ‘As to that, sir, anyone could miss us quite easily, even at church. My niece and I have seen little of society since we arrived. May I introduce her to you? Miss Caterina Chester.’

At last, Caterina’s moment had arrived. She stepped forward from her vantage point to make the prettiest bob she could devise while she had their entire attention and, though she ought to have kept her eyes demurely lowered, her natural urge to discover what effect she was having got the better of her.

‘My lords,’ she whispered, allowing her bright golden-brown eyes to reach the younger lord’s attentive face for another glimpse of his crisp dark thatch before he replaced his hat. It seemed to fall quite naturally into the correct disorder but his eyes, she noticed, held only a neutral attempt at friendship before focussing once more upon her aunt. Inwardly, she sighed.

Lord Elyot, however, saw that one of his queries had been avoided. ‘Is your stay in Richmond permanent, Miss Chester?’ he said.

‘Oh, yes, my lord. We’ve been there only five weeks and two days and there’s such a lot for us yet to see.’ And do, she thought. Again, her gaze turned hopefully in Lord Rayne’s direction, but noticed only the quizzical nature of his examination of her over-frilled and beribboned day dress and braided spencer, her flower-bedecked bonnet and the lace gloves that she had believed were all the thing. Until now.

‘Oh, you’ll need several seasons to see all that London has to offer,’ Lord Elyot replied, ‘but shopping must come first. My brother and I called in to purchase a gift for our sister’s birthday, but we possess neither the flair nor the time to find exactly the right thing. I wonder, my lady…’ he returned his attention to Amelie ‘.if you and your niece could help us out. Your taste,’ he continued, glancing at the counter covered with pieces she had bought, ‘is obviously of the most sophisticated. Do you have any suggestions as to what would please a sister most?’

‘Without knowing her, sir, that would be difficult. Is she single or married? Young or…how old will she be?’

The two men exchanged blank stares until Lord Rayne offered some statistics he was reasonably sure of. ‘Well, she’s three years older than me, married with two bra… bairns…er, children.’

‘And she’s two…no, three years younger than me,’ said his brother. ‘Does that help?’

Amelie’s smile might have grown into a laugh but for her effort to contain it, and Caterina noted again the devastating effect this gentle bubbling had on the two men, for it was genuine yet controlled. ‘That is some help. Does she have a star sign?’ Amelie prompted, twinkling.

The blankness returned.

‘The beginning of September? Or the middle?’

‘The end,’ said Lord Rayne, warming to the theme.

‘No, somewhere near the middle,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘I think. Look, may we leave this with you, if you’d be so kind? Mr Bowyer here will charge the cost to my account and send it to Richmond. We’re in a bit of a hurry.’

Smiling broadly, Mr Bowyer assented.

Amelie agreed, wondering at the same time why they had stopped to choose a gift if they were in so much of a hurry. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Miss Chester and I will surely find something appropriate in here.’

Lord Elyot bowed. ‘You are too kind,’ he said, formally. ‘I am in your debt, my lady. I hope we shall meet in Richmond.’

There was something about his eyelids, Amelie thought. He was a man of experience, and he knew how to look at a woman to make her feel as if she were the only person in the room to matter to him. He had spoken to Caterina like that too, and the child had noticed and wished the brother had done the same.

Bows and curtsies were exchanged once more and the meeting was curtailed as Caterina instantly began a search for something that would fritter away someone else’s money. The men made for the door, their voices carrying easily across the subdued interior.

‘I didn’t know we were in so much of a hurry, Nick.’

‘Well, we are. We need to return to Richmond tonight. A problem to sort out for Father. Rather urgent.’

‘What kind of a problem?’

Lord Elyot tucked his cane beneath one arm and picked up a silver snuff-box, turning it over to examine the base. ‘Oh, just some loose screw or other springing young nob-thatchers and bairns from the local workhouse,’ the deep voice drawled softly, distinctly bored. ‘Anybody who thinks that a bit o’skirt with a bun in the oven is worth rescuing must be an addle-pate, don’t you agree, young Rayne? But the Vestry want it stopped. It’s only a twenty-four-hour job, but we have to make a start before we get a new plague of vagabonds. You can help, if you like.’ He replaced the snuff-box. ‘Come on. It won’t take all that long, then we can go and look at some new cattle, eh?’

‘Stupid do-gooders! Ought to be locked up themselves. If only they knew the trouble they cause.’

They passed out of the shop into the sudden clamour of Ludgate Hill, where the street-criers and rattle of wheels drowned the rest of their conversation, and Amelie was left doing what her niece had done earlier through salt-cellars and candlesticks. She watched them pause as her own barouche drew to a standstill outside the shop and the footman leapt down to hold the horses’ heads. Her heart hammered with sudden fear.

Loose screw…springing young nob-thatchers and bairns from the local workhouse…bit o’skirt with a bun in the oven…do-gooders…

It was not so much the vulgar cant that raised Amelie’s hackles, for the men were entitled to say what they wished when they were alone; it was the revelation that they had a particular problem to solve for their father, whoever he was, which was apparently upsetting both him and the Vestry. And without a shadow of a doubt they were, without knowing it, speaking of her, Lady Amelie Chester, for she was the ‘do-gooder’ in question whose deep commitment to the plight of unfortunate women would never be understood by toffs of their kind who didn’t know the date of their sister’s birthday, or even how old she was. She felt the surge of fury, resentment and disappointment like a pain as she heard their mocking voices again. She watched them linger outside to examine her new coffee-coloured barouche with its cream-and-brown striped upholstery, its Italian lamps, the dapple-grey horses, the eight-caped coachman and liveried footman in brown and pale grey as neat as could be. They would not find any cattle to beat that showy pair, she thought, turning away with a frown. It had all ended on a very sour note, for she had liked their manner until then. She would find it even more difficult to fulfil her promise now she had seen the kind of men she had agreed to oblige. ‘Caterina dear, have you seen anything suitable?’ she said.

Wallowing almost knee-deep in expensive metalware, her niece had suddenly become animated and was eyeing a pair of very pretty silver chinoiserie cake-baskets that Amelie would not have minded owning.

‘Mm…m,’ Amelie said. ‘Pretty, but…’

‘Well, then, what about a large salver? They’re always useful. One cannot have too many salvers, can one?’

The catalyst was the word ‘useful'. If there was anything a woman disliked being given for her birthday, it came into the ‘useful’ category unless, of course, she had asked for it. Like a carriage and a pair of horses. Eagerly, she looked around for the largest, the most tasteless and most expensive ‘useful’ item on display, though it was Caterina who spotted it first, a massive silver and gilt tea urn with three busty sphinxes holding up the bowl on their wings and a tap that swung away like a cobra about to strike. Standing on an ugly triangular base, it was a monstrous reminder of Lord Nelson’s recent victory in Egypt.

‘What if she doesn’t drink tea, though?’ whispered Caterina, without knowing how she and her aunt were working at cross-purposes. ‘It looks very expensive.’

All the better. ‘Oh, she’s sure to, dear.’

‘Is it in good taste?’ Caterina queried, having doubts.

Amelie was careful here. ‘It will depend,’ she said, cautiously, ‘on what their sister’s preferences are, I suppose. If she has a growing family and plenty of visitors, then a large urn will be just the thing.’ And it would go some way, she thought, towards mollifying her resentment at the insensitive, not to say inhuman, attitude of the two brothers who, she hoped, would not follow up their introduction with anything more presumptuous.

But although the purchase of the vastly overpriced and vulgar gift had evened the score for Amelie in one direction, there was yet a more serious one to consider, calling for a return home at a faster pace than their earlier ride into London. There was now no time to lose. ‘Lise, go and tell the footman we’re ready to go home,’ she said.

The stares of admiration directed at the beautiful coffee-coloured barouche and the Dalmatian running behind were only vaguely heeded on the return journey to Richmond, for the event that concluded their shopping spree weighed heavily on Amelie’s mind, making her realise yet again that, however good it was to be an independent woman, she was still vulnerable without the comforting support of her husband.

Sir Josiah Chester had been taken from her with a frightening suddenness two years ago, a most unusual two years that left her with few relatives close enough to assist her through the worst months, the problems of inheritance and estate. The only one of their number whose help had been constant and ungrudging was Sir Josiah’s younger brother Stephen, himself a widower with a young family, of whom Caterina was the eldest.

It had been to thank Stephen for his generous support that she had agreed to take Caterina with her when she moved down to Richmond. Had it not been for that debt which she owed him, for his plea, and for Caterina’s motherless state, she would have made the move alone, which had been her first intention. She had no wish to stay in the Derbyshire town of Buxton for, although she had been happy enough there for her first twenty-two years, the two years after that had pointed out with brutal reality who she could depend on for true friendship.

Caterina’s joy at being taken to live with her, though flattering, was not what Amelie had wanted, and the inevitable conflict of interests had not been satisfactorily resolved in their first few weeks. Caterina had expected to make a new set of friends and to be received almost instantly into high society. Amelie had not the heart to explain either to Caterina or to her grateful father, that the fickleness of high society was something she would rather have shunned than sought, and that the reason she had chosen Richmond was for its proximity to Kew Gardens, to Hampton Court Palace, to the famed Chelsea Physic Garden and to Royal Academy exhibitions. The day’s shopping in London, though necessary, had been more the result of a guilty conscience than for Amelie’s own pleasure, not having tried as hard as she might to make contact with the local leading families, as Caterina had expected her to. The young lady’s very inadequate wardrobe had dictated the pattern of their shopping, and now the maid Lise sat beside a mountain of brown paper parcels that threatened to topple and bury her at each bounce of the carriage. Fortunately, there had not been room for the controversial tea urn, or Lise might have been critically injured.

The reason for Amelie’s accelerated haste to reach home was neither asked nor explained, as the clouding September sky was supposed by Caterina to be the cause. The truth, however, was more to do with Lord Elyot’s stated intention to attend directly to the problem of which the Vestry had complained.

Homeless mothers-to-be were often hustled over the boundary of one parish into the next, even during labour, to avoid the responsibility of more mouths to feed. Naturally, these women could not be let loose to give birth under hedges: untidy activities of that nature did not look well where refined citizens could be shocked by such sights. As a last resort, they had to be rounded up until it was all over, by which time the problem was often solved more permanently.

Sir Josiah Chester had not retained his vast wealth by giving it away to charitable causes, but by saving it; whether it was the powerful combination of childlessness, bereavement and wealth that gave rise to Amelie’s concern for waifs, strays and hopeless debtors, she had never tried to analyse, but the fact was that her acceptance of her new state had been smoothed by the help she had given to others less endowed and more distressed by far. She could be distressed in comfort, while they could not.

With a name as well known in Buxton as Sir Josiah’s, it had been relatively easy for Amelie, as a widow, to pay the debts of poor families threatened by imprisonment and worse and to find employment for petty criminals. She had given shelter and aid, sometimes in her own home, to pregnant homeless women and had found suitable places for them afterwards, had persuaded farmers’ wives to take in starving children and had poured money into improving the local workhouse facilities. The legacy she had received from her own wealthy parents had been exceptionally generous, and all that giving had made a greater difference to her sense of worth and general well-being than it had to her reserve of funds.

As long as she was actively helping the Vestry in Buxton to deal with their problems, no one had stood in her way, though nothing could stop the gossip of society women concerning the status of a young, wealthy and beautiful widow and the attentions of her brother-in-law, of supposed lovers and supposed rivals. The whisperings of scandal. It had been time for her to leave.

But in Richmond, the advantages associated with the name of Sir Josiah Chester had not opened the same doors as they had before, and all the help she had given so freely in Buxton now had to be done rather differently. In the dark. Anonymously. By bribery and deception and, if need be, by the useful burglary skills of a servant in her employ. It went without saying that she had far too many servants, most of them without references.

Last night, she had promised a distraught and heavily pregnant young woman, via the woman’s equally distressed companion, that she would help to release her from the workhouse where she was about to be taken. Amelie fully intended to go there that very night, and the last thing she needed was an extra guard on the gate put there by the interfering Lord Elyot. What on earth could have possessed her to agree to an introduction?

She heard the aristocratic drawl again, smoother than northern tones, more languid, deep and perfectly enunciated. His teeth were good too, and she recalled how something inside her had lurched a little at the way his eyes had held hers, gently but with devastating assurance. They had not raked over her as so many other men’s did, trespassing and too familiar. No, they had almost smiled, telling her that there were things to be shared, given the opportunity.

Well, my fine lord, she thought, grinding her teeth, there will be no opportunity. I shall know how to steer well clear of you and any family who believe charity to be a waste of time. Hateful, arrogant people.

What colour were his eyes?

Pulling herself up sharply, she redirected her thoughts to the three over-endowed sphinxes and their hideous cobra companion, drawing the Kashmir shawl closer about her at the sudden chill.

After a later-than-usual dinner, after the unwrapping of every single purchase and an examination of each item, after umpteen reviews on the perfection of Lord Rayne’s neckcloth, his hair, his noble features, Caterina was at last persuaded to retire to bed with The Mysteries of Udolpho, which she had longed to read but had not been allowed to, for fear her younger sister Sara should want to do the same. Such were the joys of leaving one’s siblings behind.

Immediately, Amelie began a transformation from lady of fashion to dowdy old woman who might, in the dark, pass for a servant or an itinerant fruitpicker looking for work. She had seen the plight of the one to be rescued the day before, waiting, weeping outside the impressive Vestry Hall on Paradise Road, a grandiose Roman-style building that would have intimidated anyone by its sheer size alone. Amelie’s house was only a few doors away, and she and Caterina, passing on their way home from the apothecary’s shop, had been arrested by the pitying group of women who stood to sympathise and scold that the woman in question was being expected to walk all the way up to the workhouse on Hill Common. The woman’s companion, probably an aunt or her mother, had been shouldered aside by the beadle, but Amelie had managed to find out from her what was happening and to assure her, in a moment of extreme compassion, that she could rely on her help the very next night, one way or another.

Previous rescues had been undertaken by those of Amelie’s devoted servants who were themselves of a similar background to the women and, so far, she’d had no need to risk her own discovery, nor would they have allowed her to if she had proposed it. This time, she had kept her plans to herself, knowing that the woman’s companion would need to recognise her.

It was a fair hike up to Hill Common and a carriage would easily be identified so, instead of walking, she rode her donkey Isabelle. It was appropriate, she thought, confidently rejoicing that she was well ahead of that obnoxious man and his abortive schemes. What a pity it was that she would not see his reaction to the latest ‘springing of a young nob-thatcher'. What disgusting jargon men used.

The road was uphill, rough, and well beyond the street lights, and the rain that had threatened all afternoon had begun to fall heavily, turning the stony way into a river and soaking the thick shawl over Amelie’s head. At last she came to the great iron gates and the gatekeeper’s box from which the dim glow of a candle could be seen wavering in the draught. Sliding thankfully off Isabelle’s back, she saw the dark figure of a woman approach and could hardly contain her relief that she would not have to wait long on such a night. Soon, they would all three be safe and comfortable, and the new life would be welcomed instead of being someone’s burden.

‘Well met,’ she said, peering hard into the blackness and easing her reticule off her wrist. ‘Have you heard how your… sister…is? Or is she your daughter? Do forgive me, I didn’t see you too well.’

‘Aye, she’s well,’ the woman croaked. ‘No babe yet, though.’

‘And have you spoken to the gateman? He’ll cooperate, will he? Do we have to bribe the doorman, too?’

‘Oh, aye, each one as we pass through. How much did you bring, m’lady? If you’ll pardon me asking.’

‘Let’s get out of this downpour…over here under the tree.’

The steady roar took on a different note as Amelie pulled the donkey behind her, then took the reticule out from beneath the folds of dripping wetness, turning her back on the woman to rest its weight on the saddle. It was in that brief moment of heedlessness when Amelie should have been holding all her wits on a knife-edge that the woman’s hand darted like a weasel towards the bag of money, pulling it off the saddle and out of Amelie’s hands, swinging it away into an indistinct flurry of blackness.

Bumping into Isabelle’s large head, Amelie threw herself after the woman and made a wild grab at her clothes, feeling the resistance and the ensuing twist as her fingers closed over the rough wet fabric. Unable to see, the two of them grappled and pulled, suffering the frantic grasp of fingers on head, hair, shoulders and throat, their feet slithering and tripping over tree roots. But the woman was stronger and older than her opponent and trained to every trick of the seasoned thief, and Amelie was taken by the hair, spun round and pushed so hard that she fell sprawling upon her front in one great lung-crushing thud that pressed her face into the wet ground with a squeak of expelled breath.

The fight was over; the sound of fumbling, then of running feet on the track becoming fainter, and the unrelenting rain pattering noisily on the leaves above, throbbing like a pain, humiliating and raw. She had promised to help a woman in need and been robbed of the chance. Failure.

‘Isabelle…Isabelle?’ she called.

She heard the jingle of the harness and a man’s voice urging the creature to come on and be quick about it, then a soft thwack on the animal’s wet rump.

‘Who…where are you?’ Amelie called. ‘Who is it?’ She struggled to gain a footing, but her boots were tangled in folds of wet skirts and she was unable to rise before a dark shape bent down to help her.

‘Forgive me, ma’am,’ he said, politely. ‘Allow me to help you up. Hold your hands out…no…this way.’

