The Laceys had earned it in a grant from the king. The Norman king who came over some time and beat the people in a war and won the country. That was how it was told in the gentry parlours. In the taproom at Acre they said that the Laceys had stolen it, robbed farmers like the Tyackes who had been there for years. In the wagons of the Rom they said that once they had held all the land, that they had been the old people who had lived alongside fairies and pixies and old magic until the coming of men with swords and ploughs. I smiled ruefully. All robbers: generation after generation of robbers. And the worst theft of all was to take someone’s history from them. So the children who went to school from the Havering estate believed the Haverings had always been there. And they were taught that there was no choice but to doff their caps to the power of the rich. And no alternative but to work for them – and try to become rich yourself.

I rolled up the parchment carefully and put it back in its package along with the marriage contract. If Peregrine were not too drunk tonight he might be well enough to take it to the lawyers tomorrow.

I glanced towards the window. It was getting dark with that cold, damp, end-of-January darkness which made me glad of the warm fire and the quiet room. I rang the bell and ordered more logs for the fire, and I heard the front door bang as Perry came home.

He was unsteady on his feet, but I had seen him a lot worse. He beamed at me with his good-natured drunkard’s smile.

‘It’s good to see you up,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you’re well again. I missed you when you were ill.’

I smiled back. ‘You’d have made a tragic widower,’ I said.

Perry nodded, unabashed. ‘I’d have missed you all the same,’ he said. ‘But oh! it’s good to have as much money as I like!’

‘Are you winning or losing these days?’ I asked dryly.

‘Still winning!’ Perry said delightedly. ‘I don’t know what devil is in the cards. I haven’t lost a game since I came back from Newmarket. No one will play with me any more except Captain Thomas and Bob Redfern! I must have had a thousand guineas off them both!’

‘Oh yes,’ I said. ‘Shall you mind leaving all this excitement to come home? I want to go back to Wideacre, and I’m well enough to travel now.’

Perry rang the bell and ordered punch made strong when the butler came.

‘When you like,’ he said. ‘But the roads will be bad. Why not wait until it is warmer, and the roads less dirty? We’ll get stuck for sure.’

The silver bowl came in and Perry poured himself a cup and handed me one. I sipped it and made a face.

‘Ugh Perry! It’s far too strong! It’s solid brandy!’

Perry beamed. ‘Keeps the cold out,’ he said.

‘Will you stop your drinking, once we are at Wideacre?’ I asked a little wistfully. ‘Will you really stop your drinking, and the gambling? Is it truly just being in London which makes you do it?’

Perry stretched out his legs to the fire. ‘I’ll tell you the truth,’ he said. ‘I started gambling because I was bored, and I started drinking because I was lonely and afraid. You know how it was for me before.’ He paused. ‘I am sure I could give it up like that,’ he snapped his fingers. ‘Any time I wanted to. I could just walk away from it and never touch it again.’

I looked at him curiously. ‘I’ve seen men who said that who would kill someone for a drink,’ I said. ‘I’ve seen men who would shake and vomit if they couldn’t get a drink when they needed it. I even heard of one man who went mad without it, and killed his little chavvy, and didn’t even know he’d done it!’

‘Don’t talk like that!’ Perry said with instant disdain. ‘Don’t talk about those horrid people you used to be with, Sarah. You’re not among them any more. It’s different for us. I’m not like that. I can take or leave it. And in London, in the Season, everyone drinks. Everyone gambles. You’d be gaming yourself if you weren’t ill and staying at home, Sarah, you know you would.’

I nodded. I was not sure. ‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘But remember you promised to never use Wideacre as security against a loan.’

Perry smiled, too sweet to be scolded. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘I’d never use your land, or my own. Mama explained it all to me, how it has to be handed on intact if we have a child. All I’m doing now is spending some of the interest and the extra rents. No one was able to touch it for years, it’s just been mounting up in the bank. And anyway…’ he said conclusively, ‘I’m winning! I’m winning faster than I can spend it. D’you know what they call me down at Redfern’s club? “Lucky Havering”! That’s what they call me! Rather fine, isn’t it?’

‘Mmm,’ I said dubiously. But then I decided to let be. I had seen Perry in London, and down at Havering. And I knew he did not gamble when he was away from the city, and from the boredom of the London season. I knew he did not drink so hard when he was in the country. And I thought it very likely that he might not drink at all when we were on our own in the country.

