At his age it seemed to them not only disgusting but actually treacherous, a desecration of the memory of their own mother. And it was incomprehensible, to the men as well as the women, for Samuel had lived so continently, had worked so hard and seemed so little interested in pretty women or any other form of divertissement, that they could not understand why he should now suddenly reverse all the habits of a lifetime.

But it was Lettice, more than any of the others, who resented her. She felt that Amber’s presence in the house was a shameful thing, for she could not regard a wife of barely twenty as anything other than her sixty-year-old father’s mistress, taken in his declining and apparently immoral years.

“That woman!” she whispered fiercely one day to Bob and the younger Sam as the three of them stood at the foot of the stairs and watched Amber run gaily up, curls tossing, skirts lifted to show the embroidered gold clocks on her green-silk stockings. “I vow she’s no good! I’m sure she paints!” They always criticized her for the things they dared to say out loud to each other, though the rest was well if silently understood among them.

Twenty-year-old Henry, who was a student at Grey’s Inn, had just sauntered up and stood watching her too. He was so much younger than the others that his share in the fortune would not be a large one and so he had no prejudice on that score. For the rest, he had a sly admiration for his step-mother which he often humoured in fanciful day-dreams.

“It wouldn’t be so bad if she wasn’t a raving beauty into the bargain, eh Lettice?” he said now.

Lettice gave her brother a look of scorn. “Raving beauty! Who wouldn’t be a beauty with paint and curls and patches and ribbons and all the rest of it!”

Henry shrugged, looking back to his sister now that Amber had disappeared down the upper hallway. “It’s a pity more women aren’t then, since it’s so easy.”

“Faith and troth, Henry! You’re getting all your ideas from the playhouse!”

Henry coloured. “I am not, Lettice! I’ve never been inside a playhouse and you know it!”

Lettice looked skeptical, and the other two brothers threw back their heads and laughed. Henry, growing redder, turned hastily and walked off; and Lettice with a sigh went out toward the kitchens to resume her work. For Amber had made no attempt to take over the running of the household and though Lettice would have liked to force it upon her Samuel had asked her to continue in charge and she could not refuse him. But it was no easy task to organize and direct an establishment consisting of thirty-five children and adults and almost a hundred and fifty servants.

Upstairs Amber was getting into her cloak, putting the hood up over her hair, tucking a black-velvet vizard inside her muff. Her movements were quick and her eyes sparkled with excitement.

“I tell you, mam,” said Nan, helping her but shaking her red-blonde curls, “it’s a foolhardy thing to do.”

“Nonsense. Nan!” She began pulling on a pair of embroidered, elbow-length gloves. “No one could recognize me in this!”

“But suppose they do, mam! You’ll be undone—and for what?”

Amber wrinkled her nose and gave Nan’s cheek a little pat. “If anyone wants me I’ve gone to the ’Change. And I’ll be back by three.”

She went out the door and down a narrow spiralling flight of stairs which led her into the back courtyard where one of the great coaches stood waiting. She got in quickly and the heavy vehicle lumbered about and drove out of the yard to turn up Carter Lane; she had kept Tempest and Jeremiah with her and they drove her wherever she went.

At last they stopped. She put on her mask and got out, crossed the street and turned into a lane which led through a teeming noisy courtyard and thence to the back of the King’s Theatre. She glanced around, then went in and down to the door of the tiring-room which she found, as always, full of half-naked actresses and beribboned gallants, most of whom were wearing the brand-new fashion of periwigs.

For a moment she stood unnoticed in the doorway and then Beck Marshall spoke to her. “What d’you want, madame?”

With a triumphant laugh and a flourish Amber took off her mask and dropped back her hood. The women shrieked with surprise and Scroggs waddled forward to greet her, her ugly old face red and grinning, and Amber put an arm about her shoulders.

“By Jesus, Mrs. St. Clare! Where’ve ye been? See!” she crowed. “I told ye she’d be back!”

“And here I am. Here’s a guinea for you to drink, Scroggs, you old swill-belly—that should keep you foxed for a week.”