‘Where? How do I know you’re a friend?’

‘Well, you don’t, ma’am. But you can’t stay down there all night, can you? See, here’s your donkey. Come, let me help you. Are you hurt?’

‘Not much. I don’t know. That woman’s nowhere to be seen, I suppose?’

‘Gone, I’m afraid. Has she robbed you, ma’am? Did she take…?’

‘My reticule. Yes, it’s gone. Tch! Serves me right.’

The stranger eased her up, releasing her arm immediately to look, as well as he was able, at the patch of ground round about. ‘No reticule, ma’am. It looks as if she must have taken it. I’d never have thought there’d be game-pullets like her out on a night like this, I must say. Shall I get hold of the gatekeeper for you?’

‘Er…no, not now,’ said Amelie, quickly. ‘I’d better go back and try again tomorrow. Thank you for your help, Mr…?’

‘Todd, ma’am. No trouble at all. Would you like me to escort you?’

‘Oh, no, thank you, Mr Todd. I’m most grateful to you, but I have not far to go and Isabelle will carry me.’

‘Well, if you’re sure. I’ll hold her while you climb aboard. There now. Good night to you, ma’am. I didn’t catch your name?’

‘Ginny,’ she said, realising at once that her voice was not in accord with her appearance. ‘Ginny Hodge. Good night to you, Mr Todd.’ She fumbled for the reins and kicked Isabelle into action, swaying and tipping over the puddles as her body, already aching with bruises, tried to stay upright. Once or twice she felt compelled to turn and look over her shoulder into the solid blackness and driving rain, though mostly her troubled thoughts were for the woman she had let down who would now believe the worst of her sort of people, as others apparently did. Perhaps she should have been a little less bountiful with her promises, a little more suspicious of people’s need to be helped. She had learned to be more philosophical over the last few years, but the disappointments of the day were felt more keenly than her bruises during the uncomfortable journey home and well into the small hours. It was at such times that she missed Josiah’s fatherly counselling most of all.

Sheen Court, Richmond, Home of the Marquess of Sheen

A guarded tap on the door of the study was answered by a gruff monosyllable and the lowering of a pen on to the leather-covered desk. A single candle guttered in the draught as the door opened and closed.

‘Any luck?’ was the quiet greeting.

The visitor allowed himself a half-smile. ‘Yes, my lord. I believe we may have something.’ He held up a wet embroidered reticule, the drawstrings of which had been pulled wide open. ‘It was not so fortunate for the woman, a certain Ginny Hodge, mind you. She got herself mugged by a thieving old dowd at the workhouse gates and lost the contents of this.’ He laid the bag on the desk before his lordship and watched as the long fingers drew out the remaining objects one by one: a blue glass perfume bottle with a silver stopper, a damp lace-edged handkerchief of very superior quality, and a tortoise-shell and silver filigree card-case, which opened to reveal one single card.

This was removed and studied in silence for what seemed to the visitor like an extraordinarily long time before his lordship shook his head with a grunt of disbelief in his throat. ‘Well…well!’ he whispered. ‘Was this…Ginny Hodge…hurt by the mugging?’

‘I think not too seriously, sir. I followed her home to Paradise Road. One of the big newish houses. She went in by the back way, but she didn’t sound like a servant to me, sir.’

Raising himself from his chair, his lordship went over to the side table, poured a glass of whisky and handed it to his informant. ‘Drink that,’ he said, ‘and get into something dry. You’ve done well.’

‘Thank you, my lord. Shall you need the coach in the morning?’

‘No, the crane-neck phaeton. Good night, Todd.’

‘Good night, my lord. Thank you.’ The empty glass was exchanged for a silver coin, and the door was closed as quietly as it had been opened. But it was much later when the candle was at last extinguished and Lord Nicholas Elyot, swinging the reticule like a trophy, ascended the staircase at Sheen Court.

Chapter Two

By breakfast, Lord Elyot’s surprise had mellowed and a plan of action had already begun to form in his mind about how best to proceed, given that his father’s instructions would require some readjustment. To the genteel rattle of newspapers and the clatter of cutlery on plates, he had consulted his brother about the day ahead, though his suggestion had not been received as favourably as he’d hoped.

‘Nick,’ said Lord Rayne, laying down his knife, ‘if I’d known you’d hauled me back to Richmond to be wet-nurse to a green chit, I’d have stayed in London. You know I’d do anything for you, but this is a fudge if ever I saw one.’ He laid down his crisp white napkin with rather more force than was necessary and sat back, still chewing. ‘She’s only just out of the schoolroom, dammit!’

‘It’s not a fudge,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘I mean it. And I’m not asking you to marry the child, only that you keep her happy while I—’

‘While you keep Lady Chester happy. Thank you, but I have a better idea. You take the frilly one and I’ll take the diamond. How’s that?’

Lord Elyot reached for the marmalade-pot and heaped a spoonful of it on to his toast. ‘Two good reasons. One is that you’re not her type. Second is that you don’t have the time. You’ll be a member of His Majesty’s fighting force soon, don’t forget.’

‘Not her type? And you are, I suppose?’

‘Yes.’ The bite into the toast was decisive.

Reluctantly, Lord Rayne was obliged to admit that his elder brother would succeed with Lady Chester if any man could, for it would take a cold woman to be unaffected by his darkly brooding good looks and the singular manner of his total concentration upon what she had to say. Which was not the usual way of things. As to the time he would need, Nick was right about that, too. The lady’s response to him had been polite, but far from enthusiastic, and he would need both time and help to gain a more lasting interest. ‘What’s it worth to you?’ he said.

Lord Elyot’s pained expression was partly for his brother’s mercenary train of thought and partly for the messy nature of toast and marmalade. ‘I’m doing you a favour, sapskull,’ he snapped. ‘The child’s a pert little thing, not a dimwit. Pretty eyes, rough round the edges, but you could have the pleasure of working on that. She’d not resent it. She’ll be a little cracker by the end of the season and then you can leave her to somebody else. A built-in escape route. What more d’ye want, lad?’

‘Cattle. I shall need three or four good mounts to take with me.’

‘What happened to your allowance?’

‘You know what happened to it or I’d not be on a repairing-lease in the country, would I?’

‘All right. Four good mounts it is. For your help, Seton.’

‘For my full…unstinting…liberal and generous help. When can we go and look at them?’

‘We’ll look at the women today. This morning. We’ll take my new crane-neck phaeton out. You can drive.’ Lord Elyot leaned back, satisfied.

‘Just one detail, Nick. How d’ye know there isn’t a husband there somewhere?’

‘I made enquiries.’

‘You don’t waste much time, do you? And what about this urgent business for Father? Where does that come in?’

‘That’s in hand, too,’ he said, ‘but I want you to keep that very much to yourself, Seton, if you will. A word about that in the wrong ear can send them up like pheasants.’

The particular pheasant Lord Elyot had in mind was already flying at a steady pace along the edge of Richmond Park in a coffee-and-cream phaeton. The driver of this neat little turn-out had evasion in mind, but her passenger was on the lookout for the merest sign of the two men who, since their meeting yesterday, had satisfied her every criteria for what makes the perfect Corinthian. Believing that she had won the argument about a need for fresh early-morning air, Caterina had resisted all her aunt’s recommendations that she should wear a shawl over her spencer and pale blue walking-dress, and now she wished that the stiff breeze would abate a little. Holding the long ribbons of her blue ruched bonnet with one hand, she clung to the side of the phaeton with the other as they bounced on elliptical springs through a deep puddle.

‘Aunt Amelie,’ she said, half-turning to see if the tiger was still on his seat behind them, ‘do you think…we could…slow down a little? There’s a…phaeton over there…in the… distance…oops! I can’t quite…see. Please?’

Amelie’s hands tightened on the reins. It had been her intention to speed with all haste to Kew Gardens with Caterina in order to avoid the visit that she feared might result from their introduction to Lord Elyot and his brother, who she knew to be returning to Richmond yesterday. Conversely, sending a message to the door to say that they were not at home would not please Caterina one bit, nor would it help to fulfil her assurances to Caterina’s father.

Yet after last night’s bitter disappointment and her poor night’s sleep, the thought of being even civil to the unfeeling pair was more than she could bear, and Caterina’s pleas to go out driving instead of revelling in her new dress-lengths had seemed to Amelie like a chance to please herself while appearing to please her niece. Now it looked as if her strategy had been identified, as the vehicle in question had swung round in a dangerously tight half circle to head in their direction.

It would have been folly for her to go any faster, as she would like to have done, with the small body of the phaeton suspended above the lightweight undercarriage and the greys being so eager, but Amelie saw no reason to slow down either. The road ahead was clear except for the approach of an open landau, and it was the tiger’s warning as he stood up to peer between their heads that decided the pace after all. ‘Watch out, m’lady!’ he called. ‘Them two are ‘avin a bit of a frisk, by the look o’ things. Better pull up till they’ve passed. Aye, I thought as much. It’s the Oglethorpes’ new pair. That’s it, m’lady. Keep ‘em on the rein till I’ve got their heads.’ He leapt down off his rear perch and ran to the bridles, and Amelie had no choice but to wait for the two fretting horses to pass, receiving the coachman’s thanks but only the briefest of acknowledgements from the two female passengers.

Amelie would have been surprised if it had been otherwise; only the men in Richmond had ever offered any warmer salutation in the last five weeks and, as yet, no lady had left her calling-card. Before they could move off again, the towering crane-neck phaeton had caught them up, making their lower version look sedate by comparison. Sensing Caterina’s frisson of excitement, Amelie glanced at her and saw how nervous fingers smoothed the blue muslin over her knees, saw the alertness in her posture like a soldier on parade. So soon she was in love, and all a-flutter. Within her own breast, she felt again that uncomfortable kick against her lungs and put it down either to the affray of last night or having eaten her breakfast muffin too quickly.

‘Lady Chester, Miss Chester,’ said Lord Elyot, tipping his hat. ‘What a happy coincidence. You are out early. Do you go to see and be seen up on the Hill?’

Richmond Hill was a favourite parade-ground for showing off one’s horse or carriage, which Amelie had so far avoided. ‘No, my lord,’ she said, aware of the looks being exchanged between Caterina and Lord Rayne, ‘we’re on our way to see the newest blooms at Kew. I’m teaching my niece to depict them.’ She wished instantly that she had not made it sound so school-marmish, but her large canvas bag lay at their feet, bulging with sketchbooks and paint-boxes, and the men would surely have seen it from their height.

Lord Rayne leaned forward the better to see Caterina. ‘The study of blooms,’ he said, ‘would seem to be a glaring omission from my education, my lady. Would you allow us, just this once, to accompany you to see how it’s done?’

Caterina was about to enthuse, but Amelie used an elbow to nudge her into silence. There was no question of her showing them or anyone else except her niece how to draw blooms, and the mock-interest Lord Rayne was showing annoyed her by its facetiousness. ‘I cannot prevent you going where you will, Lord Rayne,’ she replied, ‘but we are not inclined to demonstrate. I beg you to excuse us.’

Her indignation swelled once more as she recalled for the hundredth time those hurtful words the two men had used only yesterday: ‘Loose screw…do-gooders…addle-pate…ought to be locked up…’ Buxton people had thanked her and called her stout-hearted: here, they called it interference and would put a stop to it, if they could. Not even for Caterina’s sake could she forget or even try to find an allowance for their heartlessness, nor could she shake off the thought of the miserable childbearing woman she had failed last night. At that moment the two events were linked in her mind, and any goodwill she might have pretended for the sake of Caterina’s burgeoning emotions was still-born.

Sitting nearest to Amelie as his brother’s passenger, Lord Elyot was better able to see the coolness as well as the anger behind her dark eyes and, though they were now turned towards the horses’ ears, not to him, he was determined to get more out of this meeting than an excuse when it was obvious that the niece was setting so much store by it.

‘Of course,’ he said. ‘We have no wish to intrude, Lady Chester. But will you explain something to me, before you leave us?’

‘Certainly, if I can.’

‘I noticed that Mrs and Miss Oglethorpe could hardly raise an acknowledgement between them just now. Not that it matters, of course, but I wondered if there was a particular reason for their rudeness. Have they not been introduced to you?’

He was right. It did not matter, but he may as well know now as later, and it may as well come from her, to set the facts straight. ‘Yes, they were, at church.’ He would want to know more, she was sure.

‘Yet no smiles and hardly a bow? Was she attempting to cut you, by any chance?’

She sighed, then looked slowly at him and his handsome brother. ‘I think you and Lord Rayne will soon discover,’ she said, ‘that you do yourselves no favours by being seen speaking to Miss Chester and me. In London where we can be more anonymous, perhaps, but not here in Richmond. We are not quite the thing, you know.’

‘Is that so?’ said Lord Elyot. ‘How very intriguing. Well, I suppose we could drive on at a smart pace, but I am inclined to beg for more details. I’m sure my brother is of the same mind. Do tell us. You are highwaymen in disguise? Escaped Muscovy princesses?’

Though his eyes were shaded, Amelie recalled how they had looked at her in the shop, and she could not meet them again. ‘Nothing quite as dramatic,’ she replied. ‘We are northerners, sir. Worse still, my family has connections with industry. To put it bluntly, my lord, trade. There, I’ve said the awful word. Now I shall go and rinse my mouth with water and vinegar and you will put some distance between us as fast as you can. We shall not hold it against you. I bid you both a very good day.’

‘Wait!’ Lord Elyot’s gloved hand could not reach Amelie’s phaeton, but his command was enough to hold her back. ‘Please?’ he added, squeakily.

When she sneaked a look upwards, she saw that he and his brother were grinning broadly. ‘You may smile, Lord Elyot,’ she said, ‘but the good people of Richmond take such things very seriously, you must know. Or had you forgotten? We might display any number of harmless eccentricities like sketching blooms at Kew Gardens, but trade is unforgivable, sir. Somebody has obviously got wind of it. And the north…well, nothing there but mills and clogs and smoke and strange dialects. Miss Chester and I own only one head each, but some have two, or even three! Can you imagine it?’

To keep her straw hat firmly in place in the blustering wind, Amelie had tied a long gauze scarf over it, swathing her neck and making it difficult for him to see her face without craning forward. But her sarcasm had produced an angry flush and a sparkle to her superb eyes that Lord Elyot could only guess at until his brother moved the horses forward a step. Then he was better able to judge the passion behind her droll revelations and to see that she was not quite the amenable obliging creature he had met the day before, nor was she the misguided woman whose reticule he now possessed.

Equally significant was the expression of dismay on the pretty niece’s face at the scuppering of her hopes. So this was the reason why they had kept out of the social scene for five weeks and why the young lass was so keen to make contact with the first half-decent beau to speak to her. His laughter had stopped well before Amelie had finished her explanation.

‘With difficulty,’ he said, in answer to her question. ‘But am I to understand that Richmond approval is what you desire, my lady?’

Her voice lost its flinty edge. ‘Not for myself, my lord. I did not come here to seek high society and there is no one’s approval I need. I have more interesting matters to keep me occupied. I bid you both good day, my lords.’

Giving them no time to recover or to say a proper farewell, she called out to Riley to let the horses go, cracked the whip above their heads with astonishing precision, and set them off so fast that the poor tiger had to take a flying leap at the back of the perch as it passed.

‘Whew! You in an ‘urry, m’lady?’ he gasped.

‘Yes. How do we get out of this place?’

‘Thought you was going to Kew, m’lady.’

‘Well, I’ve changed my mind. Left or right…quick, man!’

‘Left! Steady, for pity’s sake, or we’ll all be in the ditch.’

‘Rubbish! If you can’t stay aboard, get off and walk.’

Riley grinned. ‘Yes, m’lady.’ He would rather have been seen dead.

Amelie’s sudden reversal, however, was heartily disapproved of, and had done more than bring a mild disappointment to the young breast at her side, for now there were tear-filled lashes and a voice husky with broken dreams. Turning round after taking a last lingering look at the classy phaeton’s driver, Caterina rummaged in her reticule for a handkerchief and dabbed, reserving her questions for the privacy of the breakfast parlour at Number 18 Paradise Road. Travelling at Amelie’s speed, it did not take long.

Caterina was a vivacious but not unreasonable young lady, even at times like this when her desires had been thwarted, and such was her admiration for her aunt that the explanation and assurances she was given were accepted without argument. If Aunt Amelie said that the men would not be put off, then she must wait and hope it would not take too long, though privately she could not see why they should have been so positively rejected in the first place if they were expected to try again. Did Aunt Amelie hope they would?

The rest of the day was not wasted, for Caterina’s weekly singing lesson with Signor Cantoni used up an hour after noon, then there was piano practice to be done followed by a thorough search through back copies of the Ladies’Magazine to find some day dresses for the mantua-maker to reproduce. After which she read all the advertisements for cosmetics, hair colourants, rouge for lips and cheeks, mouth fresheners, skin softeners, soaps, pills and whalebone.

