Nick started at this uncanny reading of his thoughts. What could she know of this? "Why would you think such a thing?" he demanded, his voice harsh without intention.

Polly bit her lip, her fire-warmed cheeks cooling with the chill that seemed to enwrap her. "I do not know why; but you appear so distracted, and you will not tell me of the cause. I… I was thinking of marriage." This last came out in a rush, and she dropped her eyes lest he read her panic.

"Marriage!" What sort of a mind reader was she? But now was not the moment for such a subject in all its complexities; not now when he was enmeshed in a web of an unknown's spinning, and he must make immediate decisions that could well have far-reaching consequences for both their lives. "Do you know what o'clock it is?" he demanded irritably. "When I decide 'tis time to talk of marriage, I will apprise you of the fact in good order."

"And I suppose that then I must find another protector," Polly said, unable to help herself. Once the monster had risen, it would not return peaceably to its lair.

Nicholas closed his eyes on a weary sigh. Why on earth was she playing this silly game now? Had she no more understanding of his bone-deep exhaustion, his dreadful apprehension than to make ridiculous jests? He heard truculence in her voice, rather than the anxiety this was designed to mask. He saw her pallor and interpreted it as fatigue; the

gaze that would not meet his, he interpreted as the petulance of an overtired child.

"Do not talk such arrant nonsense," he said shortly. "It seems to me that you lack even common sense. You were exhausted four hours ago, but instead of seeking your bed like the rational grown woman you are supposed to be, you waste the night in idle chatter with the maid."

"I had thought that was why Susan lived here," Polly fired back, confused resentment overcoming anxiety. "So that I should have someone with whom to engage in idle chatter!"

"I do not always make the right decisions, particularly where you are concerned," snapped his lordship. "Get you to bed straightway."

"I will not on your say-so," she declared, furious at this apparently unprovoked attack.

Nicholas sighed. "Polly, I am awearied, too much so to join battle. Go to bed or not, as you please."

"I do please!" Polly banged into the bed chamber, there to crawl beneath the quilt, falling asleep with sticky lashes and tear-wet cheeks and salt upon her lips.

Nicholas remained beside the fire, tobacco and wine providing a measure of spurious ease. Eventually he went to bed, slipping an arm beneath the sleeping figure, rolling her into his embrace before finding his own uneasy oblivion.

Chapter 19

They came for Lord Kincaid that same night, in the hour before dawn when the spirit is at its lowest ebb and the night's chill at its most pervasive.

The hammering at the street door, the bellowed "Open in the name of the king!" brought casements flung wide the length of Drury Lane, and Goodman Benson, in nightcap and gown, hurrying from his bed, shivering with fear and cold, to draw back the bolts.

The lieutenant pushed past him, a troop of six soldiers at his back. "We are come for Lord Kincaid. Where is he to be found?"

Benson, quivering like an aspen leaf, pointed abovestairs, unable to find his voice in the face of this terrifying visitation.

The lieutenant, hand on sword, mounted two steps at a time, flinging open the door to the darkened parlor. He crossed the empty room, threw wide the door to the bedchamber. "My Lord Kincaid?" he demanded into the darkness, his soldiers crowding at his back.

Nick had heard the banging, had had time to recognize what was about to happen, but not to prepare himself. Now he reached for flint and tinder, lighting the candle beside the bed. Polly had sat up, her eyes wide in incomprehension, her

tumbled hair doing little to conceal her breasts as the quilt fell to her waist.

The intruders' eyes, as one pair, became riveted upon that creamy, rose-tipped perfection. Nicholas took hold of the cover and drew it up. "You have need of this," he said quietly. "To what do I owe this pleasure, gentlemen?" An eyebrow quirked in sardonic question.

"You are Lord Kincaid?" The lieutenant approached the bed, one hand still on his sword hilt, although the man in the bed was both naked and unarmed.

"The very same," Nicholas said with an ironic bow of his head.

"What is happening?" Polly found her voice at last, clutching the sheet to her neck as she stared at a scene that smacked of a Bedlamite's lunacy.

"Hush, sweetheart," Nick commanded, gently but with authority. "You are to say nothing at all."

"I bear a warrant for your arrest, my lord," intoned the lieutenant. "You are to be committed to the Tower, there to await impeachment."

"On whose authority?" asked Nick, still quiet.

"His Grace the Duke of Buckingham signs the warrant in the king's name," came the answer, promptly.

"And the charge?"

"Treason, my lord."

Polly gasped. "But that is-"

"Hold your tongue!" Nicholas snapped. "May I see the warrant, Lieutenant?"

Polly subsided, realizing that she must sit still, and watch and listen. Only thus could she perhaps find a clue to this mystery. Surely it was a mistake; Nick would read the warrant and laugh, because it was meant for some other Lord Kincaid. But she knew that there was no mistake, and when Nick, having perused the document, handed it back without a word, the little cold space in her heart began to expand until she felt a great, terrifying emptiness.

"Will you grant me privacy to dress, Lieutenant?" Nicho- j

las asked politely. "If you await me in the parlor, I will join you in a few moments."

The soldier's eyes went to the casement. "You have my word," Nicholas said.

One could not refuse to take the word of a gentleman. "Very well, my lord." The lieutenant clicked his spurs together, spun on his heel, and left the bedchamber, his cohorts following.

"I do not understand what is happening," Polly whispered. "What is this of treason?"

"If I knew, I would be better able to form a defense," Nicholas said, swinging out of bed. "But 'tis my own fault."

"How so?" Polly sat watching him dress, in thrall to a confused terror that numbed her like the poisonous bite of a spider. The world she thought she knew was disintegrating, and she could not seem to do anything to hold it together.

"I had foreseen this, but dallied overlong," Nick said bitterly, buckling his sword belt. "Because I did not understand it, I did not believe in the urgency. I should have left London last week."

"But why?" Desperately, she still sought for a kernel of understanding. "What will they do to you, love?" Kneeling on the bed, she stretched out her hands toward him. "They will realize it is a mistake, and then you will come back. That is how it will be, isn't it?"

Nicholas looked at the huge eyes in the pale face, beseeching him with the dark, haunted terror of a small animal in a trap. He took the outstretched hands, folding them in his own, holding them to his breast. "You must go to De Winter and tell him of this. He will know how best to protect you. Tell him that the warrant bears Buckingham's signature. I know not how I have fallen foul of the duke, but it is certain sure that therein lies my offense."

Polly listened to the calm instructions, felt the warm strength of his hold, and heard again in memory Buckingham's voice: "Everyone has a price. I will find yours, make no mistake." How naive she had been to imagine that, having played with her a little at Wilton House, he considered

his revenge well taken. He had told her as plainly as he could that he had found her price-the incalculable value of love.