William always had been energetic and restless, of course, and far happier being busy with some manual labor than idling away his time at more gentlemanly pursuits. Nigel had intended him for the church, but William had openly rebelled after finishing his studies at Cambridge.

Alice was the worst of all this morning. She was attacking the sheets with her needle, and she was downright prunish. She had an annoying I-told-you-so look on her face, an expression to which she was entitled as she had indeed told Cassandra that William had not shot his father but that Nigel had shot himself.

And Alice had given Cassandra an ultimatum, or what amounted to one.

Either Cassandra agreed to honor the betrothal that had been announced verbally last night at Lady Compton-Haig's ball and would be announced in writing in tomorrow's papers, or Alice would have nothing more to do with Mr. Golding.

It was ridiculous and it was a non sequitur. But Alice was adamant.

"I daresay," she had said a few minutes ago, "Mr. Golding means no more than friendship by inviting me to accompany him to his family's home to celebrate his father's birthday. I daresay that after we return I will not see him again except by chance. But I will not even /think/ of seeing him again, Cassie, if you are going to insist on continuing with this silly and wholly unrealistic plan of settling in a small country cottage somewhere in the country."

"It is my idea of heaven," Cassandra had protested.

"Nonsense," Alice had told her. "You would be bored and miserable within a fortnight, Cassie. You would be far better off marrying the Earl of Merton, since despite everything the two of you seem fond of each other and I believe that after all he is a harmless, even decent, young man.

Besides which, there will be a new scandal if you break off the engagement now, and you really do not need another. You ought to have thought of all this before allowing him to kiss you in the middle of a ball. If you insist upon going to live in the country, I am going with you. And there is no point whatsoever in giving me that look. Looks do not kill. Mary will not be going with you, after all, will she? And though you will doubtless soon be able to hire half a dozen servants to take her place, you will not /know/ any of them. Or any of your neighbors. And what will they think if a strange widow comes to take up residence in their village without even as much as a companion to lend her respectability? No, Cassie, if you go, I go too."

She had seemed to know the main power point of her argument.

"And I will never see Mr. Golding again," she had added once more for good measure, snapping off her thread with her fingers.

And so Cassandra had threatened to go out for a walk.

"I'll take Roger with me," she said now, drumming her fingers on the windowsill.

Though Roger, the traitor, had been shadowing William about the house all morning. So had Belinda, her doll clutched to her bosom, her eyes as wide as saucers.

"You do that, Cassie," Alice said without looking up from her work. "And take an umbrella."

But it was too late. A carriage was approaching along the street, and it looked far too grand a conveyance to be on Portman Street even before Cassandra saw that there was a ducal coat of arms emblazoned on the door.

It drew to a halt outside her house, and she felt curiously resigned when the liveried coachman opened the door and set down the steps and handed the Duchess of Moreland down onto the pavement. She was not even surprised when he then proceeded to hand out the Countess of Sheringford and Lady Montford.

But of course. The whole triumvirate.

Their brother had announced his betrothal to her last evening.

"We have visitors, Alice," Cassandra said.

Alice set aside her work.

"I will leave you to them," she said. "I still have some packing to do."

And off she went before Mary could tap on the door and announce the three ladies.

And so it began, Cassandra thought. The grand charade.

"Lady Paget," the Duchess of Moreland said, sweeping toward her across the room and drawing her into a hug. "But you are going to be our sister. I am going to exercise a sister's right and call you Cassandra.

May I? And you must call me Vanessa. We simply refused to wait until a more decent hour to call upon you, and so you must forgive us. Or not, I suppose. Anyway, here we are."

She smiled sunnily.

The Countess of Sheringford hugged Cassandra too.

"Last evening," she said, "we were inhibited by a rather large audience and so could not greet you quite as we wished. It was wretched of Stephen to kiss you like that out on the balcony when I certainly brought him up to know better, but we were delighted nevertheless to discover that he was so deeply in love that he had grown reckless.