Amelie protested. ‘You need no stays, my dear,’ she said. ‘You have a beautiful youthful figure that needs not even the shortest corset. Nor does your hair need extra colour.’ It was no flattery—Caterina was exceedingly pretty and trim, and Amelie was convinced that, with an overhaul of her somewhat childish wardrobe and some practice of womanly ways, she would soon be a beauty. Her naturally curly red-gold hair would respond well to the dishevelled look, so they set about experimenting, there and then, with the Grecian style, with bandeaux, plumes, combs and knots, twists and coils. The next time Lord Rayne saw her, Amelie predicted, he would be astonished by the transformation.

Next morning, the mantua-maker and her young assistant arrived to measure Caterina for new gowns. It had rained heavily again during the night and well into the morning, damping the dressmaker and chilling her helper to such an extent that, although one of her roles was to model some of the gowns they had brought with them, her emaciated and shivering body stuck through the sheer fabrics like a grasshopper’s knees. Amelie resolved to mend that problem before the coming autumn sent the child to an early grave.

While they were merrily draping themselves with new muslins and silks, Henry the footman came to announce that Lord Elyot and Lord Rayne were below, hoping to be allowed to see them.

‘Oh, please, Aunt,’ Caterina said, clutching at her unstable toga. ‘Do say we’re at home. Don’t send them away.’

If she wondered, fleetingly, how far Lord Elyot’s enquiries had led him into the workhouse affair, Amelie concealed it well; she had no heart to disappoint her niece again so soon, even though she felt herself to be wading in rather deep waters.

‘The morning room,’ she said to Henry. ‘Leave your hair just as it is, Caterina. It looks most becoming like that, and they must take us as they find us, mustn’t they?’ Nevertheless, the advice was amended in her own favour as she passed the long cheval mirror brought downstairs for the fitting, and the darkly tumbling curls bound with lilac ribbons were tweaked into place. As a married woman she would have worn something over them, but any inclination towards convention had grown less attractive after Josiah’s death. Yet at the back of her mind was a nugget of satisfaction that there was someone in this town who, in full possession of the facts, had not been so easily put off. Indeed, a timely show of her very comfortable life without Richmond’s friendship might be no bad thing. Even now they would be looking around with some interest at the fine white and gilded entrance hall and the Ax-minster carpet, while in the morning room were two views of Venice by Canaletto that would impress them more.

The visitors were shown into the room only moments after Amelie had seated herself at the rosewood pianoforte with Caterina standing by her side, a sheet of music in her hand. Despite herself, it was an impression she wished to convey, though she could not have explained why.

‘Lady Chester. Miss Chester.’ The men bowed as the door closed behind them, their reflections disappearing into the shining oak floor.

Caterina smiled, but Amelie chose not to while resisting the temptation to continue her former irony. ‘You are welcome, my lords. May I enquire how you knew our address?’ She stood to meet them, inclining her head gracefully.

‘From the man who delivered the heroic silver tea urn from Rundell’s this morning,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘I made a point of asking him so we could offer you our thanks in person.’

‘Ah…I see.’ Amelie sat on a chair newly upholstered with her own embroidery and saw how Lord Rayne sat near enough to Caterina to admire the glossy red curls he had not seen before. Against the simple gown of white muslin, the sight seemed to hold his attention most satisfactorily.

Lord Elyot went to sit in a corner of the sofa, his arm thrown across the scrolled end, his long legs crossed as if the creasing of his tight buckskins was of no consequence, and it was this relaxed manner and his study of her face that made Amelie suspect that her choice of gift for his sister had been recognised for what it was, for now he must have caught a flavour, at least, of her excellent taste in all things domestic. Other than the tea urn, that is.

There was something more to be seen in his steady regard, however, that kept Amelie’s eyes upon his face longer than at any time since that first meeting. She noted how the dark hair down the side of each cheek reached the level of his earlobes and how the starched points of his white shirt touched each dark column. Now she was able to see the colour of his eyes away from the shadows, grey and dark-rimmed like the clouds, and very intent upon her. She gulped as the sly thud against her lungs forced her to take an extra breath, then the silent exchange ended as she looked away, conscious that this was not at all what she had expected to feel. She did not like or approve of these men’s carelessness of others’ misfortunes, but they were noblemen who could open doors for Caterina and, for that reason alone, she would have to stifle her reservations and show them some civility.

‘I hope you approve of our choice, Lord Elyot,’ she said. ‘Miss Chester and I thought that, if your sister enjoys taking tea as much as we do, then an urn would be just the thing. Especially as she has a family.’

‘My sister’s family is still very young,’ he said, ‘but taking tea is one of her delights. I’m sure she’ll be…er…’

‘Dismayed?’

‘Oh, no, indeed. She’ll be gratified that we even remembered. We’re not very good at that kind of thing, you see.’

‘I would never have guessed it, sir. Does she live nearby?’

‘At Mortlake, just across the park. May I congratulate you on such a beautiful room, my lady?’

The long sash windows looked eastwards out over the kitchen garden where the light was bright and new, bouncing off pale yellow walls and white ceiling, pinpointing the delicate gilded moulding, the silver pieces, the rosewood and satin surfaces, the sumptuous sofa striped with white, gold and apple-green, matching the chair seats. Inside the pierced brass fender stood a large white jug holding late blooms and berries, and before the white marble chimney-piece lay a pale rug.

Lord Elyot’s scrutiny paused at the views of Venice then lingered over a beautiful still life with yellow-and-white flowers. ‘I recognise Canaletto,’ he said, ‘but not this one. This is very fine. Are you a collector?’ He stood up to examine it in silence and then, leaning a little closer, read out the signature. ‘A. Carr? That’s a painter I’m not familiar with.’

‘My maiden name,’ said Amelie.

He turned to look at her, and because he was too well-bred to show his astonishment, he came back to sit on the sofa at the end nearest to her. ‘You were on your way to paint blooms,’ he said, quietly.

‘You doubted it?’

‘Not exactly, though I did think it an odd excuse. I hope you’ll forgive me. You are obviously no amateur. And a collector, too. Have you attended any of the exhibitions in London yet?’

‘One or two. I bought a set of Thomas Bewick engravings while we were there, but Caterina doesn’t share my interest, and there have been others things to attend to since our arrival.’

‘From the north,’ he smiled, reminding her of the dire warnings. ‘I am not put off in the slightest, by the way.’

‘If that includes Lord Rayne, sir, my niece will be happy to hear it.’ They glanced at the two, talking animatedly like old friends.

‘And you, my lady?’

‘I hoped I had made that clear, my lord. My concern is for her, not for myself. She left her friends behind, sadly.’

‘You are brutally honest. But the name Carr carries some considerable weight in the north, I know. Are you by any chance a descendant of the Manchester Carrs?’

‘My father was Robert Carr, the Manchester industrialist, one of the cotton-printing Carr dynasty, sir.’

‘Is that so? And the name Chester?’

‘Was my late husband’s, Sir Josiah. A merchant banker. Miss Chester is his brother’s eldest daughter.’

His firm lips had begun to form an ‘oh’ before being readjusted into an expression of admiration and approval, which Amelie misinterpreted as the usual interest at the sound of substantial assets. She was not disappointed—it would be an exceptional man indeed who failed to respond to the scent of wealth.

‘So you lived in Manchester, my lady?’

‘In both Manchester and Buxton, in Derbyshire. Among other places. I didn’t want to stay there.’ She realised that this had an unfortunate ring to it. ‘Buxton has always been my real home, Lord Elyot. It’s a lovely place. People go there to take the healing waters, you know. But it’s a small town, smaller than Richmond even, and there is gossip and snobbery, which I cannot abide, and so many restrictions for people like myself. It was time for a change. I chose Richmond for its nearness to…oh, well, never mind that. I don’t wish to be tedious.’

‘You are far from becoming tedious, Lady Chester, I assure you. But you were saying at our last meeting how your neighbours have not so far taken the trouble to leave their cards. I find that sad, but not particularly surprising, given that they’re far too cautious for their own good round here. But there are exceptions.’

‘Oh? Who?’

‘Myself. And my brother. The Marchioness of Sheen is the leading society hostess here, but she’s in London and I dare say everyone is waiting for her approval before they know whether they’re allowed to like you or not. But that doesn’t apply to us.’

‘I really do not care for her approval, sir. She sounds like a very disagreeable woman, and I’ve had my fill of such people for the moment.’

Lord Elyot smiled at that. ‘May I ask how long you were married, my lady?’

‘Two years, sir. Why do you ask?’

‘You must have been a very young bride.’

‘But not a foolish one. I am well able to take care of myself.’

‘And of your niece too? You say you are concerned for her.’

Amelie’s shawl had slipped, exposing the peachy skin of one arm where a row of dark bruises had begun to show. Unhurriedly, she drew the shawl up over her shoulder while her glance passed lightly over Caterina and came to rest upon the rain-spattered window. ‘I cannot deny that I have an obligation to my niece and her father. You must have noticed how she longs for the company of other people, but we arrived too late for the season and, in any case, next year looks to be the same as this if things don’t improve. I had not forseen that making contacts would be quite so fraught with difficulties. Perhaps I should have done. Perhaps I should have made more of an effort.’

‘You brought no letters of introduction?’

‘No, my lord. There was no one I wanted to ask.’

‘I see. So you have not attended the local assemblies yet?’

She blinked. ‘Assemblies? I haven’t heard about any.’

‘There is one tonight at the Castle Inn. It’s our local hop, you know, but always well-attended and respectable. We have a very good Master of Ceremonies who doesn’t allow anyone in without a ticket. My brother and I have season tickets. If you think Miss Chester would care for it, and if you would permit it, we’d be delighted if you would be our guests.’ The last sentence was directed towards Caterina, whose ears were tuned to the sound of her name.

Its effect on her was predictable; her conversation with Lord Rayne stopped to make way for a pleading that Amelie thought was excessive, even after her previous refusal of company. ‘Aunt…please, oh, please, may we?’

Amelie was not the only one to think so, for she caught the lift of an eyebrow from Lord Rayne to his elder brother before he took Caterina’s part. ‘There would be no lack of partners for Miss Chester,’ he said, ‘or for yourself, and you may be assured that my brother and I make the sturdiest of escorts. We can call for you and deliver you safely home again, and we shall not wear boots, I promise.’

Caterina giggled, but Amelie felt the waters deepening around her as she thought of the poor woman to whom she had promised freedom and failed. She had fully intended to go with one of her manservants to make another bid for her freedom, and now those plans would have to be revised again, or abandoned.

Her face must have reflected some doubt, for when they met Lord Elyot’s for the expected answer, it was he who looked back steadily at her as if they had already formed some kind of embryo understanding. ‘It’s all right,’ he said, very quietly. ‘Miss Chester will be quite safe with us.’

And you? she wanted to say. Will I be as safe with you, who have instructions to investigate me? Will you find me out? Will your friendship turn cold, then, and leave Caterina bereft? Will that be the end of a brief fling with Richmond society?

There were other concerns also, to which she hardly dare allot any thought for fear of making them more real. His voice. His perceptively intimate way of looking at her. His devastatingly good looks. They would dance together. He would hold her hand, and more. She would be lost. He would be well used to this game and she was sadly out of practice, and vulnerable.

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘I’m sure she will, my lord.’

‘At eight, then? They always have a decent supper.’

‘We shall be ready. Thank you.’

Fortunately, Caterina managed to contain her squealing hug of excitement until the two visitors had been shown out. ‘Only think,’ she laughed. ‘their father is a marquess and they live up at Sheen Court. We passed the gates on one of our drives. Do you remember wondering who could live at such a grand place? Well, they do. Oh, what am I going to wear, Aunt?’

‘A marquess? Then their mother is…?’

‘Yes, the Marchioness of Sheen.’ Caterina whirled away in a solo dance, already imagining a queue of beaux.

‘The leader of society.’

‘I beg your pardon, Aunt?’

‘Oh, dear,’ murmured Amelie.

Beneath the hood of the two-seater curricle, the two men were quietly confident, if not self-satisfied, on their return to Sheen Court. ‘I think that went rather well this time,’ said Lord Rayne. ‘Progress, would you say?’

‘An improvement, certainly. But still as wary as a wildcat.’

‘Well, we’ll see how they perform this evening.’

‘Yes, but try to avoid any mention of Father and Mother, will you?’

‘Sorry, old chap. Already have. She asked me.’

‘Oh, well. Too bad.’

‘I’ll warn Todd we’ll need the town coach for tonight, shall I?’

‘No, it’ll have to be one of the others. I’m sending Todd up north for a few days to make some enquiries for me. Tell me, why would neighbours in a small town gossip about a wealthy young widow so much that she feels bound to move away?’

‘Scandal, I suppose. That’s the usual gossip fodder, isn’t it?’

‘That’s what I thought. Now we shall have to wait and see.’

‘Ah, so that’s why Todd’s going up north. Enquiring into her background? You’re that serious, then?’

‘Certainly I am.’

‘So why can’t you just ask her what it is you need to know?’ The look he received from his brother apparently answered him, and there were no further questions on that subject. ‘You said we’d be calling at the workhouse on the way home. Are you still of that mind?’

‘It’s our duty, Seton, you know that. And I think it’s time you took another look. There’s a package under the seat. Infant wrappers from Mother and Dorna’s sewing-group. We’re to take that in with us.’ Then, because there was something on his mind that would not take a back seat, his remark came out of the blue. ‘I must say though, brother, she’s the most out-and-out stunner I’ve ever seen in my life.’

With years of youthful hope behind her, Caterina could still not have predicted the impact she was to make upon her standoffish Richmond neighbours that evening or the bliss she would feel at being sought for every one of the twenty or so dances. Attired with studied simplicity in a bead-embroidered white gown of her aunt’s and quickly altered to fit, the young lady shed her blue velvet cape and waited with her hand tucked into Lord Rayne’s arm, slightly behind Aunt Amelie and Lord Elyot. And from that moment on, when all heads turned in their direction, the steady stream of young men to her side increased, for one had only to watch her beauty and vivacity to see that here was a new star in the ascendant.

Naturally, she could not have been expected to pay more than a passing attention to her aunt’s enjoyment except to note, whenever she happened to look, that she was dancing, or had disappeared, or was just returning from the supper room. But the press of people, mostly men, around her aunt would have made more than the briefest contact difficult. Altogether, it was a most satisfactory beginning, especially in view of Lord Rayne’s care of her. He was the most perfect escort.

They had been taken up in Lord Elyot’s coach, although the new assembly rooms at the Castle Inn on Hill Street were only walking distance away from Paradise Road. But the roads were still muddy, and to be helped up into a coach with a man’s hand beneath one’s elbow was vastly more romantic than a moonlit walk swinging a shoe-bag and holding one’s skirts up over the puddles.

The jest about not wearing boots might, Caterina thought, have been a hint for them to dress up rather than down, for both men wore pale knee-breeches and white stockings with their long dark-blue tailcoats and, if she had not already been half in love with his brother, she would have fallen for Lord Elyot, even if he did not smile as readily at her aunt as he did at her. Indeed, his expression was quite severe at times.

‘Is your brother displeased with my aunt’s appearance, my lord?’ she whispered as they waited to be greeted by Mr Newbrook, the Master of Ceremonies. ‘He rarely smiles.’

Patting Caterina’s fingers in the crook of his arm, Lord Rayne reassured her. ‘You will find, Miss Chester, as you gain experience, that men’s smiles are not always an indication of approval, just as a straight face does not always mean the opposite. I can assure you that my brother’s regard for Lady Chester could hardly be higher.’

Caterina thought his lesson rather patronising but, from then on, her observation of men’s expressions became rather more acute. Amelie, on the other hand, with or without Lord Elyot’s smiles, was dealing with the kind of approval she had missed since the death of Sir Josiah, having recognised in her escort’s appraising glances a darkly disturbing yet controlled desire to make their short coach-drive last for hours, alone. His lingering support down the two steps confirmed it and, to her own astonishment, her body responded, if only fleetingly. It was just as quickly cautioned. This man, she reminded herself, would never be one she could allow herself to warm to.

Mr Newbrook was gratified to welcome such illustrious members of Richmond society. A rare visit, he said it was, and how honoured. They had arrived just in time for the opening minuet, and would Lady Chester and Lord Elyot be pleased to take the lead for the first figure? Splendid.

It had been over two years since Amelie had danced, but no one would have guessed it as she swept gracefully into her first curtsy, then into the slow and languid movements of the minuet. Feeling all eyes upon her and her equally elegant partner, she was confident that the white gauze-covered silk with its simple classic lines had been the right choice. Instead of a lace cap or turban, she had defied convention by binding her glossy curls into coils threaded with ropes of pearls and, apart from one very large diamond surrounded by small pearls on a chain around her neck, these were her only adornments. The pendant, however, was enhanced by the glorious expanse of peachy skin inside the low-cut neckline, her beautiful breasts crossed with satin ribbons over fine pleats, the long sleeves clinging to the point of each shoulder, tied with ribbons at intervals. Lord Elyot, she was pleased to see, did not take his eyes off her once during their duet until the others came to join them.

This, my lord, is what you will never get to know, however much you may discover about my inconvenient do-gooding, damn you.

The minuet ended and, to the accompaniment of glances, open looks and more outright stares, Amelie was led off the floor to a corner where, before she could be surrounded by potential partners, Lord Elyot made his own claim upon her quite clear. ‘You will go into supper with me, my lady,’ he said, watching carefully for her reaction, ‘and you will save the next and the last dance for me too.’

