The Education Of Portia 2ai1o

THE EDUCATION OF PORTIA

By

Lesley-Anne McLeod

Uncial Press Aloha, Oregon 2008

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events described herein are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

ISBN 13: 978-1-60174-061-8 ISBN 10: 1-60174-061-1

Copyright © 2008 by Lesley-Anne McLeod

Cover art and design Copyright © 2008 by Cait Shakoriel Bens

All rights reserved. Except for use in review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the author or publisher.

Published by Uncial Press, an imprint of GCT, Inc.

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CHAPTER ONE

Portia could not like him. Whether it was his aristocratic arrogance, his overpowering masculine energy, his clipped, assured speech or his confidence in his ability to have his own way, she did not know. But she did not like the Viscount Stadbroke.

Unwillingly, she would have to it herself impressed by his fine figure. To his imposing height he added broad shoulders enveloped in an expertly cut tobacco brown riding coat, a fine calf encased in gleaming topboots and the muscular legs of an active man displayed in leather breeches. His dark brown curling hair was brushed ruthlessly back from a broad brow. He was not precisely handsome, but his sharp features were strongly boned and his dark eyes well opened and disconcertingly acute. Added all in all, he looked vaguely, inexplicably familiar. Nevertheless, she found him dislikeable.

Portia Crossmichael rarely took an immediate aversion to anyone. She prided herself on her rational and reasonable approach to people. In general, she gave new acquaintances time to reveal their dispositions and their temperaments...time to prove themselves. In her position as school proprietress and schoolmistress, she could not afford to judge too harshly. And certainly she could not display her feelings about the characters of her patrons. It was her lot to be conciliatory, to be diplomatic and to coax the best of their natures from her lady pupils, and their parents.

"I have only two openings at present, Lord Stadbroke. You have three daughters. I think we cannot solve this conundrum of numbers." She picked up a pale quill from her ormolu inkstand, and ran her fingers over the firm yet soft feather. She had already learned that the viscount was widowed--his children motherless for

the past four years--and that the family seat was in Lincolnshire. Stadbroke had imparted the details reluctantly, in response to her inexorable inquiries.

"You cannot wish to turn away business, ma'am," he said, his abrasive tone at odds with the precision of his diction. "You seem not to desire my custom."

Portia's habitually calm façade stood her in good stead even in the face of the viscount's frown. "I do not regard my pupils as 'business', my lord, nor am I in trade. I do not accept or reject custom. I am a teacher. My students are children and must be carefully guided and educated. If I accept too many students, they will all suffer from lack of attention and insufficient guidance."

Driven to agitation by the viscount's attitude, Portia rose. Her height was not inconsiderable and she had a presence born of dignity and gravity. She did not hope to impress Stadbroke however, but only to indicate that the interview was coming to its close.

He rose politely as well, but showed no inclination to depart. He ignored her discourse on her occupation. "You said you have two places available among the older girls." His tone softened, a coaxing note infiltrating his words. "Surely one more small girl only eight years of age, Miss Crossmichael, cannot cause much difficulty. My daughters will not be separated, I fear, and they have their hearts set on attending your school."

Portia wondered why, but she refused to ask their father. "Even if I could it all three, my lord, they still would be separated. The older two, at almost twelve and fifteen, would the senior girls in the west dormitory and the younger would need to reside with her peers in the north dormitory." Before she had finished speaking, Portia knew she had made an error. The viscount was taking her explanation to be equivocation and thought that he had her wavering.

He was tapping his booted foot impatiently, as though inactivity was anathema to him. "That separation would cause no difficulty. Penelope is a sturdy, independent child; she would not be intimidated by that degree of disunion. The point is they all three wish to attend here."

Portia half turned from him to stare from the open door to the garden while she considered. Some of the older girls were reading in the shade of a massive chestnut tree; their muslin gowns reflecting the colours of the China asters and phloxes in a nearby flower bed. Beyond the glasshouse, a lively group of younger students, under the guidance of a mistress, was heading for the hawthorn wood. A gentle breeze wafted the summer scents into her study, with snatches of conversation and laughter. Her school showed to advantage in the sunny late August day.

She pressed a long finger to her temple and suppressed a sigh. Despite her dislike of the gentleman, Lord Stadbroke was correct. One small child more or less would not disturb her organization or disarrange any of the school's routines. She had only to order one more cot set up in the north dormitory. And it would be useful to have the two places in the senior class filled.

Besides, she wanted the viscount gone from her premises and her agreement would assure his departure. Her study--her cool, well-ordered, book-lined sanctuary--was violated by his presence. Portia found Stadbroke oddly disturbing. He was too aggressively male, and too demanding for her comfort. Her schedule as well had suffered with his visit. She had paper work to tend, a class to teach within the hour and the cook's problems to sort.

She fingered the equipage--keys, watch, and kit of tiny useful tools--that was suspended on chains from the band at the high waist of her gown, and found the familiar shape of the mother-of-pearl led etui that held the tools. Gripping

it, she took her decision with customary resolution. "Very well, my lord. You have convinced me. We will welcome your daughters, and endeavour to teach them each of our subjects to the best of our, and their, ability. They will be returned to you young ladies of accomplishment, learning, and modest behaviour."

"Excellent!" The viscount did nothing to conceal his satisfaction. He slapped the gloves he carried into the palm of his left hand.

Portia was hard put to maintain her civility. "When shall we expect the young ladies?"

"This day three weeks?" He smiled in great good humour, with confident charm.

Portia despised him for his self-satisfaction and his vanity. He had been very certain he would achieve his aim. She regretted that she could not--would not-deny him his object. But he would never know it.

Her façade of calm serenity did not falter. "We shall look forward to it, Lord Stadbroke. Your daughters will have their own bed each, but will each share a press with one other girl. We pride ourselves on the quality of our meals, and we have a matron that sees to the little needs of children away from the comfort of their families and their homes." She opened the top drawer of her handsome desk and withdrew a sheet of paper. "Here is a list of items that the young ladies may bring with them if they desire, and it includes the style and quantity of clothing we recommend. My invoice for the first term will be presented on the second of January, forty guineas per child. Have you any further questions, my lord?"

The viscount looked momentarily annoyed by her swift and concise completion of their transaction. He took the paper she handed him and gave it only a careless glance before folding it twice and jamming it in a small pocket in his riding coat. "None," he said. "I should warn you that I do not expect my daughters to remain long with you. I cannot think why they have undertaken this start. They have an excellent governess whom they appear to revere. I am keeping her in my employ with a view to the girls' quick return." He offered his hand, apparently unaware of the insult implicit in his words.

Portia could not ignore that slight. He thought his daughters would shortly wish for escape, did he? Well, he would learn that they would enjoy their time at Mansion House; all her girls did. They would not wish to soon leave.

Nevertheless, the girls' motive in attending at all was a mystery, one that she looked forward to solving. Could it be that the governess was less to their taste than they had itted to their father? Or was Lincolnshire just too far away from London where their father seemed to reside? And how had they heard of the Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies?

A cough from the viscount drew her attention. He was still holding out his hand. She eyed his strong, hard fingers with some distaste. She much preferred to shake gloved hands when they belonged to strangers. There was no help for it however, and she released her etui and gave him her own slender hand. He shook it briefly, his clasp as cool and dry as her own. Their was brief, no longer than polite, and yet it was rife with awareness. She snatched her fingers out of his clasp with a momentary loss of control, then pinned a smile to her lips. She avoided his eyes; she had no wish to discover if he too had experienced that consciousness.

"We will expect your daughters on the tenth of September then, my lord." She pulled the bell to summon her elderly porter. "Good day."

Viscount Stadbroke found himself on the stone doorstep, well-satisfied with his visit despite his summary dismissal. He sauntered down the well-scrubbed steps of the substantial villa that was the Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies, Hornsey. After some stout disputation, and several organized arguments on the part of Miss Crossmichael, he had carried the day. He had not expected her opposition, but had welcomed the opportunity to cross swords with her. She was a worthy opponent though the sort of female he could not ire: she was plain, officious and clever.

Miss Portia Crossmichael, he decided, could have been nothing other than a teacher. From her long, straight nose to her undoubtedly blue-stockinged toes shod in neat half-boots, she proclaimed her chosen profession. Her grey-striped muslin gown, though it was subtly fashionable, had been made high to the neck and long sleeved despite the summer warmth. A modestly ruffled cap had framed a rather long oval face that was without strong bone structure. The cap had also very nearly concealed undeniably sandy hair. Darker brows and long lashes surrounded a pair of fine grey eyes that some might have called handsome.

Whatever the deficiencies of her appearance, it was Miss Crossmichael's character that concerned him most. Her nature, by his judgement, was serene but verged on cold and detached. And she could not have more than thirty years in her dish.

There had been, he thought, a momentary interruption in her reserve when they had shaken hands. He had been very aware himself of the delicacy of her bones and the tenderness of her skin. He shook his head at the rank foolishness of his thoughts. He was imputing attractiveness to a long-meg of a schoolmistress? No, she was surely a starched up prig. The girls would not find her so kind as middle-aged Miss Thripton, or as willing to in their games and plays.

She would do however, and she offered a substantial curriculum. The noisy occupants of the several classrooms he had seen appeared happy and those abroad in the gardens looked contented. And he could not fault Miss Crossmichael on the fabric of her institution. The building was impeccably maintained, the gardens well kept. The corridors and chambers through which he had been quickly toured by the so-charming French mistress on his arrival were spotlessly clean. He had ired the fountain which played in the afternoon sun outside the schoolmistress's orderly study and the glasshouse which lay beyond a terraced yard. All in all a prosperous business.

The dearest wish of his three daughters had been fulfilled; they could attend the Mansion House Establishment for the winter months. Why they wished to attend the school when they seemed always to be perfectly happy at his seat, Stadley Place in Lincolnshire, he had no idea. But then the thought processes of women had always been a mystery to him. His daughters--at least the eldest of them-were all too rapidly approaching womanhood.

Anyway, it was a pleasant enough place, Hornsey. The village, such as it was, drowsed in the heat of the late August afternoon. Horse chestnuts towered over the lane--Cress Lane--which led to Mansion House from the High Street. There were a few isolated large houses nearby--the retreats of merchants and bankers he had been told--and The Three Comes Inn could be seen at the end of the street. To the north and west of the school spread a timbered park--an ash wood he thought--and in the distance rose the gentle height of Muswell Hill.

Stadbroke's idle reflections were interrupted by the arrival of a horseman. A young man dismounted and tossed his reins familiarly to the groom who appeared leading the viscount's own mount. He was a well-set-up young fellow-stocky and good-looking--dressed with neatness and propriety but no pretensions to fashion. He nodded politely to the viscount.

"Good day," Stadbroke said, taking no trouble to conceal his curiosity.

Perforce, the younger man stopped. "Caldwell Dent, at your service, sir. Teacher of art and astronomy..." He jerked a casual thumb over his shoulder at the school even as he bowed.

"I am Stadbroke, Mr. Dent. How can you...wait, Dent...Dent...an art teacher did you say? Are you not a portrait painter?"

"I am, my lord. I am flattered that you recognize my name; I will be better known one day."

"From what I have seen of your work, you will indeed. And why should you teach here...given what I have seen of your art?"

"Needs must, my lord. It takes time to establish a clientele." The young man was cheerful. "Besides in teaching we learn. Miss Crossmichael is my sister; she has been kind enough to encourage my artistic career. I can do no less than her educational endeavours. Have you a daughter here?"

"I shall soon have three in attendance." Stadbroke reflected idly that Dent looked nothing like his sister. A half-sister he decided; they carried different names after all. He dismissed the thought. "I was going to ask how you could bear to be plagued by females all day?"

"I find them pleasant enough company, Lord Stadbroke. My focus is on my work after all, not the ladies, whatever their age."

