Defend and Betray

chapter 6
With Major Tiplady's enthusiastic permission, Hester accepted an invitation to dine with Oliver Rathbone in the very proper circumstances of taking a hansom to the home in Primrose Hill of Rathbone's father, who proved to be an elderly gentleman of charm and distinction.

Hester, determined not to be late, actually arrived before Rathbone himself, who had been held up by a jury taking far longer to return than foreseen. She alighted at the address given her, and when she was admitted by the manservant, found herself in a small sitting room. It opened onto a garden in which late daffodils were blowing in the shade under the trees and a massive honeysuckle vine all but drowned the gate in the wall leading into a very small, overgrown orchard whose apples, in full blossom, she could just see over the top.

The room itself was crowded with books of various shapes and sizes, obviously positioned according to subject matter and not to please the eye. On the walls were several paintings in watercolors, one which she noticed immediately because it held a place of honor above the mantel. It was of a youth in costume of leather doublet and apron, sitting on the base of a pillar. The whole work was in soft earth colors, ochers and sepia, except for the dark red of his cap, and it was unfinished; the lower half of his body, and a small dog he reached out to stroke, were still in sketch form.

"You like it?" Henry Rathbone asked her. He was taller than his son, and very lean, shoulders stooped as from many years of intensive study. His face was aquiline, all nose and jaw, and yet there was a serenity in it, a mildness that set her at ease the moment she saw him. His gray hair was very sparse, and he looked at her with shortsighted blue eyes.

"Yes I do, very much," she answered honestly. "The more I look at it, the more it pleases me."

"It is my favorite," he agreed. "Perhaps because it is unfinished. Completed it might have been harder, more final. This leaves room for the imagination, almost a sense of collaboration with the artist."

She knew precisely what he meant, and found herself smiling at him.

They moved on to discuss other things, and she questioned him shamelessly because she was so interested, and because she was so comfortable with him. He had traveled in many foreign places, and indeed spoke the German language fluently. He seemed not to have been enraptured with scenery, totally unlike herself, but he had met and Mien into conversations with all manner of unlikely people in little old shops which he loved rummaging through. No one was too outwardly ordinary to excite his interest, or for him to have discovered some aspect of their lives which was unique.

She barely noticed that Rathbone was an hour late, and when he came in in a flurry of apologies, she was amused to see the consternation in his face that no one had missed him, except the cook, whose preparations were discommoded.

"Never mind," Henry Rathbone said easily, rising to his feet. "It is not worth being upset about. It cannot be helped. Miss Latterly, please come into the dining room; we shall do the best we can with what there is."

"You should have started without me," Oliver said with a flash of irritation across his face. "Then you would have had it at its best."

"There is no need to feel guilty," his father replied. He indicated where Hester was to sit, and the manservant held her chair for her. "We know you were detained unavoidably. And I believe we were enjoying ourselves."

"Indeed I was," Hester said sincerely, and took her place.

The meal was served. The soup was excellent, and Ram-bone made no comment; to do so now would be so obviously ungracious. When the fish was brought, a little dry from having had to wait, he bit into it and met Hester's eye, but refrained from comment.

"I spoke with Monk yesterday," he said at length. "I am afraid we have made almost no progress."

Hester was disappointed, yet die mere fact that he had kept from mentioning the subject for so long had forewarned her that the news would be poor.

"That only means that we have not yet discovered the reason," she said doggedly."We shall have to look harder."

"Or persuade her to tell us," Oliver added, placing his knife and fork together and indicating to the manservant that he might remove the plates.

The vegetables were a trifle overdone by any standard, but the cold saddle of mutton was perfect, and the array of pickles and chutneys with it rich and full of variety and interest.

"Are you acquainted with the case, Mr. Rathbone?" Hester turned to Henry enquiringly, not wishing him to be excluded from the conversation.

"Oliver has mentioned it," he replied, helping himself liberally to a dark chutney. "What is it you hope to find?"

"The true reason why she killed him. Unfortunately it is beyond question that she did."

"What reason has she given you?"

"Jealousy of her hostess of that evening, but we know that is not true. She said she believed her husband was having an affair with this woman, Louisa Furnival, but we know that he was not, and that she knew that."

"But she will not tell you the truth?"

"No."

He frowned, cutting off a piece of meat and spreading it liberally with the chutney and mashed potato.

"Let us be logical about it," he said thoughtfully. "Did she plan this murder before she committed it? "

"We don't know. There is nothing to indicate whether she did or not."

"So it might have been a spur-of-the-moment act - lacking forethought, and possibly not considering the consequences either."

"But she is not a foolish woman," Hester protested."She cannot have failed to know she would be hanged."

"If she was caught!" he argued. "It is possible an overwhelming fury possessed her and she acted unreasonably."

Hester frowned.

"My dear, it is a mistake to imagine we are all reasonable all of the time," he said gently. "People act from all sorts of impulses, sometimes quite contrary to their own interests, had they stopped to think. But so often we don't, we do what our emotions drive us to. If we are frightened we either run or freeze motionless, or we lash out, according to our nature and past experience."

He ignored his food, looking at her with concentration. "I think most tragedies happen when people have had too little time to think or weigh one course against another, or perhaps even to assess the real situation. They leap in before they have seen or understood. And then it is too late." Ab-sentmindedly he pushed the pickle toward Oliver. "We are full of preconceptions; we judge from our own viewpoint. We believe what we have to, to keep the whole edifice of our views of things to be as they are. A new idea is still the most dangerous thing in the world. A new idea about something close to ourselves, coming quite suddenly and without warning, can make us so disconcerted, so frightened at the idea of all our beliefs about ourselves and those around us crumbling about our ears that we reach to strike at the one who has introduced this explosion into our lives - to deny it, violently if need be."

"Perhaps we don't know nearly enough about Alexandra Carlyon," she said thoughtfully, staring at her plate.

"We know a great deal more now than we did a week ago," Oliver said quietly. "Monk has been to her house and spoken with her servants, but the picture that emerges of both her and the general does nothing to set her in a better light, or explain why she should kill him. He was chilly, and possibly a bore, but he was faithful to her, generous with his money, had an excellent reputation, indeed almost perfect -  and he was a devoted father to his son, and not unreasonable to his daughters."

"He refused to allow Sabella to devote herself to the Church," Hester said hotly. "And forced her to marry Fen-ton Pole."

Oliver smiled. "Not unreasonable, really. I think most fathers might well do the same. And Pole seems a decent enough man."

"He still ordered her against her will," she protested.

"That is a father's prerogative, especially where daughters are concerned."

She drew in her breath sharply, longing to remonstrate, even to accuse him of injustice, but she did not want to appear abrasive and ungracious to Henry Rathbone. It was an inappropriate time to pursue her own causes, however justifiable. She liked him more than she had expected, and his ill opinion of her would hurt. He was utterly unlike her own father, who had been very conventional, not greatly given to discussion; and yet in his company she was reminded, with comfort and a stab of pain, of all the wealth of belonging, the ease of family. Her own loneliness was sharpened by the sudden awareness. She had forgotten, perhaps deliberately, how good it had been when her parents were alive, in spite of the restrictions, the discipline and the staid and old-fashioned views. She had chosen to forget, to accommodate her grief.

Now, unaccountably, with Henry Rathbone the best of it returned.