I was not such a fool as to believe that he did not need drink. But we were wed and inseparable. There was little gain for me to scold him. The only thing I could do was get him into the country as quick as I could where I could have the keys to the wine cellar and Perry would be away from the clubs and his drinking, gambling, dissolute friends.

‘Are you out tonight?’ I asked.

Perry made a face. ‘You are too,’ he said glumly. ‘Don’t blame me, Sarah, it’s Mama. She says we’ve both got to go to Maria’s, she’s having a music party and Basil is to be there and we have to go too to look happy.’

‘Me too?’ I asked surprised. Since my illness I had done very well at escaping all the Quality parties. Lady Clara was content to let me rest and convalesce at home, she had done her duty and introduced me to her world as she had promised. She was working night and day to keep Maria and Basil shackled, and she did not care whether I took and returned calls or not.

‘Your mama wants me to go?’ I asked.

Perry ran a grimy hand through his hair and chuckled. ‘Scandal,’ he said briefly. ‘They’re saying Mama saddled Basil with a light-skirt, and that we’ve robbed you and got you locked up at home. Mama’s had enough of it. You’re to come out to Maria’s party. Maria has to look happy and behave well, and you have to look happy and behave well.’

‘And you?’ I asked, amused.

‘I shall be radiant,’ Perry said glumly.

I laughed.

‘Actually, I shall stay for the first half-hour and then I shall cut along to Redfern’s club, I promised him a game of piquet. He wants to win his losses back,’ Perry said.

‘I don’t want to stay long myself,’ I warned.

Perry beamed at me. ‘Well bless you!’ he said. ‘We’ll say you need to be taken home, and I can escort you. That way we can both leave early.’

‘Done!’ I said, then I pointed to the punch bowl. ‘But leave go that, Perry, it’s too strong, and your mama won’t want you there half-cut.’

Perry got to his feet. ‘To please you,’ he said and held the door for me.

I gathered up the parcel of our marriage contract and the deeds for Wideacre. ‘The papers from my lawyers,’ I said, as Perry held the door for me and we went up the stairs together. ‘We’ll have to take them to your lawyers tomorrow.’

‘At last!’ Perry said. ‘They’ve taken long enough!’ He held out his hand for them and I passed them over. He tucked them in his coat pocket and gave me his arm to help me up the stairs.

We parted at my bedroom door and I went in to dress for dinner. I did not mind going out this once, and I was spiteful enough to anticipate some pleasure from the sight of Maria, daggers drawn with her husband, having to smile and play foot-licker to him.

My new maid was waiting and I had her open my wardrobe so I could choose a gown grand enough for Maria’s music evening. I had a shiny silk gown, as bright as emeralds with little white puff sleeves, cut quite low, and a white shawl to match.

‘I’ll wear that one,’ I said to the girl, and she got it out while I splashed water on my face and slipped out of my afternoon dress. She fiddled with the buttons at the neck while I stood impatiently, and then I sat before my mirror and she took up the hairbrush.

Then I caught her eye and we both laughed.

‘You’re wasting your time,’ I agreed. ‘It’s so short I can’t even put a ribbon through it without looking odd. I shall just have to leave it all curly like this until it has grown a little.’

‘Perhaps a cap, and maybe some false hair?’ she asked tentatively, looking at my bright copper mob with her head on one side.

‘Leave it,’ I said. ‘Everyone knows I had a fever and they cut my hair. I won’t hide it as if it had all fallen out and I was bald.’

She dipped a curtsey and then I went down to dinner.

Lady Clara was there, looking very grand in a lovely gown of pale blue watered silk which matched the colour of her eyes. She was wearing fine diamond earrings and a diamond necklace.

‘They might as well see we’re not in utter poverty,’ she said acidly when Perry made a nervous little bow and said how fine she looked. ‘The gossip is that you were bankrupt and that I locked Sarah up until she agreed to marry you.’ She made a little grimace of disdain. ‘We’ll scotch it tonight, but after tonight I expect you both to come out more into society until the end of the Season.’

‘I want us to go back to Wideacre, as soon as the roads are fit to travel,’ I said. ‘I don’t want to stay in London any longer.’

Lady Clara looked at me under veiled eyes, but said nothing while the butler served the soup. When he had stood back at the sideboard she looked from me to Perry and said: ‘It would suit me very well at the moment to have you both in town for at least another month. I should like you to go out and around together. People expect it, and Sarah you have not yet been presented at Court. That should be done as soon as your hair is grown long again.