"I shall leave you to it then, Dent. And think you a more patient man than I." Stadbroke nodded and took charge of his bay mare from the groom.

Dent offered a quick farewell and, after taking the steps two at a time, entered the school.

Stadbroke mounted, tossed a coin to the groom, and continued his ruminations as he headed down the gravelled drive. The girls would be safe here, and happy, though he questioned the ability of the reserved schoolmistress to provide as pleasant a course of learning as Miss Thripton did at Stadley Place. He turned his horse's head and trotted down the lane without a backward look.

The girls would learn a thing or two at the school; he had no doubt of that. Well, on their own heads be it, he thought. He'd given them what they desired.

* * * *

Portia looked at the three youthful faces before her and wondered what it was that the three daughters of Lord Stadbroke desired of her school.

They had arrived four days earlier in company with their father and a middleaged governess. Portia had taken immediately to the governess; she was just the sort of commonsensical and intelligent woman she liked to employ as her teachers. She might find a way to indicate to Miss Thripton that, should she ever seek to leave Stadbroke's employ, she could apply to Mansion House School for a position.

Portia had taken care to speak only briefly with the viscount on his visit. Her comments had been polite and businesslike. He had in his turn had little to say to her, and she told herself she was glad of it. She had closely observed his exchanges with his daughters; to her surprise they were both informal and loving. He had taken his leave quickly with a sensitivity to his daughters' feelings that she could scarcely credit. She had been left with much to ponder and again with that niggling feeling of familiarity. She had pushed it all aside in the bustle of installing the young ladies.

They had been matter of fact and cheerful about the departure of their father and their governess, had made their farewells with a modicum of sentiment and no melancholy. From all s, they had been in good spirits since also. Portia had received reports of them from various of the mistresses and masters, and the matron, and she had already a good notion of their characters and capabilities.

Now they had been invited to take tea with her in the school's parlour, a small nicety that she practiced with all her new students. When she thought they had settled in to their new surroundings, she gave them opportunity to tell her if all was well with them.

The weather had broken and autumn rain lashed the closed windows. The colza lamps had been lit against the dreary day, and a substantial fire warmed the pleasant room. It held a variety of chairs and sophas, well-filled bookshelves and useful tables. Some of Caldwell's oils--his occasional still-life renderings-decorated the softly distempered walls. The parlour served a variety of uses in the daily life of the school, particularly as a meeting place for the senior girls in the evening after their supper. The young ladies were encouraged to read and study in the parlour, work at their needlework, and turn over the newspapers that were brought each day from London. Portia thought of it as the social heart of her school.

The Misses Perrington stood before her in a neat stepped row on the India carpet after their orderly entry. Lord Stadbroke must be justifiably proud of his offspring, for they were pretty girls and well-behaved. They were gowned in simple kerseymere dresses as befitted the cool day. Everything about their garments bespoke quality, but they wore no ornaments. Someone had carefully conned the list she had bestowed on the viscount, and kept the young ladies' apparel within its guidelines.

Portia regarded them thoughtfully, and they returned her scrutiny without dissimulation. Sabina, the eldest of the three, already showed a charming figure and her piquant face, with her father's dark eyes, would only gain in beauty as it gained in maturity. Melicent, the middle child, was inclined to moodiness; Portia had heard of hints of drama already. No doubt the avid intelligence that peered at her from a triangular face would enhance an elfin charm in later years. The smallest girl, Penelope, had displayed none of the homesickness that she might have expected from any other eight-year-old. The child had taken to dormitory life with sturdy independence--as her father had indicated she would--and had already begun to gather her own coterie about her.

Examining the threesome, Portia experienced again that strong sensation of familiarity their father had engendered. And suddenly the reason for it came to her. She had encountered the viscount before--long before--during her single Season in the heart of the beau monde. She had had that season eleven years previous; it had been just three unfortunate months in the bosom of society. Being tall and thin--all awkward angles and corners--and shy, she had not garnered any notice and certainly no popularity. She had been a hanger-on at the season of her cousin who, being both vivacious and pretty, had taken. At every ball, every rout, and every call she had had time to watch her cousin with yearning and observe all the other bright and beautiful creatures enjoy themselves.

Yes, she had seen both the viscount and his wife during that season. The encounter she best ed had been at a ball--which one she could not now

have told--but at a great, glittering affair that she had experienced from its margins. The Viscount Stadbroke--he'd been the Honourable Ingram Perrington then--had been the darling of the ton and he had looked the happiest, most carefree, young man in it. He was then only a few years wed to the beautiful Honoria Wickson, and the grace and gaiety with which he had danced with his exquisite wife, and showered attentions upon her, had stayed with Portia in all the long years since. Hidden in her subconscious yes, but nevertheless that vision had stayed with her.

She had wanted, during that humiliating season, to be the lovely Mrs. Perrington, to be the cynosure of all eyes, and the darling of a virile and attractive husband. She had dreamed dreams then that she had long since dismissed and she had entertained fancies and fantasies that even then she had known would not come true.

No wonder the Perrington girls were handsome; their mother had been a beauty. She ed that lady's loveliness with a familiar wistful pang. She would not permit herself to envy others' beauty, but she would always regret her own lack of comeliness.

Her calm good sense reasserted itself and satisfaction with her current situation flooded back. Her recent impressions of the viscount made nonsense of her former immature daydreams; he was no longer her beau ideal. She could smile at her youthful self.

"Miss Crossmichael?"

"Ma'am?"

She heard absently the interested query in the elder girls' voices, but it was Penelope's impatient tug on her gown that finally caught her attention. That hasty pull at her plum-coloured merino skirt which set her keys to jingling brought Portia back from her reflections to her own parlour, in her own school, and to her prosaic life.

"My dears! I was wool-gathering. You must forgive me." She waved the girls to seats and took her own place behind the tea tray. "Now, how do you go on? Have you everything you need? Do you miss your home and your papa?" She poured out for them, watching them unobtrusively. They were consulting in unspoken language about their response. Young ladies, in her experience, were remarkable communicators.

Finally, Sabina spoke. "We do miss our home, ma'am, but we have come here precisely so that we need not yearn for our father this winter."

Portia was briefly at a loss. She ed her young guests the plate of raspberry tarts for which her cook was rightly renowned, and assumed an enquiring air.

"Papa ith an ornament to society. And a pillar of government," young Penelope explained earnestly as she chose a sweet. Her gaze strayed to the cluster of suspended keys and watch that included her etui at Portia's high waist.

"Last winter, he left Stadley Place in October to attend at Parliament, and from then to the end of May we saw him only at Christmas." Melicent frowned ferociously.

"Lincolnshire is a vatht distance from London, Mith Crothmichael." Penelope

was possessed of an occasional lisp--caused by half-emerged front teeth--which disturbed her not at all. It did not either interfere with her careful consumption of her chosen tart.

The lisp bestowed a droll charm upon her words that made Portia wish to smile. But anger with the viscount overrode all other emotions. How could he desert these delightful children? An ornament to society, indeed! No doubt the viscount was in search of another wife, for surely he would want a male heir. That would be the reason he had left his daughters in Lincolnshire, so that he could search London unencumbered for a second lovely lady.

"We asked if we might come, with Miss Thripton, to stay in our new Hill Street house, but he refused us permission." The injustice of the viscount's prohibition evidently rankled with Melicent. She broke her own tart into shards upon the fine china plate she held.

"We thought all last winter that if only we were at least near London, we could see Papa much more frequently. Attendance at a school seemed our best possibility for a removal from Lincolnshire." Sabina took control of the conversation with a minatory look at her younger sisters. "We heard of your school, Miss Crossmichael, from the cousin of one of my dearest friends. She said everyone who attended here had the most wonderful times, and learned more than they could have imagined. Mansion House School seemed a quite perfect answer to our needs."

"When he was at home in the summer we plagued him the entire time, pleaded and begged." Melicent said with smug satisfaction. "We were determined to come south with him. He soon agreed."

Portia thought that it would take someone experienced indeed in the ways of

children to withstand the machinations of these three. She hoped her own knowledge was sufficient to the task. A chuckle threatened her composure; she turned it into a cough. "I am very happy that we may be of service. I think though that I had rather have pupils come to me because they wish to learn what we have here to teach." She tranquilly drank her tea, and allowed her words to be digested.

"Oh we do want to learn!" Sabina was quick to understood the delicate criticism and even quicker to counter it.

"Miss Thripton doesn't teach German or astronomy," said Melicent, proving that she had studied the curriculum of the school. She chewed the fragments of her tart thoughtfully.

"Yet Miss Thripton may suffer because of your attendance here. Did that occur to you? Why should your father continue to employ her if you are here at school?"

Penelope's round eyes grew yet more round. "He wouldn't...he couldn't. Oh, Mith Crothmichael, he would not send her away, would he?"

Even Melicent looked concerned.

Sabina said, with a worried frown, "We have been selfish. She seemed so ive, so certain that we were right in wanting to be nearby to Papa." She set her teacup on the Pembroke table that sat beside the sopha on which she perched.

"I think Miss Thripton would put your needs beyond her own interests. But perhaps a letter to your father asking if you have endangered Miss Thripton's livelihood might be in order." Portia made her suggestion with a show of disinterest.

She was rewarded by an immediate response.

"Yes!" Sabina rose.

"Oh yeth." Penelope's lisp seemed quite uncontrollable, sometimes much in evidence, sometimes unnoticeable. She hurried to the door without requesting permission.

"May we be excused?" Melicent was the only one to recall her manners.

"You may." Portia watched the girls hurry out. Sabina followed her younger sisters and closed the door carefully behind them.

She had poured herself a second cup of tea when the door reopened. Penelope's small dark-haired head appeared around the edge. "If we are nearby to Papa though, surely he must come, do you not think?" she asked.

"I cannot imagine that he would stay away," Portia said, her reassurance genuine. She would herself see that the viscount visited his delightful offspring, if she had to.

* * * *

When the Perrington girls had been with her three weeks, Portia began to wonder if indeed she would have to summon the viscount to visit his daughters. She mentioned the matter at the regular Friday afternoon meeting of her teaching staff attended by the dancing master, the local rector who instructed in Latin and religious studies, the arithmetic and natural sciences' mistress, the long time needlework and pianoforte mistress, the languages' mistress, and of course Portia's brother. All the young ladies of the school were encouraged to undertake quiet pursuits overseen by the matron and housekeeper while their teachers held their discussions in Portia's study.

"Does anyone know if the daughters of Lord Stadbroke have received a communication from their father?" Portia asked. She looked at the paper before her upon which she had been making notes. At an earlier meeting with her housekeeping staff, she had approved the purchase of two new sets of linen and had informed the cook that though the students' dislike of mutton was indeed reprehensible, they must replace mutton stew with some other dish. Just moments ago she had sanctioned a new course of advanced mathematics which Miss Gamston highly recommended. Her tidy handwriting recorded the details, but she was not aware of them. Her attention was upon the failings of Lord Stadbroke.

Her staff rustled their papers and shuffled their feet but Madame Heloise Montlucon, the mistress of French and Italian, was the only one who volunteered any knowledge of the matter. "One of them has received a letter each week in turn. I believe it means a great deal to them; they huddle over the notes with such eagerness. Gavrielle has had snatches of the viscount's tidings related to her."

Madame, a widow of some five years standing with a daughter of twelve, was also Portia's very good friend. She was a small, pretty woman of some two and thirty years, with curling hair, a neat figure, close acquaintanceship with the ton, and a penchant for gossip. Although an émigré of a dozen years, she had still a pronounced accent and a habit of sprinkling her native language throughout her conversation.

"He should have visited by now," Portia said. "How are his daughters dealing with their class work?"

There was a general agreement among the teachers that the young ladies were the equal of, if not superior to, the other students.