‘My lord, that sounds remarkably like a command. And you know what will be said if I dance more than twice with you.’

‘It is a command,’ he said. ‘And people may say whatever they wish. They are talking already, I dare say.’

She looked. Yes, heads were bent behind fans, plumes nodding. It was as she had half-expected, and although most of her new acqaintances were men introduced to her by Lord Elyot, only a few were their wives and daughters who may or may not have been told that they must be introduced to her, like it or not.

Lady Sergeant and her daughter obviously had, otherwise their greetings would have come sooner and been delivered with more sincerity. ‘Well Nicholas,’ said Lady Sergeant, squinting through a waterfall of heavy blond lace and greying curls, ‘you’ve picked up another handsome gel, and no mistake, though you could hardly miss her on your own doorstep, could you? Eh?’ She tapped Lord Elyot’s arm while looking Amelie up and down several times. ‘Heard your husband was in the metal trade…what was it…lead?’

Amelie’s policy had always been to make no response to outright rudeness, which was quickly fielded by Lord Elyot. ‘Lady Chester’s late husband was in gold,’ he said, ‘not lead. He was a banker, Lady Sergeant. Now, if you and your daughter will excuse us, this is my dance and I don’t intend to miss it.’ Taking Amelie firmly by the hand, he drew her away, transferring his palm to the small of her back on purpose, Amelie thought, to give the obnoxious woman something else to talk about.

‘Lead mines,’ she said to him in a low voice.

Across the set, he faced her, mouthing the words, ‘Lead mines?’

They met in the middle. ‘In Derbyshire.’

‘Good grief!’ he murmured, retiring.

‘I knew it,’ she said as they met again.

He took her hands. ‘What?’

‘I should have worn my other two heads.’ She turned with him and retired, smiling to herself.

His response, when it came, made her blush. ‘That, my lady, would be to gild the lily.’

The glow was still in place when they next met to go down the set, hand in hand. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It would shock you as much as the rest of them.’

‘I am learning enough about you to be neither shocked nor surprised.’ Ducking under the arch of hands, they parted to return to the top of the set, and his meaning was not made clear to her, as the dance steps forbade anything more than the odd word in passing. Then it became more than a holding of hands and a linking of arms, but a series of more recent dance moves where she was entwined and turned by him, where arms were placed across waists with hands clasped above, where there was a closer contact than ever with him looking down at her as if they were alone, and this but a prelude to something even more intimate.

She felt the firm pressure of his hands upon her shoulders and knew that her own hands were resting on hard muscle that could have lifted her clean off the floor with little effort, and that dance was what epitomised the manly qualities of self-confidence, support and…yes, captivation. What use was there in denying it?

Taking her hand again, he led her away. ‘I shall re-introduce Mrs Oglethorpe and her mousey daughter to you,’ he said. ‘She may not leave her card until you do, so now I shall remove both your excuses.’

‘I’d much rather you did not,’ Amelie said, releasing herself. ‘I prefer to choose my own friends.’

‘You must know you cannot do that in this business, my lady.’

‘In what business, sir?’

‘In society. For your niece’s sake, you need all the contacts you can get, as long as they’re respectable. It won’t cost anything to know who they are.’

But there he was mistaken, for it cost Amelie not a little in hurtful remarks that she felt could not possibly be unintentional, some to her face, others overheard. ‘Ah, from the north,’ said the hard-faced Mrs Oglethorpe, not knowing Derbyshire from the Outer Hebrides. ‘Is that not where they fix the heads of stags all round the halls? And do they still use the furs on their beds?’

‘You seem to know more about that than I do, Mrs Ogel-thorpe,’ said Amelie, tiring of such nonsense. ‘Did your coachman manage to get your horses under control, by the way? I always send my men to Tattersalls, you know. Costs are higher, but I prefer that to local dealers. Don’t you?’

Then there was the barely concealed remark concerning Lord Elyot, which, for different reasons, Amelie would rather not have heard. ‘Well, my dear, with a reputation like his, you know where she’ll be heading, don’t you? Heartbreak, almost certainly. Two mistresses that I know of and plenty more that I don’t. His brother is just as bad, I believe.’

Amelie concluded her dance with a charming red-coated army officer who returned her to Lord Elyot, who knew him. ‘Where is Caterina?’ she said. ‘Perhaps we should be thinking of leaving soon.’

‘What is it?’ he said.

‘Oh…nothing. But it’s time we—’

‘You’ve heard something. I can see by your face.’

‘No…really…I…’ she looked round for Caterina, but now there was a general movement towards the supper room and there she was, with Lord Rayne and a group of young people heading for the refreshments, chattering and laughing, oblivious to her aunt’s concern.

‘She’s perfectly safe,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘You surely cannot take her away from that because of some idle gossip, can you? Isn’t this what you wanted for her? Is it not worth a little discomfort? Here, come with me.’ Threading her hand through his arm, he led her through large glass doors that opened on to a long verandah on the northern side of the inn that looked out over a large torchlit garden. Steps led down to wide terraces, the lowest one to the Thames where boats were tied, rocking on dark-mirrored water. Couples sauntered round huge stone flower-filled pedestals or sat on benches drinking and eating, and on one of these he bade her sit and wait while he went to find food.

In admiration, she watched his tall lithe figure stride away, stopping to speak to two officers who had partnered her. As if they had been waiting for permission, they kept her company with their gallantry until he returned with a servant then, bowing politely, left her alone with him.

‘If you hope to get through the evening at the same pace, my lady, you’re going to have to eat something. The tea may be lukewarm, but—’

‘It’s very good. Thank you.’

‘You’re not still thinking of leaving, surely? You will disappoint a great many admirers if you do.’

Notes of high-pitched laughter floated through the darkness, followed by the deeper men’s tones. ‘Is she.?’

‘Miss Chester is in safe hands. Why? What is it you’ve heard?’

‘Oh, the usual kind of thing. I suppose there must be some truth in it, my lord.’

‘About Seton, or me?’

‘Both.’

‘Well, then, it’s probably true unless you’ve heard that we eat live eels, or some such thing. That’s not true. But one would hardly expect two men of our age to have lived a celibate existence, surely?’ He waited for a response, then asked, ‘Does it matter to you?’

She might have returned some flippant and meaningless answer, but again his eyes demanded that she stop to think before she spoke. It did matter to her, so much so that she felt something rage inside her at the thought of him being intimate with other women, speaking tenderly to them, looking at them the way he’d looked at her all evening. Watching him dance while trying not to be observed, she had scolded herself for her prying unnatural curiosity. Now, he was asking her if she cared, and if it mattered that she cared.

‘Does it?’ he insisted, gently.

‘No…no, of course not,’ she said, looking away. ‘Why should it?’

‘Look at me and say that.’

Nettled, she kept her face averted, unable to lie so blatantly. ‘I made a mistake about Lady Sheen…the Marchioness…I’m afraid I may have…well, put my foot in it. Please accept my apologies, my lord.’

‘None are necessary. She’ll never hear of it. She’s still in town or I suppose she’d have been here tonight. But perhaps it’s as well that she’s not or we’d not be dancing Irish jigs and Scottish reels, I can tell you. She’s a stickler for propriety.’

‘Are you saying she would not approve of me, my lord?’

‘I have never been influenced by my parents’ approval or disapproval of my friends, Lady Chester. Nor has Seton.’

‘Thank you. That is a great comfort to me.’

Tipping his head sideways, he studied her expression in the dim light. ‘I could make myself much plainer, if you wish it.’

‘No, sir. I think you will find that our friendship will die a natural death quite soon without any help from the family.’

‘You suggested something similar once before. Are there more skeletons in the cupboard, then?’

Her smile was rueful. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Shall we go in? I can hear the musicians tuning up. Do you have a partner for “The Shrewsbury Lasses"?’

‘No. I shall be watching you instead.’

Climbing the damp stone steps towards a blaze of chandeliers whilst holding up a long gown caused more than one lady to slip and others to cling like crabs to their partners. Amelie did neither. Laying her arm along Lord Elyot’s, she experienced the rock-solid hardness and the firm grasp of his fingers under hers, receiving smiles for the first time as she entered the ballroom, some of them from women.

Not quite believing that he would watch her dance, she glanced every now and again to see if he meant what he had said. And since he did, every one of her looks was intercepted. But now she made a point of observing Caterina and Lord Rayne more closely, for although there would always be talk about the morals of handsome men, her thoughts on the matter were less than charitable where these two were concerned. Still, she had found a certain comfort in learning that their mother, at least, had high standards.

Several times she met him in the dances that followed as they crossed the set, turning to smile. She danced twice with Lord Rayne and found him as good as his brother, and as attentive. Speaking to Caterina several times, the latter could hardly finish a sentence for laughter and breathlessness, and even Lord Rayne admitted that Caterina was like quicksilver, meaning it as a compliment. Lord Elyot danced two dances with the young lady, thus making the score infuriatingly even for those who were counting until the last dance, which tipped the balance and caused tongues to click more furiously than ever.

That, however, was not the only effect it had, for there was a repeated movement where partners stood face to face, holding hands and taking turns to draw each other forward, stately, provocatively and, if one were in the mood, significantly. One, two, three, he stepped forward and she stepped back as if to tease him; one, two, three, he drew her towards him with unyielding hands and eyes that said, ‘You will come to me, woman.’ His message was clear, and she was too tired to misunderstand it, and they were both particularly silent as they left the floor for the last time, hand on hand.

Their departure was more delayed than their arrival by the good nights and the finding of cloaks, hats and shoes. Bundling her velvet evening cape over one arm, Amelie was able at last to smile and bid adieu to many of her neighbours with Caterina by her side making last-minute introductions. Then they had to wait for the coach to move up the queue outside, while she warmed her back on Lord Elyot’s solid chest and watched the glitter of diadems and flushed faces.

His arm moved across to shield her from the doddery footwork of an elderly gentleman, pulling her in yet closer. She could have moved away again as he passed, but she did not, nor did she protest when Lord Elyot’s hand slid beneath the cape in front of her, settling upon her waist and sending its warmth immediately through the silk. Then it moved in the lightest of caresses, and she responded, shifting and edging at the infringement, but not knowing whether to stay or flee, wanting to do both yet feeling herself yield to its heady excitement and by the events of the evening.

As if he could sense her dilemma, he firmed his hand upon her waist, holding her back, telling her to stay while his other hand came to rest upon the beautiful curve of her hip, lightly stroking and smoothing where no one could see. And as Amelie continued to call out her good nights, to smile and make believe that her heart was tranquil, all her awareness was alive to that gentle movement sliding upon the fine fabric of her gown, exploring like a summer breeze over hip, buttock and thigh, as intimate as water.

Vaguely, she tried to excuse her own deplorable behaviour with references to her exhaustion, her elation, and the years of solitary mourning, the newness of the company, her success and the lateness of the hour. But she could find no truly acceptable reason for allowing such a thing to happen, knowing what she did of the man.

He had stopped of his own accord when the crowd began to move, had placed the cape around her shoulders and, in doing so, had obliged her to look at him with neither reproach nor approval in her dark confused eyes, but to accept the mastery in his. It was, without question, the most outrageous and unacceptable behaviour towards a lady, which could never be condoned, but the aching fires deep within her body were a new experience that held any sense of insult or shame well out of her reach.

In the coach, the two men sat beside their partners and, as Caterina bubbled over with chatter to Lord Rayne’s happy prompting, Amelie sat in silence close to Lord Elyot, linking hands beneath the folds of her cape, feeling the gentle brushing of his thumb over her skin and thinking of nothing except that she was in imminent danger of losing her wits along with her closely guarded principles.

Chapter Three

The crash back to earth came as soon as the door had closed upon the departing escorts and their cries of farewell. Caterina was halfway up the staircase as the sound of a door into the hall made Amelie turn in surprise. She had forgotten about Fenn, her gardener, until that moment.

‘Ah, Fenn,’ she said, pulling her thoughts back into reality. ‘You waited up for me? What time is it?’

‘'Bout two o’clock, m’lady. No matter.’

‘And what news? Did they come back with you? Where are they?’

‘No, m’lady.’ Fenn stifled a yawn and rubbed his nose. ‘I went up to the workhouse as you bade me. I offered them the purse, but they sent it back.’

‘With what message?’ Hardly able to believe it, she leaned against the wrought-iron banister, suddenly overcome by tiredness and impending disappointment after such an evening. It would be too much for her to bear, she was sure of it.

‘You all right, m’lady?’

‘Yes, just tell me what happened. Why have they not come?’

‘I don’t really know. It was like she didn’t want to. They telled me she was well enough and that the babe was well too, and that she’d chosen to stay where she was, thank you very much. And that’s all.’

‘And you didn’t get to see her or the child?’

‘Lord, no, m’lady. I didn’t get no sight of them.’

‘So you don’t know whether this is the truth, or whether she’s being prevented from leaving?’

‘Well, no.’ He looked at the door, then back at her. ‘But she’s had her bairn and they said she’s all right, so perhaps it’s for the best. I dunno.’ He fished into one baggy pocket and brought out a leather purse weighted with coins. ‘They wouldn’t take it,’ he said, passing it to her and watching how her hand sunk a little.

‘They actually…sent it back? Well, that’s a first.’ She sighed and shook her head. ‘Thank you, Fenn. You did your best. Did they tell you.?’

‘Tell me what, m’lady?’

A hand crept to her breast. ‘Did they say…whether it was.?’

Fenn understood. ‘Oh, aye. It were a little lass. Night, m’lady.’

‘Good night, Fenn. And thank you. You did your best.’

The mother would rather stay where she was, in that dreadful place, with a new babe? Yes, and I’d like to know who gave the orders to turn all benefactors away at whatever cost to the unfortunate inmates. Was it you, my fine lord? Could it have been you, by any chance? You, with your lack of compassion and your wandering, knowing hands? Damnyou…damnyou…

If anything more had been necessary to persuade Amelie that this so-called friendship must cool, this was it. Not only had she made a complete fool of herself in allowing a most indecent intimacy, but now he would believe her to be no better than a low woman ready for anyone’s favours. All her earlier protestations about caring nothing for her own social contacts would be worthless, for she had shown herself to be desperate and ready to drop the handkerchief at the first man to show an interest. Well, she had warned him that their friendship would not last. Now, he had better believe her.

Wriggling deeper into her warm bath, she scrubbed vigorously at the parts where his hands had smoothed. ‘Like a horse…a mare.’ she growled.

‘Beg your pardon, m’lady?’ said Lise.

‘My hair. Is the shampoo ready?’

She could never have grown to like him, anyway, a man with so little pity in his heart that he could actually forbid a woman’s release from a squalid workhouse to the safety of a caring employer. He must know that there was no likelihood of exploitation or abuse in such circumstances. And he was a womaniser, too. Never was there smoke without fire, nor had he bothered to deny it.

One more thing was certain. Caterina must be better protected from men like Lord Rayne. Perhaps she ought never to have allowed the introduction in the first place. Yes, it had been a mistake. Both friendships must be slowed, before it was too late.

Accordingly, Caterina’s breezy request to go driving in the park and to leave cards at the homes of her new friends met with a puzzling refusal that put an end to any chance of meeting Lord Rayne, which was what she had intended. Instead, she was taken through the aspects of housekeeping and accounting using Mr John Greig’s The Young Ladies’New Guide to Arith-metic, which did little to banish her yawns or her frustration.

Later that morning, the mantua-maker arrived for a fitting of Caterina’s new gowns, though her young assistant had gone down with something and had not arrived for work. Amelie suspected that the child was close to starvation.

After a light luncheon, they went into the garden to practise the sketching they had missed at Kew, and there Henry came to say that Lord Elyot and Lord Rayne were in the hall asking if they were at home.

Caterina was already on her feet, drawing-pad and pencils discarded.

‘No, Henry,’ said Amelie. ‘Tell their lordships we’re not at home today. Caterina, come back if you please and finish your study.’

‘Very good, m’lady,’ said Henry.

‘Aunt Amelie!’ Caterina squealed. ‘How can you say that? You must know how I want to see him. Please…please, let me go. He’ll want to—’

‘Not this time, my dear. Take my advice on this. It doesn’t do to show too much interest at this stage, you see. Make him wait a while. In any case…’ She bit her lip, regretting the necessary deviousness.

‘In any case what? Don’t you like him?’

‘Of course, I cannot say that he’s not a charming companion, but such men are not innocents, you know. They tend to…well…change partners rather too frequently for most women’s comfort. Such men break hearts, I’m afraid.’

‘Well, I’m not afraid of that,’ said Caterina, knuckling away a tell-tale tear. ‘I haven’t given him my heart, so he can’t break it, can he?’

‘You’d be surprised what men can do, my dear.’

Although her aunt’s enigmatic remark did very little to inspire a recognisable drawing of an artichoke head, it provided food for thought in other ways, one of them being the exact nature of Lord Rayne’s interest. Being less experienced than her aunt in such matters, Caterina was by no means sure that he would care as much as she did about her being unavailable. All this waiting was a huge risk, at seventeen years old.