Henry interrupted her thoughts, jerking her back to the present and the Carlyon case. "But that all happened some time ago. The daughter is married already, from what you say?"

"Yes. They have a child," she said hastily.

"So this may rankle still, but it will not be the motive for murder so long after?"

"No."

"Let us suggest a hypothesis," Henry said thoughtfully, his meal almost forgotten. "The crime seems to have been committed on the spur of the moment. Alexandra saw the opportunity and took it - rather clumsily, as it turns out. Which means, if we are correct, either that she learned something that evening which so distressed her that she lost all sense of reason or self-preservation, or that she already wished to kill him but had not previously found an opportunity to do it." He looked at Hester. "Miss Latterly, in your judgment, what might shake a woman so? In other words, what would a woman hold so dear that she would kill to protect it?"

Oliver stopped eating, his fork in the air.

"We haven't looked at it that way," he said, turning to her. "Hester?"

She thought, wishing to give the most careful and intelligent answer she could.

"Well, I suppose the thing that would make me most likely to act without thinking, even of the risk to myself, would be some threat to the people I loved most - which in Alexandra's case would surely be her children." She allowed herself a half smile. "Regrettably it was obviously not her husband. To me it would have been my parents and brothers, but all of them except Charles are dead anyway." She said it because it was high in her mind, not to seek sympathy, then immediately wished she had not. She went on before they could offer any."But let us say family - and in the case where there are children, I imagine one's home as well. There are some homes that go back for generations, even centuries. I would imagine one might care about them so extremely as to kill to preserve them, or to keep them from felling into the possession of others. But that does not apply here."

"Not according to Monk," Oliver agreed, watching with dark, intent eyes. "And anyway, the house is his, not hers -  and not an ancestral home in any way. What else?"

Hester smiled wryly, very aware of him. "Well, if I were beautiful, I suppose my looks would also be precious to me. Is Alexandra beautiful?"

He thought for a moment, his face reflecting a curious mixture of humor and pain. "Not beautiful, strictly speaking. But she is most memorable, and perhaps that is better. She has a face of distinct character."

"So far you have only mentioned one thing which she might care about sufficiently," Henry Rathbone pointed out. "What about her reputation?"

"Oh yes," Hester agreed quickly. "If one's honor is sufficiently threatened, if one were to be accused of something wrongfully, that could make one lose one's temper and control and every bit of good sense. It is one of the things I hate above all else. That is a distinct possibility. Or the honor of someone I loved - that would cut equally deeply."

"Who threatened her honor?" Oliver asked with a frown. "We have heard nothing at all to suggest anyone did. And if it were so, why should she not tell us? Or could it have been someone else's honor? Who? Not his, surely?"

"Blackmail," Hester said immediately. "A person blackmailed would naturally not tell - or it would reveal the very subject she had killed to hide."

"By her husband?" Oliver said skeptically. "That would be robbing one pocket to pay the other."

"Not for money," she said quickly, leaning forward over the table. "Of course that would make no sense. For something else - perhaps simply power over her."

"But who would he tell, my dear Hester? Any scandal about her would reflect just as badly upon him. Usually if a woman has disgraced herself, it is the husband whom the blackmailer would tell."

"Oh." She saw the point of what he was saying and it made excellent sense. "Yes." She looked at his eyes, expecting criticism, and saw a gentleness and a humor that for an instant robbed her of her concentration. She was far too comfortable here with the two of them she liked so much. It would be so easy to wish to stay, to wish to belong. She recalled herself rapidly to the subject.

"It doesn't make sense as it is," she said quietly, lowering her eyes and looking away from him. "You said he was an excellent father, with the exception a couple of years ago of forcing Sabella to marry instead of taking the veil."

"Then if it doesn't make sense as it is," Henry said thoughtfully, "it means that either there is some element which you have not thought of, or else you are seeing something wrongly."

Hester looked at his mild, ascetic face and realized what intelligence there was in his eyes. It was the cleverest face she had seen that held absolutely nothing spiteful or ungenerous whatever. She found herself smiling, without any specific reason.

"Then we had better go back and look at it again," she resolved aloud. "I think perhaps it is the second of those two cases, and we are seeing something wrongly."

"Are you sure it is worth it?" Henry asked her gently. "Even if you do discover why she killed him, will it alter anything? Oliver?"

"I don't know. Quite possibly not," Oliver confessed. "But I cannot go into court with no more than I know now."

"That is your pride," Henry said frankly. "What about her interests? Surely if she wished you to defend her with the truth, she would have told it you?"

"I suppose so," he conceded. "But I should be the judge of what is her best defense in law, not she."

"I think you simply don't wish to be beaten," his father said, returning to his plate. "But I fear you may find the victory very small, even if you can obtain it. Who will it serve? It may merely demonstrate that Oliver Rathbone can discover the tram and lay it bare for all to see, even if the wretched accused would rather be hanged than reveal it herself."

"I shan't reveal it if she does not give me permission," Oliver said quickly, his face pink, his dark eyes wide. "For heaven's sake, what do you take me for?"

"Occasionally hotheaded, my dear boy," Henry replied. "And possessed of an intellectual arrogance and curiosity, which I fear you have inherited from me."

They continued the evening very pleasantly speaking of any number of things other than the Carlyon case. They discussed music, of which all were fond. Henry Rathbone was quite knowledgeable, having a great love of Beethoven's late quartets, composed when Beethoven himself was already severely deaf. They had a darkness and a complexity he found endlessly satisfying, and a beauty wrought out of pain which excited his pity but also reached a deeper level of his nature and fed a hunger there.

They also spoke of political events, the news from India and the growing unrest there. They touched only once on the Crimean War, but Henry Rathbone was so infuriated by the incompetence and the unnecessary deaths that after a quick glance at each other, Hester and Oliver changed the subject and did not hark back to it again.

Before leaving Hester and Oliver took a slow stroll around the garden and down to the honeysuckle hedge at the border of the orchard. The smell of the first flowers was close and sweet in the hazy darkness and she could see only the outline of the longest upflung branches against the starlit sky. For once they did not talk of the case.

"The news from India is very dark," she said, staring across at the pale blur of the apple blossoms. "It is so peaceful here it seems doubly painful to think of mutiny and battle. I feel guilty to have such beauty ..."

He was standing very close to her and she was aware of the warmth of him. It was an acutely pleasant feeling.

"There is no need for guilt," he replied. She knew he was smiling although she had her back to him, and could scarcely have seen him in the dark anyway. "You could not help them," he went on, "by not appreciating what you have. That would merely be ungrateful."

"Of course you are right," she agreed. "It is self-indulgent for the sake of conscience, but actually achieves nothing at all, except ingratitude, as you say. I used to walk near the battlefields sometimes, in the Crimea, and knew what had happened so close by, and yet I needed the silence and the flowers, or I could not have gone on. If you don't keep your strength, both physical and spiritual, you are of no help to those who need you. All my intelligence knows that."

He took her elbow gently and they walked towards the herbaceous border, lupin spears just visible against the pale stones of the wall and the dusky outline of a climbing rose.

"Do you find hard cases affect you like that?" she asked presently."Or are you more practical? I don't know - do you often lose?"

"Certainly not." There was laughter in his voice.

"You must lose sometimes!"