"Very well, I think that is all for today then," Portia dismissed her staff with a vague feeling of dissatisfaction. She rose as they did, and became aware that her brother and Heloise showed no signs of departing.

Miss Gosberton--Portia's own teacher when she had begun to study at the school--turned back at the door from the small crowd of masters and mistresses. "Oh, Miss Crossmichael, the pianoforte needs tuning."

"Thank you, Ada, I shall send a note to our excellent Fishling. We cannot teach the young ladies proper pitch if we cannot trust our instruments." She bent to add to the notes on her desk, then moved to shepherd the stragglers out of the door. A sigh of relief escaped her as she turned back to the two remaining.

"This viscount has you agitated, cheri," Heloise remarked with curiosity from her seat near the fire. "I can sympathize; he is very attractive. I was delighted to

tour him about the day he first visited. My correspondents tell me he cuts a great dash in town. The ton is wild for him: his fine house, his handsome horses, his charm, his dancing. He was from society for years, immured in Lincolnshire, and is only recently returned. Shall we seek to impress him?" She raised her dark brows in a distinctly continental inquiry.

From where he stood at the terrace doors, Caldwell Dent snorted inelegantly.

"We shall seek only to give Lord Stadbroke nothing of which to complain," Portia said, with a snap. "It seems to me that he would have no hesitation in doing so. While I would complain of him: his style of life, and his neglect of his children." She gathered her papers together and tapped them to a tidy pile upon her desk.

"Neglect is a harsh word." Dent crumpled his own papers in his hand and crossed the room to pause by Madame Montlucon's chair. "Madame M. is the only parent I know who sees her child every day and that is because Gavrielle is right here in the school, her mother's place of employment."

The French mistress rose and rapped his arm with a roll of documents she carried. "You, sir, are impertinent! But correct. You know it is so, Portia. The children of England's aristocrats and even its gentry do not regularly encounter their parents. And how should they? Those adults are busy with all that is in the beau monde. You were part of that world, cherie, do you not recall it?"

"I scarcely knew it, Heloise. I was hardly a part of it; I stalked its fringes. My uncle was a Scottish peer; I only accompanied my cousin, his daughter, through her London season on sufferance. She took, I did not. I suppose it is an enchanted world, but now I see those who suffer for it. The Perrington girls long to see their father. He should be aware of it, but he is just another arrogant

aristocrat."

"Such venom, cherie. You sound like the revolutionaries I heard in my childhood," Heloise said. "Did you meet the viscount during your season?"

Portia was appalled at her loss of composure. Now she had revealed to her astute friend her disproportionate interest in Stadbroke and his children.

Caldwell gave her a moment's respite. He was struggling with laughter. "Portia, a revolutionary? You know better than that, Madame M." He continued more seriously, "I can say nothing against Stadbroke. He seemed a good enough sort when I met him on the steps."

"You met him?" Portia turned on her brother in astonishment.

"I did. Did I not mention it? We enjoyed a brief exchange of views. He has been vetted by both Madame and me, Port; he is no ogre." Caldwell wandered to the terrace doors again, stared at the increasingly sere garden, and came back to perch on the corner of Portia's desk.

"Just neglectful. Yes, I did meet him once in my youth; he has no recollection of it. I shall not mention it to him, but I will demand his attendance upon those poor children." Portia clung stubbornly to her annoyance.

Heloise regarded her friend with lively curiosity and something of perplexity. "Do write to him then, my dear. I certainly would not hesitate to communicate

with the viscount had I a reason. But I shall go now to Gavrielle, so that she may not also think herself neglected." Heloise fluttered her fingers in farewell to both sister and brother, and whisked out the door.

Abandoning her desk, Portia crossed the chamber and seated herself on the Sheraton sofa which she had bought for herself on the first month her school had turned a profit. It had been an extravagance that never ceased to please her. From it, she regarded her brother. She strove to regain the serenity on which she prided herself.

"Do you suppose she truly finds Stadbroke attractive? Would she really welcome the opportunity to become further acquainted with him, do you think?" Caldwell, who had risen on Madame's departure, flung himself down again this time in a winged chair by the fire.

"I don't know, Cal. I shouldn't suppose so. You know she is very attached to you." She smiled at the young man with whom she shared so many memories. They were not all pleasant. "I would not refine too much upon it. You know Heloise loves to tease you, and me. Now, have you any concerns about the week just past, or the one to come? Have you enough time to devote to the portrait of Lady Mottingham?"

"Of course I do. You are ridiculously generous with me, you know that."

Portia did know it, but it was her pleasure to be indulgent of her step-brother. His widowed father had married her widowed mother when Portia was but ten and Caldwell only four. She had delighted to have a sibling, even without the relationship of blood, and through the vicissitudes of life with a weak mother and a venal father, they had formed a close and constant bond.

Caldwell had early showed signs of artistic talent and now at four and twenty he was a talented portraitist. Portia was determined to give him every opportunity to develop his skill and advance his career. She was happy to provide him with a home in return for the lessons he taught in drawing and watercolour and astronomy to her students.

"You deserve every benefit I can bestow upon you," she said.

"Well, the least I can do is see off this viscount if he gives you any trouble!"

They grinned at each other in mutual charity.

But Portia returned to worry at the matter of the Perringtons. "I am overstating my concern, I know it. But the girls are charming and they deserve his consideration." She became aware that her step-brother was not listening. "Enough of Stadbroke however. I have known you these twenty years and I can tell when something is bothering you. What has happened, my dear?"

Caldwell sobered immediately, got to his feet and stalked again to the window that overlooked the gardens. He stared again at the last bedraggled flowers and was silent for a long moment. Then he turned and said, "I have had word, a letter, from my father."

Whatever she had expected, it had not been that. Portia goggled inelegantly at him. "Step-father? But it must be five or more years since we have heard from him. What does he want? Why now?"

"I do not know. I cannot even guess how he came to have my direction. But he wants to meet with me, as I am 'his only son and therefore dearer to him than anyone on this earth'." Caldwell paced the India carpet, his agitation evident in every tense muscle.

"That rings true of his hypocrisy. When?"

"He says he will write again. I can only hope he will not do so. I have no inclination to attend him." Caldwell paused by the fire.

Portia was briefly silent, thinking anxiously. "I think you must if you receive another communication, Cal," she said at last. "He might be ill, or in some difficulty. Despite his faults he is still your father."

"His faults included unkindness to you, and your mother, and a near run thing with dishonour for us all, if you will . I have little inclination to meet him."

She ed it all too well, the slights and insults, the unhappy school vacations, and the humiliation of Dent's slaps. Her attempts at protection of her mother and her step-brother had failed miserably. "Still, I think you must. But you will do of course as you wish. You will know what is proper and possible."

He cast her a quick smile that banished the frown lines on his forehead and made him appear even younger. "You taught me what is 'proper and possible', Port. You are always so equitable, and so wise. You have made good for all of those

you employ, sister dear, and we are as always your devoted slaves. You'll impress this viscount if you do not frighten him to death. How odd that you have met him before."

"I wish you will forget that. I do not want to impress Stadbroke, except with his duty to his children. And I cannot think that he will frighten easily," Portia said. "Why do fathers cause their children so much misery?"

"I don't know, Port, but I shan't if Heloise will only consent to marry me. I shall be the best of stepfathers to Gavrielle, and the most attentive of fathers to my offspring should Madame present me with un petit paquet."

"You are so nonsensical, my dear! And you run ahead of yourself; best not let Heloise hear you speak so."

"Life requires a certain levity, Port. You worry too much," Caldwell suggested as he bent to pat her cheek before leaving her.

Portia, left alone, supposed that she did. But she was determined that Lord Stadbroke would attend upon his daughters.

CHAPTER TWO

Ingram Perrington--Lord Stadbroke--was reflecting upon the same matter. He had strolled into White's in a fit of abstraction, nodded to those of his acquaintance with distracted courtesy, ordered himself a brandy, and sunk into a leather chair isolated near a fireplace that remained unlit due to the recurrence of fine September weather.

What was he to do about his daughters? Now that they were installed close to London in that damned school, he would have to visit them more frequently than he had had to last winter.

Not that he minded. He loved his children. He could take them to Astley's and the menagerie and the Panoramas and the wax works. Penelope and Melicent would enjoy those activities, he was certain of it. But Sabina...Sabina was within weeks of her fifteenth birthday, and the older his daughters grew, the less he knew what to do with them, how to talk with them.

In truth, he wished that female children had not to become young women. He rolled a mouthful of brandy over his tongue, and stared unseeingly at the uncertain oil painting of some hunt that hung on the dark paper of the far wall. When his girls had all been under twelve he had gloried in their company. They'd fished and ridden, laughed and talked, played at spillikins and silver loo, solved puzzles and conundrums, and created tableaux and dramas. Then they had gotten older, more like--at least in appearance--the women he knew. The manipulative, silly, frivolous ladies who were his mother, his mother-in-law and his late wife.

He did not know how to prevent his daughters becoming images of those foolish women. And he had had no intention of submitting to any more feminine persuasion. So he'd come to London. He had bought a town house, furnished it to his own taste, and staffed it to his own liking. He had accepted invitations, made himself agreeable to the beau monde, and entertained himself as he wished. He had recaptured the youth he had missed through his marriage at twenty and fatherhood at one and twenty. The past thirty months had been an escape, a revelation and an education; he had thoroughly enjoyed himself.

Now the girls' presence threatened his style of life. Oh, they were not close enough to London to watch his movements from Watier's and White's to Manton's, Tatt's and Jackson's. They were not in society so they would not know of his flirtations or his liaisons or his apparently irresistible appeal to various ladies of the ton. Nor would they ever know of the mistress he kept discreetly in a narrow house near Covent Garden.

But still they were close, too close to London. Their proximity discomfited him, caused him to consider his actions. He felt guilty.

He wrote to them each week, addressing his letter to a different daughter each time, but it wasn't apparently enough. Their letters were full of requests for his company. And he wanted to see them...

Just not too often.

As well, they seemed to need his reassurance that he would not dismiss Miss Thripton. Had Miss Crossmichael had anything to do with the girls' sudden worries? He had wondered when it would occur to them that he might terminate the governess' employment. He would do it too, if he was not so very certain that they would tire of the school and miss the Place. He'd sent Miss Thripton back to

Lincolnshire, but he'd made certain a generous retainer kept her in his employ.

"Stadbroke?" The speaker's tone indicated that it was not the first time he had tried to attract the viscount's attention. He was gentleman of medium height with fair good looks and a pleasant, dependable air about him.

Ingram looked up from his contemplation of his brandy, to see his one trusted London friend before him. "Lanark!" he exclaimed, "Good to see you. Will you sit down? me in a drink?"

"Are you certain you wish my company? You looked miles away, and not just because you chose this isolated corner of the club."

"No, no, I'm always glad to see a friend." Ingram's pleasure was sincere. Most of the men he had come to know in London had remained acquaintances, their company enjoyed while engaged in a variety of masculine pursuits. Only this one fellow had become a true friend, in the way that his neighbours in Lincolnshire were his friends. He had met Lord Francis Lanark at Manton's in the first week of his taking up residence in Hill Street and they had quickly formed a bond that Stadbroke ventured to hope was lifelong.

He gestured to the waiter to bring another brandy.

Lanark drew over a leather-clad armchair to him. "What's to do? You were certainly lost in thought."

"M'daughters. They've come to school, in Hornsey." The words came out more doleful than Ingram intended.

"Ah, Miss Crossmichael's establishment..." Lanark took his brandy from the waiter's tray and leaned back in his chair with a contented sigh.

"Good God, how did you know?" Ingram's astonishment was genuine.

"Every parent of daughters knows of the Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies. It's a byword. If you want your daughters educated in more than mere accomplishments, you send them to Mansion House. Dorothea's already considering when Genevra should attend, and she's only seven."

"I'd never heard of the place, until my daughters started campaigning to attend there."

