"Money must be high on his list of priorities, so I'll leave word with his bankers," Giles replied. "I'll also let some of Robin's friends know that I'm looking for him."

The conversation brought Desdemona's fancies to earth. While she had come to trust the marquess, Lord Robert was still a doubtful quantity. If he had harmed Maxima, the repercussions would certainly affect the fragile feelings growing between herself and Giles.

Resolutely she reached for another piece of toast. Let the future take care of itself. Today she would enjoy the hours spent with the most attractive man she had ever known.

The roads were muddy, so they didn't reach Ruxton until almost noon. The gatekeeper was happy to admit the marquess, but when questioned, said that Lord Robert had not visited.

Unconvinced, they entered and went to the estate office. The steward, Haslip, was frowning over his books when Giles and Desdemona entered. The frown disappeared when he glanced up to see the man who had hired and supervised him for years.

"Lord Wolverton!" He got quickly to his feet. 'This is an unexpected pleasure, my lord. Will you be staying for a time?"

Giles shook his head. "I only stopped by to see if my brother was here."

Haslip hesitated. "Perhaps he was, but I'm not sure."

When Giles raised his brows, Haslip said, "No one saw him, but this morning two horses were missing and this note was in the stable." He handed a piece of paper to the marquess. "I don't know if this is his lordship's handwriting. If it is, well enough, but maybe it was forged by a clever thief. Whoever the fellow was, he took the two best mounts in the stables."

Giles scanned the note. It said only, "I need the horses," and was signed "Lord Robert Andreville." The writing was his brother's distinctive backslanting script.

"That's his hand." Giles passed the note to Desdemona. "So he was here last night. At what time was it noticed that the horses were missing?"

"About nine o'clock."

"I'll look in the house and see if he spent the night. If he arrived late, he probably didn't wish to waken anyone," Giles said smoothly. Better not to mention the Sheltered Innocent; where she was concerned, the less said, the better.

Haslip obviously had questions, such as how his new employer had entered a walled estate, why he had left without notifying anyone of his presence, and why he needed two horses. But the steward said only, "Very good, my lord. I'll fetch the keys."

After being let into the manor house, Giles dismissed Haslip. Then he and Desdemona spent some time searching the house, finishing in the kitchen.

"They were here, all right," Desdemona said after prowling through the stillroom, the china closets, and a tin bathing tub with a few drops of water inside. She held a newly washed and polished crystal goblet up to the light. "It appears they dined in some style."

"Robin has always had style," Giles remarked. "I looked through the linen closet. Judging by the number of sheets that had been used once, then carefully refolded, they slept in separate beds. Perhaps all our worries were for naught."

"We shall see," Desdemona said tersely. Still, she was willing to accept the possibility that a couple could travel together without the man ravishing the woman. A day earlier she might have disagreed, but association with Giles was teaching her that a mature man did not invariably act like a lust crazed youth.

Perhaps Lord Robert really had offered his escort to Maxima from pure altruism.

But even if there had been no misconduct, the questions of propriety and reputation remained. "Since they're on horseback, they could be in London tonight."

"Yes." The marquess gave her an encouraging smile. "In another day or two, this whole imbroglio should be cleared up."

As she led the way from the house, Desdemona thought wryly that the problem of Maxima might be on the verge of solution, but the problem of the marquess was a good deal more challenging. Still, it was the sort of challenge she could relish.

Chapter 26

After a long day in the saddle, London assaulted Maxie's senses so fiercely that it made Boston seem like a market town. Wearily she followed Robin's mount through the dusky streets, her only interest in their destination being when they would arrive.

It was a rude shock when Robin reined to a halt in front of the grandest mansion in a section of the city full of grand mansions. "We're stopping here?" she asked, dismayed.

He gave her a reassuring smile as he dismounted. "This is it. The knocker is up, so my friends are in residence."

"Looking as we do, they won't feed us at the kitchen door, much less allow us into the parlor," she muttered as she swung her tired body from her horse.

