"Aye." Villiers sighed regretfully. "But I'd as lief continue it for a while longer. If I'd known what a joy you would be, I'd have fixed upon a month." He got out of bed, stretched and yawned, then went to throw coals upon the fire's embers.

Polly made no response, merely huddled beneath the quilt, which still retained his body warmth, trying to stop her teeth from chattering. She watched him dress, thinking dispassionately that it was for the last time. She would go home, and Susan would have the tub of hot water waiting before the blazing fire, and she would scrub the night's violations from her body, and the memory from her mind for the last time. And Nicholas would return, and would replace those grimy memories with his own fresh, present reality.

Dressed, the duke went to the mantel, where he took up the sealed document that had lain there for the last seven nights. He tapped it thoughtfully against the palm of his hand, regarding the figure on the bed. "Extraordinary!" he murmured, shaking his head. "That one would voluntarily expose oneself to such a fatiguing emotion as love." He

crossed to the bed, thrusting the document into the deep pocket of his coat. "A farewell kiss, sweet bud. 'Tis the last demand."

Eventually, the door closed on his departure. Polly flew from the bed, scrambling into her clothes, drawing her hooded cloak tight about her. The house reeked of stale liquor and tobacco smoke, and many other less savory remnants. A ragged, skinny girl, her chapped hands blue with cold, her nose dripping, was sloshing cold water over a pool of vomit in the corner of the landing. Polly drew her skirts aside and stepped quickly past. The doorkeeper, grumbling and mumbling, spat phlegm onto the sawdust-covered floor as he pulled back the bolts on the street door.

"It'd 'elp a body if n ye'd come down t'gether!"

It had been the same complaint for the last six mornings. Buckingham always left before Polly-just another client leaving his whore in the brothel, where she belonged-and the doorkeeper always bolted the door after him, then grumbled mightily at having to open up again five minutes later. Polly ignored him today, as she had done every previous day. Out in the street, where the night's debris still littered, she took a deep breath of freedom. She would cleanse both mind and body of the soil of those nights. She was no delicately nurtured flower, no piece of porcelain to be cracked and broken by such doings. She had seen worse, had known as bad. For many, such sordid degradations informed their lives from birth until death. For her it was over.

She ran, gulping the air in great drafts, enjoying the icy scalding as it pierced her lungs. Susan, who as usual had been watching for her from the parlor window, had the door open before she could knock. Polly thanked her and leaned gasping against the newel post until she could get her breath.

"Bath's all ready," Sue said. "My Lord De Winter's abovestairs, waitin' on ye."

Still somewhat breathless, Polly went upstairs. Richard was standing beside the fire, waiting for her return as he had done for the last five mornings, ever since she had told him

of Buckingham's bargain. He looked at her searchingly. " 'Tis done?"

"Aye." She nodded and came to the fire, stretching her hands to its warmth. " 'Tis done, Richard. He'll not renege?"

"God's grace, no!" Richard caught her chin, tipping it up. "And you, child?"

"Am no child," she said with a tiny smile. "But I am whole. The scars will not run deep."

His frowning examination continued. She returned the look with candor. After a while he nodded slowly. "It's well. But I could wish you had stayed for advice before taking the bit between your teeth. Mayhap I could have spared you these last nights."

Polly shrugged. "Even had you been able to, Richard, 'twould have taken a tedious long time. This way was speedier, and Nick will be free within the day. Indeed-" An exciting, yet somehow terrifying, thought struck her "-maybe within the hour, and I must bathe. I cannot greet him with… with…" Her hands passed down her body in a gesture expressive of disgust. "And he must not find you here, Richard, at this hour. It will puzzle him mightily." She began to push him toward the door. "Nothing must arouse his suspicions."

Richard resisted the inhospitable pressure of the small hands in his back. "You have Buckingham's pledge of secrecy?"

All the light died from the hazel eyes. She shook her head in sudden defeated weariness. "I thought not to ask for it."

"Then, if you will heed the advice of a friend who knows Nick of old, you will lay the whole before him without delay," Richard said briskly. "It is no great tragedy. He is a man of the world, Polly."

"I do not wish him to know," she said fiercely. "I would not have him share my own hells with the feeling that he was responsible for them. Can you not understand that?"

Richard sighed. "And suppose he should hear it from Buckingham, or from court whispers? Why do you imagine

Buckingham will keep it a close secret? He can have no reasons for doing so."

"But by the same token, he can have no reason for not doing so," Polly pointed out. "I cannot bring myself to tell him, Richard." She shuddered slightly. "Mayhap when it has faded a little, but not now."

She looked wan, fragile, seven sleepless nights etched upon her face, giving that usually vibrant beauty an ethereal appearance. Three afternoons, during this dreadful week, she had performed at the Theatre Royal, and only three members of the audience knew what superhuman effort it had cost her: Thomas Killigrew knew because he alone could read the professional actor; Buckingham and Richard knew. She had come close to breaking, and was still perilously close to the edge.

Richard decided that he would be unwise to push the issue at present. Her exhaustion, Nick would put down to worry, and maybe, for a few days, they would keep close to this house. Nick would not feel inclined to venture into society immediately, and when he was ready, Polly would perhaps be strong enough to tell him the truth of her ordeal.

"I will leave you to your bath, then," he said, picking up his cloak. "An hour or two of sleep would not come amiss, either."

Polly helped him with his cloak. "I could not have managed without your strength, Richard," she said softly.

He smiled. "You underestimate yourself, my dear. You would have done what you felt you had to, with or without my support." He bent to kiss her cheek. "Nicholas is a most fortunate man."

Nicholas, at that moment, was standing on the parapeted walk outside his prison. He drew his cloak tight against the wind gusting from the Thames. The river ran, gray-brown, below the parapet, a major highway on which the townsfolk went about their business, sparing little attention as they passed beneath Tower bridge for those within the massive

gray walls of the Tower itself. Perhaps they looked at Traitor's Gate, where the green river slime clung to the step, and the water slopped against the portcullis. And if they did so, perhaps they spared a thought for all those who had made the melancholy river journey, to enter this great and gloomy prison through that gate, to leave it only for the scaffold on Tower Hill.

It was a gloomy thought, but Nick could see little reason for cheer. True, he had not entered the Tower through Traitor's Gate, but he was as securely held as any, and he still had no concrete charges to defend.

He turned to look over the other side of the parapet, down into the great court of the Tower, where the distinctive black ravens squabbled amongst themselves, circling and strutting with the self-importance of those who had inhabited this place for longer than any human soul. Even at this early hour, the scene was lively, guards and servants hastening about their business, troops of soldiers responding with well-trained obedience to bellowed orders, heralds and liveried messengers on horseback passing back and forth through the gates. The governor appeared, striding briskly across the quadrangle. He looked up to see his prisoner, and raised a hand in salute.