A Secret Affair

“It is nothing to concern you, Your Grace,” she said. “It is not poor health that is causing me to feel a little bilious, but good health. I am to have another baby.”

“Oh,” Ha

“We intended to have another within two years of Hal,” Lady Montford said. “But the powers that be had other ideas. I am glad they have relented at last.”

“You must be my age or even younger,” Ha

And she had, she realized in some dismay, spoken aloud.

Mrs. Finch was bent over a rosebud, holding it cupped gently in both hands. Lady Merton and Lady Montford turned to look at Ha

“I am thirty,” Ha

“I was twenty-eight when I married Stephen last year,” the countess said as Lady Montford linked an arm through Ha

Mrs. Finch straightened up.

“I was seventeen when I married,” she said, “and eighteen when I had Michael. Thomas came two years later, Valerie two years after that. I am only twenty-seven now. I love my children dearly, and my husband too, but sometimes I have wicked thoughts about having lost my youth too soon. Perhaps there is no easy road through life. We must each walk our own and make the best of it.”

“Wise words indeed,” Lady Montford said, patting Ha

They strolled onward, enjoying the sight and smell of the flowers, taking a whole hour over it though the gardens were not large.

And Ha

And two of these ladies had refused her initial invitation.

“Mmm,” Lady Merton said, breathing in deeply just before they went back inside the house, “this is perfect. I ca

“Are you feeling any better?” Ha

“I am,” she said. “It struck me when we first came outside that perhaps it was foolish to walk among flowers and breathe in their scent. But the air has done me good. I will be perfectly fine for the rest of the day—until tomorrow morning. It is all in a good cause, though. And soon the morning nausea should be over.”

Lady Sheringford was coming downstairs as they stepped inside.

“I have been putting Alex down for a nap,” she explained. “He fell over and scraped his knee and was feeling mightily sorry for himself. The wound has been cleansed and kissed better, his tears have been dried and kissed away, and he is fast asleep. You have a little more color in your cheeks, Kate. Are you feeling better?”

“I am,” Lady Montford said. “Her grace has been showing us the flower beds, and I am quite restored.”

Lady Sheringford’s eyes moved to Ha

“You really ought to wear colors more often,” she said. “Not that you do not look quite stu

“Approachable?” Mrs. Finch suggested, not perhaps with the greatest of tact. “It is what I have been thinking since I saw you in that gorgeous yellow dress yesterday, Your Grace.”

“Well,” Lady Sheringford said. “You look more something. Something good, that is. That particular shade of sage green goes well with your blond hair.”

“We came inside for coffee,” Ha

She was feeling happy, she realized. She had never had women friends, except Barbara, who was usually far away. She had never thought she wanted or needed any. Today she could live with the illusion that these ladies were her friends.

CLOUDS MOVED OVER late in the morning, and a sudden chill wind drove everyone indoors sooner than they might otherwise have come. A sharp shower kept them indoors after luncheon, but no one seemed unduly unhappy about it. The youngest children were taken to the nursery for a sleep, while most of the others went off to the gallery to play some game devised by Mr. Newcombe and the Earl of Sheringford.

A few of the adults sat in the drawing room conversing or in the library reading or writing letters. One or two had disappeared entirely, probably for a rest in their own rooms, Ha

He was not playing. He was standing just inside the door, his arms folded across his chest, watching.

“It is a pity,” she said, “that I have only the one billiard table.”

“You must not fret about that, Your Grace,” Mr. Park said. “I am a far better billiard player when I watch someone else than when I play myself. I never miss a shot, in fact, and all are perfectly brilliant.”

There was general laughter.

“I have come here,” Lady Montford said, “so that I will know if the shots Jasper will claim to have made when I ask him later are actually only a figment of his imagination.”

“My love!” Lord Montford protested from some distance away—she had not tried to lower her voice. “Do I ever exaggerate? Do I ever boast?”

“This is the moment, Kate,” the Earl of Merton advised his sister as he chalked the end of his cue before bending over the table to concentrate upon his shot, “when silence is golden.”

“Well, that was nothing to boast about, Stephen,” Lord Montford said a moment later as the earl missed his shot. “If I ca

Ha

“Would you care to come out for a ride?” she asked softly.

“Now? Is it not raining?” He raised his eyebrows, but he looked toward the window to see that indeed it was not and then followed her from the room.

“I always keep riding horses in the stables,” she said when he had closed the door behind them. “I suppose I should ask if anyone else would like to come too, but everyone seems contented doing what they are doing, and I would like to show you something.”

“Just me?” His eyes smiled at her.

“I will ask Barbara to take charge of the tea tray later on,” she said without answering him.

“Just me.” He answered his own question and dipped his head closer to hers. “Lucky me.”

“I will go and change,” she said. “I will see you at the stables in fifteen minutes.”

And she turned to hurry away.

She changed into one of her oldest, plainest riding habits—her favorite, actually. It had been quite a pale blue when it was new. Now it was even paler. She had Adèle twist her hair into a simple knot at the nape of her neck so that it would not push her hat right off her head. She pulled on her riding gloves and looked with some satisfaction into her dressing room mirror. She wore not a single jewel.

It was important that she look like an ordinary person this afternoon, that she not look like the Duchess of Dunbarton, before whom everyone felt it necessary to bow and scrape. She was begi