"Oh but you haven't precisely spent your time in London talking about your children with mothers and dowagers, have you? Opera dancers and gamesters tend to discuss...other matters." Lanark's jest was without malice, but Ingram was stung to a quick response.

"I devoted fourteen years to my estate, my wife, and my children. I like discussing other matters." He knew his response to be defensive, and the fact irritated him.

"I had no intention of criticism," Lanark assured him. "You certainly missed out

on all the things most of us did in our salad days. You sowed no wild oats before you were wed. You are entitled to sow some now, surely. I was merely pointing up the fact that you do not keep the company that might have informed you of the elevated position that Mansion House School holds in the opinions of the ton."

Ingram relaxed with a laugh. "That is certainly true. I just wish I knew why the girls were so set upon attending the school. I'd rather they were safe in Lincolnshire, enjoying the Place as I did in my youth."

"Do you wish them in Lincolnshire so that they are safe, or so that you are safe?" Lord Francis examined his brandy glass assiduously as he voiced the pointed question.

Ingram acknowledged the hit with a wave of his left hand. He responded after only a moment's thought. "Both, dear chap, both, I fear. What do you know of this Miss Crossmichael? She seemed a calm, capable sort: not restrictive, I hope? I want my daughters to enjoy their youth."

"Dorothea informs me that Miss Crossmichael is the personification of wisdom. The young ladies which Mansion House turns out are paragons of every virtue, and well-educated. And they regularly return to visit Miss Crossmichael because they adore her and have a wonderful time in her establishment."

"Good God," Ingram blinked. "She seemed a cold stick, not the kind to inspire such hero worship."

"Only seen the woman once, so I can't say. She has some sort of connection to

the ton, attends the occasional soiree, though I've never spoken with her. But I trust Dora's judgement. I think you may be comfortable about your girls. If she approves the woman, it is good enough for me."

"Having met your Dora, I think I must agree. Her understanding is superior and I have every faith in her discernment." A distant burst of laughter from the card room caught Ingram's attention momentarily. He noticed his glass was empty and decided not to order another brandy. He'd never been a heavy tippler.

"That is high praise from you. I have the impression that you do not hold women in high esteem." Lanark seemed intent upon a serious discussion.

Ingram was loathe to consider his prejudices, but he could not deny his friend's accusation. "I have found women to be manipulative, calculating and controlling. I spent years being manoeuvred by tears, recriminations and reproach until I finally understood their methods. When my wife died and then my mother, I determined never to submit again to petticoat tyranny. I revel in my freedom."

"I thought so. There's a bet about the town that you are hanging out for a new wife."

Ingram snorted incredulously. "I hope you've put your blunt on the negative. Be damned if I'll leg-shackle myself again. The girls are duty enough. They are in expectation of frequent visits."

"A Sunday drive might be all that is required. They are kept busy, that I do know." Lanark spoke with the confidence of a man whose progeny all were little

more than infants.

"Possibly," Ingram said. Lanark did not know his children. Their demands were without the subtlety of mature femininity but they were none the less determined. His girls were straightforward and stubborn, and they wanted to have their way. "I wish you may be right."

Lanark seemed content to abandon his cross-questioning. "Are you attending at the Castlereaghs' rout this evening? Do you fancy an amble over to Tatt's?"

"No, and no, I thank you." Ingram rose, anxious suddenly for more solitude. He softened his abrupt departure with the promise of future meetings and made his way from the room with the pretence of an important engagement. He gathered his beaver and his stick from the porter and let himself out of the building.

Once standing on the doorstep of the exclusive club, he paused, however, and reflected upon his destination. He had had it in mind to visit his mistress this afternoon, before he met a few of his parliamentary colleagues to plan strategy for use when the House of Lords gathered again in a little over a month.

The visit had seemed a good idea that morning. Clothilde was expecting him. Now with his daughters crowding his mind, it seemed indefinably wrong to visit the woman he ed in such style. Drat it, she was someone's daughter, someone's sister. And he didn't even know what had driven or encouraged her to take up such a career; he had never asked. Had someone neglected her, had her father abused or abandoned her?

He shook his head at his thoughts, and absently greeted acquaintances who

pressed past him to enter White's. He was an obstruction to the doorway, he finally realized, and set off down the street. Clothilde was a Cyprian, he reminded himself, a high flyer; she had chosen her life. But had she really, his conscience whispered. He paused again, was buffeted by ers-by, and withdrew to a shop wall to pull out his pocketbook and a small silver pencil. He jotted a quick note excusing himself from Clothilde's company, and summoned a grubby urchin who often hovered outside the clubs hoping for remunerative errands.

"Take this to King Street, Number 2." He pressed a coin into the grimy hand with the note and manufactured a severe look. "I shall know if it is not received." The boy seemed reliable, and he promised prompt delivery of the note. Ingram hoped the lad kept his promise, but what did it matter after all? He was paying Clothilde to be available to him at his convenience.

With his daughters in his thoughts, the arrangement did not seem as satisfactory as it had the past two years.

* * * *

"I don't know how I shall be civil to the dratted man. He has not been near since he left his daughters here nearly a month ago." Portia paced the length of her comfortable study, pausing momentarily at the door to the terrace to watch the young ladies walking the labyrinth in the weakening autumn sun. She scowled at the papers littering her well-polished desk. "Those poor children confided that of the whole winter last year Lord Stadbroke spent no more than three weeks with them at Christmas."

Her friend Heloise sipped her cup of tea. They had stolen a half of an hour between classes to refresh themselves and prepare for their next lessons. She

said, "That is more time than most of the ton spends with their children. You know this, Portia, we spoke of it not so long ago. Even if the children are in the same house, the parents rarely see them. A visit to the nursery, a curtsy in the drawing room; if the child is very privileged, an hour before bedtime perhaps a story. If the viscount did at Christmas as the children say, play with them, skate with them, decorate the house and present them gifts, they are fortunate."

Portia misliked her friend's tolerant smile. "They have no mother, Heloise! And you know there are parents who do things very differently: who think their children more than a nuisance or mere continuance of a noble line." A frown creased Portia's wide brow.

"Why do you care so much about these children, cherie?"

"I care about all my girls." Portia plumped down in her chair, devoid of her customary grace. Her equipage jangled as the keys clashed with her watch and etui. The skirt of her dark blue dimity gown subsided in well-ordered folds about her long legs. She took up her own tea cup.

"Of course you do," Mme. Montlucon soothed her friend. "But the viscount it seems, scratches you the wrong way, despite you have seen him only twice."

"Rubs me the wrong way," Portia corrected. "Well, tell me I am wrong then to judge him harshly. It is true I scarcely know the man. You must know more gossip of him; you know tales of every member of the ton. Tell me what else you know of Lord Stadbroke and I will know if I have misjudged him."

"Well...." Heloise made a great work of hesitation. "Only since you ask, mind."

She sipped her tea again thoughtfully. "He is very wealthy, our new client, with a fine estate in Lincolnshire. A widower of some four years. The lady wife was a beautiful peagoose, though I hesitate to speak ill of the dead." She crossed herself devoutly.

Portia snorted inelegantly. She knew her friend to be a stout Huguenot. "Someone of your acquaintance had no such scruples!"

"True, true," Heloise nodded agreeably. "Your viscount never set a foot wrong, not to his thirty-first year. He was a devoted son, a faithful husband, a doting father. He was rarely seen in London, in fact. His estate is a showplace of modern agriculture and husbandry."

"Your sources of information spread their nets wide," Portia said, a sniff indicating her superiority. She fiddled with her etui, opening the small case and removing and replacing the scissors and the small pencil.

"And you benefit from it," her friend chided her. "Do you not? Or perhaps you wish to hear no more?"

"Wretch, you know I do. I should like to believe that I listen so that I might better understand my pupils. If I know their families, I will be aware of their challenges, surely."

"I think it may be of help, cherie. We shall believe it does. I know that you are not simply interested in gossip of the viscount." Heloise grinned mischievously at her friend. She finished her tea and set the delicate china on the polished surface of a nearby tripod table. "Three years ago this Stadbroke visited London,

bought a house in Hill Street. He left his daughters in the care of devoted servants in Lincolnshire, and proceeded to become familiar with London. Who knows what his goals are, but he is proficient in every sport, a sought after guest at any gathering from a ball to a rout to a musicale. I told you this before. He is a friend of Scott and of Constable, he may be seen frequently at libraries, booksellers and all the best exhibitions of art. And he attends regularly in the House of Lords."

"An impressive catalogue of merits." Portia was non-committal. Somehow the gentleman she had met did not quite match the information--complete as it was-that her friend was detailing.

Heloise said, "Then there is the other side to his character. He games, though not to excess, and may be seen at every club and hell. He likes the theatre, particularly the opera dancers. And the rest of his activities must not be told to a maiden lady of your standing."

"Very well. I think I desire to know nothing else. The man is no more nor less than others of his ilk." Portia knew that to display interest in Lord Stadbroke's less savoury exploits would cause Heloise to teasingly withhold them. She rose to go about her business. There was a sudden increase in activity out in the corridor bespeaking a change in classes.

Her friend likewise rose. "A little more, I think." Her eagerness to complete her tale was obvious.

"More?"

"Oh, yes." Heloise made certain the door was closed and cast a glance at the glassed door which led to the small terrace. It revealed only the young ladies leaving the labyrinth to return to the house, and a day that had turned overcast. Her voice dropped in volume nevertheless. "He is insatiable, my dear. Discriminating, but insatiable. He has had two mistresses in three years, each of them deeply saddened to lose his 'company'. The ladies of the ton are likewise enamoured of his boudoir skills."

Portia was suddenly appalled, at herself, at her friend and her friend's informants, and in no small amount at the viscount--a paragon of every virtue-and devotee of every vice. "Enough!" she said loudly enough to startle Heloise.

That lady stared at her in some surprise.

"Enough," said Portia more quietly. "I should not have asked and am well served. I now know more than I could ever wish of the viscount. Those young ladies must certainly never know all this. I charge you to keep your counsel."

Mme. Montlucon drew herself up to the utmost of her inconsiderable height and assumed an air of dignity. "As if I should ever divulge such tales of a father to a daughter. I, the mother of a daughter, and all too aware of the frailties and fears of girls. I will bid you good day, Miss Crossmichael."

"Oh come down from your high ropes," Portia said. She hurried to pacify the friend she had made ten years before. Heloise had already been living in the village with her emigr&e#233; husband and infant daughter when Portia had returned to the school to teach after her disastrous season. They had forged a friendship that had ed them through Portia's decision to purchase the school and the death of Heloise's husband. It had been Portia's idea that Heloise should teach languages at the school when she had recovered from the first sharp

sting of grief. "You know precisely what I mean. Sometimes your correspondents are too efficient, and I am gullible enough to listen. 'Tis the closest I will ever again come to the ton, and still I am shocked by their habits." She hastened to turn the topic. "You have another class?"

"I do, as well you know. Gavrielle and her form await their Italian conjugations."

"Best to make them wait no longer. Twelve year olds can be unreasonable at the best of times." Portia picked up her own notebook. Geography with the most senior of the girls awaited her.

"As we have all too much opportunity to know." Heloise paused with her hand on the door handle. "Ah, Portia, this is not what we planned when we met, is it? Who would have thought...." She opened the door, nodded at Caldwell who had raised a hand to rap on its s and departed in a swirl of plum kerseymere.

Who would? echoed Portia in her mind even as she turned to greet her stepbrother. "A geography class is awaiting me."

"I know, I know. But spare me five minutes." Caldwell Dent wore his smock, which told Portia he was fresh come from his studio. He seldom wore it beyond the studio door, and that alone informed her of his inner turmoil.

"You have heard from Mr. Dent again?" she asked.

"How did you know?" Caldwell said, as grimly as his good nature would allow.