Stephen is almost never reckless. And we are very pleased that it has happened with /you/. Our only wish for him has always been that he find love and happiness, Cassandra. I am Margaret."

"And I am Katherine, Cassandra," Baroness Montford said, third in line to hug her. "Stephen engaged and planning a wedding! My mind has still not fully comprehended the reality of it. But there is so much to do we scarcely know where to begin. We know that you have no mother and no sisters, though it was a pleasant surprise to discover that Sir Wesley Young is your brother and that you are not all alone in the world. Meg, Nessie, and I are going to be your sisters after you marry Stephen, but we have no intention of waiting until that happens. We are going to help you celebrate your betrothal and plan your wedding."

"It is really quite wicked of us to be almost glad that you have no female relatives of your own," Vanessa said. "But we are glad, nevertheless. We are going to have /enormous/ fun for the rest of the Season – unless you plan to marry before it ends, of course. Where do you – "

"Nessie!" Margaret laughed and linked an arm through Cassandra's. "Poor Cassandra's head will be spinning on her shoulders if we do not soon curb our enthusiasm and stop jabbering. We have come to take you out for coffee and cakes, Cassandra – provided you do not have other plans for the rest of the morning, that is. And when we are sitting down and are relaxing, we are going to discuss your betrothal ball at Merton House.

We are going to see to it that it is the grandest squeeze of the Season."

Cassandra looked from one to the other of them – beautiful, fashionable, elegant ladies, all well married – and wondered if they could possibly be as delighted by her betrothal to their brother as they claimed to be. It did not take much power of observation to understand that they adored him. /Of course/ they were not delighted. They must be dismayed, alarmed, worried… They were, she guessed, making the best of a bad situation, of what they thought was a fait accompli.

She made an impulsive decision. Putting on an act for the /ton/ during what remained of the Season was one thing. Deceiving Stephen's sisters was another.

"Thank you," she said. "I would be delighted to go out for coffee in your company. And I will be pleased to help with the ball. There will be no wedding to plan, though."

They all looked inquiringly at her.

"There will be no /wedding/," she said.

None of them spoke. The duchess clasped her hands to her bosom.

"I like your brother," Cassandra said. "He is probably the kindest, most decent man I have ever known. He is undoubtedly the most handsome. He is also very… well, /attractive/. I believe he finds me attractive too.

Indeed, I know he does. That kiss resulted from our mutual attraction, nothing else. It was unpardonably indiscreet – on both our parts. The Earl of Merton behaved with great presence of mind and gallantry when he saw we had an audience. He announced our betrothal. But it is something neither of us wants, and we cannot allow the whole of the rest of our lives to be dictated by one foolishly impulsive kiss, though he, of course, feels obliged to protect my reputation. I cannot humiliate him by refusing to have the betrothal announced and celebrated, and so I have agreed to remain betrothed until the Season ends. Then I will put a quiet end to it. Your brother's reputation will suffer scarcely a dent, I do assure you. Indeed, everyone is sure to be very relieved for him.

Yourselves included."

His sisters exchanged glances.

"Bravo, Cassandra," Vanessa said.

"It is so /good/ of you," Katherine said, "to be frank with us."

"Now," Margaret said briskly, "we have to decide whether to let Stephen know that we know. Will he be annoyed with you for telling us, Cassandra?"

"Probably," Cassandra said. "I am sure he considers our betrothal real, and I believe he hopes to make me change my mind. He does not, of course, really /want/ to be married to me. But he is unfailingly gallant."

"And also," Vanessa said dryly, "incurably in love. That has been very obvious to us for a few days. And he openly admitted to me just a day or two ago that he really /likes/ you, Cassandra. That, when there is emphasis upon the word, is an enormously significant admission for a /man/ to make. I do believe that the male lips and tongue were formed in such a way that it is virtually impossible for them to utter the word /love/, especially in combination with those other two words on either side of it – /I/ and /you/."

"And so," Margaret said, "we must disagree with you, Cassandra. It would seem altogether probable to us that Stephen really does wish to marry you."

Cassandra could think of no answer to make.