She came on into the room and was instantly surrounded on every side by the women who kissed her, asking a dozen questions at once, while the gallants hung close and insisted they had been adying for her company. There had been rumours that she had gone into the country to have a baby, had died of the ague, had sailed for America, but when she told them she had married a rich old merchant—whose name she did not disclose—they were much impressed. The actors heard that she was there and came in too, claiming a kiss each, examining her clothes and jewels, asking her how much money she would inherit and if she was pregnant yet.

Amber felt wholly at her ease for the first time in more than four months. At Dangerfield House she was constantly dogged by the feeling that she would inadvertently do or say something improper. And she was made more uncomfortable by a nagging mischievous desire to suddenly throw off her air of sweet naivete, make a bawdy remark, wink at a footman, shock them all.

Then all at once she caught sight of a face which, for an instant, she did not recognize, seeing it in this unfamiliar environment. And suddenly she clapped her mask back on, turned up her hood and began to make her goodbyes. For there across the room, talking to one of the new actresses, was Henry Dangerfield. In less than a minute she was on her way down the dimly-lighted corridor, but she had not gone far when footsteps came up behind her.

“I beg your pardon, madame—”

Amber’s heart jumped and she stopped perfectly still, but only for an instant and then immediately she went on again.

“I don’t know you, sir!” she snapped, changing her voice to a higher pitch.

“But I’m Henry Dangerfield and you’re—”

“Mrs. Ann St. Michel, sir, and travelling alone!”

“I beg your pardon, madame—”

To her intense relief Amber found that he had stopped and when she got outside and glanced back he was not in sight. Nevertheless she did not get into the coach but said softly to Tempest as she walked by, “Meet me at the Maypole corner.”

Amber spent the rest of the afternoon in her room, nervous and restless. She paced back and forth, looked out the window dozens of times, wrung her hands and asked Nan over and over why Samuel was late. Nan had not said that she knew this would happen, but she looked it.

But when he came in, late in the afternoon, he greeted her with a smile and kiss, just as he always did. Amber, who had put on a dressing-gown and nothing else, laid her head against his chest.

“Oh, Samuel! Where ’ve you been! It’s so late—I’ve been so worried about you!”

He smiled and, glancing around to make sure that Nan was not looking, he slipped one hand into her gown. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. A gentleman had come from out of town on business and we talked longer than I expected—” His head bent to kiss her again, and from behind his back Amber signalled at Nan to leave the room.

At first she thought she would stay there that night and not go down to supper, but finally she decided that it would do no good. If Henry had recognized her he could mention it tomorrow as well as today, and she could not hide in their apartments forever.

But the supper went exactly as it usually did and afterward, as was their custom, they all went into one of the small parlours to spend an hour or two before retiring. Again Amber thought of pleading a headache and getting Samuel to go upstairs with her, but again she decided against it. If Henry was suspicious and she stayed—perhaps he would think that he had been wrong.

Lettice, with Susan and Philadelphia and Katherine, sat before the fireplace talking quietly and working on pieces of embroidery. The younger children started a game of blind-man’s-buff. Samuel sat down to a chess game which had been going on for several nights between him and twelve-year-old Michael, and Henry pulled up a chair to watch. The older brothers smoked their pipes and discussed business and the Dutch and criticized the government. Amber, beginning to feel comfortable again, sat in a chair and talked to Jemima, prettiest of all the good-looking Dangerfield children.

Jemima, just fifteen, was the one friend Amber had made in her new home; and Jemima admired her whole-heartedly. She was too unsophisticated to understand much more regarding her father’s recent marriage than that he had brought a new woman to live in the house. And this woman looked and dressed and behaved exactly as she would have liked to do herself. She could not understand the animosity felt toward Madame by her older brothers and sisters, and had often repeated to Amber the things she had heard them say about her. Once she told her that Lettice, upon hearing of how devotedly Madame had nursed him through his illness, had said that she would just as soon think she had made him sick herself to have the opportunity of making him well. Amber, somewhat uneasy to hear this, was relieved that the oldest brother had cautioned Lettice against being carried too far by her own jealousy. After all, he had said, the woman might be of dubious character—but she couldn’t be that bad.