He entered, closing the door on a hall full of young ladies making their way to their next classes.

"Nothing else could bring such a frown to your face. What has he said?"

Caldwell withdrew a creased paper from the pocket of his smock and unfolded it. "You may read it."

Portia carried the paper to the window where the light, though now obscured by mist, was better. She read quickly. "Apologies for neglect, assurances of affection, and a proposal to meet. All very right and proper." She tapped the paper on her slender palm, before turning to her brother. "Why should we doubt his familial devotion?"

"You have to ask? With our history, knowing what you know of him?" Caldwell's paint-stained hands clenched and unclenched convulsively.

Portia abandoned her joking manner. He was in no mood to appreciate her irony. "No, no of course not. He will have some reason, some devious plan, afoot. Will you meet him?"

"I think so. Better the devil you know, and so on. I had rather understand what he is plotting than wonder." Caldwell visibly set aside his concerns and added, "I have finished the Mottingham portrait. Do you care to come and have a look before I wrap it?"

"I should be delighted; I'll just pop in on my class and set them an exercise." Portia thrust away new worries and headed out the door. It was always pure pleasure to see one of her brother's new works. He deserved every commission and every success that he could gain. They had heard that even Mr. Turner had begun to recommend Caldwell Dent to those wishing to have their portrait taken.

They paused at Portia's classroom on the first floor and Cal waited in the corridor while she requested her students to study the atlas to find the maps of Asia Minor. Then they climbed the stairs to Caldwell's studio. On their way, they ed the three Perrington sisters descending. Portia checked the small gold watch that had earlier clashed with her suspended keys and other necessities.

"Girls, you are aware that Sabina and Melicent have needlework in ten minutes? And Penelope you should be on your way to your arithmetic prep." Portia's tone was grave but not severe.

"Yes, Miss Crossmichael." Sabina's response was all that it should be: respectful and dutiful.

But Portia noticed that the girl's gaze strayed with worshipful devotion to Caldwell before she hurried down the stairs. She sighed; it seemed every senior girl had to suffer an infatuation, at least briefly, for her brother.

The responses of the other two girls were polite and compliant.

"Yes, Miss."

"Yeth, Mith."

They exchanged nothing more than grins with Mr. Dent before following in their older sister's wake down the polished stairs.

Portia wondered what the girls had been about. As they disappeared at the half landing she said to her brother, "Yet another danger there, my dear, with young Sabina."

"I am aware," he said with an impatient shrug. "I am no coxcomb or Nonesuch, Port, why must the older girls see me as desirable? They are children." He emphasized the last word heavily.

"I am as always happy to hear you say it, Cal, but that is the problem. They are not children. But the fact that they fancy themselves in love with you speaks more of them than of you. Any presentable young man would garner the same attention. Just manage the matter with your usual aloofness."

"I will!" He ushered her into his studio. "You may be certain, I will."

* * * *

It was a magnificent portrait for the sitter was favoured with a beauty that was undeniable. Caldwell's talented brush had captured every nuance of character and loveliness. Portia stood in silent awe for some minutes then congratulated him with sincere extravagance before hurrying back down the stairs. Her

thoughts lingered on the perfection of Lady Mottingham's countenance. Her whole life she had wished for beauty, or even simple prettiness. Why do I always long, she wondered, for that ephemeral attribute when I am blessed with other, more lasting, qualities?

Despite that her class was waiting for her, she paused at the great window on the landing. With conscious effort she ordered her thoughts and dwelt on the lovely view spread before her. The window overlooked the front gates of the school and the viewer's eye followed the trail of the lane until it disappeared in the distant woods. On the southerly horizon a smudge of smoke told of the great city that lay there, but the nearer view was the more pleasant with the trees' leaves beginning to turn their colour. The golden browns of harvested fields were highlighted here and there by the dark green of evergreens, holly, fir and yew. And a flash of peacock blue...

Portia looked more closely. There could be no reasonable explanation for that spot of peacock blue in the middle distance. She paused to be refreshed by this view every day and had for ten years. She had never before seen that particular colour infringe on her landscape.

She hesitated; something important was hovering at the edges of her awareness. Someone--one of her girls--wore a cloak of that vivid blue. But who... Who? She gulped on the remembrance and flew down the stairs.

Penelope Perrington--the smallest of the three sisters--it was she who had that blue cloak. Portia had commented herself upon it the day the girls had arrived.

She poked her head into her classroom. "Please read pages twenty to thirty in Pauling's Geography, and draw your own outline map of Asia Minor," she instructed the dozen surprised young ladies who had been waiting for her.

Without waiting for comments, she withdrew.

She continued down the stairs to the main floor and paused only for a moment in her study to catch up her own sober cloak of dark green. Then with a nod to her porter, she let herself out of the house.

Portia hurried down the path and through the wrought iron gates into the lane. With a backward look at the house, she ascertained that there were no faces at the windows and that no one was watching from the gardens. Confident she was unobserved, she picked up her skirts and raced--with a turn of speed that surprised her--down the lane.

Her long legs soon caught up the very short ones of her quarry and she slowed to catch her breath before speaking to the child. The little girl had not apparently heard her approach for she did not look around. The mist was turning to rain and the wind was gathering strength; Portia wondered why the child had not chosen a better day for her escape.

At length she spoke. "Penelope? Penny!"

The child halted immediately and looked back. "Mith Crothmichael? What are you doing here?" There was surprise but no fear and nothing of guilt in the little girl's bright face.

"More to the point dear, what are you doing?" Portia placed a hand on the child's shoulder, wishing to make a physical connection with the miscreant.

"I am going to London to see Papa, and Ruff." Penelope evidently had no sense of having done anything wrong. Her statement of purpose was entirely without guile.

"Who is Ruff?" Portia's question was a mixture of curiosity and cunning distraction.

"Our dog...Papa'th hound. We brought him to London with us. We knew Papa would want to see him. We love him; he's a ferocious guard dog but not with uth. Hith real name is Perrington's Ruffian. Papa says it is appropr'ate 'cause he has no manners."

"Ah." Portia had a vision of Lord Stadbroke coping with a country-trained beast in an elegant London townhouse. He was well-served, she decided uncharitably. "Well, do let's discuss your journey a little first. It is quite some little distance you know and the weather is not of the best. "

Penelope hunched a shoulder that dismissed such considerations. "We came to Hornthey to be close to Papa. And he has not visited. So I am determined upon visiting him."

Irritation with the viscount surged through Portia yet again. The embankment was steep nearby and there was a sheltered hollow in the lee of the hedge still clinging to its leaves and full of hips and haws. She drew the child to sit beside her there on a fortuitous stone.

"Now Penny, do you know that you are not supposed to leave the school?" Portia chose her words carefully. The sturdy independence of the child must not be

harmed, but a consciousness of her responsibilities and her restrictions must be brought to bear.

"Yeth." The child's dark gaze was fastened unwaveringly upon her face.

"And you know that the rule is supposed to keep you safe?"

"Yeth."

"Do you think you would be safe, walking alone to London? This is not Lincolnshire, my dear. Everyone here does not know you and respect you as Lord Stadbroke's daughter. London is a great city and not always harmless."

The child studied her with an earnest gaze. "P'raps I should have thought a little more on it. But now that you know where I mean to go, you can accompany me."

"Penny, that is not possible. Particularly not today. I am certain your papa will visit you soon. In fact, I will engage to ensure it."

"Can you? We just had a council of war, my sisters and I. They also said he would come soon. But they will say anything to keep me biddable, so I decided to see him today." Her small face twisted in a ferocious frown.

"I am sure they have the right of it. They would not lie to you, nor will I. And I

know for a fact that Cook has made jam tarts."

"Very well, I'll come back." The child hopped to her feet and waited for Portia to rise and shake out her skirts. Her keys, watch and etui collided and chimed.

"You always jingle, Mith. I like it. We always know where you are, becauthe we can hear your tune. Why do you wear those things?"

Portia drew up her own hood to defend against the swirling rain, and she fastened Penelope's cloak and hood against the weather as well. Illness would be the crowning seal of this day's adventure; to be avoided at all cost. "I have my keys to open locks, my timepiece to watch our schedule and my etui to hold my scissors and my pencil and my notepad. Madame calls it my chatelaine; she says I am like the mistress of a great house."

"Our houthkeeper calls it an equipage, but hers does not jingle nearly so nicely. I like you, Mith Crothmichael," Penelope observed as they set out on the lane to return to Mansion House. "So does Sabina, but Mel...Mel isn't sure. She weighs things extravagantly long, Papa says. Sabina particularly likes Mr. Dent. She says he is something quite beyond the ordinary. And Sabby is sure he likes her. She thinks he lingered with her during drawing this morning.

"Mel said he probably found her drawing deplorable. And that she thinks every young man is a model of all virtues, except John Mudd, at home. He's a good horseman, Mith Crothmichael, but he goes red whenever you talk to him."

Portia disregarded this aside. "Do you girls often have an, er, council of war?"

"Quite often. We always did so at home when there were urgent decisions to be made. We were supposed, this morning, to decide how we might see Papa on Saturday. We have been here ages already, and he has not been next or nigh us. My thithters did not have a good plan, and Mel thought that he doesn't love us anymore, so I decided to go and see him." Penelope skipped ahead, then turned and walked backwards, talking all the while.

"Sabina said he does of course, and she thought we need not worry. She says he is just disordered by Mama's ing and then Grandmama's. I thought I would prove to him that we are of more importance than the Parl'ment or the ton. Mel said he has changed, but I think he has not, not so very much. When he is with us he is as loving as ever and such fun. He's just not with uth very often.

"Mel said perhaps he's enamoured of some young lady. She said we shall have a new mama, and she'll beat us." Penelope's lower lip trembled.

Portia, struggling to make sense of the tide of information, closed her eyes briefly wishing for wisdom to reassure the child. The flood of confidences suggested that the child was not as self-assured as she appeared. And she could see that Melicent was suffering a crisis of faith in her father also.

"I know Papa would never choose a step-mama that we could not like," Penelope said.

Portia hurried to reinforce that shaky belief. "I am sure he would not. He loves you all, and wants you all to be happy."

The simple reassurance seemed enough to bolster Penelope's spirits. Reaching the school, they turned in at the gates just as the heavens decided to open and a deluge of rain fell.

Hand in hand, they dashed up the path and burst into the entry, giggling. They handed their sodden cloaks to the porter, and Portia sent a maid hurrying for the matron. The lamps had been lit against the lowering afternoon, and Portia bustled the child over to the hall's glowing fire.

"You must go with Matron and be dried and warmed, Penny. No more excursions, mind; please tell me if you have a desire for an adventure. And, Penelope, I shall send a message to your papa myself if he does not come by week's end."

"Will you, Mith? That is very kind. I told Mel and Sabina that you had kind eyes and a nice smile, even if you weren't pretty."

Portia smothered a sigh at the home truth. "Do you like our school?" she asked.

"Yeth, Mith." The child shivered a little, but Matron was hurrying down the staircase, a broad length of towel in her capable hands. She soon had Penelope enveloped in the dry cloth, and was urging her up the stairs.

Portia headed to her study, but said over her shoulder, "Then do not leave us again without advising us of your plans. If you will think on it, you will see we cannot have everyone going here, there and everywhere at their sudden whim."

"I won't, Mith. Thank you, Mith." The child gave her a flashing smile, revealing those two tardy front teeth, and mounted the stairs at the matron's side.

Portia closed her study door with inordinate emphasis born of relief and annoyance. She crossed to the fire where her skirts steamed gently as she nursed her frustration with the viscount. He was a neglectful reprobate and there was no excuse for his lack of attention to his children. Well, she would keep her promise to the child, and she would demand his presence, for his daughters' sake.

She thought of her surprised, abandoned class, and the mad dash through the pouring rain with Penelope. Against her better judgement she started to laugh. The three Perrington girls promised to be a lively addition to Mansion House School.

