A Secret Affair

This was to be her first house party here. She wanted everything to be perfect.

She envied—and was somewhat irritated by—Barbara’s cheerfully calm demeanor. She strolled outside with Ha

“What if it rains tomorrow?” Ha

“Then everyone will hurry inside from their carriages,” Barbara said with great good sense. “It is unlikely to rain hard enough to make the roads impassable.”

“But I do want everyone to see Copeland at its best,” Ha

“Then they will be pleasantly surprised when the sun shines the day after they come,” Barbara said. “Or the day after that.”

“What if it rains every day?” Ha

Barbara turned her head to look closely at her and linked an arm through hers.

“Ha

“But never here,” Ha

“They will be delightful,” Barbara said. “And they will ultimately be their parents’ responsibility, not yours.”

“But the party,” Ha

“But you attended any number of them when we were children,” Barbara reminded her, not for the first time. “And I was in charge of more than a few when Papa was still vicar and Mama was not up to organizing them herself. You have made more than enough preparations to keep them all busy and entertained for every moment of the party.”

“I must have windmills in my head,” Ha

Barbara led her to a bench close to one of the windows, sat them both down, and took Ha

“I am sorry to see your anxiety, Ha

Ha

Barbara sighed.

“I ought not to say it,” she said. “You will be a

Ha

“Nonsense!” she said briskly. “And see, Babs? While we have been sitting here, the rain has stopped. And look, you can see the sun as a bright circle behind the clouds. It is going to be shining by tomorrow, and the grass and trees and flowers will look all the brighter and fresher for having been rained upon.”

She got to her feet and approached the window.

She was very inclined to dismiss what Barbara had said about the changes in her until the thought struck her that the duke had intended from the start that she reach this moment when she could finally unveil her real self. And be her real self.

She was finally daring to be the person he had wanted her to be, still a little anxious and uncertain of herself, but ready and eager to meet life and enjoy it instead of protecting herself from it behind the mask of the duchess. She was finally becoming the person she chose to be.

“Babs,” she said, “what shall I wear tomorrow? What color, I mean? White? Or something … brighter?”

And why was she asking? It was something she must decide for herself. It was something she had been debating in her mind for three days, perhaps longer. As if the turning of the world depended upon her making the right decision.

She laughed.

“No answer required,” she said. “I shall decide for myself. What are you going to wear? One of your new dresses?”

“I want Simon to be the first to see me in those,” Barbara said wistfully. “Though I am sure I ought to wear them here, Ha

“Your vicar must be the first to see them,” Ha

She was not going to think about what Barbara had just said, Ha

But it had been three days, and three nights, since she had seen him last. And she knew that though she wanted everything to be perfect for all her guests and that she wanted them all to see Copeland at its best when they arrived tomorrow, she wanted it all to be a little more perfect for Constantine.

Something could not be more perfect than perfect.

But it was what she wanted. For him.

She did not care to pursue her reasons.

“I am starved,” she said. “Let’s go have tea.”

COPELAND WAS several miles north of Tunbridge Wells in Kent. The carriage passed through pretty countryside, past orchards and hop fields and grazing cattle. Constantine kept more than half an eye on the scenery as he traveled with Stephen and Cassandra. They might have left the baby with his nurse, who was coming in another carriage, but he was too new and too precious to be let out of their sight except when strictly necessary, it seemed.

Stephen held him most of the way and spoke to him as if he were a little adult. The baby stared solemnly back, except when his eyelids fluttered and he slept. Cassandra straightened his blanket and rearranged his bo

It was all a trifle disconcerting. Not because there were any open and embarrassing displays of affection between husband and wife, but perhaps because there were not. They were so thoroughly comfortable with each other, Stephen and Cassandra, and it was very obvious that young Jonathan was their world. It was all so damnably domestic. And Stephen, by Constantine’s estimation, was twenty-six years old. Nine years younger than he was.

He felt a vague sort of restlessness. And envy.

He really must give serious consideration to finding a suitable wife. perhaps next year. This year he was too tied up with the duchess. But if he was going to have children—and this year, for perhaps the first time, he felt the stirring of a desire to have sons and daughters of his own—he would rather start his family before he reached the age of forty. Even now he was older than he ought to be.

He distracted his mind with conversation and a more careful perusal of the latest report from Harvey Wexford at Ainsley than he had been able to give it at breakfast.

One of the lambs had died—but it had been sickly from birth. The others were all flourishing. So were the calves, except for the two that had been stillborn. The crops were coming through nicely, the weather having been warm for a whole month and the rains having come when they were needed—though they could do with another right about now. Rosea