When they reached the dower house, Edward's firm step faltered. "I don't wish to startle her," he muttered. "Will you go in and warn her?"

"Warn her of what?" Theo inquired with a raised eyebrow. "Her fiance's return? For heaven's sake, Edward, you used to love to surprise her. Emily loves surprises. She'll burst into tears, of course, but tears of joy. She loves to cry with happiness."

"Oh, Theo," he said. "You know what I'm talking about."

"Yes, of course I do. And I'm telling you not to be such an idiot. Come on."

She tethered Robin to the gatepost of the dower house, then took Edward's hand, running him along the path. "Emily… Mama… Clarry… see who's here."

Elinor was in her boudoir when she heard Theo's exuberant tones quickly followed by Emily's cry. "Edward! Oh, Edward." And the sound from the hall became a confused turmoil of voices and tears.

Elinor went quietly downstairs, prepared to deal with the inevitable surge of emotions attendant on Edward's arrival.

Edward separated himself from his betrothed as Elinor descended the stairs. He came forward, holding out his hand. "Lady Belmont."

"Edward, dearest." Ignoring his hand, she embraced him. "How wonderful to see you."

Edward was flushed, and a determined look crossed his face. "Lady Belmont… Emily… I came to say that of course I am ready to release Emily from our engagement immediately."

There was a stunned silence; then Theo said, "Edward, you great gaby. How could you possibly say something so idiotish?"

Before Edward could respond, Emily had flung herself against his chest. "How could you possibly imagine it could make the slightest difference? Theo's right, you're a gaby, Edward!" She was weeping against his shirtfront, and he held her tightly, his eyes meeting Lady Belmont's. She shook her head at him in mock reproof and smiled.

"Can I see it, Edward?" Rosie's high voice broke into the tender scene.

"See what?" He released Emily and bent to embrace the girl.

"Where your arm ought to be," Rosie said matter-of-factly. "Is there a stump? Or does it stop right at the shoulder?"

"Oh, Rosie!" It was a universal groan.

"But I'm interested," the child persisted. "It's good to be interested. If you're not interested in things, you don't learn anything, Grandpapa said."

"Very true," Theo agreed. "But that doesn't permit such personal questions, you obnoxious brat."

"I'm not an obnoxious brat," Rosie declared, not at all offended. "Won't you show me, Edward?"

"One day," he said, laughing with the rest of them. Rosie had managed to turn his nightmare into an ordinary, interesting fact of life. She'd somehow managed to puncture his dread that his mutilation would disgust those he loved, would turn love into pity.

"Is it all healed?"

"Yes, but it's not very pretty." He glanced at Emily over the child's head. "It's very red and raw looking."

"Does it pain you?" The soft question was Emily's.

"When the wind's in the wrong direction," he said. "Come and walk with me, love."

Emily nodded, taking his outstretched hand.

"You will dine with us, I hope, Edward?" Elinor said.

"Yes, if I may," he responded.

"In that case I hope the invitation extends to me," Theo declared.

"What of Stoneridge?" Edward raised an eyebrow.

"He has a previous engagement," she said firmly.

For an instant the temptation to pour out her heart to her mother, weep her anger and mortification away, receive the comfort Elinor always had to offer, almost got the better of her. And then she smiled briefly and said, "He went into Dorchester on business. He'll be dining there."

Elinor nodded. Her daughter was lying. The strain in the dark eyes, the jangled chords of her unhappiness, couldn't be hidden from her mother. But Theo always dealt with problems in her own way, and if, as Elinor suspected, this was something to do with her marriage, then it was best that Theo and Stoneridge came to their own resolution. Elinor had no intention of playing either interfering mother-in-law or overprotective mother. It would do far more harm than good where two such strong personalities were concerned.

Chapter Fifteen

Sylvester fell into a laudanum-induced sleep toward midnight and awoke just before dawn filled with the sense of well-being approaching euphoria that always followed the agony.

It didn't take long for the euphoria to dissipate as he lay in the semidarkness remembering what had triggered the attack – a mercifully short attack for once, but it couldn't have come at a more inopportune moment.

He threw aside the bedclothes and stood up, stretching before going to the window, flinging it wide, inhaling the salt-sea fragrances on the light breeze blowing from the cliff top. He stared into the misty, pale light and heard in his head Theo's voice, despairing in its confusion and rage, hurling those dreadful accusations at him.

He glanced toward the connecting door to his wife's bedchamber. Presumably she was still asleep. In other circumstances he would have been tempted to go in and wake her in the way he knew she loved, with the long, slow strokes of passion that would bring the sleepy whimpers of delight to her lips, and her eyes would eventually open, deep, limpid pools brimming with sensuality, her mouth curving with amused pleasure.

But not this morning.

Deciding he'd take advantage of the dawn peace to gather his thoughts and marshal his arguments, he dressed rapidly and went downstairs, where he took a shotgun and a game bag from the gun room and let himself out of the house.

Webster's Pond lay beyond the orchard, through a band of thick undergrowth and massed blackberry bushes. The air smelled of sea and the damp grass beneath the tangled undergrowth. Spiky tendrils from the bushes caught at his buff coat and slashed across his buckskin britches. The sun was veiled in the dawn mist, a suffused reddish glow on the horizon, and the morning was alive with the exuberant calls of the dawn chorus and the indignant chatter of squirrels as he penetrated the undergrowth, disturbing their preserve.

He was following a narrow ribbon where the undergrowth was trampled into something resembling a path, but it clearly hadn't been used that recently, and the whole feel of the place was of somewhere rarely visited by man. The sport certainly should be excellent.

He caught a glimmer of the pond through the bushes as he pushed aside a tangle of thorny branches with the butt of his gun. It was a large body of water, more of a lake than a pond, thick reeds massed at the edge, lily pads floating serenely across the flat brown surface.

Sylvester took a step forward onto the narrow bank, and something hit him in the middle of the back, sending him crashing to the ground.

"What the hell!" Winded, he stared up at his assailant, more angry than alarmed. A young man stood over him.. a young man with the empty sleeve of his jacket pinned across his chest, and a gun on his other shoulder.

"I beg your pardon," Edward said. "But you were about to put your foot into this vile thing." He gestured to the oval jagged-toothed trap concealed in the underbrush. "I saw it a second before you took that step."

"Sweet Jesus!" Sylvester got to his feet, staring at the vicious iron, nausea rising in his gorge as he imagined the bite of those teeth rending his calf, breaking the bone.

"They've never used man traps on Belmont land before," Edward was saying, frowning. He glanced at his companion. "You must be Lord Stoneridge, sir."

There was a crackle of breaking twigs from the bushes, and they both spun round, with a soldier's instinct bringing their guns to the ready, Edward with a neat twist, swinging his weapon under his arm.