CHAPTER THREE

"Melicent Perrington missed the nuncheon again today," Mme. Montlucon advised Portia as she bustled into Portia's study. "That is twice this week, and you know how the girls prize that little meal. She is spending every spare moment in the stables. Matron advises that she has had a word with the child about the state of her boots and gleaned nothing but impertinence. Gavrielle says that Melicent adores les chevaux. It is the one thing about which they are not sympathetic."

Portia paused in her preparations for her afternoon history class with the older girls. She was not overly surprised by the report. Melicent Perrington, though she seemed to enjoy the work she was set and positively relished all competitive opportunities, was not happy. "Thank heaven Melicent has Gavrielle for a friend. She is a moody child not, I think, pining for home but not content. We must watch her carefully. I cannot like her wandering at will, and I think Lord Stadbroke, though he no doubt reveres horse flesh, would not like her to spend too much time in our stables."

"Melicent told Gavrielle that she and her papa were used to ride out every day, and that she misses it more than anything." Heloise laid the pile of papers she carried on Portia's desk and began to sort them tidily.

Portia stared from her window. There was a group of girls walking the gravel path of the boxwood labyrinth, their pale muslin skirts fluttering. She was pleased to see that they were all wearing spencers against the autumnal edge on the north breeze. There was an established rule that the labyrinth was to be walked in silence; she opened the door a little the better to hear any illicit conversation. There was none. She had developed the labyrinth seven years

earlier after reading of the history of the meditative tool and hearing Heloise's description of the labyrinth in the paving of Chartres Cathedral. Originally intended to offer a place of contemplation to miscreants, the Mansion House labyrinth now afforded everyone in the school a place of reflection.

Turning from the window, she returned her attention to Heloise. "Well, we cannot resolve all the problems of the Perringtons. But the girls saw the viscount this past Saturday, did they not?"

"You know they did, for all that you hid in your study here so that you would not have to speak with him," Madame said.

Portia received her friend's droll look with some embarrassment. It was true, she had found business to keep her in her study while the viscount was received in the parlour. "I was busy," she protested without conviction.

"So I told Lord Stadbroke. I do not know if he believed me. He ired the labyrinth. He had seen the one in Chartres, and spoke of Pliny's references to them,"

"Bona Dea! He didn't."

"He did. And why you have to use that heathen exclamation, calling on the good goddess of Rome, when you could use a good Christian avowal like Mon Dieu, I shall never understand. I blame the Reverend Sainsthorpe for setting you that course of Latin you requested."

"Never mind that." Portia was unusually impatient. "Did Stadbroke say anything else?"

"Pleasantries, nothing more; an idle comment on your absence. You know that he drove his children to the city in his phaeton, took them to visit the Tower, bought them ices at Gunters, and returned them radiant with happiness in time for evensong?"

"I know." Portia had made it her business to discover the girls' state of mind following their father's visit, and she had heard their rapturous praise of their parent. "They were very excited, were they not?" She did not wait for her friend's response, but continued tartly, "Perhaps if he will call a little more frequently, Melicent will spend less time in the stable." She seated herself again behind her desk, and toyed with the chains of the keys on her chatelaine. "How does Penelope in her French exercises?"

"Tres bon. She is a very bright little girl."

"She has settled well since her adventure," Portia was thinking out loud. "And Sabina seems to have adjusted..."

"To the school, yes. But I cannot call an infatuation with Mr. Dent proof of adolescent balance." Madame was sardonic.

"Well, they all seem to have to fall in love with Caldwell, don't they? But he is so good, never varies in his avuncular kindness. They seem eventually to realize that he is no more than everyone's brother." Portia knew that her step-brother could be absolutely trusted to depress any untoward fancies of the older girls.

"You know he has eyes only for you. Even though you constantly rebuff him. He will never think you too old for him, you know. Six years is not enough to discourage him."

"And you will not be discouraged from being his champion, will you?" Heloise countered.

"Not when I know how well suited you are." This was an old discussion, ground well travelled in many conversations between the two of them.

"Did you know that Mr. Dent thinks little Penelope the most talented of all the girls in her drawing?" Heloise stacked her papers once more, and prepared to depart. "And are you aware she worships you?"

"Me?" Portia was truly astonished, silenced by the thought.

"Why are you always so surprised when I tell you of such devotion? The girls love you, all of them. Why must you think that because you are no more than ordinary in appearance you have no appeal at all?" Heloise shook her frivolously-capped head as she crossed to the door. "You have good sense, Portia, you display it all the time on a wide variety of matters. You need to use it to consider your own circumstances."

"Yes, yes, very well." Portia disliked her friend's reprimands. It was true that she attached too much importance to the physical, she knew it. But it had always been her experience that the pretty girls were also the fortunate girls in life. She shook her head. "But we are speaking of the Perrington girls. I am pleased to hear of Penelope's talent. Her father cannot but be impressed, if we can nurture

it. And we must watch Melicent carefully. Perhaps we need to organize a regular riding session for her; I wonder if we should offer a program of equestrian exercise?"

"Very costly," Heloise commented on her way to the door.

"Hmmm."

A rap on the door s startled both ladies. After a moment, Caldwell Dent entered. He greeted them both with a smile, then said, "I've another commission, a referral from Lady Jersey!"

Portia observed his quick, hopeful glance at Heloise. If he was disappointed by her sedate but sincere congratulations, he did not show it.

Her own good wishes were more spontaneous. Portia was so pleased she crossed the room to hug her brother.

He accepted her embrace with a modest grin. He suggested to Heloise, "You could do the same, Madame...strictly in a laudatory spirit of course."

His teasing brought quick colour to Heloise's face. "You may only dream of it," she said tartly, remaining where she was.

He turned back to Portia. "About that other matter... I have made a pledge to

meet my father on Saturday next after the noon. I shall let you know what comes of it."

"Your father?" Madame seized on the information. "But you have not seen him these many years, have you?"

Portia knew Caldwell would much rather not discuss his disreputable parent with the woman he longed to impress. "An absent father can be better than a bad one," she said. "We have neither of us missed his presence. Cal intends a brief visit, nothing more."

"So unfortunate, to have a parent malveillant. I am grateful I have no experience of such. Even with the variety of parents of our students offer, there are none of actual wickedness."

"Stadbroke is the most infuriating, annoying, arrogant and thoughtless man it has ever been my misfortune to entertain as parent," Portia stated.

Her companions stared at her, for a moment bereft of speech.

Then, "How can you say that?" Heloise said. "You have met the gentleman but twice!"

"Indeed, Port, that's a bit harsh, isn't it? He was saying on Saturday--I saw him as he was taking his leave--how much he ired the school. Indeed, he asked me to particularly tell you that he felt the house looked very fine from the labyrinth,

especially the situation of your study and the parlour."

Portia felt the colour drain from her face. The viscount had seen her. He had seen her peep from her study window as he walked in the gardens with his daughters. The girls said they had showed him every detail of their favourite places. She had thought he could not have spotted her. She had assured herself he had not. Now he knew that she had not been busy, but that she had been avoiding him. She refused to think about the possible repercussions of her cowardly actions. Casting about for some way of extracting herself from the coils of her comment, she said, "Well, that is my early impression of him. I may be wrong."

"I think you will find you are." Caldwell dismissed consideration of the Perringtons. "I foresee nothing but harm from the meeting with my father. His reappearance now, his importunities, can do nothing but damage my career. I am not inclined to indulge him. I have no stomach for it."

"I am de trop, my dears. If you will excuse me, I will be off to my class." Heloise whisked to the door before Portia or Caldwell could ask her to stay.

Caldwell leapt to hold it open for her, and closed it quietly after her departure.

"You must meet with Mr. Dent, Cal." Portia realized she was grateful for her friend's sensitivity. She had rather speak with her brother alone about her stepfather. "It can do no harm to talk to him. We must know if he has some nefarious designs."

"I know, but equally I know he will be nothing but trouble."

Portia paused, though her own class would be growing reckless with her extended absence. "We can cope with whatever difficulties he creates, Cal; we always have." She shivered despite her brave words. There had always been a quality of meanness about Harold Dent that had made her flesh crawl. How he could have had such a thoroughly decent, kind and intelligent son was ever a mystery to her. And Dent's reappearance now could only harm Caldwell's hopes for winning over Heloise.

They gazed at each in mutual agreement and dismay. What could Dent want?

* * * *

Matron burst into Portia's bedchamber after no more than a token knock. "Lord Stadbroke has called, and we cannot locate Melicent, his middle daughter."

On Saturday mornings, Portia took a little time for herself, reading, writing or reflecting in her bedchamber until the nuncheon was served at one o'clock. Many of the children were taken on excursions at the week's end by a parent or a friend's parents; their proximity to London made for more such outings than with many boarding schools. There were dancing and music lessons in the afternoon for those students who had no other activity, but Saturday was by and large a respite from the week day routine.

For Portia, it was a most welcome one, and on this particular Saturday, she had embraced the solitude. It had given her opportunity for much-needed calm reflection. If her thoughts had included the viscount, she had to it it to no one.

Now she was caught unawares by him, her hair down her back and nothing more than a faded blue round gown clothing her. "Stadbroke is here? Bona Dea, what is he about? Why can he not give warning of his arrival? And where is Melicent? Ring for my maid if you will, Mrs. Yaxham. Ask Mr. Dent to search for the girl. Send the other two daughters to the parlour for Papa and discover if anyone saw Mel go out. Ask Mrs. Shap to serve tea, and make my apologies to the viscount. Say that I will be with him shortly."

She arrived in the sitting room, appearing cool and serene, within fifteen minutes. Her sandy hair was coiled neatly under a modestly embellished cap and her pale green kerseymere gown was unornamented but for the chatelaine hanging from the silk ribbon at the gown's high waist.

The viscount rose at her entrance, as did the handsome, rather large Old English hound as his side.

Portia suppressed a gasp at the sight of the dog in her tidy parlour. The two girls were obviously delighted to see their pet. She was solemnly introduced to the beast and ventured a quick pat on his smooth head. A swift survey told her that the viscount saw and understood her consternation and was amused by it. He was impeccably turned out--hessians gleaming, blue tail coat fearfully welltailored, pantaloons stretched over an irable hip and thigh--she discontinued her scrutiny and smothering irritation, offered her hand.

He shook it briefly. "Miss Crossmichael." An inclination of his head served for a bow. "I am so pleased you are not too busy today to see me."

Portia could not prevent the hot colour she felt mount to her cheeks. She

transferred her gaze from his sharp, handsome features to Sabina and Penelope standing by their pet. Behind their father's back, they were indicating their puzzlement as to their sister's whereabouts.

"I thought to take my daughters for a drive, ma'am, but it appears there is one missing." Nothing in his voice indicated undue alarm, but his dark brown eyes were as cold as was possible for such a warm colour. He turned abruptly and caught his other daughters in mid-pantomime. "Have you something to tell me, Sabina? Penelope?"

"No, Papa," Sabina curtsied and sat abruptly, one hand on the dog's square head.

"No, Papa," Penny echoed, but went to her father's side and slid her hand into his large one.

The confiding gesture touched Portia's heart, as did the look father and child exchanged.

"Melicent is out walking," she said her calm voice revealing nothing of her emotion.

"I would appreciate her attendance on me."

And so too would I, thought Portia. Where is the wretched child? "I have sent a servant to fetch her. Would you care to take tea?" Portia suppressed a sigh of relief as the maid entered with a laden tray.

"Thank you, no. We will await Melicent and be on our way." The viscount was coldly civil.

"One cake, Papa?" Penelope wheedled. "I'm dreadfully hungry. Breakfast was ever so long ago, and Cook does make the most thcrumptiouth jam tarts."