The laughter vanished. "Yes, of course I do. And yes - I find myself lying awake imagining how the prisoner must feel, tormenting myself in case I did not do everything I could have, and I was lying in my warm bed, and will do the next night, and the next . . . and that poor devil who depended on me will soon lie in the cold earth of an unhallowed grave."

"Oliver!" She swung around and stared at him, without thinking, reaching for both his hands.

He clasped her gently, fingers closing over hers.

"Don't your patients die sometimes, my dear?"

"Yes, of course."

"And don't you wonder if you were to blame? Even if you could not have saved them, could not have eased their pain, their fear?"

"Yes. But you have to let it go, or you would cripple yourself, and then be of no more use to the next patient."

"Of course." He raised her hands and touched his lips to them, first the left, and then the right. "And we shall both continue to do so, all we can. And we shall both also look at the moonlight on the apple trees, and be glad of it without guilt that no one else can see it precisely as we do. Promise me?"

"I promise," she said softly. "And the stars and the honeysuckle as well."

"Oh, don't worry about the stars," he said with laughter back in his voice. "They are universal. But the honeysuckle on the orchard fence and the lupins against the wall belong peculiarly to an English garden. This is ours."

Together they walked back to where Henry was standing by the French doors of the sitting room just as the clear song of a nightingale trilled through the night once and vanished.

Half an hour later Hester left. It was remarkably late, and she had enjoyed the evening more than any other she could recall for a very long time indeed.

* * * * *

It was now May 28, and more than a month since the murder of Thaddeus Carlyon and since Edith had come to Hester asking her assistance in finding some occupation that would use her talents and fill her time more rewardingly than the endless round of domestic pleasantries which now occupied her. And so far Hester had achieved nothing in that direction.

And quite apart from Edith Sobell, Major Tiplady was progressing extremely well and in a very short time would have no need of her services, and she would have to look for another position herself. And while for Edith it was a matter of finding something to use her time to more purpose, for Hester it was necessary to earri her living.

"You are looking much concerned, Miss Latterly," Major Tiplady said anxiously. "Is something wrong?"

"No - oh no. Not at all," she said quickly. "Your leg is healing beautifully. There is no infection now, and in a week or two at the outside, I think you may begin putting your weight on it again."

"And when is the unfortunate Carlyon woman coming to trial?"

"I'm not sure, precisely. Some time in the middle of June."

"Then I doubt I shall be able to dispense with you in two weeks." There was a faint flush in his cheeks as he said it, but his china-blue eyes did not waver.

She smiled at him. "I would be less than honest if I remained here once you are perfectly well. Then how could you recommend me, should anyone ask?"

"I shall give you the very highest recommendation," he promised. "When the time comes - but it is not yet. And what about your friend who wishes for a position? What have you found for her?"

"Nothing so far. That is why I was looking concerned just now." It was at least partially true, if not the whole truth.

"Well, you had better look a little harder," he said seriously. "What manner of person is she?"

"A soldier's widow, well-bred, intelligent." She looked at his innocent face. "And I should think most unlikely to take kindly toieing given orders."

"Awkward," he agreed with a tiny smile. "You will not find it an easy task."

"I am sure there must be something." She busied herself tidying away three books he had been reading, without asking him if he were finished or not.

"And you haven't done very well with Mrs. Carlyon either, have you," he went on.

"No - not at all. We must have missed something." She had related much of her discussions to him to while away the long evenings, and to help put it all in order in her own mind.

"Then you had better go back and see the people again," he advised her solemnly, looking very pink and white in his dressing robe with his face scrubbed clean and his hair a trifle on end. "I can spare you in the afternoons. You have left it all to the men. Surely you have some observations to offer? Take a look at the Furnival woman. She sounds appalling!"

He was getting very brave in offering his opinions, and she knew that if Monk and Rathbone were right, Louisa Furnival was the sort of woman who would terrify Major Tiplady into a paralyzed silence. Still, he was quite correct.

She had left it very much to other people's judgment. She could at least have seen Louisa Furnival herself.

"That is an excellent idea, Major," she concluded. "But what excuse can I give for calling upon a woman I have never met? She will show me the door instantly - and quite understandably."

He thought very gravely for several minutes, and she disappeared to consult the cook about dinner. In fact the subject was not raised again until she was preparing to leave him for the night.

"She is wealthy?" the major said suddenly as she was assisting him into bed.

"I beg your pardon?" She had no idea what he was talking about.

"Mrs. Furnival," he said impatiently. "She is wealthy?"

"I believe so - yes. Apparently her husband does very well out of military contracts. Why?"

"Well go and ask her for some money," he said reasonably, sitting rigidly and refusing to be assisted under the blankets. "For crippled soldiers from the Crimea, or for a military hospital or something. And if by any chance she gives you anything, you can pass it on to an appropriate organization. But I doubt she will. Or ask her to give her time and be a patron of such a place."

"Oh no," Hester said instinctively, still half pushing at him. "She would throw me out as a medicant."

He resisted her stubbornly."Does it matter? She will speak to you first. Go in Miss Nightingale's name. No self-respecting person would insult her - she is revered next to the Queen. You do want to see her, don't you, this Furnival woman?"

"Yes," Hester agreed cautiously. "But. . ."

"Where's your courage, woman? You saw the charge of the Light Brigade." He faced her defiantly. "YouVe told me about it! You survived the siege of Sebastopol. Are you afraid of one miserable woman who flirts?"

"Like many a good soldier before me." Hester grinned. "Aren't you?"

He winced. ' "That's a foul blow."

"But it hit the mark," she said triumphantly. "Get into bed."

"Irrelevant! I cannot go - so you must!" He still sat perched on the edge. "You must fight whatever the battle is. This time the enemy has picked the ground, so you must gird yourself, choose your weapons well, and attack when he least expects it." Finally he swung his feet up and she pulled the blankets over him. He finished with fervor. "Courage."

She grimaced at him, but he gave no quarter. He lay back in the bed while she tucked the sheets around him, and smiled at her seraphically.

"Tomorrow late afternoon, when her husband may be home also," he said relentlessly."You should see him too."

She glared at him. "Good night."

* * * * *

However the following afternoon at a little before five, dressed in a blue-gray gown of great sobriety, no pagoda sleeves, no white broderie, and looking as if she had indeed just come off duty in Miss Nightingale's presence, Hester swallowed her pride and her nerves, telling herself it was a good cause, and knocked on Louisa Furnival's front door. She hoped profoundly the maid would tell her Mrs. Furnival was out.

However she was not so fortunate. She was conducted into the hall after only the briefest of pauses while the maid announced her name and business. She barely had time to register the doors in the hallway and the handsome banister sweeping across the balcony at the far end and down the stairs. The suit of armor had been replaced; however, without the halberd. Alexandra must have stood with the general at the top on the landing, perhaps silently, perhaps in the last, bitter quarrel, and then she had lunged forward and he had gone over. He must have landed with an almighty crash. However had they not heard him?

The floor was carpeted, a pale Chinese rug with heavy pile. That would have softened the noise to some extent. Even so ...

She got no further. The maid returned to say that Mrs.

Furnival would be pleased to receive her, and led her through the long corridor to the back of the house and the withdrawing room opening onto the garden.