Her fears were allayed next day when Lord Seton Rayne arrived after breakfast in his brother’s perch-phaeton to ask if Miss Chester would be allowed to take a turn with him round the park and up the hill. Amelie was speaking to her housekeeper, Mrs Braithwaite, in the hall when Lord Rayne was shown in, so it was well-nigh impossible for her to refuse the invitation with anything like a convincing excuse. Realising that this would do nothing to cool matters between the two of them, she could only beg Lord Rayne to be careful with her niece, to return her in exactly two hours and not to allow her to drive, no matter how much she might wish it. If Caterina had not yet given him her heart, she had certainly loaned it to him.

Expecting that Lord Elyot might follow his brother’s example and hoping he would not, Amelie went up to her workroom where she had already begun a painting of her artichoke in an interesting state of decay. The tap on the door and the arrival of the footman caused her heart to leap uncomfortably, but it was only to deliver a letter, the handwriting of which she didn’t recognise, nor did it have the assured flourish of an aristocrat’s hand.

Laying her fine sable pencil aside, she broke the wafer and opened the sheet of paper, puzzled by the unfamiliar scrawl.

Then, before reading it, she searched for the signature at the bottom and found the words that drained the blood from her face. I remain your most obedient and loyal servant, Ruben Hurst.

A sickness churned inside her, and she held her mouth to prevent a cry escaping. This was a man she hoped had vanished from her life forever and, although she had never seen his handwriting before, she had seen enough of him to wish him perpetually at the ends of the earth. Which is where she believed he had gone.

Her hand shook as she read:

Dearest and Most Honourable Lady, My recent return to Buxton has made me aware of your removal from that town, which saddens me, for I had hoped to speak with you about our future sooner than this. However, while staying at St Anne’s Hotel, I discovered that enquiries were being made about you other than my own, these from a manservant in the employ of the Marquess of Sheen, a magistrate of Richmond in Surrey, where I understand you to be residing. Without revealing my own interest, I tried to ascertain the nature of this man’s enquiries and the reason thereof, but all he would say was that it was a personal matter. Nevertheless, from the escutcheon on his carriage door, I discovered that it belongs to the Marquess’s eldest son, Lord Nicholas Elyot. Which begins to sound, my Dearest Lady, as if your past is about to follow you whether you will it or no, as the man has taken the liberty of interviewing your erstwhile neighbours. I believe he is soon to be on the road to Manchester, whereas I am to leave Buxton at my leisure by post-chaise tomorrow. I shall send this news to you by mail, for you to receive it soonest.

Assuring you of my Highest Esteem and Devotion at all times, I remain your most obedient.

Lowering the unwelcome letter to the table, Amelie propped her forehead with one hand and stared at the words which, more than any she could think of, were the most disagreeable to her. Furious that her privacy should be so invaded, she felt in turn the raging forces of fear, resentment and indignation, followed by a desire to pack her belongings and move on again before the troubles of the past could reach her.

Ruben Hurst was the ghost of her past who had wedged himself between her and her beloved husband. He was a man who lost control of his affairs to such a degree that he could ruin the lives of others. He had ruined her life quite deliberately, and eventually she’d had to move away. And so had he. Now he had found out where she was and, of all the times when she needed the protection of a husband most, Josiah was not there to do it.

What made this news even more unacceptable was that Lord Elyot, the man from whom she was hiding her other self, the ‘do-gooding’ as he would see it, had somehow known of it from the start, otherwise why would he want to investigate her so thoroughly? Was he muck-raking? And she had even had him in her home, let him escort her to a ball, had danced with him and…oh…the shame of it! What a deceiver the man was.

Once again the footman knocked and put a toe inside the room. ‘Lord Elyot, m’lady, asks if you’d be pleased—’ ‘No, Henry! I will not be pleased to see him. I’m not at home.’ ‘Er, yes, m’lady. Though he may find that hard to believe.’

‘He’s not supposed to believe it, Henry.’

‘Very good, m’lady.’ The door closed.

Within moments, he was back. ‘Lord Elyot says to tell you, m’lady, that he’ll call tomorrow afternoon and hopes you’ll receive him.’

‘Order the phaeton for tomorrow afternoon, Henry.’

Henry grinned, beginning to enjoy himself. ‘Very good, m’lady. Anything else?’

‘Yes. Get Lise to come and make some tea.’

Having bought tickets for a local charity concert for that evening, Amelie decided that there were more pressing matters to be attended to. The idea that Lord Elyot and his brother might also be there was only a passing thought in her mind that had nothing to do with her decision, she told herself.

That afternoon, she sent her housekeeper and maid to the house of the mantua-maker’s young assistant to ask if a contribution of food would be acceptable to the family. Furthermore, would Millie, when she was sufficiently recovered, care to come and work for Lady Chester as a seamstress and to live in at Paradise Road? The grateful reply came within the hour, a small victory that soothed much that was disturbed in Amelie’s mind. It had occurred to her more than once that it might not have been the most diplomatic method of solving Millie’s problem, but she feared that the mantua-maker would do her utmost to delay the matter of the girl’s welfare, and delay was unacceptable in cases of dire need.

A very disturbed night’s sleep found Amelie unready for Caterina’s company the next morning, and she was not able to find any good reason why Lord Rayne should not whisk her away to visit his sister at Mortlake, which seemed a safe enough way to spend an hour or two.

But no sooner had she settled down to her painting when Henry came up to say that a gentleman had called and hoped to be allowed to see her. Amelie stared at the footman. If it had been Lord Elyot, she knew he would have said so. Could it be someone she had met at the dance?

‘Did he give his name, Henry?’

‘Yes, m’lady. Mr Ruben Hurst. You all right, m’lady? I can send him away? Tell ‘im you’re not at home? He said you’d want to see him.’

If Henry had been one of her Buxton servants, he would have known how far from the truth that was. But he was not, and now Hurst was here, in her house, and there was no one to protect her as there used to be. To have him thrown out, shrieking his protests, would attract exactly the kind of attention she wished to avoid, yet to be civil to the dreadful man after all the damage he had done was more than most women could cope with. While she had the chance, she must know what else he had discovered about Lord Elyot’s man, which of her old neighbours he had spoken to, what she might expect from their loyalty, or lack of it. If she wanted to control her future, it was best to be prepared in every way possible.

‘Show him up, Henry, but wait outside the door. Don’t go away. Do you understand?’

‘Perfectly, m’lady.’

She heard Hurst take the stairs two at a time and was reminded of the fitness that had once stood him in good stead. He had changed little since their last meeting over two years ago when he had suddenly ceased to be the devoted friend he claimed to be. His bow was as correct as ever, his figure as tall and well proportioned, his clothes as unremarkable but clean, a brown morning coat and buff pantaloons setting off the curling sandy hair like a crisp autumn leaf just blown in. Yes, he was very much the same except that the blue eyes were a shade more wary and watchful, marred by pouches beneath, which one would hardly have expected from a man of only twenty-eight years.

‘My dear Lady Chester,’ he said, having the grace not to smile.

Amelie remained seated at her work table. ‘It would have been more fitting if you had given me some warning of your visit,’ she said. ‘That is the usual way of things.’

‘Ah, a warning. Now that’s something you might have gleaned from my letter, then you could have had.’ his eyes swivelled melodramatically ‘. an escort. Would that have been too inhibiting? You did receive my letter, I suppose?’ His faint Lancashire burr sounded strange here in Richmond.

Rinsing her paintbrush in the water-pot, Amelie took her time to wipe it into a sharp point before laying it down, then she rose from her chair and picked up her shawl to drape it around her shoulders. Her morning dress was a brief pale-green muslin over which she wore a deeper green sleeveless pelisse, and she did not want his stares at her bosom any more than she wanted his stupid insinuations.

‘I did receive it, sir, and I think you are as much of a fool as ever you were to make contact with me, whether by letter or in person.’ And if I did not want desperately to find out more of another matter, you are the last person to whom I would ever give house room. ‘What have you come here for, exactly, and why on earth did you return to England?’

He was about to lay his hat and gloves beside her paintbox, but was stopped. ‘Not on my work table, if you please.’

He tried again on the demi-lune by the wall. ‘Why did I come out of hiding? Well, you know, I thought I’d take a gamble on seeing you again. The stakes are high, but I cannot stay out of society for the rest of my life, can I? And two years without a sight of your lovely face is too long for any man.’

‘You might have suffered a far worse fate, Mr Hurst. Indeed, you should have done. Don’t expect any help from me, sir.’ Even as she spoke, she heard the emptiness of her refusal, for she knew full well that he had come as much for money as to see something of her, and that to keep him quiet she would, eventually, give him some. What alternative was there?

‘Ah, yes,’ he said. ‘One law for the toffs and another for the rest of us, eh?’

Amelie was committed to redressing that imbalance, but she would not discuss that with such a man. ‘And what have you come for, sir, apart from delivering the mealy-mouthed flattery?’

For an instant, Hurst’s eyes narrowed at her rebuke. ‘You were always cruel, Amelie,’ he said, quietly.

‘I loved my husband,’ she replied.

‘And he’s left you even more comfortable than you were before,’ he said, looking around him at the beautiful feminine green-and-whiteness. ‘Well, then, perhaps you might consider sharing it with me for a few days since I’m looking for somewhere to lay my head.’

‘Here? Don’t be ridiculous, man. You must know you can’t stay here. What would.?’

‘What would the neighbours say? They wouldn’t see me.’

She felt the fear crawl inside her, standing the hairs up along her arms, and she summoned all her grit to hold on to her apparent coolness.

‘Oh, I understand why you had to move on,’ he continued, picking up a pencil sketch of a toadstool and studying it. ‘You’ve not lost your knack, I see. You must have known you’d not escape while I’m still alive, but the gossip…well, that’s equally tricky to shake off, isn’t it? And there’s Miss Caterina too. She’ll not get far in society once your affairs get an airing, will she? And you’re not going to blow the whistle on me or you’d have to be a witness at my trial, and then the whole nasty business will be there for everybody to pick over. Newspaper reports, cold shoulders. Very embarrassing. No, my lady, surely you didn’t think moving down here would solve everything, did you?’

‘You’ve thought it all out, haven’t you? And put that down.’

‘I’ve had two years to think it out, my dear Amelie, and only the memory of your beauty to keep me sane. Oh, yes, I’ve thought it out all right, so now you can start with a generous subscription to my funds. Then you can send for Mrs Braith-waite. See, I still remember your housekeeper’s name. I’ll take one of the best rooms. Next to yours?’

‘Get out! Get out of here and crawl back into the gutter.’

‘Tch! Still like ice, dear Amelie. Did that old husband of yours never—?’

‘Get out!’ She reached for the hand bell on her work table, but Hurst’s hand was quick to grasp her wrist, holding her arm in midair as if he was about to assault her.

She had known him during the two years of her marriage, and indeed there had been a time when she had thought him likeable, charming and clever. He and Amelie’s husband had gambled together regularly, but whereas Sir Josiah knew exactly when to stop, Hurst never did, nor when to stop drinking, or borrowing money, or making promises he couldn’t keep. Perhaps if Amelie had never shown him any of the kindliness she extended to all Josiah’s friends, this man might never have deluded himself about her. But self-discipline was not a strong point with Hurst as it was with her husband, and there had come a time when all his weaknesses came together. Now he was a man to be feared, for the pity she had once borne him had been purged forever, and he had become a menace.

‘Let go of my arm, Mr Hurst,’ she said calmly, though she quaked inside with every shade of insult and anger. ‘You have forgotten yourself, I believe. I can lend you some money and then I shall expect you to go and find somewhere to stay. You can not stay here. It’s not as safe as you think. I have some rather influential friends, you see.’ It was a long shot, but it might work.

Releasing her, he watched as she moved away well beyond his reach while his eyes widened at her boast. It was unlike her. ‘You surely don’t mean the Marquess and his son? Him, too? What’s his name…Elyot? So you know the man who’s been scouring Buxton for gossip about you, then?’

‘He was not scouring Buxton for gossip, Mr Hurst,’ she said, fabricating the beginning of an outrageous piece of fiction in the hope that he might swallow it. ‘He was simply clearing up some questions to do with Sir Josiah’s property. The man you spoke to was Lord Elyot’s lawyer. Naturally he wouldn’t disclose his client’s business to a complete stranger, would he? The neighbours he visited are those whose names I gave him, personal friends, and loyal. There was no need for your dramatic conclusion, Mr Hurst. It’s all quite innocent. He should be back from Manchester any day now, I dare say.’

Hurst sat down rather suddenly, gripping the arms of the chair until his knuckles were white. ‘What? You know this Lord Elyot and his father? The magistrate? Is it true?’

‘Of course I know them,’ she said, derisively, warming to the theme. ‘What do you suppose I’ve been doing for the past five weeks, living like a recluse? Miss Chester is at this moment out driving with Lord Elyot’s brother, visiting his sister.’

The arrogance drained from his face as he sifted through this surprising development, hoping to find a flaw in it. He tried scepticism. ‘Hah! You’re not telling me he sent a man up to Buxton to prepare the ground for some kind of. understanding… between you, are you? After only five weeks?’

‘He’s settling a few legal matters for me, visiting my solicitor. He has the means. It’s quite the usual way to proceed, I’m told.’

‘That’s not what I asked you,’ he said, nastily. ‘Do you have an understanding with this man?’

‘Yes, of sorts.’ The plunge into such a fathomless untruth was like a douche of icy water, so absurd was the idea. She had never told such a whopper before, but nor had she needed the protection of a man’s name more than she did now, her excuse being that Lord Elyot would never know how she had used him, of all unlikely people. ‘You really do ask the most indelicate questions, Mr Hurst. It is not common knowledge, yet.’

Hurst leaned back in the chair, eyeing her with some disbelief. If a man could win her in five weeks, he must have something no one else had. Even Chester with all his wealth had taken longer than that, but then she had been only twenty and as green as grass. ‘Not common knowledge, eh? That sounds to me remarkably like saying that Lord Elyot doesn’t know of it either.’

‘Then you’ll be able to ask him yourself, won’t you? I’m expecting him to call any time now.’ That, she thought, should see the back of him.

To her joy, her clever ruse began to work. Hurst rose slowly from the chair and strolled over to pick up his hat and gloves, apparently taking seriously the possibility that he might at any moment bump into the influential son of the local magistrate. This time, he suspected that the odds were definitely stacked against him. ‘Money,’ he said. ‘There’s a small matter of a contribution, if you would be so kind. Then I shall leave you to your lover. Are we talking of wives, or mistresses?’

Amelie paled with the effort of controlling her fury. ‘We are not talking at all, sir. The sooner you go, the better. Here, take this and get out of my house. It’s all I have available.’ She took the weighty bag of coins that had been returned from the workhouse and threw it in his direction, but because she was thoroughly unnerved by his insult and by her own indiscretion, and because he was not expecting that particular mode of conveyance, the bag landed on the floor with a heavy thud some way from his left heel.

At that precise moment, Henry threw open the door, but was unable to announce the visitor’s name before he strode in, pulled up sharply, and stood there with that unshakeable poise which was one of his most attractive qualities.

Amelie could have screamed at him that he was not expected until the afternoon, and that he was not to speak to Mr Hurst under any circumstances. Her plan was destined to come unstuck, however, teaching her never to lie like that again. ‘Lord Elyot,’ she said, breathlessly, ‘your timing is perfect, as ever. My guest is just about to leave.’

‘I hope you will introduce us,’ he said coolly, taking in the complete picture including the money-bag on the floor, Hurst’s eagerness to be gone, and the angry red blotches upon Amelie’s neck and cheeks.

‘Ruben Hurst. Lord Elyot,’ she said.

The two men bowed, and Hurst would have made for the door except that Lord Elyot stood in his way and looked unlikely to move.

‘Mr Hurst is an old friend of the family,’ Amelie said, ‘on his way to London.’

‘Is that so? And you’re staying here in Richmond?’ said Lord Elyot, still not moving.

Hurst seemed to cringe a little. ‘Well, my lord, I am suffering a slight embarrassment. I came down by post-chaise from Buxton and discovered at the first stop that my luggage has been left behind…mixed up, somehow…stupid porters. you know how it is…well, no, you probably don’t. And now I find myself without my belongings or my money. It was in my trunk, you see, safe from highwaymen. So annoying. I had wondered whether dear Lady Chester would be in a position to offer an old friend a night’s hospitality, but perhaps that’s not a good idea after all.’

‘There are some good inns in Richmond, Mr Hurst,’ said Lord Elyot with a remarkable lack of sympathy.

‘Ah…yes, of course. Lady Chester has kindly offered to lend me some funds to pay for accommodation until my own arrives. We have been close friends for a good many years, you see, as I’m sure she has sometimes mentioned to you. Very close.’

‘No, I don’t believe Lady Chester has ever mentioned you.’

‘Oh…er, that does surprise me, my lord. She has confided in me something of the nature of your personal relationship…your 1 understanding, that is, though of course I shall keep it to myself until it’s announced. May I offer you my felicitations, my lord? You are fortunate indeed, as I’m sure Lady Chester is also.’

Amelie closed her eyes and held her breath.

‘Thank you for your felicitations, Mr Hurst. Yes, I am indeed a very fortunate man,’ came Lord Elyot’s unwavering response. ‘And as a very good friend of the family, you will be kept informed of our progress. However, I am sure you will appreciate that our negotiations are still at a rather delicate stage, and I must point out to you that Lady Chester’s circumstances are changing, even as we speak. So the funds she has so kindly offered to lend you are frozen for the time being. Unfortunately, she is no longer in a position to lend you anything, Mr Hurst. Not until everything is finalised, you understand. Then we shall review the situation.’