Stadbroke considered the salver of sweets that had been bestowed tenderly on the table at Portia's side. His dog's nose was twitching eagerly. "Well, if Miss Crossmichael starves her pupils, I suppose you had best have a tart."

Portia bristled at the accusation, and then realized the cold brown eyes had warmed. He was teasing her. She seated herself with a chime of keys, and poured a cup of very milky tea for the child.

Penelope chose a tart and Sabina, with an apologetic look, did also. "Try one, Papa, they are ever so tasty..."

The viscount's twisted smile indicated he recognized his girls' transparent attempts at distraction. But he accepted a sweet when his eldest daughter ed the plate. Portia pretended not to see Penny slip the hound a piece of pastry.

They were struggling for conversation still twenty minutes later when, after a quick rap on the door, Caldwell entered with a very sulky Melicent in tow. Her cheeks were rosy with the chill of the sunny autumn day, but she was wellwrapped up in a warm worsted cloak.

Portia almost sagged in relief, and she was aware of a relaxation of the tension that had emanated from the viscount, as his daughter appeared.

Stadbroke greeted his middle child gravely and she hurried to stand before him after pausing to hug the patient hound.

"Lord Stadbroke, you have met my brother, Caldwell Dent, I believe? Lord Stadbroke, Caldwell?" The two men confirmed their acquaintance and shook hands, exchanging assessing glances.

"Thank you for escorting my daughter, Mr. Dent. You had not too far to search, I hope."

The viscount's urbanity set Portia's teeth on edge.

"Not at all. She had only walked to Comton Grange, my lord, one of our nearest neighbours. The young ladies often walk to the hawthorn wood, so we sought there first, which is why we were some little time fetching your daughter. Comton Grange is the opposite direction..." At a glance from Portia, Caldwell dwindled into silence.

"Melicent, you may your sisters in refreshment, then you may show us this wood. I was going to take you all for a drive, but I have an engagement this evening, and you have taken up much of our time."

There was a chorus of groans from the girls. They were silenced by Portia's onitory look.

"I am sorry, Papa. I shall hurry to wash my hands; I need nothing to eat or drink. It is very kind of you to come, indeed it is, and I am so happy you brought Ruff," Melicent said, anxiety replacing the sullen expression on her small face.

Portia seethed. The child had little to apologize for, in her opinion, and should not have to thank her father for bestowing attentions upon his children. She did not like the viscount, attractive though he was, any more on this third visit than previously.

He probably had a liaison planned with one of his fancy women this evening. Heaven forbid that his children should interfere with his pleasures. And now she would have him on her grounds for an hour or two--and the dog. The knowledge did not please her. In the corridor, she could hear a discussion probably centered on the girls who wished to use the parlour's pianoforte. She could perceive their disappointment as they were sent elsewhere. If only she could orchestrate the viscount's departure. Her thoughts, well-concealed by a calm façade, were interrupted when he spoke.

"Mr. Dent, I've seen your new portrait of Lady Mottingham. Fine work--in fact, I consider you among the best of the current portraitists at capturing that indefinable essence of a sitter."

Portia was distracted into sending her brother a proud look.

The young ladies watched this exchange with round eyes.

"Thank you, my lord. Portraits are my first love, but I paint landscapes as well. My teaching gives me opportunity for variety. Your daughter has a rare talent."

Stadbrooke turned to his eldest child. "No one has mentioned this before. Sabina, are you hiding your light under a bushel?"

"Not Miss Perrington, my lord, Miss Penelope."

"Penny?"

The little one grinned at her astonished father. "I like drawing, Papa."

"She shows a distinct talent and a love of drawing. Occasionally a child will display more than an ordinary competence with brush and charcoal, and Miss Penelope certainly does. She is a pleasure to instruct."

The viscount looked thoughtful, but Melicent, who had slipped from the room, now returned in a spencer and bonnet that declared her readiness for their outing.

"I should like to see more of your work, Mr. Dent. May I hope you will indulge me--perhaps after I have walked with my daughters?"

"I should be honoured, my lord. But not today, I am sorry. I have an engagement

at four o'clock in town and must be on my way," Caldwell was apologetic, but no more than good manners required.

The viscount nodded. "I understand...another time then." He stood and swept his daughters and the dog before him from the room.

Caldwell took his own leave, and Portia left the parlour. She sent the maid to find the young ladies who had wished to use the pianoforte, listened to the sounds of singing above stairs, and heard the harp in the main floor classroom being played. Feeling shaky, she entered her study and sank into a chair near the warming fire glowing there. The lowering sun played across her desk. She found herself quite done up, from the rush of preparation and the tension of Melicent's absence. That Stadbroke's presence had unstrung her, she would not it. She wrapped a mohair shawl she kept in her study closely about her.

The viscount occupied her thoughts without her permission though. She could see the young man who had fascinated her eleven years earlier before in his now mature face. She had no doubt that he was the 'ornament of society' that Penelope had once dubbed him. She was unlikely to experience his charm however, and in any event, she could not respect his levity and devotion to frivolity. Life, especially when nurturing a new generation, was a serious business.

She did not know how long she had sat deep in thought when a peremptory rap sounded on her terrace door. Startled, she leapt to her feet to discover the viscount, with a face darkened by temper, staring in at her. She hurried to turn the key and open the door.

He burst into intemperate speech without preliminaries. "How dare you lie to me, ma'am?"

"I do not lie, my lord. State your meaning!" Portia was mortally offended and prepared to be as abrupt as he.

"In simple , ma'am, I wish for nothing less than your complete honesty in the future. Nay, I demand it. I have entrusted the care of my children to you, unwillingly, I confess it. If I cannot trust you for the truth, I will remove the girls regardless of their wishes. Melicent has told me that she went to Comton Grange to see their horses, and that it is not the first time she has caused you concern with her disappearance. I would have expected to be told of her unsanctioned absences, ma'am."

Portia stirred. "Where are your daughters now, my lord?"

"Out there, in your gardens, ably guarded by Ruff!" The viscount held up a silencing hand. "I am watching them, Miss Crossmichael, which is more than I can say for you. I am informed that my youngest daughter attempted to walk to London. I would also expect to have been informed of that escapade. I want to know these things. For God's sake, ma'am, what do they have to do to warrant your concern?"

The injustice stirred Portia to unaccustomed fury. She strove to keep her voice level and her anger contained. Her fingers clenched around her chatelaine. "Your daughters have been carefully supervised and scrupulously cared for, Lord Stadbroke.. I care about all my pupils, and I do not retain staff who are not equally concerned. Melicent was very clever in her disappearances and yet we knew where she was at all times, until this latest start. We have been discussing how to satisfy her 'equine needs'. As for Penelope--well, I simply did not think her mistaken attempt at a journey to London important enough to inform you of it. I circumvented her intentions because I am alert and I care. There was no harm done. She understood her error and all was well."

"If there is a problem with my daughters, I wish to be informed of it immediately." The viscount was vigorous in his anger, striding about the room but pausing to thump his fist on her desk for emphasis. "A woman will in such matters of course be less analytical and more variable--even unreliable and capricious--than a man. But I will have honesty."

Portia stiffened. He made his opinion of the female character very clear; there was no doubt he believed it no more than a compilation of wiles and machinations. Likewise he made no secret of his distaste for the supposed shortcomings of women. "You have a low opinion of your daughters' natures, my lord."

He obviously did not expect her counter-attack. Briefly he was silenced, struck either by the temerity of her accusation or by the truth of her criticism. He rallied after a moment. "My daughters are children. They have not yet displayed the unfortunate weaknesses of their sex."

Portia's composure deserted her. "But you fear they soon will. Is that why you left them in the north country, my lord? To avoid them? Well, they missed you, all of last winter. I suspect that fact has more than a little to do with their presence in my school. They feel closer to you now and hope to see more of you. Yes, Penny tried to walk to London to see you! Do you need more evidence of their profound feeling of abandonment?"

Ingram felt as though he had been floored by Gentleman Jackson's stout left hook. She was right. The sandy-haired, gimlet-eyed pattern card of virtue was spot on the mark. He should have seen the truth himself. The girls felt abandoned. They did not know that he had found himself all at sea as they matured. The damned schoolmistress had seen it though. The girls did not--and should not--know that he had sought an escape from his perplexity. They must

not know why he had neglected them; that he had run away from a problem rather than facing it. He sat down in the nearest chair, uninvited and against all propriety, leaving his hostess standing.

She was blaming him, though, a typical female trick, burdening him with the responsibility for his daughters' actions. He was to be held able just for desiring a little enjoyment, a modicum of freedom? Yes, it was a truly feminine ploy, turning the blame onto the convenient male.

Freshly infuriated, he rose again and put a hand on the door to the terrace. "I shall take my leave of my daughters, Miss Crossmichael, and send them in to you. I will visit them as and when I can. You may assure them of it. I hold you able for their safety, and I bid you good day."

Satisfied that he had had the last word, and with more than he wished to consider of his own behaviour and his daughters', he left Miss Crossmichael with that stiff farewell. In the garden he hugged his daughters, called the blasted dog to heel, and left the vicinity of the Mansion School with something of relief and more of anger.

* * * *

"It was a terrible scene, Cal." Portia sank into the chair behind her desk, while her step-brother took his clay pipe and a spill from the mantelpiece. She was still--four hours after the viscount had departed--more disturbed than she would ever it by the exchange. "I can only be glad that he left his daughters, and the hound, outside."

"I should not have told him where Melicent was. Perhaps I could have saved you a trimming. Certainly I should not have left you..." Caldwell withdrew a tobacco pouch from his pocket and filled the pipe.

"You could not have foreseen it. The viscount was livid over what he saw as our collusion in silence." Portia rested her chin on her hand, her elbow on the desk. "I have to consider my own part in the matter; with any other child, any other parent, I would have immediately discussed the problems with all parties concerned. Because the viscount annoys me, I did not wish to consult with him, and because I had not decided what to do about Melicent, I did not speak with her. I endangered her because my own prejudices."

"Well, you saved Penelope from harm. Her actions were none of your doing." Caldwell lit his spill from the fire and ignited the tobacco. When his pipe was drawing cleanly, he tossed the spill into the flames.

The study's green damask curtains were pulled against the autumn night, and the fire and lamps created a warm sanctuary of light and warmth. Laughter and music echoed from the parlour next door where the senior girls now entertained themselves. For the first time in her tenure, Portia found no comfort in her sanctuary. "I should have told him about it. I have at least determined to institute a class of riding instruction, once a week. I don't know as yet how many of the young ladies will be interested but if we have to lease mounts, so be it."

"A good idea," Caldwell said.

Portia suddenly ed where he had been and recognized his distraction. "Oh, Cal, you have been so patient. Listen to me running on and on, and here you have more important news of your own. How did you go on? What of Mr. Dent?" Portia left her desk and ed him by the fire, realizing for the first time

that he looked weary and worried.

Her step-brother considered his pipe carefully. "He was late. Whether it was a deliberate strategy or not, I do not know. It had me on edge though, if that was what he intended."

"I am sure it did. He has not changed in that. How did he look?"

"Much the same, if you allow for eight years' dissipation. He is a little harder, a little more dissipated, rather more desperate. His words all were conciliatory: how sorry he was we had grown apart, how he regretted past mistakes, how he wished for a reconciliation. He wishes to be in close , he says. His children are important to him, vital to his continued happiness," Caldwell snorted in disgust. "I had no confidence in his candour or his scruples; I put no stock in his prattle. He wants something, but he is not ready to reveal his stratagems. "

"Stadbroke as well avowed the importance of his children. Until I reminded him of his abandonment of them."

Caldwell stared at her vehemence. "You did exchange hard words with him."

"He animadverted on the inadequacies of the female character," she said grimly.

