My Dear Miss Faringdon:

I fear this note will be quite short but I pray you will forgive my haste when I tell you why that is the case. The reason is that I will very soon be arriving in your vicinity. I am to be a house guest at the country home of Lord Gillingham, whom I understand to be a neighbor of yours. I trust I am not being overbold when I tell you that I am hopeful you will be so kind as to afford me the opportunity of making your acquaintance in person while I am there.

Emily froze in shock. S. A. Traherne was coming to Little Dippington.

She could not believe her eyes. Heart racing with excitement, she clutched the letter and reread the opening lines.

It was true. He was going to be a guest of the Gillinghams, who had a country villa a short distance away from St. Clair Hall. With trembling fingers Emily carefully put down the letter and forced herself to take several deep breaths in order to control the flood of excitement that was washing over her.

It was an excitement shot through with dread.

The part of her that had longed to meet S. A. Traherne in the flesh was already at war with the part of her that had always feared the encounter. The resulting tension made her feel light-headed.

With a desperate attempt to hold fast to her common sense, Emily forced herself to bear in mind that nothing of a romantic nature could possibly come of such a meeting. In fact, she stood to lose the treasured correspondence that had become so important to her these past few months.

The terrible risk involved here was that while he was ruralizing in the neighborhood, S. A. Traherne might hear some awful hint about the Unfortunate Incident in her past. His hostess, Lady Gillingham, knew all about that dreadful stain on Emily's reputation, of course. So did everyone else in the vicinity of Little Dippington. It had all happened five years ago and no one talked about it much now, but it was certainly no secret.

Emily tried to be realistic. Sooner or later, if S. A. Traherne stayed in the area long enough, someone was bound to mention the Incident.

"Bloody hell," Emily said quite forcefully into the stillness of the library. She winced at the unfeminine words.

One of the disadvantages of spending so much time alone here in the great house with only the servants for company was that she had picked up a few bad habits. She was, for example, quite free to curse like a man when she felt like it and she had gotten in the way of doing so. Emily told herself she would have to watch her tongue around S. A. Traherne. She was certain a man of his refined sensibilities would find cursing very objectionable in a female.

Emily groaned. It was going to be very difficult to live up to S. A. Traherne's high standards. With a guilty twinge she wondered if she might have misled him a bit about her own degree of refinement and intellect.

She jumped to her feet and walked over to stand at the window overlooking the gardens. She honestly did not know whether to be overjoyed or cast into the depths of despair by Traherne's letter. She felt as though she were teetering on a high precipice.

S. A. Traherne was coming to Little Dippington. She could not take it in. The possibilities and risks staggered the imagination. He did not say when he would be arriving but it sounded as though he might be here within a short time. A few weeks, perhaps. Or next month.

Perhaps she should invent a hasty visit to some distant relative.

But Emily did not think she could bear to miss this opportunity, even if it ruined everything. How awful that it should be so terrifying to contemplate a meeting with the man she loved.

"Bloody hell," Emily said again. And then she realized she was grinning like an idiot even though she felt like crying. The tangle of emotions was almost more than she could stand. She went back to the big desk and looked down at the remainder of S. A. Traherne's letter.

Thank you for sending along the copy of your latest poem, Thoughts in the Dark Hours Before Dawn. I read it with great interest and I must tell you that I was particularly struck by the lines in which you explore the remarkable similarities between a cracked urn and a broken heart. Very affecting. I trust that you will have had a positive response from a publisher by the time you receive this letter.

Yrs ever,

S. A. Traherne

Emily knew then she could not possibly rush off to visit a nonexistent relative. Come what may, she could not resist the opportunity of meeting the man who understood her poetry so well and who found her verses very affecting.

She carefully refolded S. A. Traherne's letter and slipped it into the bodice of her high-waisted, pale blue morning gown. A glance at the tall clock showed that it was time to get back to work. There was much to be done before she left to meet with the members of the Thursday Afternoon Literary Society.

