In perfect honesty, she would have been quite content to leave these reveries safely in her head and omit any actual experience of them. Instead of Trev, it was Major Sturgeon who seemed to be assuming the role of brooding corsair, which was disconcerting in the extreme. She had no inkling of why he could possibly wish to call upon her. Their betrothal had been broken off through the medium of a letter, with no specific reason given but that he felt himself unworthy of her hand. Since he had shortly thereafter felt himself worthy to become engaged to another woman, she drew the obvious conclusion that she had not satisfied his requirements in a wife. Her father had been of a mind to forcibly alter Major Sturgeon's decision on the matter but submitted when Callie begged him not to do so. She had no desire, she told her papa, to marry any gentleman who did not wish to marry her.

It had all been very unpleasant and mortifying from start to finish. She recalled very little about Major Sturgeon himself, as she had only met him when he was on brief leave from Paris, and once again after Waterloo, and hardly spoken to him during the few times they were in company. He was quite a hand some man, very firm of jaw and military in his bearing, always in uniform when she had seen him. That was why she had recognized him after so long. Very few active officers in full dress crossed her path-none, to be precise-and she quite clearly remembered the imposing stiffness of his braids and shoulder epaulets. But there was a certain swashbuckling air about him now, in all his scarlet and gold, a resolute sweep in the way he removed his cloak. The intense manner in which he looked at her was unnerving.

To make things yet more unsettling, the instant antagonism between the two gentlemen had been palpable, and magnified by Trev's careless insolence. She had heard of duels being fought for less insult than he had offered to Major Sturgeon. It was one thing to tease about skewering and pistols, but the idea appalled her in reality.

However, she could not deny that it had been grati fying to have Trev stand by her. Very gratifying. In truth, the whole encounter had made her daydreams seem quite pale in comparison.

She found herself at the only corner in Shelford, gazing blindly at a new poster plastered over the old ones on the greengrocer's wall. It displayed the image of a bullbaiting, showing a colossal spotted animal in combat with two huge dogs. The advertisement was for a butcher shop in Bromyard and made great news of that old wives' tale that meat from a baited bull was the more tender.

Callie scowled. Colonel Davenport would be using Hubert for breeding, not baiting, but his resemblance to the imaginary bull made her shiver. This type of ancient nonsense caused poor creatures to be tortured for hours, when they ought to be dispatched with a single well-placed blow. Her father had taught her to patronize men who knew their trade. They did not allow the animals to suffer through lack of skill or carelessness. But this sort of cruelty was maddeningly common, made worse because it pleased the fairgoers and sporting crowd.

She reached up and ripped the bill down, tearing it into pieces. Shelford's grocer owned the butcher shop too and would no doubt thank her for obliterating an advertisement for one of his competitors from the wall of his own property. She thought of buying some stale bread for Hubert, remembered that he wasn't there, and blew her nose into her handkerchief, trying not to burst into tears in the center of Shelford's village green.

"Married at Blackburn, Henry Osbaldeson, aged 95, to Rachel Pemberton, spinster, aged 71." Trev read by candlelight from an ancient copy of La Belle Assemblée. "Do you suppose she's given him an heir yet?"

"And twins by this time," his mother said faintly. She sat propped up on pillows, cradling a tisane without drinking from the cup. "I'm sure that journal may have ten years."

Trev f lipped to the front page. "Eight." He raised his wineglass. "To the health of Mrs. O! Let us hope she's still spending his money to this day."

She smiled and plucked at the coverlet with her long fingers. "Myself, mon trésor-I hope you will not delay so long as Mr. O to take a wife."

Trev realized he had wandered onto dangerous ground. "I vow I won't wait a day past eighty."

She gave a sigh. It turned to a cough, and he reached for her medicine glass, but she shook her head. "No, I don't wish to… sleep." The color was very high in her cheeks, so that she looked younger, almost a girl in the candlelight. "Trevelyan," she said. "Tell me, have you ever considered to… propose to Lady Callista Taillefaire?"

"Certainly. I've offered myself to her several times," he said casually. "But alas!"

"Alas?" His mother tilted her chin. "Do not tell me she refused you."

"Not everyone appreciates my virtues as you do."

She pursed her lips. "I dare say that Lady Callie… I believe she… has some appreciation."

"Do you? I'm f lattered. Her father was of another opinion, however."

She frowned a little, a pretty sulk, like a thwarted child.

He turned a page. "Mr. Thomas Haynes, of Oundle, will soon publish a treatise on the improved culture of the strawberry, raspberry, and gooseberry," he announced. "This can't possibly animate us so much, however, as the news that the Rev. James Piumptre has made considerable progress in printing his English Drama Purified, and it will appear in the early spring."

She put on a smile, only half attending. Trev feigned a concentrated attention to the journal, watching her fold the edge of the coverlet over and over with her fingers.

"It was before, then?" She looked up searchingly at him. "You asked her before you went away?"

He turned the magazine in his hands and rolled it into a cylinder. "Don't let us speak of this, Maman. Lady Callista has no desire to wed me, I assure you."

"But with Monceaux, the circumstances have so much… changed."

"Exactly. She would not wish to move to France, and leave her sister, and go away from all she knows."

"I think she might be willing."

"Maman-" he said.

"She can't wish to be a… spinster all her days."

"Please," he said, tapping the rolled journal against his fist. "Please."

She drew a deep, unhappy breath. "You love her."

"Damn," he said, staring into the dark corner of the room.

They sat without speaking. Trev felt all his lies and failures hovering on his tongue-only the knowledge that he would disappoint her yet more kept him silent.

"Is it money, Trevelyan?" she asked at length. "I know you have not told me… the whole. Do you have no money?"

"I have a great deal of money, Maman. A very great deal of it."

That he could say with full truth. She looked at him, her eyes large and brilliant in the unsteady light.

He drained his wine and set the empty glass on her table. "Come, madame le duchesse, don't you want me to find a girl of the old blood, to dignify Monceaux with her prestige?"

"No," his mother said. "I want you to be happy. Lady Callie would… make you happy."

He smiled wryly. "I'm not so sure I would make her happy."

"Why not?"

"You know what I am, Maman. Unsteady character."

"You were only a wild boy. Your grandfather-he could not help himself to drive you mad. I tried to say to him…" She trailed off and shrugged. "He could not help himself. He wanted everything to turn back… as it was."

"Yes, I did try single-handedly to restore the monarchy, but Bonaparte would have none of it. And then Wellington stole a march on me and did the thing himself."

She reached toward him across the coverlet, smiling. "You have accomplished what mattered most to us. Your father and your… grandfather would be so proud, to know we were in possession of Monceaux again."