Amelie opened her eyes and slowly began to breathe again.

Hurst took a step backwards, glancing at the money-bag on the floor with a grimace between a frown and a forced smile of defeat. ‘Yes, indeed, my lord. Yes…er…I had not thought, and naturally Lady Chester did not say as much to me.’

‘No, she wouldn’t.’ Lord Elyot smiled at her. ‘She is the most kind-hearted lady.’

‘Quite, my lord. You see, she lent me money in the past for which I have never ceased to be grateful. Most grateful.’

‘Really? What was that for, Mr Hurst? More luggage problems?’

‘No, it was for my beloved sister, my lord. A predicament. These things happen,’ he whispered, sadly. ‘Lady Chester was infinitely generous.’ He turned a look upon her that Garrick could have boasted of, full of devotion, adoration, and a sickening intimacy that almost turned Amelie’s stomach.

At that, she caught Lord Elyot’s eye for the first time and, without the slightest effort, conveyed to him all the fury and humiliation of the past half hour. Relieved beyond words to have had his support at this most disturbing interview that had satisfied none of her intended queries, she also felt the repercussions of her grotesque lie banking up behind her like the thunderclouds of doom in some Gothic novel, with the supernatural calm that comes before the storm.

‘I could not agree more, Mr Hurst,’ said Lord Elyot smoothly. ‘Lady Chester’s warmth and generosity are the first things that attracted me to her. Now, my good fellow, I can recommend some excellent inns in Richmond: the Red Lyon and the Feathers are opposite each other, the Greyhound, the Talbot…oh, any number of them. On the other hand, the mail coach leaves for London from the King Street posting-office three times daily. You may wish to take advantage of that as soon as your baggage catches you up. I see you understand me well, sir.’

As he spoke, Lord Elyot reached behind him to open the door where the faithful Henry was waiting for just such a moment.

From beneath his gathered brows, Hurst glowered with deep distrust at his audience, but carefully avoided looking at the money he was forbidden to retrieve. He bowed. ‘Your servant…my lady…my lord.’ Then he was gone.

In spite of her new predicament, Amelie’s relief and gratitude robbed her of words and, if she had been of a weepy frame of mind, she would almost certainly have burst into tears and thrown herself bodily into the arms of her rescuer. But since her rescuer was bound to be expecting some convincing explanations very shortly, she stood with both hands enclosing the entire lower half of her face as if she were praying. Which, in a sense, she was. She was also wondering how on earth to explain herself, not to mention Ruben Hurst.

She realised she was in for a rough ride as soon as Lord Elyot approached her with that maddeningly cryptic expression he favoured, and said, ‘Well, my dear Lady Chester, there’s a dirty dish if ever I saw one. You really do have the oddest friends. I fear I may have to forbid you to see him again once our engagement is formally announced. He won’t do, my dear. Really he won’t. Not up to the mark at all.’

‘You were not expected until this afternoon,’ Amelie mumbled through her fingers.

‘Yes, and you’d have been out, wouldn’t you? Hardly the way to behave towards your intended husband.’

‘Please…stop it! You must have realised that was a last resort.’

‘Thank you. I cannot recall when I was last known as a last resort. Must have been in my schooldays, I suppose.’

‘That’s not what I meant.’

‘Then what did you mean? And who was that jackanapes with his bag of moonshine?’

Inside her hands, she shook her head, closing her eyes.

‘You’ll do better like this,’ he said, taking her wrists. ‘It releases the mouth, I find. There now. Come and sit over here.’ Leading her to the chair vacated by Hurst, he lowered her into it. Then, pouring her a glass of some mulberry-coloured liquid from a decanter, he passed it to her. ‘I don’t know what this stuff is, but take a sip.’

‘Blackcurrant juice. Thank you.’ Obediently, she sipped.

A pained expression fled across his eyes. ‘Is that what I’m going to have to put up with? Heaven help me.’

‘Lord Elyot, I owe you an explanation, I know, and an apology for making use of your name. I didn’t think you would ever find out, and that’s the truth of it and, at that particular moment, I desperately needed that dreadful man to believe I had influential friends here.’

‘Well, that’s an improvement on being a last resort, I suppose. But if you didn’t think I’d find out, what d’ye suppose he’ll be doing in the nearest tap-room at this very moment but telling everyone within range that Lady Chester, his very close friend, has an understanding with Sheen’s eldest son? I’m really quite gratified to discover who my next partner is to be before the rest of Richmond does. You must understand my relief, I hope?’

That was a possibility she had not taken time to consider. ‘Would he do that?’ she asked, weakly.

‘Well, I would if I were him. He needs all the clout he can get. Who is he?’

‘A gambler and prime scandalmonger from Buxton. I’m afraid this so-called affection he professes is all in his mind. He was a family friend, my lord, but not any more.’

‘So why let him in?’

‘If I’d thought he would come here to Richmond, I would have told Henry to keep him out, but since he was in, I thought it was best to know exactly what he was up to. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know, as they say. I suspected he’d ask for money. He always needs money. So I gave him some, hoping he’d go away and leave me in peace.’

‘Most people would call that blackmail, Lady Chester. You really are not the most worldy-wise of women, are you? A charming naïvety, I suppose some would call it.’ He glanced at the money bag still on the floor.

Stung by the criticism, even though it was accurate enough, she threw him a glance not intended to alter the rhythm of his heart, which it did. ‘I had a good husband,’ she snapped, ‘who was worldly-wise enough for both of us and I have not acquired the knack of it yet.’

‘Then it’s time you had a replacement, my lady. Indeed, you’ve already set the machinery in motion all on your own. I find your reading of my mind quite uncanny.’

Amelie leapt to her feet, slamming the glass down upon her table so hard that the juice slopped on to her toadstool sketch. ‘I’d rather not stay in here with you any longer, my lord. This is my favourite room, not to be shadowed by argumentative men with silly talk. Two in one morning is more than I can bear.’

Glancing around him again, Lord Elyot could well understand her feelings on the matter, even if the expression of them came close to a set-down. The room was obviously special to her, for not only was her work table spread with paints, papers and sketches, but by his side stood a large oak folio stand holding her unframed watercolour paintings, very like the one he had admired on his first visit. He would much rather have given his sister one of those. Leather-bound volumes lined the walls, botanical journals, poetry, and novels in French and Italian. A portrait of a middle-aged businessman holding a roll of parchment looked down from above the marble chimney-piece. Her father, perhaps? Whoever he was, this conversation would be better continued, he thought, out of the man’s hearing.

‘I agree,’ he said. ‘I have a better idea.’ Before she could object to any plan, he hitched the shawl up around her shoulders and threw the long end over to the back. ‘There’s a decided chill in the air. Come with me.’

Without a murmur of protest she went with him downstairs and out through a back door into the garden, boxed into sections by waist-high hedges and paved pathways. Rose-covered columns supported wooden beams across which blowsy roses drooped their wet rusting petals and, at the far end in the shelter of a tall yew hedge, a curved stone bench waited for them, warmed by the sun.

With some foreboding, Amelie wondered if she would be able to fend off his imminent and no doubt relentless questions, for it was clear he was not going to leave things as they were. Brushing the dust off the bench, he waited for her to sit before taking his place at her side, and she could not hold back a comparison of his tight white breeches with Hurst’s buff pantaloons, a world apart.

He saw what was in her mind. ‘Memories?’ he said, softly.

Beneath the shawl, heat flooded into her neck and she looked away quickly to conceal the reply in her eyes. ‘I have apologised, my lord,’ she said, stiffly. ‘Pray do not retaliate by reminding me of…things…I would rather forget. You cannot know how deeply shamed I am.’

‘So shamed that you thought it a good idea to attach your name to mine? That doesn’t sound like shame to me, my lady.’

‘A temporary device. I’ve tried to explain. What more can I do?’

‘Oh, that’s easily solved,’ he said, smiling. ‘But we’ll discuss those details later, shall we? What I’d like to know is why you were—’

‘Naïve?’

‘…generous enough to lend money to Hurst in the past. I suspect he was lying when he said it was for his sister. Didn’t you?’

‘The story does me no credit, my lord. It happened when I was newly married and very trusting of men. I know better now. He told me his sister was being evicted because she was… well…in a difficult situation. She needed money desperately. I let him have some and he swore he’d repay me. He never did. It was not until after my husband’s death that I discovered Hurst had no sister, that the money was to pay a gambling debt. To Josiah. And since you are about to ask the obvious question, no, Josiah did not know of my loan to Hurst.’

‘Or he would have been angry with you?’

‘For trying to help a woman in distress? No, not for that, though he might have been surprised by the amount I was asked for.’

‘But Hurst can be prosecuted for such a thing. That’s theft, you know. Obtaining money by false pretences. Fraud.’

‘It’s too late for all that. Water under the bridge.’

‘No, it isn’t. You have friends who know the truth of the matter, surely? They’d testify at a trial. And your word is worth something.’

‘His word against mine. I told no one about the loan because the reason for it was confidential. Afterwards, I was not likely to tell anyone how I had been duped by a man like that. I hoped to learn by it, that’s all.’

‘But you haven’t, have you?’

This was getting too close. She must seem not to understand him. ‘Oh, I think I have, my lord. I’ve learnt that it’s best to stay clear of men, for the time being, at least. It’s my niece who needs to get to know them, not I.’

‘You wish to protect Hurst, then?’

‘I wish him to stay well out of my life, sir.’

‘Then the best place for him is behind bars or, believe me, he’ll keep on coming back for more. Unless you can rely on the timely intervention of your future husband, that is.’

‘Please…can we forget that now? I shall manage well enough, I thank you, and I’d be most grateful if you would think no more about the device I used. It was an emergency and I shall never do it again.’

‘You won’t have to. It’ll be all over Richmond by this time tomorrow.’

With any other man of so short an acquaintance, especially one whose compassion was so underdeveloped, she would have asked him to leave her to sort out her problems alone. But having used Lord Elyot’s good name and linked it so firmly with her own, she could not now tell him it was nothing to do with him when it so patently was. And unfortunately he was right about Hurst spilling the news. She’d had enough evidence of the power of his malicious tongue to know that the damage would spread like oil on water. Why this had not occurred to her at the time she would never know, her only excuse being that she was taken unawares.

‘No, you’re mistaken,’ she said, rising. ‘I know him. He’ll leave.’

But the other matter had not been resolved to Lord Elyot’s satisfaction, and he was determined she should not escape so lightly. He stood before her just one step too close for comfort, his dark head inclined towards her. ‘For a lady who thinks it best to steer clear of men, I’d say you were not making a very convincing job of it, wouldn’t you? Could it be that you’re sending out the wrong signals? Eh?’

‘No, my lord. I think it more likely that they’re being wilfully misinterpreted, if indeed there are any signals to be seen.’

‘Really. But to adopt a man’s name for such an intimate relationship for whatever reason seems to me more like a miscalculation on your part, for if you believe I shall simply ignore a signal like that, which is what you suggest, then you have miscalculated, my lady. I take such an appeal for help very seriously.’

‘You were not meant to know. If you had not turned up—’

‘If I’d not turned up when I did, you’d have had that wretch in your house for the next few weeks. You’re too generous for your own good, and far too impulsive to be let loose on your own in a place like this. You must admit that you’ve not made a very impressive beginning, have you?’

‘I’ve hardly had time in five weeks, but thank you for the vote of confidence.’ She made as if to turn and walk away, but he anticipated her, facing her into a curve of the high yew hedge where she could not turn without standing almost on his toes.

She felt again the solid and potent bulk of him at her back, his warmth through her clothes, the unaccustomed and mysterious electric charge that had a strange effect on the softness deep inside her, and it was as she had been at the dance, too tired and exhilarated to feel anything except an inexplicable urge to surrender herself without protest. It seemed then not to matter that she couldn’t approve of a man who took mistresses instead of marrying, who used his power to restrict the freedom of others, and the unacceptable elements faded into nothing as he moved closer and placed his arms across her, pulling her against him until, this time, his mouth was against her ear, whispering, beguiling.

‘Hush, my beauty. You need a man’s protection, if ever a woman did.’

Oh, yes…yes…I need your protection…no other…

She kept her head turned as he stopped her from twisting away, but his warm breath was upon her neck, emptying her lungs of air with a sudden shudder of delight. ‘My lord,’ she said, willing herself to concentrate, ‘I am not…th…things are not as they seem…please… let me go. What happened that evening was a terrible mistake…and today also…and I deeply regret.’ But his arms held her fast while one hand eased her face upwards and, before she could say more about how wrong he had got it, her protests were tenderly extinguished under his lips, holding her mind in a limbo between excitement and fear.

If she had thought that this might be a quick peck meant to tease her, the idea dissolved within seconds as his mouth moved expertly over hers, unhurried and assertive like that of a man who knows how to change a woman’s protest to wanting. Yet Amelie knew almost nothing of kissing. It was not something she and her late husband had ever practised, and now it was her complete lack of proficiency that became obvious to Lord Elyot, who knew from years of experience the difference between a novice and an unwilling woman.

Though surprised, he was unable to resist letting her know of it. ‘At last, my lady,’ he whispered, lapping at her lips, ‘I have discovered an art at which you are not so accomplished. A little more tutoring, perhaps?’

She was not ready for the taunt, nor could she pretend not to know exactly what he meant. Angrily, she pushed herself out of his arms and, if he had not held her, she would have fallen into the hedge. ‘Let go of me!’ she snarled. ‘I should have expected a man like you to take advantage of a lady in such a manner, Lord Elyot. Please leave me.’

He did, but not without having the last word. ‘I think, my lady, that you should not be the one to be complaining about taking advantage. That was to even the score, nothing more. Your servant, ma’am.’

She had little choice but to watch him march briskly away towards the house, knowing that he would find his way out as easily as he’d found his way in.

Planting tulip bulbs was as good a way as any of dissipating anger, though this time it was only partly effective, even after Amelie had lectured the polished copper bulbs on being fortunate enough to have everything they needed, that they had nothing to complain of, not even a lack of companionship. It was the missing element in her own life that no talking-to would be able to reverse.

Signifying everything she had lacked in her marriage, Lord Elyot’s kiss had brought home to her for the second time how little attention she paid to her own physical needs, perhaps deliberately. His hands on her body, his desirous eyes, his deeply moving voice, his authoritative manner that both riled and fascinated her. Josiah had had other sterling qualities, but this was the first time a man had aroused in her such intensely disturbing emotions, combining dislike and fear with a yearning to be near him. He would never know, she told the fecund bulbs, what his kiss had meant to her and, though he had detected a lack of practice, he would surely put it down to her two years of widowhood without taking into account the two bleak years that had gone before. Her despair was for what she had missed, for what she had just been allowed to see, and for what she would never taste again, for by now his enquiries must be nearing some kind of conclusion.

It would mean little to him, of course, one way or the other. His sort made a game of such minor diversions, of teasing respectable women before leaving them to pick up the broken pieces. Twisting the old dry roots from the base of a bulb, she allowed indignation to take the place of sorrow. ‘Well, not me, my lord,’ she growled. ‘I know exactly what to expect from you any day now.’

That same day, Amelie’s obliging young footman, Henry, carried a note to a certain Mr Ruben Hurst at Number 9 King Street from where the mail-coach departed for London three times daily. So intent on his mission was Henry that he failed to notice Lord Seton Rayne resting there on his way home from delivering Miss Chester safely back at Paradise Road. Nor did Henry notice that he was being overheard asking for Mr Hurst, or being told that Mr Hurst had already taken the mail-coach half an hour earlier. Tucking the note back into his waistcoat pocket, Henry was observed leaving the postingoffice, whistling.

As Lord Rayne had been asked by his brother, Lord Elyot, to keep his eyes peeled for anything havey-cavey, he thought the incident worth reporting, though this he was unable to do until after his brother’s long consultation with Todd, the coachman who had just returned to Sheen Court from his visit to the north.

Chapter Four

After helping to plant tulips without noticing her aunt’s unusual preoccupation with the task, Caterina went to her room to write her weekly epistle to her father and brother in Buxton. She followed this with a more chatty account of her doings to Sara, her younger sister.

Dearest Sara,

It has been such a week I cannot begin to tell you, but you recall saying how I must find someone with a perch phaeton and that nothing less will do? Well, I have, dear sister. Yes, just imagine your dear Cat bouncing along beside the handsomest gallant with shining top-boots and an hauteur such as you never saw. A marqess’s son, no less. We went to see his sister and her darling puppies today. She has children too. And we’ve been to a dance, a local affair where the men didn’t wear gloves, but good fun with more militia than one could dance with. So very dashing. My escort? Well, yes, I suppose I may befalling in love, which I could not tell to Father.

Oh, how I wish you could be here. Write to me soon. I have my French lesson next. Aunt Amelie lets me read to her from the Journal des Dames et de Modes and I am also reading The Mysteries of Udolpho at last and I have a new bonnet with strawberries on, and Aunt Amelie is getting a new seamstress called Millie. I am to learn how to ride side-saddle tomorrow.