She did not even bother to look at the sunlight on the grass, or the mass of flowering bushes. All her attention was on the Woman who awaited her with unconcealed curiosity. She assumed in that instant that she had gained admittance so easily because Louisa was bored.

"Good afternoon, Miss Latterly. The Florence Nightingale Hospital? How interesting. In what way can I possibly be of help to you?"

Hester regarded her with equal curiosity. She might have only a few moments in which to form an opinion before she was asked to leave. The woman in front of her standing by the mantel wore a full crinoline skirt, emphasizing the extreme femininity of her form. It was up to the minute in fashion: pointed waist, pleated bodice, floral trimmings. She looked both voluptuous and fragile, with her tawny skin and mass of fine dark hair, dressed immaculately but far fuller than the fashion dictated. She was one of those few women who can defy the current mode and make her own style seem the right one, and all others ordinary and unimaginative. Self-confidence surrounded her, making Hester already feel dowdy, unfeminine, and remarkably foolish. She knew immediately why Alexandra Carlyon had expected people to believe in a passionate jealousy. It must have happened dozens of times, whatever the reality of any relationship.

She changed her mind as to what she had been going to say. She was horrified as she heard her own voice. It was bravado, and it was totally untrue. Something in Louisa Furnival's insolence provoked her.

"We learned a great deal in the Crimea about just how much good nursing can save the lives of soldiers," she said briskly. "Of course you are probably aware of this already." She widened her eyes innocently. "But perhaps you have not had occasion to think on the details of the matter. Miss Nightingale herself, as you well know, is a woman of excellent family, her father is well known and respected, and Miss Nightingale is highly educated. She chose nursing as a way of dedicating her life and her talents to the service of others - "

"We all agree that she is a most excellent woman, Miss Latterly," Louisa interrupted impatiently. Praise of other women did not appeal to her. "What has this to do with you, or me?"

"I will come immediately to the point." Hester looked at Louisa's long, slanting eyes, saw the fire of intelligence in them. To take her for a fool because she was a flirt would be a profound mistake. "If nursing is to become the force for saving life that it could be, we must attract into its service more well-bred and well-educated young women."

Louisa laughed, a rippling, self-conscious sound, made from amusement but tailored over years to have exactly the right effect. Had any man been listening he might well have found her wild, exotic, fascinating, elusive - all the things Hester was not. With a flash of doubt she wondered what Oliver Rathbone would have made of her.

"Really, Miss Latterly. You surely cannot imagine I would be interested in taking up a career in nursing?" Louisa said with something close to laughter. "That is ridiculous. I am a married woman!"

Hester bit back her temper with considerable difficulty. She could very easily dislike this woman.

"Of course I did not imagine you would be." She wished she could add her opinion of the likelihood of Louisa's having the courage, the skill, the unselfishness or the stamina to do anything of the sort. But this was not the time. It would defeat her own ends. "But you are the sort of woman that other women wish to model themselves upon." She squirmed inwardly as she said it. It was blatant flattery, and yet Louisa did not seem to find it excessive.

"How kind of you," she said with a smile, but her eyes did not leave Hester's.

"Such a woman, who is both well known and widely..." She hesitated."And widely envied, would find that her words were listened to with more attention, and given more weight, than most other people's." She did not flinch from Louisa's brown-hazel eyes. She was speaking lhe truth now, and would dare anyone with it. "If you were to let it be known that you thought nursing a fine career for a young woman, not unfem-inine or in any way degraded, then I believe more young women, hesitating about choosing it, might make their decisions in favor. It is only a matter of words, Mrs. Furnival, but they might make a great deal of difference."

"You are very persuasive, Miss Latterly." Louisa moved gracefully and arrogantly to the window, swinging her skirts as if she were walking outside along an open path. She might play at the coquette, but Hester judged there was nothing yielding or submissive in her. If she ever pretended it, it would be short-lived and to serve some purpose of her own.

Hester watched her, and remained seated where she was, silently.

Louisa was looking out of the window at the sun on the grass. The light on her race betrayed no age lines yet, but there was a hardness to the expression she could not have noticed, or she would not have stood so. And there was a meanness in her thin upper lip.

"You wish me to allow it to be known in those social circles I frequent that I admire nursing as an occupation for a woman, and might have followed it myself, were I not married?" she asked. The humor of it still appealed to her, the amusement was there in her face.

"Indeed," Hester agreed. "Since quite obviously you could not do it now, no one can expect you to prove what you say by offering your services, only your support."

Laughter flickered over Louisa's mouth. "And you think they would believe me,, Miss Latterly? It seems to me you imagine them a little gullible."

"Do you often find yourself disbelieved, Mrs. Furnival?" Hester asked as politely as she could, given such a choice of words.

Louisa's smile hardened.

"No - no, I cannot say I can recall ever having done so. But I have never claimed to admire nursing before."

Hester raised her eyebrows. "Nor anything else that was an ... an extending - of the truth?"

Louisa turned to face her.

"Don't be mealymouthed, Miss Latterly. I have lied outright, and been utterly believed. But the circumstances were different."

"I am sure."

"However, if you wish, I shall do as you suggest," Louisa cut her off. "It would be quite entertaining - and certainly different. Yes, the more I think of it, the more it appeals to me." She swung around from the window and walked back across towards the mantel. "I shall begin a quiet crusade to have young women of breeding and intelligence join the nurses. I can imagine how my acquaintances will view my new cause." She turned swiftly and came back over to Hester, standing in front of her and staring down. "And now, if I am to speak so well of this wonderful career, you had better tell me something about it. I don't wish to appear ignorant. Would you care for some refreshment while we talk?"

"Indeed, that would be most agreeable," Hester accepted.

"By the way, who else are you approaching?"

"You are the only one, so far," Hester said with absolute veracity. "I haven't spoken to anyone else as yet. I don't wish to be blatant."

"Yes - I think this could be most entertaining." Louisa reached for the bell and rang it vigorously.

Hester was still busy recounting everything she could to make nursing seem dramatic and glamorous when Maxim Furnival came home. He was a tall, slender man with a dark face, emotional, and made in lines that could as easily sulk or be dazzlingly bright. He smiled at Hester and enquired after her health in the normal manner of politeness, and when Louisa explained who Hester was, and her purpose in coming, he seemed genuinely interested.

They made polite conversation for some little time, Maxim charming, Louisa cool, Hester talking more about her experiences in the Crimea. Only half her attention was upon her answers. She was busy wondering how deeply Maxim had loved Alexandra, or if he had been jealous over Louisa and the ease with which she flirted, her total self-confidence. She did not imagine Louisa being gentle, yielding with pleasure to other than the purely physical. She seemed a woman who must always retain the emotional power. Had Maxim found that cold, a lonely thing when the initial passion had worn off, and then sought a gentler woman, one who could give as well as take? Alexandra Carlyon?

She had no idea. She realized again with a jolt of surprise that she had never seen Alexandra. All she knew of her was Monk's description, and Rathbone's.

Her attention was beginning to flag and she was repeating herself. She saw it in Louisa's face. She must be careful.

But before she could add much more the door opened and a youth of about thirteen came in, very tall and gangling as if he had outgrown his strength. His hair was dark but his eyes were heavy-lidded and clear blue, his nose long. In manner he was unusually diffident, hanging back half behind his father, and looking at Hester with shy curiosity.