Emily did not find the latest rejection letter from the publisher until she was halfway through the stack of correspondence. She recognized it immediately because she had received a great many others just like it. Mr. Pound, a man of obviously limited intellect and blunted sensitivity, apparently did not find her poetry very affecting.

But somehow the news that S. A. Traherne was soon to be in the vicinity softened the blow enormously.


"Damn, don't understand why you would want to attend a meeting of the local lit'ry society, Blade." Lord Gillingham's shaggy eyebrows rose as he regarded his house guest.

He and Simon were standing in the court in front of the Gillinghams' villa waiting for the horses to be brought around.

"I thought it might be amusing." Simon gently slapped his riding crop against his boot. He was getting impatient now that he was within minutes of meeting Miss Emily Faringdon.

"Amusing? You're an odd one, ain't you, Blade? Expect it's all those years you spent in the East. Don't do to spend too long living among foreigners, I say. Gives a man strange notions."

"It also provided me with my fortune," Simon reminded him dryly.

"Well, that's true enough." Gillingham cleared his throat and changed the subject. "Told the Misses Inglebright you'd be attending. You'll be more than welcome, I imagine, but I should warn you, the society's nothing but a pack of aging spinsters who get together once a week and rhapsodize over a bunch of damn poets. Women are very, very inclined toward that sort of romantic nonsense, y'know."

"So I've heard. Nevertheless, I find myself curious to see how country folk are entertaining themselves these days."

"Suit yourself. I'll ride over to Rose Cottage with you and introduce you, but after that, you're on your own. You won't mind if I don't hang around, will you?"

"Of course not," Simon murmured as a groom led the horses forward. "This is my odd notion and I am quite prepared to live with the consequences."

Simon vaulted lightly into Lap Seng's saddle and cantered down the drive alongside his host. The anticipation he was feeling was growing stronger, gnawing at his insides. He fought to control it. He prided himself on his ironclad self-control.

Simon had little doubt of his welcome from the Misses Inglebright and the group of poetry-reading spinsters. He might not be handsome in the style made popular by Lords Byron, Ashbrook, and others, but he was, after all, an earl.

That simple fact, Simon was well aware, combined with his enormous wealth and power, was fully capable of erasing a multitude of defects in a man's physical appearance as well as obliterating a wide variety of assorted sins, lapses in judgment, and various character failings.

The ladies of the Thursday Afternoon Literary Society had no doubt been thrilled to learn the Earl of Blade wished to attend their humble salon.

Rose Cottage proved to be humble indeed. It was a tiny little house, situated off a short lane not far from the village, surrounded by a tiny little rose garden.

Two small, gray-haired women of indeterminate years stood at the gate greeting three other women who had just arrived on foot. They were all bundled up against the cold in worn, aging cloaks and pelisses that were uniformly drab in color. Their old-fashioned bonnets were tied tightly under their chins.

Simon surveyed the ladies standing at the gate as he rode up with Lord Gillingham. He got the immediate impression he was about to confront a flock of nervous gray pigeons. He swore softly to himself, wondering which of these dull birds was Emily Faringdon. He experienced an odd sense of dismay and realized he was also somewhat surprised.

Somehow, from her letters, he had not pictured her as one of these severe, middle-aged females. He had been expecting a young woman who bristled with brash energy and overindulged romanticism.

Five pairs of wary eyes peeped out from under the unfashionable bonnets. Not a one of those gazes appeared to belong to anyone under forty. Simon frowned. He had been positive Miss Faringdon would be far younger. And prettier. The Faringdons were known for their looks as well as their feckless ways.

"Good afternoon, ladies." Gillingham removed his hat with an air of gallantry and smiled jovially. "I have brought along your guest for the afternoon. Allow me to introduce the Earl of Blade. Just recently returned from the East Indies, y'know. Wants to see what's up in lit'ry circles back here in England."

Simon was in the process of removing his curly-brimmed beaver hat, steeling himself for the task ahead, when it suddenly struck him that there was no sign of welcome in any of the five pairs of eyes that confronted him.