Or would it have been Meg sitting where she was now?

She could feel the warmth of his thigh through his pantaloons and her glove, and she was secretly glad that the letter had not come sooner.

How /could /he? How could Crispin Dew have treated Meg so shabbily?

She leaned slightly sideways and took comfort from the solidity of Elliott's shoulder. She swallowed hastily when she heard a gurgle in her throat.

15

VANESSA was still feeling depressed. It was not something she allowed herself to feel very often. There was almost always something to do, someone with whom to talk, something to think about, something to read that would elevate her mood. And there was almost always something to wonder at, something to smile over, something to laugh about.

Laughter was so much better for the soul than glumness.

But just occasionally depression hit like a stone wall. Usually it was because there was more than one cause and it was virtually impossible to avoid.

Her honeymoon had come to an end. And though the unexpected happiness that had filled her days and nights at the dower house and the lake might surely be brought back to the main house with her and taken to London tomorrow, she could not rid herself of the notion that now all would change, that she and Elliott would never again be as close as they had been there.

If that had been all, of course, she would have firmly shaken off any low spirits that threatened. It was up to her to see to it that her marriage worked. If she expected things to change for the worse, then almost certainly they would.

But Elliott had gone off for the afternoon to take care of some estate business. It was perfectly understandable. She did not expect him to go walking and boating and picking daffodils with her every afternoon of the rest of their lives. But it was a bad time just now today for her to be left alone.

Crispin Dew had married a Spanish lady in Spain.

Meg must be desperately, devastatingly unhappy, but there was absolutely nothing Vanessa could do to help her. The suffering of a loved one was in many ways worse than one's own suffering because it left one feeling so very helpless. She knew that from bitter experience.

And of course /that /thought, the thought of Hedley, sent her running up to her bedchamber and rummaging through her large trunk, which had been brought over from Warren Hall but not yet unpacked because it was to go to London tomorrow. Just where she had placed it with her own hands after carefully wrapping it, she found the object she had almost decided to leave behind. It was only at the last moment that she had slid it down the left front corner.

She sat down on a love seat and opened back the velvet cloth that kept the treasure safe from damage. And she gazed down at the framed miniature of Hedley that Lady Dew had given her after his death.

It had been painted when he was twenty, two years before Vanessa married him, and just before it became obvious that he was really very ill indeed.

Though the signs were apparent even then.

She ran one finger about the oval frame.

His eyes were large, his face thin. It would have been pale too if the painter had not added color to his cheeks.

But even then he had been beautiful, as he had to the end. His had been a delicate beauty. He had never been robust. He had never been able to participate in the more boisterous games of the other children in the neighborhood. Though strangely he had never been teased or victimized by them. He had been widely loved. /She /had loved him.

She would have died in his place if it could have been done.

Those large, luminous eyes gazed back at her now from the portrait. So full of intelligence and hope. /Hope/. He had not given it up until close to the end, and when he had finally let it go, it had been with grace and dignity. "Hedley," she whispered.

She touched a fingertip to his lips.

And she realized something. Apart from one fleeting memory on her wedding night, she had not thought of him at all during the three days at the lake. /Of course /she had not. It would have been dreadful if she had. She had been there with her new husband, to whom she owed her undivided loyalty.

But even so…

Until very recently it had seemed inconceivable that a single day could ever go by without her thinking of him at least a hundred times.

Now three days had slipped by.

Three days in which she had been blissfully happy with a man who did not even love her. Whom she did not even love.

Not as she had loved Hedley anyway. It was impossible to love any other man as she had loved her first husband.

But she had never been able to know with Hedley the sort of sensual happiness she had just experienced with Elliott. By the time of their marriage his illness had rendered him all but impotent. It had been a terrible frustration for him, though she had learned ways to soothe and satisfy him.

And now she had found sexual satisfaction with another man.

She had not thought of Hedley for three whole days - no, four by now.

Would she eventually forget him altogether?

Would it be to her as if he had never existed?

She felt a deep welling of grief and a sharp pang of guilt, which was all the worse for the fact that it was quite unreasonable. Why should she feel guilty about putting behind her memories of her first husband when she was married to a second? Why should she feel as if she were cheating on a dead man? Why should she feel as if she were hurting him?

She felt all of those things. /You must go on with your life, Nessie, /he had told her during the final few days of his life while she held his hand and dabbed at his feverish face with a cool cloth. /You must love again and be happy again. You must marry and have children. You must. Promise me?/ She had called him a goose and an idiot and flatly refused to make any promises. /Oh, not a goose, please, Nessie, /he had said. /A gander if anything, but not a goose./ They had both laughed. /Keep on laughing at the very least, /he had said. /Promise me you will always laugh./ /Always when something is funny, /she had promised and had held his hand against her lips while he fell into an exhausted half-sleep.

She had laughed a few more times in the next few days but not for a long time after that. "Hedley," she whispered again now and realized she could no longer see the portrait clearly. She blinked the tears from her eyes. "Forgive me." For doing what he had begged her to do - for living again and being happy.

For marrying again. For laughing again.

And for forgetting him for almost four whole days.

She thought of the vigor of Elliott's lovemaking and circled her palm over the miniature. Somewhere she had crossed over a border between depression and something more painful, something that tightened her chest and made breathing difficult.

If Hedley had just once been able…

She closed her eyes and rocked backward and forward. "Hedley," she said again.

She sniffed as the tears flowed, tried to dry them with the heels of her hands, and then felt around for a handkerchief. She had none yet was feeling too inert to get up to fetch one.

She gave in to a terrible self-pitying despair.

Finally she sniffed again, swiped at her nose with the back of her hand, and decided that she must get up, find a handkerchief, give her nose a good blow, and then wash her face in cold water to obliterate the signs that she had been weeping.

How awful if Elliott were to see them! Whatever would he think?

But just after she had set the miniature down on the cushion beside her a large handkerchief appeared over the back of the seat, held in a large masculine hand.

Elliott's.

He must have come through his dressing room and hers - the door was behind her back.