"Ah, Valentine." Maxim ushered him forward. "My son, Valentine, Miss Latterly. Miss Latterly was in the Crimea with Miss Nightingale, Val. She has come to persuade Mama to encourage other young women of good family and education to take up nursing."

"How interesting. How do you do, Miss Latterly," Valentine said quietly.

"How do you do," Hester replied, looking at his face and trying to decide whether the gravity in his eyes was fear or a natural reticence. There was no quickening of interest in his face, and he looked at her with a sort of weary care. The spontaneity she would have expected from someone of his years was absent. She had looked to see an emotion, even if it was boredom or irritation at being introduced to someone in whom he had no interest. Instead he seemed guarded.

Was that a result of there having been a murder in his house so recently, and by all accounts of a man of whom he was very fond? It did not seem unreasonable. He was suffering from shock. Fate had dealt him an extraordinary blow, unseen in its coming, and having no reasonable explanation. Perhaps he no longer trusted rate to be either kind or sensible. Hester's pity was quickened, and again she wished intensely that she understood Alexandra's crime, even if there were no mitigation for it.

They said little more. Louisa was growing impatient and Hester had exhausted all that she could say on the subject, and after a few more polite trivialities she thanked them for their forbearance and took her leave.

* * * * *

"Well?" Major Tiplady demanded as soon as she reached Great Titchfield Street again. "Did you form any opinion? What is she like, this Mrs. Furnival? Would you have been jealous of her?"

Hester was barely through the door and had not yet taken off her cloak or bonnet.

"You were quite right," she conceded, placing her bonnet on the side table and undoing the button of her cloak and placing it on the hook."It was definitely a good idea to meet her, and it went surprisingly well." She smiled at him. "In feet I was astoundingly bold. You would have been proud of me. I charged the enemy to the face, and carried the day, I think."

"Well don't stand there smirking, girl." He was thoroughly excited and the pink color rose in his cheeks. "What did you say, and what was she like?"

"I told her" - Hester blushed at the recollection - "that since all women admire her, her influence would be very powerful in encouraging young ladies of breeding and education to take up nursing - and would she use her good offices to that end."

"Great heavens. You said that?" The major closed his eyes as if to digest this startling piece of news. Then he opened them again, bright blue and wide. "And she believed you?"

"Certainly." She came over and sat on the chair opposite him. "She is a dashing and very dominant personality, very sure of herself, and quite aware that men admire her and women envy her. I could flatter her absurdly, and she would believe me, as long as I stayed within the bounds of her own field of influence. I might have been disbelieved had I told her she was virtuous or learned - but not that she was capable of influencing people."

"Oh dear." He sighed, not in unhappiness, but mystification. The ways of women were something he would never understand. Just when he thought he had begun to grasp them, Hester went and did something completely incomprehensible, and he was back to the beginning again. "And did you come to any conclusions about her?"

"Are you hungry?" she asked him.

"Yes I am. But first tell me what you concluded!"

"I am not certain, except I am quite sure she was not in love with the general. She isnot a woman who has had to change her plans, or has been deeply bereaved. Actually the only person who seemed really shaken was her son, Valentine. The poor boy looked quite stunned."

Major Tiplady's face registered a sudden bleak pity, as if mention of Valentine had brought the reality of loss back to him, and it ceased to be a puzzle for the intellect and became a tragedy of people again, and their pain and confusion.

Hester said no more. Her mind was still busy trying to make a deeper sense out of her impressions of the Furnivals, hoping against experience to see something which she had missed before, something Monk had missed - and Rathbone.

* * * * *

The following morning she was surprised when at about eleven o'clock the maid announced that she had a visitor.

"I have?" she asked dubiously. "You mean the major has?"

"No, Miss Latterly, ma'am. It's a lady to see you, a Mrs. Sobell."

"Oh! Oh yes." She glanced at Major Tiplady. He nodded, his eyes alive with interest. She turned back to the maid. "Yes, please ask her to come in."

A moment later Edith came in, dressed in a deep lilac silk gown with a wide skirt and looking surprisingly attractive.

There was only sufficient black to pay lip service to mourning, and the rich color enhanced her somewhat sallow skin. For once her hair was beautifully done and apparently she had come by carriage, because the wind had not pulled any of it loose.

Hester introduced her to the major, who flushed with pleasure - and annoyance at still being confined to his chaise tongue and unable to stand to greet her.

"How do you do, Major Tiplady," Edith said with courtesy. "It is very gracious of you to receive me."

"How do you do, Mrs. Sobell. I am delighted you have called. May I extend my condolences on the death of your brother. I knew him by repute. A fine man."

"Oh thank you. Yes - it was a tragedy altogether, in every respect."

"Indeed. I hope the solution may yet prove less awful than we fear."

She looked at him curiously, and he colored under her gaze.

"Oh dear," he said hastily. "I fear I have been intrusive. I am so sorry. I know of it only because Miss Latterly has been so concerned on your behalf. Believe me, Mrs. Sobell, I did not mean to sound - er. . ." He faltered, not sure what word to use.

Edith smiled at him suddenly, a radiant, utterly natural expression. Under its warmth he became even pinker, stammered without saying anything at all, then slowly relaxed and smiled hesitantly back.

"I know Hester is doing all she can to help," Edith went on, looking at the major, not at Hester, who was busy taking her bonnet and shawl and giving them to the maid. "And indeed she has obtained for Alexandra the most excellent barrister, who in his turn has employed a detective. But I fear they have not yet discovered anything which will alter what appears to be a total tragedy."

"Do not give up hope yet, my dear Mrs. Sobell," Major Tiplady said eagerly. "Never give up until you are beaten and have no other course open to you. Miss Latterly went only yesterday afternoon to see Mrs. Furnival and form some opinion of her own as to her character."

"Did you?" Edith turned to Hester with a lift in her voice. "What did you think of her?"

Hester smiled ruefully. "Nothing helpful, I'm afraid. Would you like tea? It would be no trouble at all."

Edith glanced at the major. It was not a usual hour for tea, and yet she very much wished to have an excuse to stay awhile.

"Of course," the major said hastily. "Unless you are able to remain for luncheon? That would be delightful." He stopped, realizing he was being too forward. "But you probably have other things to do - people to call on. I did not mean to be ..."

Edith turned back to him. "I should be delighted, if it is not an imposition?"

Major Tiplady beamed with relief. "Not at all - not at all. Please sit down, Mrs. Sobell. I believe that chair is quite comfortable. Hester, please tell Molly we shall be three for luncheon."

"Thank you," Edith accepted, sitting on the big chair with uncharacteristic grace, her back straight, her hands folded, both feet on the floor.

Hester departed obediently.

Edith glanced at the major's elevated leg on the chaise longue.

"I hope you are recovering well?"

"Oh excellently, thank you." He winced, but not with pain at any injury, rather at his incapacity, and the disadvantage at which it placed him. "I am very tired of sitting here, you know. I feel so . . ."He hesitated again, not wishing to burden her with his complaints. After all, she had merely asked in general politeness, not requiring a detailed answer. The color swept up his cheeks again.

