"Aye, that it must," Mathilde said grimly. The thought gave her some satisfaction as she laced her charge a little more tightly than usual.

Cordelia endured without a murmur of protest. When Mathilde was this upset, it was best to let her get it out of her system. Involuntarily, she glanced at the bookshelves. Could she make them open again? She didn't know exactly how it had happened last night. Was there a knob she'd accidentally pushed, or a switch? Or did one just lean against the books at a certain spot? Not that she'd ever find out. They'd be long gone from this place in an hour.

"There, you'll do." Mathilde twitched Cordelia's starched stock into place at her neck. "Hurry away now." She waved her hands at her, shooing her from the room. Cordelia couldn't decide whether her nurse was vexed as well as concerned.

Deeply thoughtful, she stepped into the corridor just as Leo, in riding dress, emerged from the next-door chamber. "Good morning." She felt strangely shy. She curtsied, her eyes lowered.

"Good morning." His expression was somber, his eyes lightless, his mouth taut. He gestured curtly that she should precede him down the staircase to the hall.

Cordelia, most unusually, was tongue-tied. Throughout the ceremonial breakfast, her eyes kept drifting to his hands and she would remember where they had been on her body

and a surge of glorious memory would flood her with warmth. It was a relief to concentrate on the ceremonies as the dauphine took farewell of her brother Joseph, who would now return to Vienna, leaving his little sister to journey without family to Strasbourg, where she would be formally received into France.

Toinette was less emotional at taking leave of her brother than she had been of her mother, but it was still a solemn moment when the emperor escorted his sister to her carriage for the last time.

"I see you intend to ride today, my lord." Cordelia gestured toward Leo's riding dress, speaking to him for the first time since she'd greeted him on the stairs. It was supposed to be a neutral comment, but her voice sounded strangely intense to her ears in the monastery's busy, noisy courtyard.

"Yes," he said shortly. "We will ride behind the cavalry and to the side of the coaches." He surveyed the scene, frowning, looking for his groom with their horses.

"What made you change your mind?" Cordelia ventured. "You said yesterday that you would travel in the peace and quiet of the carriage if I was riding."

His brow darkened. "You're in my charge, Princess. Much as I might lament it, I'm responsible for you. If you're going to make anyone's life a misery, it had better be mine rather than some poor groom's."

He ordered his groom to help Cordelia to mount.

Cordelia cast Leo a covert sidelong look. His face was drawn, dark shadows beneath his eyes. He looked as if he hadn't slept a wink-a man haunted by conscience. She thought remorsefully of her own deep and dreamless sleep untroubled by guilt.

Leo mounted his own horse, waiting until Cordelia was settled in the saddle, the girths tightened, stirrups adjusted. Her Lippizaner mare was a beautiful animal, and he assumed that like the Hapsburgs with whom she'd grown up, she was an accomplished horsewoman, so he wouldn't need to worry about her safety on such a prime beast. But he also guessed from what he knew of her that Cordelia would chafe at the necessity of keeping her place in the procession.

"We will keep to a walk," he stated. "We cannot overtake the dauphine's carriage without offending protocol, so I'm afraid it will be dull riding."

"But we could leave the procession," Cordelia suggested. "Branch off across the fields and rejoin it later."

"That kind of suggestion is why I wouldn't entrust you to a groom," he said grimly.

Cordelia closed her lips tightly, gathered up the reins, and fell in beside him. The procession wound its way along the banks of the Danube as the sun grew stronger, burning off the early morning mists. Leo said not a word, and finally Cordelia could bear it no longer.

"Please talk to me, Leo. I feel as if I'm in disgrace, but I can't see why I should be."

He said gravely, "You don't seem to understand, Cordelia. What happened last night was unforgivable. I lost control."

"You feel you have betrayed your friend and my husband," she ventured.

Leo didn't answer. It wasn't as simple as that. He also felt he had betrayed Cordelia. She was in his trust and he'd betrayed that trust.

"I don't know anything about this man, my husband," Cordelia said into the silence. "It doesn't feel like a betrayal when I don't even know him, but I do know that I love you."

She looped the reins and then let them run through her fingers. The mare raised her head and high-stepped delicately. "I've been thinking," she said hesitantly while Leo was still trying to gather his forces in the face of her calm declaration. "While I accept that I'm married to Prince Michael, I don't see why I can't still be your mistress.

