“And those children are Bedwyns?” Claudia spoke the name as though she referred to some particularly odious vermin. “And your host is to be the Duke of Bewcastle?”

“I will probably not even set eyes upon him,” Anne said. “And I will have little or nothing to do with the Bedwyns. Apparently there are a number of children. I will spend my time in the nursery and the schoolroom amusing them.”

“Doubtless,” Claudia said tartly, “they will have nurses and governesses and tutors enough to fill a mansion.”

“Then one more will make no difference,” Anne said. “I could hardly say no, Claudia. Joshua has always been very good to us, and David loves him.”

“I pity the man from my heart,” Miss Martin said, resuming her seat on the other side of the hearth from Susanna. “It must be a severe trial to him to be married to that woman.”

“And to have the Duke of Bewcastle for a brother-in-law,” Susanna said, smiling at Anne, her eyes dancing with merriment. She even winked when Claudia was not looking. “It is a great shame that he is married. I would have come with you and wooed him. It is still my primary goal in life to marry a duke.”

Claudia snorted-and then chuckled.

“Between the two of you,” she said, “you will have me plucking gray hairs from my head every night until I am bald before the age of forty.”

“I do envy you, Anne,” Susanna said, setting down her bonnet and sitting up straighter in her chair. “The idea of a month by the sea in Wales is very appealing, is it not? If you do not want to take David yourself, I will take him. He and I get along famously.”

Her eyes were still twinkling, but Anne could see some wistfulness in their depths. Susanna was twenty-two years old and exquisitely lovely, with her small stature and auburn hair and green eyes. She had come to the school at the age of twelve as a charity girl, after failing to find employment in London as a lady’s maid by pretending to be older. Six years later she had stayed at the school after Miss Martin offered her a position on her staff, and she had accomplished the transition from pupil to teacher remarkably well. Anne did not know much about her life before the age of twelve, but she did know that Susanna was all alone in the world. She had never had any beaux even though she turned male heads whenever she stepped out on the street. Sunny-natured though she was, there was always an air of melancholy about her that only a close friend would sense.

“Are you quite, quite sure, Anne,” Claudia asked, “that you would not rather stay here for the summer? But no, of course you would not. And you are quite right. David does need the companionship of other children, especially boys, and this is a very good opportunity for him. Go then with my blessing-not that you need it-and try to steer as clear of adult Bedwyns as you would the plague.”

“I solemnly swear,” Anne said, raising her right hand. “Though it is just as likely to be the other way around.”



It was not that he felt intimidated, but Sydnam Butler was nevertheless moving out of Glandwr House into the thatched, whitewashed cottage that lay in a small clearing among the trees not far from the sea cliffs on one side and the park gates and driveway on the other.