He raised their hands and kissed the back of hers before releasing it. He tried to smile at her.

“I will teach David,” he said. “I will be a father to him in every way I can. I will ride with him. I will-”

“You must paint with him,” she said. “You must paint.”

But though he had calmed down considerably, there was still a coldness and a rawness at the core of his being, where he had not dared tread during all the years since he returned from the Peninsula.

“And you,” he said, realizing something suddenly with blinding clarity when he had not even been thinking about it, “need to go home, Anne.”

There was a brief, tense silence between them while the faint rushing sound of rain beyond the shelter mingled with the lapping sounds of the lake water.

“To Ty Gwyn?” she asked.

“To Gloucestershire,” he said.

“No.”

“Sometimes,” he said, “it is necessary to go back before we can move forward. At least I think that must be so, unwelcome as the thought is. I suppose we both need to go back, Anne. Perhaps if we do it, both of us, there will be hope. I cannot see it in my own case, but I must try.”

When he looked at her, he found her staring back, her face pale, her look inscrutable.

“It is what you want me to do,” he said.

“But…” She paused for a long moment. “I cannot and will not go home, Sydnam. It would change and solve nothing. You are wrong.”

“So be it, then,” he said, taking her hand in his again.

They sat in silence, watching the rain.

Anne eyed the horses apprehensively. They looked so very large and full of energy, and the stable yard seemed to be filled with them. It was some time since she had ridden. But she would do so this morning in a good cause. She glanced over to where Sydnam and Kit were supervising David as he mounted. Having accomplished the task successfully, her son gazed down, triumphant and happy, at both men-and then across the stable yard at her.

“Look at me, Mama,” he called.

“I am looking,” she assured him.

Kit had turned his attention to Lauren, helping her mount her sidesaddle, and lifting Sophia up to sit with her.

Sydnam came striding toward Anne.

“Riding is not something you forget,” he assured her, correctly interpreting the look on her face. He grinned at her in his attractive, lopsided way. “And Kit has chosen a good horse for you.”

“Meaning she is ancient and lame in all four legs?” she asked hopefully.

He laughed.

“Set your boot on my hand and you will be in the saddle in no time,” he said.

“Let me do that, Syd,” Kit suggested, coming toward them.

“I thought I broke you of that habit years ago,” Sydnam said, still grinning.

“Of underestimating you?” Kit said. “Go ahead, then, and show off for your bride. Impress all of us.” He was chuckling too.

Anne set her booted foot in Sydnam’s hand and found it as solid as a mounting block. A few moments later she sat in her sidesaddle, smiling down at him as she arranged her skirts about her. Kit had slapped a hand on his shoulder. They were both laughing.

“You have made your point,” Kit said. “No one needs two arms. The second one is superfluous.”

Just yesterday afternoon Anne had been in the depths of gloom, sitting in the temple folly by the lake while it rained, convinced that she had made a terrible mistake in marrying Sydnam, convinced that what she had said to him-quite unplanned-had hurt him beyond measure, and convinced that he was terribly wrong in saying that they-she-must go back before they could go forward. The only chance anyone had in life was to move constantly onward.

But then, after the rain had stopped, they had picked their way through the wet woods and walked side by side up the long driveway, and David had met them in the hall with his excited tale of riding on his own, first with a leading rope and then with none, beyond the paddock and to the limits of the park before turning around and being rained upon before they arrived safely back at the stables.

“You should have seen me, Mama,” he had cried. “You should have seen me, sir. Uncle Kit says I have a good seat.”

“I could see that yesterday.” Sydnam had reached out a hand to ruffle his hair, and David had beamed happily up at him.

And suddenly a great deal of the gloom had dispersed.

And suddenly and for no real reason it had seemed that after all there was hope.

This morning they were going to ride over to Lindsey Hall to call upon the Duke and Duchess of Bewcastle. When they had mentioned their plans in the nursery after breakfast, David had begged to go too and had renewed his pleas even after Anne had explained to him that all the children with whom he had played at Glandwr were now at their separate homes.

“But James will be there,” he had reminded her. “Let me come, Mama. Please, sir?”

And then, of course, Andrew had wanted to go too. And Sophia had wormed her way into the group and tugged at the tassel on Sydnam’s Hessian boot to gain his attention.

Yes, this morning, despite a night spent at opposite sides of their bed and no real resolution to any of their problems, Anne was filled with hope. The sun was even shining again from a cloudless sky, and there was warmth in the air.

Andrew, mounted on his pony, was attached to Kit’s horse by a leading rope, the understanding being that he would ride as far as he was able and then be taken up before his father.

The two men mounted last.

Anne watched Sydnam, appreciating anew the power of his leg muscles, his sense of balance, his control over a horse that was not even his own. He sat squarely in the saddle and gathered the reins in his hand.

“Ho!” David said admiringly. “How did you do that, sir?”

“There is very little a person cannot do if he has the will to do it,” Sydnam said, smiling at the boy and glancing at Anne. “A horse is not ridden with the hands, after all, but with the thighs. I heard Uncle Kit telling you that the day before yesterday.”

“I did not know then that you could ride,” David said, “or you could have taught me.”

“I would not be able to do my work at Glandwr if I could not ride, would I?” Sydnam said. “But now that you can ride, you will be able to come with me whenever you wish.”

“Will I?” David sounded interested.

“Of course,” Sydnam said. “You are my boy, are you not?”

They rode off side by side, following after Kit and Lauren and Andrew, and Anne drew her horse in alongside them. Sydnam smiled at her across David’s horse, and she smiled back. There was genuine warmth in the wordless communication, she thought. They were a family.

They rode at a very sedate pace all the way to Lindsey Hall, much to Anne’s relief, though she thought that the men might find the speed irksome. Lauren looked back when they were almost there and called out to Anne.

“I am always thankful to have Andrew with us when we go riding,” she said. “Kit is less likely to challenge me to a race.”

They both laughed.

“A race?” Kit said. “Heaven help us, a race with Lauren involves taking our horses into a fairly moderate trot. It is enough to make one weep, Syd, I swear.”

But Anne’s attention was soon taken by the approach to Lindsey Hall along a straight, tree-lined driveway-the very driveway down which Claudia must have stridden on the day she resigned from her post as Lady Hallmere’s governess. The house itself, huge and sprawling, was a mixture of architectural designs, testament to its great age and to the attempts of former dukes to enlarge and improve it. It was impressive and surprisingly beautiful. Before it was a large circular flower garden, still colorful though it was late in the year. At its center was a massive stone fountain, though the waterworks must have been turned off for the approaching winter.