"Of course," she agreed with a quick smile. "You must be terribly . . . caged. I am used to spending all my time in one house, and I feel as if I were imprisoned. How much worse must you feel, when you are a soldier and used to traveling all over the world and doing something useful all the time." She leaned forward a little, and unconsciously made herself more comfortable. "You must have been to some marvelous places."

"Well ..." The pink spots in his cheeks grew deeper. "Well, I had not thought of it quite like that, but yes, I suppose I have. India, you know?"

"No, I don't know," she said frankly. "I wish I did."

"Do you really?" He looked surprised and hopeful.

"Of course!" She regarded him as if he had asked a truly odd question. "Where in India have you been? What is it like?"

"Oh it was all the usual thing, you know," he said modestly. "Scores of other people have been there too - officers' wives, and so on, and written letters home, full of descriptions. It isn't very new, I'm afraid." He hesitated, looking down at the blanket over his knees, and his rather bony hands spread across them."But I did go to Africa a couple of times."

"Africa! How marvelous!" She was not being polite; eagerness rang in her voice like music. "Where in Africa? To the south?"

He watched her face keenly to make sure he was not saying too much.

"At first. Then I went north to Matabeleland, and Mash-onaland..."

"Did you?" Her eyes were wide. "What is it like? Is that where Dr. Livingstone is?"

"No - the missionary there is a Dr. Robert Moffatt, a most remarkable person, as is his wife, Mary." His face lit with memory, as if the vividness of it were but a day or two since. "Indeed I think perhaps she is one of the most admirable of women. Such courage to travel with the word of God and to carry it to a savage people in an unknown land."

Edith leaned towards him eagerly. "What is the land like, Major Tiplady? Is it very hot? Is it quite different from England? What are the animals like, and the flowers?"

"You have never seen so many different kinds of beasts in all your life," he said expressively, still watching her. "Elephants, lions, giraffes, rhinos, and so many species of deer and antelope you cannot imagine it, and zebras and buffalo. Why, I have seen herds so vast they darkened the ground." He leaned towards her unconsciously, and she moved a fraction closer.

"And when something frightens them," he went on,"like a grass fire, and they stampede, then the earth shakes and roars under tens of thousands of hooves, and the little creatures dart in every direction before them, as before a tidal wave. Which reminds me, most of the ground there is red -  a rich, brilliant soil. Oh, and the trees." He shrugged his shoulders. "Of course most of the veldt is just grassland and acacia trees, with flat tops - but there are flowering trees to dazzle the eyes so you scarcely can believe what they see. And - " He stopped suddenly as Hester came back into the room. "Oh dear - I am afraid I am monopolizing the conversation. You are too generous, Mrs. Sobell."

Hester stopped abruptly, then a slow smile spread over her face and she continued in.

"Not at all," Edith denied immediately."Hester, has Major Tiplady ever told you about his adventures in Mashona-land and Matabeleland?"

"No," Hester said with some surprise, looking at the major. "I thought you served in India."

"Oh yes. But he has been to Africa too," Edith said quickly. "Major" - she faced him again eagerly - "you should write down everything about all these places you have been to, so we all may hear about them. Most of us don't even leave our miserable little parts of London, let alone see wild and exotic places such as you describe. Think how many people could while away a winter afternoon with imagination on fire with what you could tell them."

He looked profoundly abashed, and yet there was an eagerness in him he could not hide.

"Do you really think so, Mrs. Sobell?"

"Oh yes! Indeed I do," Edith said urgently. "It is quite apparent that you can recall it most clearly, and you recount it so extraordinarily well."

Major Tiplady colored with pleasure, and opened his mouth to deny it, as modesty required. Then apparently he could think of nothing that did not sound ungracious, and so remained silent.

"An excellent idea," Hester agreed, delighted for the major and for Edith, and able to endorse it with some honesty as well. "There is so much rubbish written, it would be marvelous that true adventures should be recorded not only for the present day, but for the future as well. People will always want to know the explorations of such a country, whatever may happen there."

"Oh - oh." Major Tiplady looked very pleased. "Perhaps you are right. However, there are more pressing matters which I can see you need to discuss, my dear Mrs. Sobell. Please do not let your good manners prevent you from doing so. And if you wish to do so in private ..."

"Not at all," Edith assured him. "But you are right, of course. We must consider the case." She turned to Hester again, her brightness of expression vanished, the pain replacing it. "Hester, Mr. Rathbone has spoken to Peverell about the trial. The date is set for Monday, June twenty-second, and we still have nothing to say but the same miserable lie with which we began. Alexandra did not do it" - she avoided using the word kill - "because of anything to do with Louisa Furnival. Thaddeus did not beat her, or leave her short of money. She had no other lover that we can find trace of. I cannot easily believe she is simply mad - and yet what else is there?" She sighed and the distress in her face deepened. "Perhaps Mama is right." She dragged her mouth down, as if even putting form to the thought was difficult, and made it worse.

"No, my dear, you must not give up," Major Tiplady said gently. "We shall think of something." He stopped, aware that it was not his concern. He knew of it only by virtue of his injured leg, and Hester's presence to nurse him. "I'm sorry," he apologized, embarrassed that he had intruded again, a cardinal sin in his own view. No gentleman intruded into another person's private affairs, especially a woman's.

"Don't apologize," Edith said with a hasty smile. "You are quite right. I was disheartened, but that is when courage counts, isn't it? Anyone can keep going when all is easy."

"We must use logic." Hester sat down on the remaining chair. "We have been busy running 'round gathering facts and impressions, and not applying our brains sufficiently."

Edith looked puzzled, but did not argue. Major Tiplady sat up a little straighter on the chaise longue, his attention total.

"Let us suppose," Hester continued, "that Alexandra is perfectly sane, and has done this thing from some powerful motive which she is not prepared to share with anyone. Then she must have a reason for keeping silent. I was speaking with someone the other day who suggested she might be protecting someone or something she valued more than life."

"She is protecting someone else," Edith said slowly. "But who? We have ruled out Sabella. Mr. Monk proved she could not have killed her father."

"She could not have killed her father," Hester agreed quickly. "But we have not ruled out that there may be some other reason why she was in danger, of some sort, and Alexandra killed Thaddeus to save her from it."

"For example?"

"I don't know. Perhaps she has done something very odd, if childbirth has turned her mind, and Thaddeus was going to have her committed to an asylum." - "No, Thaddeus wouldn't do that," Edith argued. "She is Fenton's wife - he would have to do it."

"Well maybe he would have - if Thaddeus had told him to." Hester was not very happy with the idea, but it was a start. "Or it might be something quite different, but still to do with Sabella. Alexandra would kill to protect Sabella, wouldn't she?"

"Yes, I believe so. All right - that is one reason. What else?"

"Because she is so ashamed of the reason she does not wish anyone to know," Hester said. "I'm sorry - I realize that is a distasteful thought. But it is a possibility."

Edith nodded.

"Or," suggested Major Tiplady, looking from one to the other of them, "it is some reason which she believes will not make her case any better than it is now, and she would prefer that her real motive remain private if it cannot save her."

They both looked at him.

"You are right," Edith said slowly. "That also would be a reason." She turned to Hester."Would any of that help?"

"I don't know," Hester said grimly. "Perhaps all we can look for now is sense. At least sense would stop it hurting quite so much." She shrugged. "I cannot get young Valentine Furnival's face out of my mind's eye; the poor boy looked so wounded. As if everything the adult world had led him to believe only confused him and left him with nowhere to turn!"