Your ever loving sister who misses you. Cat.

Post Script, take good care of Father and Harry, won’t you? Aunt Amelie’s house is prettier than ours, but smaller. I’m learning to play the harp.

Lady Chester’s new house on Paradise Road was known only as Number Eighteen. Found for her by her agent, then extended and renovated to conform to Amelie’s requirements before her move, it had been on the same site in one form or another for close on three hundred years, growing and evolving through each new style, now more like a mansion than the original timbered cottage. From the road, the white stone façade was elegantly four-storied, the front door with a beautiful fanlight above and accessed by a paved bridge across the basement yard known as ‘the area'.

Through the large double gates along the adjoining wall, the land surrounding the house was more extensive than one might think. Here was not only a sizeable formal garden, a hothouse, kitchen gardens and an orchard, but also a square courtyard surrounded by the kitchen buildings, the servants’ quarters, offices and stores and, beyond all that, the coach house and stables.

In the Peak District of Derbyshire, Amelie’s previous existence had been countrified on a larger scale than this, her entertaining both lavish and frequent in accordance with her husband’s status. At Chester Hall she had tended the preserving of plums and the drying of apple rings, she had pickled walnuts and helped to lay down spare eggs in ash, store the pears, pot the beef and concoct lemon wine using brandy smuggled through Scarborough and Whitby. She had fish on her table from her own ponds and streams, her own ducks and geese, vegetables and fruit enough to send up to the Manchester house and, best of all, she had her own blooms to draw and paint. There was very little that Sir Josiah had denied her—intended, they both knew, to make up for what she could not have.

Being offered her niece’s company for the next phase of her life had required some consideration, but whereas it meant accepting a responsibility she had not anticipated, the diversions had so far been entertaining, even satisfying. Caterina was good company, eager to learn, intelligent, well-mannered and, thank heaven, possesssed of a natural grace that was easy to clothe. The new riding habit she had worn that morning fitted her shapely young figure like a dream, already attracting some admiration from the men and envy from the women.

They had gone riding in the park well before breakfast to avoid meeting certain acquaintances, and a party of young officers from the local militia at Kew had hung around them to stare and to vie for her attention. But Caterina had acquitted herself well and had even managed a comfortable trot attached to the head groom’s leading rein. Fortunately, they had not met anyone disagreeable to Amelie, who had already begun to reap the benefits of having attended the ball, for now there were several waves and smiles and calls of, ‘Good morning to you, Lady Chester.’

Clattering into the stable yard two hours later, however, was like a sneaky winter breeze to cool Amelie’s warm praise of her niece, for there, being walked up and down by a groom in Lord Elyot’s grey livery was a very large and glossy dark bay with a double-bridle. On a marble table in the front hall of the house lay a beaver hat, a pair of leather gloves and a riding whip, with a rather concerned Henry standing by to tell his mistress that Lord Elyot felt sure she would not mind him waiting.

Biting back the very obvious reply, she asked instead, ‘Where?’

‘In the morning room, m’lady.’

‘Very well, Henry. Caterina, go up and change, dear. Then go and take a little breakfast, then perhaps a little practice on the pianoforte. The new Haydn sonata we bought the other day—you might take a look at it.’ She would have given much to go with her instead of to the council of war in the morning room. The staircase seemed twice as high, for she knew why he had come at this early hour and why he had insisted on waiting.

Pausing only to remove her gloves, hat and veil, Amelie half-expected to see her visitor standing on the hearth with hands clasped behind his back, as her late husband had often done to hear an account of her activities. But Lord Elyot was reading the newspaper over by the window and did not hear Amelie’s quiet entry through the rattle of the paper as he fought with a wayward page.

She caught sight of herself in the round ornate mirror over the mantelshelf, like a miniature fashion plate of a highwaisted habit of soft violet velvet with a mandarin collar open at the neck to show the delicate ruffle of lace on her habitshirt. Her brown curls, however, were in a mess. No matter, she thought. Who was there to impress? She closed the door with a loud click, taking pleasure in the crash of paper as he turned, quickly.

‘Ah, Lady Chester. Do forgive me.’ He laid the crumpled heap of newspaper upon the table, then stood to perform an elegant bow.

‘You’ve waited all this time to apologise, my lord? Well, then, I shall accept it on condition that it never happens again. Which I think is a safe bet in the circumstances. Don’t you?’

His smile was full of admiration. ‘On the contrary, my lady, I think it an extremely dodgy one. In any case, I never apologise for kissing a woman. So very hypocritical.’

Refusing to be drawn further along that line, Amelie went to pick up the crumpled newspaper and, carrying it between her finger and thumb to the door, dropped it outside. ‘Then I think,’ she said, moving to the striped sofa, ‘that you had no need to wait so long.’ She waved a hand towards the nearest chair, trying to appear calm and in command of the situation. ‘If you do not mean to apologise, then what can be the purpose of your visit?’

‘Given your record of being out when I call, even when you’re in, I thought it wiser to be in first, while you were out, so that we could stand a fair chance of being in together. Eventually.’

‘Ah, to be of such importance,’ she sighed, gazing at the top of the sash window. ‘Can you bear to get to the point, I wonder?’

Slipping one hand into the front of his deep blue morning-coat, Lord Elyot pulled out a velvet reticule and passed it to her, dangling it by its long drawstrings. ‘Yours, I believe? Or that of a certain Ginny Hodge?’ he said.

Amelie’s heart pounded. This was horribly unexpected.

Frowning, she took it. ‘Who? Why would you think this was mine, my lord?’

He leaned back into the chair, making a steeple with his fingers. ‘For two reasons—one is that it had one of your visiting cards inside.’

‘Which this…Ginny person…could have stolen. How did you come by it?’

‘The man who picked it up after you had been mugged on the night you went up to the workhouse followed you home again. You were riding a donkey named Isabelle.’

‘Todd!’ The name escaped before she could prevent it.

‘Exactly. My coachman.’

So, he must have known of this for quite some time.

Her heart still hammered under the strain of staying calm. ‘And does this prove something, my lord? Apart from being robbed, is it a crime to ride one’s donkey at night?’

‘It is a crime to bribe His Majesty’s servants to release people in their custody,’ he said, quietly. ‘You did not quite manage it that time, but you have done it several times before through your servants, I understand. Those who live at the workhouse have been sent there by the authorities, my lady. By the Vestry, in other words. Any release must be done through the proper channels, not by stealth or bribery, or without permission. You sent a man up there to try again while you were with me at the Castle. Am I correct?’

‘So it was you who prevented—’ Unbidden, the words tripped out.

‘Prevented?’

‘Prevented that poor woman from giving birth to her child in decent surroundings,’ she snapped. ‘It was you, wasn’t it? You told them to keep her there at all costs because your father is the local magistrate who heads the Vestry who put her there in the first place. And no matter how inhumane, how stigmatising, how downright dangerous it is for a child to be born in a workhouse, your father’s interests must come first. Think how he would look if the poor unfortunates were cared for properly,’ she went on, striding across to the window. ‘Would he ever hold his head up in Richmond again?’

‘So you admit—’

‘What good would it do me to deny it?’ she said, sifting through the untidy pile of music sheets on top of the pianoforte. The Haydn sonata caught her eye as she hit the edges with a clack on the rosewood surface. She slammed them down. ‘Do your worst, my lord. There must be more serious crimes a woman can commit than trying to help those less prosperous than herself. If that’s so wrong, then it’s time the law was changed.’

‘It isn’t a crime when it’s done openly and above board. By your method, any gypsy or conman could bribe his way in and take his pick of anyone there, even a child, and whisk it away in the dark, never to be seen again. The rules are there to safeguard—’

‘I would have cared for them,’ she croaked, on the verge of tears. ‘I would have…oh, you would not understand. People like me are loose screws and addle-pates, are we not? And the women in that predicament not worth rescuing.’

‘Women who get themselves into that kind of predicament—’

She rounded on him, furiously. ‘Tell me, how does a woman do that, my lord? Any woman who gets herself with child will be the talk of the century, surely. Don’t talk such nonsense. And in any case, I am not a gypsy or a conman. I am Lady Chester and I know what women need.’

‘Then why could you not have gone to the Vestry with your suggestions?’

Sending him a withering look of scorn, she replied, ‘Because there was no time for all that. Do you think a woman can wait a week or two while the Vestry makes its mind up?’

‘So what about the men released from the pound since you came to Richmond? That was your doing too? And the child?’

‘Yes, and I’m proud of my success. The men were desperate. They had families to feed. The child had stolen a carrot. Yes, my lord, a carrot. There now, you can tell the noble Marquess how diligent you’ve been, and then I can remind you how accurate my prediction was, can’t I?’

‘About the end of our friendship? Well, yes, that’s quite a collection of skeletons you have in your closet. It must be quite a large closet, for there are still more to come, I believe.’

‘Let me help you out, my lord, to spare you the effort. You have my card with my old Buxton address on it, so you sent your man up there to rake up all the tittle-tattle he could find about Sir Josiah and Lady Chester. And how do I know? Because your Mr Todd bumped into Ruben Hurst, who warned me. You see, I’ve known for days, like you. And now you know all, and if I’m not arrested for perverting the course of justice, then I shall certainly make no progress whatever in society. Poor Caterina.’

Poor Caterina entered on cue just in time to hear the sentiment. Standing with one hand on the brass door-handle, she looked from one to the other, hoping for an explanation.

Lord Elyot came promptly to his feet. ‘Miss Chester,’ he said.

‘Caterina,’ said Amelie. ‘I was saying what a pity it was that you’d have to come looking for the Haydn. Here it is, my dear. Use the other pianoforte, will you?’ She handed over the bundle of music sheets with a smile.

‘Yes, Aunt. Thank you.’

‘Miss Chester,’ said Lord Elyot, ‘I believe that in a matter of…’ he took a gold fob-watch from his waistcoat pocket, flicked open the cover and glanced at it ‘.about ten minutes, my brother will be calling upon you. He’s a great admirer of Mr Haydn.’

Caterina’s sweet face lit up with a smile. ‘Is he really, my lord? Oh!’ The door closed again, leaving the two opponents to face each other for the next bout. Lord Elyot resumed his seat. ‘Tell me,’ he said, ‘about the duel, if you will. Would it pain you too much?’

Amelie had sensed it coming and had to turn away to hide her face from him. Now she must control the anguish that came every time she thought about it. ‘Oh,’ she said, taking a slow deep breath, ‘I expect you must have heard. People are usually ever ready to give their own version of events.’

‘That’s why I’d like to hear yours, my lady. I heard that Hurst was responsible for your husband’s death. You should have allowed me to have him arrested while there was still a chance, instead of warning him to flee. I take it that’s what your message to him contained?’

Her curls bounced as she whipped round to glare angrily at him. ‘You have spies posted at every corner, do you? You must live a depressingly dull life to go to such lengths. Yes, if you must know, I did warn him to flee, but he’d already gone.’

‘But why warn him? Because you desire his safety? Your amazing generosity is sometimes hard to understand, my lady.’

‘Not from where I stand, it isn’t. Surely you can see that for Hurst to face trial would mean a public airing of events I need to forget, sir. He would say whatever he liked about me to try to lay the blame elsewhere. My name would be blackened, and Caterina’s chances of…well, you know the rest.’

‘Yes, I can imagine. So Hurst quarrelled with your late husband, I take it? Gambling, was it?’

Reluctantly, Amelie recounted the story while roaming from one piece of furniture to the next, touching and tracing the outlines as if to keep herself safely grounded. ‘They played hazard together with a group of friends. It was Josiah’s relaxation. Nothing serious. But Hurst became a nuisance. He craved my attention, and it was noticed. The men laughed it off, but the women didn’t.’

‘And your husband?’

‘Josiah was twenty-three years my senior. I would not have done anything to hurt him…a younger man hanging around his wife…you can imagine what that would have meant to him if he’d believed it. I suggested excluding Hurst, but Josiah saw only that he lost too regularly and drank rather too much. He did everything too much. Rumours began to circulate about his…well…obsession, I suppose one might call it.

‘Then one evening at their club, Hurst lost far more than he could afford to Josiah, and he became abusive. He shouted that I was…no, I cannot say it…’ Her voice broke up, and for some time she stood quaking, clinging to the curve of the large harp that stood in one corner, fingering its gilded scrolls. Eventually, as Lord Elyot waited in silence, she found the strength to continue in a voice husky with emotion. ‘He told Josiah that he was my lover and that he should tend his wife better if he wanted to keep me. It was shocking. So shocking.’

‘Did your husband believe that?’

‘No, my lord, he didn’t. He knew I would never, never have. But the insult was too near the bone, too wounding to both of us, and he challenged Hurst to a duel. Josiah’s brother tried to reconcile them, but Hurst would not apologise and Josiah would not withdraw the challenge. They met in the woodland early the next morning, but Josiah was no shot and Hurst knew it. He was much older, was Josiah, and he died in his brother Stephen’s arms. Caterina’s father.’

‘I’m sorry. And Hurst?’

‘Well, you must know how the law stands on such matters,’ said Amelie, staring out into the garden. ‘A nobleman may be allowed to get away with it as a matter of honour, but not a man like Hurst. He knew he’d be brought to trial and condemned, so he fled to Ireland and I believed he would stay there for good.’ She came at last to the sofa where she sank down with her back to the light, fighting the tears. ‘You can imagine the rest, I’m sure. The inevitable gossip, the jealousy of what some seemed to think were my favoured circumstances. It would have been easier for them to bear if I’d been penniless, I suppose, as a result. They could have forgiven me that. Some found it hard to understand why a wealthy woman of twenty-two could be so distressed by the murder of her forty-five-year-old husband, or why she should be so grateful to his widowed younger brother and his family who, as it happened, was one of the few to offer me real help and support. The others were all too afraid of their wives, I suppose, and their wives were too concerned about the rumours to believe totally in my innocence. One quickly learns about true friendship at such times, my lord. The moral of the story is never to challenge anyone to a duel unless you are prepared to lose more than your honour.’

‘Well, your advice comes too late for me, my lady. But then, I always make a point of winning, you see.’

Glancing at him, she noted once more the impressive length of his muscled leg as he lounged into the chair, the width of his shoulder, the deep chest and strong hands. At ease, he was a darkly brooding god, and she could imagine only too well how proficient he would be at any physical activity. She had seen his dancing, so unlike Josiah whose keen brain was his most active part. He had provided for her well, however, and he was no stranger to compassion, as some men were.

‘Your parents,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘I understand they were lost to you only the year before. Was that as sudden?’

‘A coaching accident in Switzerland. Had they still been alive, I would probably have gone back to live with them immediately. But the Carr estate was entailed to my cousin, and his wife couldn’t wait to claim it as soon as it became vacant. Fortunately, when my husband died, his brother Stephen allowed me to stay in my own home until I bought this one, instead of claiming it for himself and his family as he was entitled to do. He moved in after I left, but I suppose you must know that.’ She shot a resentful glance at him, but he received it with no more than a slow blink. There had been gossip about the mutual support of the brother and sister-in-law which, in many people’s eyes, could not have been platonic.

‘According to my information,’ said Lord Elyot, ‘you were highly regarded by Buxton people.’

‘Really,’ said Amelie, twisting the wedding ring on her finger. ‘What a pity all those charitable people who were glad to accept my husband’s hospitality for so long could not have maintained the same charity for his widow when she most needed it. It comes a little late, wouldn’t you say?’

‘I can offer you my help, my lady, if you will accept it. The situation is certainly grave, but not irredeemable.’

Suddenly fearful of the soothing tone, Amelie leapt to her feet. ‘Oh, come now, my lord. Don’t tell me you came here to help. Why not be truthful and admit that, armed with all you know of my past and present life, you cannot wait to hound me out of here? An upstart northerner with trade connections in Richmond? We’ll soon get rid of her. I can almost hear your parents in chorus, sir. Well, now I’m in trouble with both of them, am I not? Which one will you tell first, or have you already done so?’

‘Calm down,’ he said, rising to his feet. He strolled to the chimneypiece and lay an arm along its edge, resting the sole of his shining Hessian boot along the brass fender. He took some time to study her graceful but guarded bearing, the angry challenging tilt of her head upon the long neck, the dark moist flash of her sun-flecked eyes. ‘I have not told either of them, and Todd knows better than to speak without my permission. But my father is expecting some kind of result and so are the Vestry and, yes, you could certainly be in serious trouble if word got out about your involvement in their affairs. And the scandal wouldn’t do much to help, either.’

‘Not to mention the do-gooding,’ she snapped over her shoulder.

‘That might have done very well for Buxton where you were known, but creeping around at night with a reticule full of bribing-brass is not the way it’s done here,’ he snapped back. ‘Anyone knows that, but your brains appear to be governed by your woman’s instincts, and look where that’s got you!’

‘What choice did I have?’ she cried, furiously. ‘I’ve told you, it would have taken too long. Why, by the time those bumbling old fools had got together, you’d have had more corpses on your hands. Is that the way it’s done round here, my lord? It certainly saves on food, but my way saves lives. Don’t expect me to apologise for that. As for the scandal— well, it will soon be common knowledge now, won’t it? So you had better warn your Haydn-loving brother to have no more to do with my niece. She’ll do better in Buxton, after all.’