"It's perfectly acceptable in French society, I'm told," she rushed on as he exhaled sharply and seemed ready to break in. "If two people are in love but are forced to marry their family's choice, it's understood that society will turn a blind eye if they pursue a liaison discreetly. Even the king says so."

"And just who told you that?" he inquired, finding his voice at last.

"A cousin of Toinette's. He said that husbands say to their wives, "I allow you to do as you please, but I draw the line at princes of the blood and footmen." She glanced interrogatively at him. "Is that true?"

"What's true for some is not necessarily true for all," he pointed out dryly.

"But it is the court attitude, though. I mean, the king has had mistresses who were closer to him and more influential than the queen. Madame de Pompadour was the most important woman at the court for over twenty years. And isn't that true of Madame du Barry now? And I know all about the Pare aux Cerfs, where the king keeps his prostitutes," she added with the air of one delivering the coup de grace. "It's all true, isn't it?"

"Yes," he agreed, unable to refute any of what she'd said. Cordelia was rather better informed than he'd expected of one reared in the strict moral atmosphere of the Austrian court.

"Then there shouldn't be any difficulty. I could be your mistress and my husband's wife." She gazed at him from her great blue eyes, a picture of earnest sincerity.

"My dear girl, you seem to expect Versailles to be some magical place where the usual rules don't apply, and all you need do is wave your wand to make whatever you wish come true." He sounded as impatient as he felt. "Even supposing such a fairy story were the case, and I do assure you it isn't, does it occur to you that I may not wish for a mistress?"

"Oh." It hadn't occurred to Cordelia. "Do you already have one?"

"That is beside the point," he said frigidly, wondering with a degree of desperation why he couldn't seize hold of this ridiculous conversation and break it off.

"I don't think it is at all. If you do have one already, it would be difficult, because one wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings unduly."

"Cordelia, I have not the slightest interest in taking you as my mistress. Neither interest nor inclination," he stated baldly, staring fixedly at the clouds of dust created by the cavalry on the road ahead.

"Oh," she said again. She swallowed uncomfortably. "Don't you care for me, then?"

He refused to look at her. "I care more for other things," he said resolutely. "I took advantage of your innocence last night, Cordelia, for which I beg your pardon. I can only assume I dipped too deep in the cognac. It will never happen again."

"But I would like it to happen again," she said simply. "I don't mean to sound bold or… or wanton, although I suppose I am being. But Mathilde said that very few men know how to give pleasure as well as take it, and it seems that when one finds such a rarity then one should work to hold on to it."

"Who the hell is Mathilde?" It was all he could find to say in response to that curiously artless yet appallingly knowing speech.

"My nurse… or at least she was my wet nurse and she's looked after me since my mother died. She was my mother's maid and I think they were about the same age. Mathilde knows everything about anything and she's amazingly wise."

"You confided in her?" Leo pushed a finger inside his stock, loosening the starched linen. He seemed very hot suddenly.

"I needed to understand what happened. I wasn't sure you would tell me if I asked you."

"I will tell you precisely what happened." He spoke with a cold finality. "I allowed a situation to develop in which I lost control. Fortunately, I came to my senses in time to prevent the worst happening. You will now forget everything about last night. You will stop talking nonsense about love and liaisons. You will treat me from now on with a scrupulous distance as I will treat you. Do you hear me, Cordelia?" She nodded. "I hear you."

"Then don't forget it." He nudged his horse's flanks and the animal broke into a trot, drawing ahead of Cordelia.

She knew not to catch up with him as he rode a few lengths ahead of her. A few days ago, she would have allowed her impulse free rein and cantered up beside him, but she was learning things these days that had no place in the schoolrooms of her past life. She would not be downcast, Cordelia told herself fiercely. She would cultivate patience, a vastly underrated virtue, she was sure.

The day's journey was as tedious as the previous day's despite the freedom of horseback. In fact, Cordelia decided it was more tedious, since she was obliged to ride in silence, her eyes fixed upon Viscount Kierston's straight back ahead of her. She'd hoped he would be a little more friendly when they stopped for refreshment, but Toinette demanded her friend's company at the al fresco luncheon on the banks of the river. Leo, having seen her safely ensconced at the dauphine's side beneath the trees, surrounded by the fawning burghers of the local township, went off on his own, and Cordelia looked for him in vain.