Edith sighed. "Cassian is the same. And he is only eight, poor child, and he's lost both his parents in one blow, as it were. I have tried to comfort him, or at least not to say anything which would belittle his loss, that would be absurd, but to spend time with him, talk to him and make him feel less alone." She shook her head and a troubled expression crossed her face. "But it hasn't done any good. I think he doesn't really like me very much. The only person he really seems to like is Peverell."

"I suppose he misses his father very much," Hester said unhappily. "And he may have heard whispers, no matter how much people try to keep it from him, that it was his mother who killed him. He may view all women with a certain mistrust."

Edith sighed and bent her head, putting her hands over her face as if she. could shut out not only the light but some of what her mind could see as well.

"I suppose so," she said very quietly. "Poor little soul -  I feel so totally helpless. I think that is the worst part of all (his - there is nothing whatever we can do."

"We will just have to hope." Major Tiplady reached out a hand as if to touch Edith's arm, then suddenly realized what he was doing and withdrew it. "Until something occurs to us," he finished quietly.

But nearly a week later, on June 4, nothing had occurred.

Monk was nowhere to be seen. Oliver Rathbone was working silently in his office in Vere Street, and Major Tiplady was almost recovered, although loth to admit it.

Hester received a message from Clarence Gardens in Edith's rather sprawling script asking her to come to luncheon the following day. She was to come, not as a formal guest so much as Edith's friend, with a view to persuading her parents that it would not be unseemly for Edith to become a librarian to some discreet gentleman of unspotted reputation, should such a position be found.

"I cannot endure this idleness any longer," she had written. "Merely to sit here day after day, waiting for the trial and unable to lift a finger to assist anyone, is more than I can bear, and keep a reasonable temper or frame of mind."

Hester was also concerned about where she herself would find her next position. She had hoped Major Tiplady might know of some other soldier recently wounded or in frail health who would need her services, but he had been extremely unforthcoming. In fact all his attention lately seemed to be on the Carlyons and the case of the general's death.

However, he made no demur at all when she asked him if he would be agreeable to her taking luncheon with Edith the following day; in fact he seemed quite eager that she should.

Accordingly noon on the fifth saw her in Edith's sitting room discussing with her the possibilities of employment, not only as librarian but as companion if a lady of suitable occupation and temperament could be found. Even teaching foreign languages was not beyond consideration if the worse came to the worst.

They were still arguing the possibilities and seeking for more when luncheon was announced and they went downstairs to find Dr. Charles Hargrave in the withdrawing room. He was lean, very tall, and even more elegant than Hester had imagined from Edith's brief description of him. Introductions were performed by Felicia, and a moment later Randolph came in with a fair, handsome boy with a face still soft with the bloom of childhood, his hair curling back from his brow, his blue eyes wary and a careful, closed expression.

He was introduced, although Hester knew he was Cassian Carlyon, Alexandra's son.

"Good morning, Cassian," Hargrave said courteously, smiling at the boy.

Cassian dropped his shoulder and wriggled his left foot up his right ankle. He smiled back. "Good morning, sir."

Hargrave looked directly at him, ignoring the adults in the room and speaking as if they were alone, man to man.

"How are you getting on? Are you quite well? I hear your grandfather has given you a fine set of lead soldiers."

"Yes sir, Wellington's army at Waterloo," the boy answered with a flicker of enthusiasm at last touching his pale face. "Grandpapa was at Waterloo, you know? He actually saw it, isn't that tremendous?"

"Absolutely," Hargrave agreed quickly. "I should think he has some splendid stories he can tell you."

"Oh yes sir! He saw the emperor of the French, you know. And he was a funny little man with a cocked hat, and quite short when he wasn't on his white horse. He said the Iron Duke was magnificent. I would love to have been there." He dropped his shoulder again and smiled tentatively, his eyes never leaving Hargrave's face. "Wouldn't you, sir?"

"Indeed I would," Hargrave agreed. "But I daresay there will be other battles in the future, marvelous ones where you can fight, and see great events that turn history, and great men who win or lose nations in a day."

"Do you think so, sir?" For a moment his eyes were wide and full of unclouded excitement as the vision spread before his mind.

"Why not?" Hargrave said casually. "The whole world lies in front of us, and the Empire gets bigger and more exciting every year. There's all of Australia, New Zealand, Canada. And in Africa mere's Gambia, Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, South Africa; and in India there's the Northwest Province, Bengal, Oudh, Assam, Arakan, Mysore, and all the south, including Ceylon and islands in every ocean on earth."

"I'm not sure I even know where all those places are, sir," Cassian said with wonderment.

"Well then I had better show you, hadn't I?" Hargrave said, smiling broadly. He looked at Felicia. "Do you still have a schoolroom here?"

"It has been closed a long time, but we intend to open it again for Cassian's use, as soon as this unsettled time is over. We will engage a suitable tutor for him of course. I think a complete change is advisable, don't you?"

"A good idea," Hargrave agreed. "Nothing to remind him of things best put away." He turned back to Cassian. "Then this afternoon I shall take you up to the old schoolroom and we shall find a globe, and you shall show me all those places in the Empire that you know, and I shall show you all the ones you don't. Does that appeal to you?"

"Yes.sir - thank you sir," Cassian accepted quickly. Then he glanced at his grandmother, saw the approval in her eyes, and moved around so that his back was to his grandfather, studiously avoiding looking at nun.

Hester found herself smiling and a little prickle of warmth coming into her for the first time on behalf of the child. It seemed he had at least one friend who was going to treat him as a person and give him the uncritical, undemanding companionship he so desperately needed. And from what he said, his grandfather too was offering him some thoughts and tales that bore no relationship to his own tragedy. It was a generosity she would not have expected from Randolph, and she was obliged to view him with a greater liking than before. From Peverell she had expected it anyway, but he was out on business most of the day, when Cassian had his long hours alone.

They were about to go into the dining room when Peverell himself came in, apologized for being late and said he hoped he had not delayed them. He greeted Hester and Hargrave, then looked around for Damaris.

"Late again," Felicia said with tight lips. "Well we certainly cannot wait for her. She will have to join us wherever we are at the time she gets here. If she misses her meal it is her own doing." She turned around and without looking at any of them led the way into the dining room.

They were seated and the maid had come with soup when Damaris opened the door and stood on the threshold. She was dressed in a very slender gown, almost without hoops they were so small, the whole outfit in black and dove-gray, her hair pulled back from her long, thoughtful face with its lovely bones and emotional mouth.

For a moment there was silence, and the maid stopped with the soup ladle in the air.

"Sorry I'm late," she said with a tiny smile curling her lips, her eyes going first to Peverell, then to Edith and Hester, finally to her mother. She was leaning against the lintel.

"Your apologies are wearing a little thin!" Felicia said tartly."This is the fifth time this fortnight that you have been late for a meal. Please continue to serve, Marigold."

The maid resumed her duty.

Damaris straightened up and was about to move forward and take her seat when she noticed Charles Hargrave for the firsttime. He had been partly shielded by Randolph. Her whole body froze and the blood drained from her skin. She swayed as if dizzy, and put both hands onto the door lintel to save herself.