‘You’re forgetting something.’

‘What?’

‘That your past is not yet known hereabouts, but what has become common knowledge is what your loud-mouthed little friend Hurst blabbed to the entire posting-office before he left for London yesterday. This morning I’ve received two invitations for myself and my lady. Not to put too fine a point on it, for you. And if you think,’ he continued before her open mouth could let out a squeak, ‘that I’m going to have my future wife’s name linked to a local court case and to my mother’s scalding disapproval of that kind of scandal, you can think again. I’m not!’

‘You said you were never influenced by your parents’ approval.’

‘I’m not. But that doesn’t stop her telling the rest of society what to think. Once she’s done that, Miss Chester’s future will be even less assured than it is now, that’s for certain. Mother has resigned herself to having sons who keep mistresses, but neither she nor my father would welcome a daughter-in-law with a criminal record.’

Amelie shook her head, trying to clear it, wondering what she was supposed to make of this tangle. ‘Then remind me, will you? You think I should go and explain? Is that what the Vestry will expect? An apology? I’ve told you, I won’t apologise.’ She flounced away, slapping at the reticule as she passed it.

He moved just as fast. ‘Will you hold your peace, woman?’ he barked. ‘Saints alive, but it’s time somebody took you in hand before you fly off at another fence you can’t clear. Come back here!’ In two strides, he had cut short her quick march towards the door and, rather than subject her to an undignified tussle, he bent, placed an arm under her knees and swung her up against him before she could escape. Carrying her to the sofa in three more strides, he set her firmly back against the round tasselled pillow and held her by the wrists, sitting to face her so closely that his previously mysterious statement about offering her some help now began to take on a new meaning.

‘No!’ she said, growling and spitting with rage. ‘No…no!’

There was more she would have said, but although she was beginning to guess at his intentions, the ensuing struggle took all her concentration. Then it was too late, and a cry was all she could manage before his mouth silenced her, blotting out all memory of words and protocol. Dominated by the weight of his chest upon hers, his hand in her hair, and his arm around her back, she was held captive by his searching mouth. She felt the change in him from the previous gentle occasion, a new urgency, as if to reinforce the message that someone should take her in hand. All the half-formed sensations that had filtered into her mind like moonbeams since yesterday suddenly faded, unable to compare in any way with the fire that flared through some deep untouched place inside her, seeping an ache into her thighs.

One of her arms was trapped under his, her hand idle upon his warm broad back, her lips teased into a response where she could not remain passive beneath the tormenting invasion. Heady and upset by the emotional wrangling of the last half hour, and confused, her voices of conscience ceased to protest, then wavered and collapsed beneath the expertise of a master, and at last her lips moved and parted, tasting and curious, waiting for more, perilously close to surrender. His kiss deepened and her nostrils filled with the intoxicating and elusive scent of his virility, luring her even deeper into his complete control.

But all the pent-up fears of a lifetime were even greater, surging over her like a giant wave that pushed back the needs of her body, lending strength to her arms. It was neither propriety nor reticence, but raw fear of some unspeakable consequence that held him away at last, tearing her lips from his. ‘Stop…no…stop! I cannot do this,’ she panted. ‘Let me go, my lord. If this is what you wanted from me, you should have given me warning, then I could have told you…to spare yourself…the effort.’

However, if she had expected that he would leave her immediately, full of contrition, she had misunderstood his purpose, for he was not the kind of man to apologise for kissing a woman, as he had said, and his purpose was as resolute as ever. So, although he eased back enough to allow her to recover, he caught her pummelling hands by the wrists and held them close to his chest.

‘Let me go, my lord. You must leave immediately. Please. ‘

‘All right…all right…I’ve ruffled your feathers, my beauty, but I’m not leaving till we have this business sorted out.’

‘To your advantage, of course.’

‘Of course. Well—’ he almost smiled ‘—to both our advantages. You are in a bit of a mess, there’s no getting away from that, is there? And I can offer you a way out of it, if you’ve a mind to listen.’

‘I don’t need to listen. You’ve already shown me what’s in your mind, and I’m astonished you should take me for that kind of woman. I have received some serious offers, sir, but no one has ever taken such outrageous liberties, and I—’

‘Shall I kiss you again?’

‘No!’

‘Then be quiet, or I will. There. Now calm down and listen to what I have to say. And don’t pretend you didn’t enjoy that, just a little, because I know otherwise.’ He watched the colour flush her cheeks again, adding an angry sparkle to her eyes where a single tear hung like a pearl. ‘And talking of outrageous liberties, have you forgotten already how Hurst has set Richmond ears buzzing and how he’ll be doing the same in every gaming-den in town? So who was it first took liberties with the name of Elyot, my lady? Remember?’

‘I told you, it was an emergency. I thought you understood that.’

‘Oh, I do understand. But this whole situation is an emergency, isn’t it? And I’m not inclined to deny that I have an understanding with the lady who accompanied me to the local assembly when to do so would look as if one of us has had second thoughts. And no one in their right mind would believe it was me, would they? Unless, of course, they knew about your illegal deeds of charity and your exceedingly interesting past. Oh, I agree that was not through any fault of yours,’ he went on as she tried to protest, ‘but nevertheless, it’s there, and the only way you can keep it all quiet is by keeping me quiet. Do you understand me?’

Her lovely face, usually so serene, was a mask of anger as every word took her further into a situation that both offended and enticed her, for she had not recovered from the effects of his lovemaking, and her body still trembled and responded to his shocking closeness. ‘You are…a…demon!’ she cried. ‘An unprincipled—’

‘There’s not a lot wrong with my principles.’

‘Let go of me!’

He released her wrists, but the sudden blaze of rage in her eyes gave him all the warning he needed, and he blocked her arm in midair as it swung towards his head, hurting her with its terrible hardness.

The pain infuriated her, and she tried again and again to inflict some kind of damage, astonishing herself by the release of a physical rage she had never known before, blaming everything and everybody in the process, herself in particular, Lord Elyot and his parents, Hurst, the Vestry, and society in general. But for that one crazy moment of weakness after the ball, he would never have known of her vulnerability, and now he had identified her needs far more accurately than she herself had done. Like a swordsman, he had dived straight under her guard, and the only way she could escape was to damage herself in the process.

If the damage had been limited only to her, the dilemma would have been simpler to manage. She would have lived without the approval of society and been content to do so, for society had not shown itself to be worthy of her patronage. But Caterina’s future could not be jeopardised with a clear conscience, for the young woman had everything in her favour except an impeccably aristocratic lineage and the right connections. It would take far more than Amelie could do on her own to launch Caterina into an approving world. She had been foolish to believe otherwise and even more foolish to put everything at risk in order to ease the tender place in her heart that responded too keenly to the needs of others.

There was yet another side to his dubious proposal that cut even deeper into Amelie’s objections, a fear that he had made real to her from their very first meeting concerning his attitude to certain unfortunate women. Where would she stand then, she wondered? In the gutter?

Against his superior strength, her attempts to wound him failed miserably as she was caught and held hard against his chest, panting with anger. ‘No,’ she whispered, hoarsely, ‘you ask too much of me. I’ve told you, I’m not that kind of woman. How could you ever have thought so?’

‘Shh…shh,’ he said, rocking her. ‘Hush, lass. I know you’re not that kind of woman, but since your name is now linked with mine, whether you like it or not, all you have to do is to be seen with me on a regular basis and to agree to our engagement.’ Tenderly, he brushed his thumb along the line of her jaw.

‘Only seen with you?’

‘Er, no. There will be times when I’m sure we shall not be seen, but there will be other times when I shall wish to be accompanied by my future wife to various functions. It makes life less complicated if I can rely on a woman of your calibre to play hostess to my host. All those dreadful mothers and daughters. Ugh!’

Stiffly, she drew away from him and wiped a finger across one eyelid, giving herself time to recover. He waited until she was ready, then he rose and eased her to her feet, handing her a slipper that had fallen off and watching how her dark curls fell untidily at odds with her attempts to pull herself together. In his eyes, the tousled hair and her recovering composure seemed to typify this complicated woman with her conflicting social needs, her passionate yet fearful nature, her astounding stylishness and amazing generosity of spirit that was leading her into untold trouble. Hearing at first hand of her last four years, he could see how lesser women would have become hardened and embittered by the strain far more than she, though her cynicism had already made her distrustful of men, shunning their company. He could also sense the struggle taking place inside her and how, although she had responded to him, she was still on the point of refusing his offer. She would take more persuading than this. He took her by the elbows, turning her to face him.

‘My lord,’ she said, ‘I realise how you are trying to make this suggested arrangement sound equally advantageous to us both, but it isn’t, is it? For instance, did you ever make any provision for your lovers when they reached an interesting condition? Did you send unwanted infants to the Foundling Hospital? Did you pack the mothers off to the workhouse to get on with it alone? They do, after all, get themselves into that awkward situation, don’t they?’

‘Tch! Tch!’ He shook his head at her. ‘My, but you’re a fierce one, my beauty. Like a dog with a favourite bone. What is it that set you on this path, I wonder? Could we not agree to deal with that problem if and when it arises?’

‘That would do well enough for a man, I’m sure. But I know of a better way of dealing with the problem, my lord. From a woman’s point of view.’

‘Which is?’

‘Surely you can guess. This talk of engagements and understandings is merely a cover for something else, isn’t it? To all intents and purposes, I would be your mistress and you would leave it so, if it were not for my resistance to the idea. You see, I am not such a fool that I cannot see what you want from this relationship, but what would you say, I wonder, if we left that part out of the bargain altogether?’

His head tipped slightly, and Amelie found that she was being scrutinised until a ripple of colour stole around her neck like a scarf. ‘That,’ he said, ‘sounds to me almost like a contradiction in terms, my lady.’

‘Yes, I can see that it would. Still, who’s to know?’

‘I would. And you would.’

‘Does that matter?’

She knew what his reply would be, for he had already demonstrated to her how important it was. ‘Lady Chester,’ he said, ‘listen to me a while. Your fears about the intimate side of things are groundless…no…don’t protest. I can see that you have concerns, but you need not. I shall take into account your period of widowhood and, before that, your marriage to an older husband which, I take it, must have been more your parents’ choice than yours. Am I correct?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you had no children?’

She shook her head.

‘Well, then. But I think you may be overlooking some of the benefits to you in this. There is the matter of Miss Chester, isn’t there? Together, you and I can take her into the heart of society and, with the protection of my name, doors will be opened to her. Isn’t that worth something to you?’

‘You know it is, my lord. In fact, my niece’s welfare is my only reason for even considering your proposal which, I should tell you, offends every code of decency I’ve ever been taught.’

‘Coming from one who flouts the law when it suits her purposes, my dear lady, that is a load of moonshine that doesn’t wash with me. If there was ever a way out of the tricky situation you got us both into, this is it. Can you not see that? It may be that people will wonder at it. Well, I have never offered for a woman before, but we are both old enough to make our own decisions, and I am not likely to leave you in an embarrassing situation, my lady. I can promise you that, if you should find yourself so, as a result of our relationship, I shall not abandon you. There, how does that sound?’

‘It sounds like a typical man trying to make light of his responsibilities, my lord, if you must know.’

He drew her slowly towards him until her face was under his. ‘And this evasive idea of yours about being mine in name only sounds to me like a woman doing exactly the same. So now I shall make a decision for both of us, and if you think it’s weighted in my favour, that’s because you were the one to cause the problem in the first place. You have yourself to thank for it.’

‘You are ungallant, and a fiend!’

‘And you cannot afford to refuse my offer, can you?’

Before he could kiss her again, which she knew he was about to do, she lifted his arms away and stepped sideways out of reach. She felt trapped and angry, yet now there was a kind of excitement, an anticipation, a new dimension in her life to take her into the future, beckoning even while warning her of the risks and of the fearfully intimate part of the deal which she would somehow have to delay. He had not been duped by the ‘name only’ idea.

‘This is not going to look good, my lord,’ she said, picking up the sadly abused reticule. ‘A widow of only two years engaging herself so soon. I left Buxton to escape the gossip only to plunge myself into a different sort. I cannot imagine what my brother-in-law is going to say. Or Caterina, for that matter.’

She would have expected him to offer some dismissive reply to that. After all, had she not already been seen in his company, been visited, and had he not made his interest in her quite obvious to Richmond’s prying eyes? Who would be really surprised to learn of their deepening friendship, and who would be upset by the news except those dreadful mothers and daughters he had mentioned? And his parents. But to her annoyance, he simply rested his behind on the scrolled end of the sofa, sprawled out his long legs, folded his arms and waited for the rest of her objections.

Disconcerted, she tried another tack. ‘How long does it usually take you to win a woman’s consent to be your mistress, my lord? Hours, is it? Days…weeks?’

‘Never much longer than that.’

‘So you’ve never had to work too hard at it, then?’

‘I’ve been fortunate, I suppose. I find it best playing it by ear.’

‘Forgive the indelicacy. I need to know, you see, because you are apparently expecting a commitment from me in a matter of minutes, which surely must be some kind of record. I would not call that “playing it by ear", my lord, I would call it molto allegro con brio more like. Wouldn’t you?’

His laughter was so prolonged that it was some moments before he could speak. ‘Lady,’ he said, still gasping a little, ‘you have shown up a problem that had not occurred to me, I have to admit. Blame it on my keenness. If it will make you easier, I will woo you, take time to win you, seduce you. I don’t want to rush my fences, believe me.’

Blinking a little at the change of metaphor, she felt another surge of heat flood into her throat as the thought skipped into her mind that it might not take her as long to submit to him as she was indicating, and that she had already begun the journey, to her shame. ‘I have not been likened to a fence since I don’t know when,’ she murmured, moving away from him.

But his reach was long and she was scooped up against him and held fast while he looked down into her troubled eyes, all signs of his former levity gone. ‘Steady, my beauty,’ he said, quietly. ‘You are an exception. I would have pursued you anyway, with or without the complications, but they give me a hold over you that I will not let go of. I need to be sure of you; you with your prickly defences. I suspect you’ve never been truly wooed before, have you? It’s not only the Hurst ordeal that’s cooled you towards men, is it? It’s fear, too. I can feel it in your kisses. Well, we’ll take it slowly, eh? And you’ll not find me difficult to please, or too demanding.’

His kiss did nothing to convince her of that and, at the back of her mind, Amelie wondered once again how long she would be able to keep him waiting for her full involvement in the art of being a lover.

Breathless and reeling, she held herself away. ‘I cannot approve of this arrangement, my lord, except that it appears to solve my major problems. But I beg one thing of you before I am obliged to accept it. Please do not ever offer me money, for then I shall be no better than a kept woman. A whore, to put it plainly. I value my independence, you see.’

His face revealed nothing of his reaction to that, and Amelie thought that perhaps this time her outspokenness had gone too far. Indeed, she doubted she had ever spoken that word out loud before.

‘I shall not offer you anything, my lady, that you have no need of. Does that reassure you?’ he said.

It was a cleverly crafted, if ambiguous, reply that made her feel ungracious. Instead of warning him, she could have thanked him for helping her out of more than one very damaging predicament which, if it created others of a different kind, would surely be of a more manageable order. But for the life of her the only difference she could see between the blackmailing methods of Ruben Hurst and Lord Elyot was that one man was a vile and treacherous murderer and the other an attractive but heartless rake whose offer had perhaps not insulted her as much as it ought to have done.

As for not offering her what she had no need of, he would probably never appreciate the full significance of that or how it created the greatest of all her fears, which he had thought too remote to be worth discussing. In which case she must ensure that his promise of a slow seduction was performed ralentando.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘that does reassure me. Thank you. Now, we must not trespass upon your brother’s patience any longer. I cannot hear any sounds of Haydn. Do you think.?’

‘That’s probably because they’re both out there,’ he said. Looking over the top of her head towards the garden, he had caught sight of Miss Chester leading his brother towards the summer house in the far corner of a lawn. ‘Shall we follow?’

The french windows opened on to a large verandah with steps leading down to pathways, plots and lawns. Further along the verandah another pair of french windows were open, too. ‘My workroom,’ she said, seeing him look, ‘where I am presently trying to incorporate a blackcurrant stain into a painting of a toadstool.’ She took the arm he offered, thinking it a particularly comforting gesture after what had just transpired. ‘What of your father?’ she said. ‘He will be expecting some kind of result from your investigations, surely?’

‘As long as the matter is cleared up, he will accept my findings. There will be no proceedings.’

‘Thank you. Will he accept your choice of mistress…er…wife?’

The arm clasped hers tightly to his side as they reached the bottom of the steps. ‘What a beautiful garden,’ he said. ‘Your design, of course?’

This was all very well, Amelie thought, walking by his side, but what is to happen when he wearies of the pretence or finds someone to love, someone he really wants to marry? Would she then be obliged to quietly fade away into a demimonde like Mrs Fitz Herbert, the Prince of Wales’s ‘wife'? Would the two of them have any kind of future together, her with her unacceptable northern industrial connections and him with his noble mistresses, while there in the background was the possibility of a pregnancy, which he preferred to believe would not happen after a childless two-year marriage. Not so, my lord. Not so. You do not know the truth of it.

‘My design,’ she said. ‘But still immature, as you see.’

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