He chuckled. "Don't worry, they've seen me in worse case."

Her feet planted on the cobblestones, she scrutinized the massive facade, feeling like a mud stained provincial. Pride came to her aid; she would be damned if she would turn coward now. What did it matter what a parcel of over bred English aristocrats thought of her? If Robin thought it fitting to bring her here, she'd not skulk in like a craven hound.

She held the horses while Robin wielded the knocker. The door was quickly opened by a liveried and bewigged footman. The servant made a slow, insulting scan of the visitor, looking as if he had found a barrel of longdead fish on the steps.

Before the footman could speak, Robin said imperiously, "Call someone to take our horses." He had made one of his instant transitions, this time into pure aristocratic hauteur.

The footman sputtered, men subsided under his visitor's disdainful eye. Within another minute, the butler appeared and the footman found himself leading the horses back to the mews.

In spite of her resolutions, Maxie was hardpressed not to cringe when she set foot in a marble floored foyer so vast that a cavalry company could have mustered in it. The vaulted ceiling soared two stories above, statues that must have been stolen from Greek temples stood on pedestals around the edges, and a sweeping double staircase dominated the center of the room.

She was not familiar with grand houses, but this one might have been a royal palace. Lord, for all she knew, the building was Carlton House with the Prince Regent carousing upstairs.

Robin, however, was as nonchalant as if he owned the house. He asked the butler, "Is the duchess in?"

Less easily intimidated than his minion, the servant said loftily, "Her grace is not receiving."

"That is not what I asked," Robin said with soft, lethal precision. "The duchess will see me. Tell her Lord Robert is here."

The butler's face showed rapid mental calculations that weighed the visitor's accent and manner against his unsavory appearance. Then he bowed slightly and went off.

Duchess? Maxie wondered if the august lady would prove to be Robin's grandmother, and he the adored family black sheep or something equally appalling. She had decided early in their acquaintance that Robin was well bred, but was he really from the highest levels of English society? With a sick feeling in her stomach, she admitted that it was quite possible, even probable.

Rigid with discomfort, she avoided Robin's eye, pulling in on herself in this strange and possibly hostile territory. Every muscle in her body tense, she prowled about the foyer like a cat investigating a new home. Even her companion's air of command hadn't gotten them invited into a drawing room.'

She had reached the farthest corner of the foyer when she heard the sound of swift footsteps. Turning, she saw a glorious golden creature racing down the sweeping staircase. The woman didn't see Maxie; instead, she hurled herself at her visitor, ignoring his filthy clothing. "Robin, you wretch! Why didn't you let me know you were coming?"

Robin reached out, laughing, to catch her up in his arms. "Show a little care, Maggie! Think of the future Marquess of Wilton, if not of yourself."

"You're as bad as Rafe," the duchess said fondly. "It could be a girl, you know."

"Nonsense. You're far too efficient not to provide the requisite heir on your first attempt."

For a moment the two stayed loosely linked in each other's arms with the casualness of long intimacy. The duchess was almost as tall as Robin, with the same blazing blond looks.

In her quiet corner, Maxie felt a shock so profound that for a moment her vision darkened. She had thought herself prepared for whatever this house had to offer, but not this. God in heaven, not this! How could he have brought her to his mistress's home? How could he?

In all the long journey from the north, Robin had never seemed further away. His gilt hair shone in the lamplight, and even in his shabby, travel worn clothing he was unmistakably an aristocrat. Not since her early childhood, when she had been taunted by white children, had Maxie felt so much a halfbreed and an outcast, so irredeemably small, dark, and alien.

Releasing the duchess, Robin said, "I want you to meet someone very special."

As he led Maggie across the foyer, Maxie was near paralysis from a volatile blend of fury and social confusion. What did one do in the presence of a duchess? In particular, what did a female dressed as a male do?

The answer floated up from a grande dame she had known in Boston: a citizen of the American republic bowed to no mortal, only to God, and only then if so inclined. That being so, the mistress of Maxie's lover certainly did not rate a curtsy.