Peverell rose to his feet immediately, scraping his chair back.

"What is it, Ris? Are you ill? Here, sit down, my dear." He half dragged her to his own abandoned chair and eased her into it. "What has happened? Are you faint?"

Edith pushed across her glass of water and he seized it and held it up to Damaris's lips.

Hargrave rose and came forward to kneel beside her, looking at her with a professional calm.

"Oh really," Randolph said irritably, and continued with his soup.

"Did you have any breakfast?" Hargrave asked, frowning at Damaris. "Or were you late for that also? Fasting can be dangerous, you know, make you light-headed."

She lifted her face and met his eyes slowly. For seconds they stared at each other in a strange, frozen immobility, he with concern, she with a look of bewilderment as if she barely knew where she was.

"Yes," she said at last, her voice husky. "That must be what it is. I apologize for making such a nuisance of myself." She swallowed awkwardly. "Thank you for the water Pev -  Edith. I am sure I shall be perfectly all right now."

"Ridiculous!" Felicia said furiously, glaring at her daughter. "Not only are you late, but you come in here making an entrance like an operatic diva and then half swoon all over the place. Really, Damaris, your sense of the melodramatic is both absurd and offensive, and it is time you stopped drawing attention to yourself by any and every means you can think of!"

Hester was acutely uncomfortable; it was the sort of scene an outsider should not be privy to.

Peverell looked up, his face suddenly filled with anger.

"You are being unjust, Mama-in-law. Damaris had no intention of making herself ill. And I think if you have some criticism to make, it would be more fitting if you were to do it in private, when neither Miss Latterly nor Dr. Hargrave would be embarrassed by our family differences."

It was a speech delivered in a gentle tone of voice, but it contained the most cutting criticism that could be imagined. He accused her of behaving without dignity, without loyalty to her family's honor, and perhaps worst of all, of embarrassing her guests, sins which were socially and morally unforgivable.

She blushed scarlet, and then the blood fled, leaving her ashen. She opened her mouth to retaliate with something equally vicious, and was lost to find it.

Peverell turned from his mother-in-law to his wife. "I mink it would be better if you were to lie down, my dear. I will have Gertrude bring you up a tray."

"I . . ." Damaris sat upright again, turning away from Hargrave. "I really ..."

"You will feel better if you do," Peverell assured her, but there was a steel in his voice that brooked no argument. "I will see you to the stairs. Come!"

Obediently, leaning a little on his arm, she left, muttering "Excuse me" over her shoulder.

Edith began eating again and gradually the table returned to normal. A few moments later Peverell came back and made no comment as to Damaris, and the episode was not referred to again.

They were beginning dessert of baked apple and caramel sauce when Edith caused the second violent disruption.

"I am going to find a position as a librarian, or possibly a companion to someone," she announced, looking ahead at the centerpiece of the table. It was an elaborate arrangement of irises, full-blown lupins from some sheltered area of the garden, and half-open white lilac.

Felicia choked on her apple.

"You are what?" Randolph demanded.

Hargrave stared at her, his face puckered, his eyes curious.

"I am going to seek a position as a librarian," Edith said again. "Or as a companion, or even a teacher of French, if all else fails."

"You always had an unreliable sense of humor," Felicia said coldly. "As if it were not enough that Damaris has to make a fool of herself, you have to follow her with idiotic remarks. What is the matter with you? Your brother's death seems to have deprived all of you of your wits. Not to mention your sense of what is fitting. I forbid you to mention it again. We are in a house of mourning, and you will remember that, and behave accordingly." Her face was bleak and a wave of misery passed over it, leaving her suddenly older and more vulnerable, the brave aspect that she showed to the world patently a veneer. "Your brother was a fine man, a brilliant man, robbed of the prime of his life by a wife who lost her reason. Our nation is the poorer for his loss. You will not make our suffering worse by behaving in an irresponsible manner and making wild and extremely trying remarks. Do I make myself clear?"

Edith opened her mouth to protest, but the argument died out of her. She saw the grief in her mother's face, and pity and guilt overrode her own wishes, and all the reasons she had been so certain of an hour ago talking to Hester in her own sitting room.

"Yes, Mama, I. . ." She let out her breath in a sigh.

"Good!" Felicia resumed eating, forcing herself to swallow with difficulty.

"I apologize, Hargrave," Randolph said with a frown. "Family's hit hard, you know. Grief does funny things to women - at least most women. Felicia's different - remarkable strength - a most outstanding woman, if I do say so."

"Most remarkable." Hargrave nodded towards Felicia and smiled. "You have my greatest respect, ma'am; you always have had."

Felicia colored very slightly and accepted the compliment with an inclination of her head.

The meal continued in silence, except for the most trivial and contrived of small talk.

* * * * *

When it was over and they had left the table and Hester had thanked Felicia and bidden them farewell, she and Edith went upstairs to the sitting room. Edith was thoroughly dejected; her shoulders were hunched and her feet heavy on the stairs.

Hester was extremely sorry for her. She understood why she had offered no argument. The sight of her mother's face so stripped, for an instant, of all its armor, had left her feeling brutal, and she was unable to strike another blow, least of all in front of others who had already seen her wounded once.

But it was no comfort to Edith, and offered only a long, bleak prospect ahead of endless meals the same, filled with little more than duty. The world of endeavor and reward was closed off as if it were a view through a window, and someone had drawn the curtains.

They were on the first landing when they were passed, almost at a run, by an elderly woman with crackling black skirts. She was very lean, almost gaunt, at least as tall as Hester. Her hair had once been auburn but now was almost white; only the tone of her skin gave away her original coloring. Her dark gray eyes were intent and her brows drawn down. Her thin face, highly individual, was creased with temper.

"Hallo, Buckie," Edith said cheerfully. "Where are you off to in such a rush? Been fighting with Cook again?"

"I don't fight with Cook, Miss Edith," she said briskly. "I simply tell her what she ought to know already. She takes it ill, even though I am right, and loses her temper. I cannot abide a woman who cannot control her temper - especially when she's in service."

Edith hid a smile. "Buckie, you don't know my Mend, Hester Latterly. Miss Latterly was in the Crimea, with Florence Nightingale. Hester, this is Miss Buchan, my governess, long ago."

"How do you do, Miss Buchan," Hester said with interest.

"How do you do, Miss Latterly," Miss Buchan replied, screwing up her face and staring at Hester. "The Crimea, eh? Well, well. I'll have to have Edith tell me all about it. Right now I 'm off up to see Master Cassian in the schoolroom."

"You're not going to teach him, are you, Buckie?" Edith said in surprise. "I thought you gave up that sort of thing years ago!"

"Of course I did," Miss Buchan said tartly. "Think I'm going to take up lessons again at my age? I'm sixty-six, as you well know. I taught you to count, myself, and your brother and sister before you!"

"Didn't Dr. Hargrave go up with him, to show him the globe?"

Miss Buchan's face hardened, a curious look of anger in her eyes and around her mouth.

"Indeed he did. I'll go and find out if he's there, and make sure nothing gets broken. Now if you will excuse me, Miss Edith, I'll be on my way. Miss Latterly." And without waiting to hear anything further she almost pushed past them, and walked very briskly, her heels clicking on the floor, and took the second flight of stairs to the schoolroom at something inelegantly close to a dash.