"Damn his eyes! Women are in most things more irable than men. They cause no wars, people no armies. He's fair and far out with those attitudes, and

him with three daughters!" Caldwell leapt to his feet, his irritation with his parent finding a new object in disparaging the viscount. "He'll not find a better school. And he can whistle to become a patron of mine. We've no need of him."

Singing resounded from the next chamber; strains of "Early One Morning" sung in parts accompanied by much laughter. Portia took comfort from the sound; her pupils were happy and well-cared for. She would redouble her efforts to keep them so.

Despite the strains of the day, she retained enough common sense to say, "We have every need of the viscount's good will. I cannot afford to antagonize such a prominent member of the ton, and neither can you, especially with your father's sudden reappearance."

Caldwell set aside his pipe, which he had neglected. He rose and went to the window. Pushing aside the drapery, he stared at the creeping dusk. "My father is an added complication, but he had best not be complacent that he has gulled me. I am rather more than seven now; he will find it impossible to pull the wool over my eyes." He turned to look at Portia. "But if Stadbroke was to learn of him..."

Portia ed the viscount's accusation of dishonesty and shivered. But he could not, need not, be told of Harold Dent. It was none of his affair. She shivered. "We must take care, be watchful in all things, it seems. Perhaps your father means nothing more than what he has said. And it may be that the viscount will allow us to do our job unhindered."

A soft rap on the door made them both jump. On Portia's word, Sabina Perrington entered. She bobbed a curtsey to Portia and bestowed a ravishing smile on Caldwell.

He gave her a short greeting and turned to pick up his pipe, tap its contents into the fire, and lay its clay length on the study's mantelpiece.

The girl looked away from him uncertainly, and transferred her wide-eyed gaze to Portia. "Miss Crossmichael, I fear Papa was very annoyed this afternoon, and my sisters and I wished to apologize for anything he might have said to upset you."

Portia flung up a hand to halt the flood of explanation, exculpation and excuse that she was certain was about to be released. "My dear, it is not your place to ask for forgiveness for your father's behaviour. You and your sisters need not be concerned by the dealings between Lord Stadbroke and me. Your papa may express his opinions freely to me and I will favour him with mine."

Gavrielle Montlucon appeared in the open doorway and stared with curiosity at the study's occupants. Then she dropped a curtsy and said, "Mama instructs me to request you us, Miss Crossmichael. The young ladies are desirous of dancing and she needs your assistance."

"Thank you Gavrielle. Assure Madame I shall her directly. Run along, Sabina." Both young ladies withdrew, Gavrielle with a pert smile reminiscent of her mother's as she closed the door.

"Well, much as I should like to dance with Heloise, I shall withdraw as always." Caldwell managed a shadow of a smile.

"A wise decision, my dear," Portia said. She was weary but she had long since learned to suborn her desires to the requirements of her position. "Are you sanguine about gaining a daughter yourself should your suit ever succeed with Heloise?"

"Gavrielle is a good girl and if I have learned anything from watching my father's association with you, it is how to be a good step-father. I have only to execute the direct opposite of his actions."

Portia conjured a laugh and rose. "You handled Sabina well, my dear. Do continue in the same vein. The viscount will not care for his eldest daughter's infatuation, I fear and he needs no further fuel to feed his anger."

"He'll have none from me. I have no interest in fanning any flames." Caldwell opened the door for her. "I have work to do in my studio."

They separated in the entry, and Portia entered the parlour. She made a general greeting to the room at large and the assembled young ladies chorused their own welcome.

Mme. Montlucon greeted her with some relief. "They want to dance, and you know I cannot play the piano and maintain decorum at the same time."

"Indeed, not!" Portia crossed to the pianoforte, smiled her thanks at the pupil who pulled out the stool for her and settled the chosen music on the holder. She shifted the candelabra that lit the music, and over her shoulder ordered the young ladies to take their positions.

"Mr. Dent has chosen not to us?" Heloise leaned over her shoulder for a moment.

Portia searched her friend's face for regret or disappointment. She could not be sure she saw either. "You are the only female in the house with whom he wishes to dance, Heloise. You know that. He will not make himself available to those of our girls with infatuations to enflame."

"I know it. He is very good with them; it is to his credit." Madame frowned repressively at two young ladies whose high spirits threatened to destroy all propriety in the room.

"There is much to his credit, Heloise," Portia played the opening bars of the reel to gather the attention of the young ladies. "You should think on it more."

"In my leisure, which is none too abundant, I think of little else."

Portia allowed her fingers to wander over the ivory keys. "Are you worried about Gavrielle?"

"No, no. Gavrielle re her poor father not at all, and thinks very well of Caldwell. Ah, but what of Caldwell's father? How went his meeting?"

Portia began to play in earnest and the young ladies curtsied to each other on gales of laughter. "Well enough." If Cal did not wish to apprise Heloise of his

father's perfidies, it was not her lot to do so. "There can be little point of reference between them now, but perhaps some sort of relationship may be possible. Now do go and keep order. Miss Masefield must not be so rowdy, and Henrietta Cathcart has deplorable timing!"

Mme. Montlucon did as she was bid, and Portia was left with her thoughts and her music. She sighed soundlessly. It had been a long day, and one way and another not very successful.

CHAPTER FOUR

Portia made it a habit to take three or four of her girls to London each month on an educational excursion. It gave her the opportunity to become better acquainted with the young ladies, and to evaluate their behaviour, their interests and their acumen.

She chose to take the three Perrington girls to the city in October. They were to visit the British Museum with its burgeoning collections of sculpture and antiquities. She was influenced by the fact that it was one of her favourite places in the capitol and that there was inevitably something new on display in the aging, crowded building.

The girls were agog for two days prior to their Saturday excursion. On the prescribed morning, despite that they were allowed to sleep an hour later on Saturdays, the young ladies were prepared and waiting in the entry hall for the trip by half past nine.

"Perhapth we shall see Papa," Penelope said, as Portia descended the staircase, pulling on her gloves carefully.

"Could we call upon him?" Melicent added, a sparkle flaring in her brown eyes so like her father's.

Portia's response was interrupted by the girls' older sister.

"Don't be silly. Penny, London is a huge city, the hugest in all of England. For us to encounter Papa among all the people we will see in the streets would be the most remarkable coincidence. And Mel you know this is an educational outing. It is nothing to do with Papa. Though perhaps we could leave Miss Crossmichael's card in Hill Street? With perhaps a note?"

Portia was dismayed by the suggestion. She ushered the girls out to the waiting carriage as she considered her reply. She had no wish to see the viscount's home, no desire to leave her card, and she would never it to a wish to see him again.

How best to divert the girls' thoughts? "We'll see," she said.

Her step-brother trod down the steps from the front door and she greeted him with relief.

"Mama wath always used to say 'we shall see' when she wished not to do something with uth," Penelope said.

"Hush, Penny." Melicent, spying Mr. Dent, frowned ferociously.

Portia overlooked the frown and the trembling lip of the youngest Perrington to say, "Mr. Dent is ing us. He has business in the city." She bestowed her companions carefully in her closed carriage: Melicent and Penelope on either side of her, Sabina beside Caldwell on the opposite seat.

It was her theory that less flirtatious glances and languishing looks were possible when a young lady was seated beside her victim. Innate modesty would keep Sabina from crowding Caldwell closely.

With a sigh at the machinations even the most simple undertaking could require, Portia--so soon as they reached the main road--began to point out sights of interest and educational objects to be seen from the carriage.

Her efforts took them to the edge of the city, but Sabina's animation could not be contained at her first sight of the metropolis. "Papa has promised I shall come out in three years, Miss Crossmichael. I thought I could not wait, but I do not find the city so very attractive. I had not thought London so very dirty and noisy."

"You must not judge all London by Islington and Finsbury, my dear. Wait a little moment... Yes, here we are come to Oxford Street. Now the streets improve."

"Oh, yes I do see what you mean! This is much of an improvement. Oh, Mr. Dent, do you not find it exciting? I could imagine... Oh, good gracious there is Papa!"

All five heads in the carriage turned in the direction of her pointing finger.

"Sabina, drop your hand! Of all things, to point in company is the most rude action of all." Portia's reproof was swift and sharp. Her dismay at spying Lord Stadbroke herself fairly choked her.

Reactions in the carriage were swift and mixed. "I did not thee him," wailed Penelope.

"Neither did I," said Melicent.

Sabina blushed deeply over her lapse of manners and murmured that her father had only been visible for a moment. She was too overcome to pay any heed when the carriage halted to deposit Dent on the pavement.

"Five o'clock at the Fox and Grapes?" Caldwell asked.

Portia agreed with a nod. Cal was going to meet with his father. She could only hope his visit was without incident. She was overwhelmed by unexpected feelings of her own. She had clearly seen the viscount, his head bent protectively toward the lady leaning on his arm. Portia used the term 'lady' advisedly in her thoughts; the rouged cheeks and flamboyance of the woman's clothing proclaimed her to be nothing of the sort.

She could only be relieved that the crowded pavements had immediately swallowed up the view of the dratted libertine and his lightskirt. She was only astonished that they were abroad so early in the day, but she supposed that the ladies of the ton had not yet left their chambers, much less their homes, and so the Cyprians ruled the pavements.

She took a deep breath. "Well, it was remarkable to glimpse Lord Stadbroke, was it not? As Melicent earlier said, it is most unusual to see among the crowds

anyone whom one knows. Now our destination is just ahead, on the left."

To her relief, the Museum visit was uneventful though a great success with her charges. They were all three possessed of avid curiosity and Portia was kept busy answering their questions about everything from the ancient Greeks to the South Seas. After three hours and a half, they were all beginning to flag however.

Portia canvassed their opinions. "Shall we leave now, and take tea and ices at Gunter's? We may come back another day and see more."

The young ladies overwhelmingly agreed. They were trailing down the steps, Portia holding Penelope's small hand securely, when Melicent cried, "Papa!"

And there on the pavement, ing by, was Lord Stadbroke. On his arm this time was a breathtakingly lovely young woman, whose every feature and detail breathed lady of quality and aristocrat. There could be no mistaking that this young lady was separated by the widest of gulfs from the viscount's companion earlier in the day.

Portia cursed their ill luck. Of all the people there were in London, how could they come to encounter the viscount twice in one short space of time? "Bona Dea!" she muttered vainly under her breath. The gods were surely against her.

"Papa, we saw you before. Hourth ago," Penny lisped, descending the remaining steps to cling to his leg, grubby gloves marking his biscuit pantaloons.

The viscount flashed a glance to Portia and she allowed him to see all her distaste for their earlier glimpse. She hoped she left him in no doubt as to what she had seen.

His gaze flickered back to his daughters, as a frown creased his forehead. "Lady Mary, I must introduce you to my daughters: Sabina, Melicent and Penelope. Girls, Lady Mary Therford."

Portia was proud of the girls' curtsies and Sabina's dignified response. "Lady Mary, may I introduce our teacher, Miss Crossmichael?" she said.

The young lady's response was honey-sweet but subdued.

Portia noticed that her grip on the viscount's arm had tightened. And the look Lady Mary directed at Portia was not at all sweet. "We have had an educational day, my lord. And now we are going to Gunter's for tea before I see my students home to Hornsey."

"Do come, Papa!" Penelope transferred one grubby paw to one of the tails of the viscount's impeccable coat.

"Please do, Papa," Melicent echoed.

"Oh, Lord Stadbroke, I must go home. Mama will be expecting me!" The young lady's voice was breathless with appeal.

Portia could see that the party of schoolgirls was not at all to Lady Mary's taste, and that the attractions of the viscount were tarnished by his position of father to three daughters. She swallowed a chuckle.

Lord Stadbroke visibly sought for a solution to demands of four young women. "I...ah..."

"Papa, you promised we should see the Hill Street house sometime. This is a splendid opportunity. Does Lady Mary live nearby it? Perhaps we may convey her home and continue on to our house?" Sabina offered her father a solution.

"Yeth pleath, Papa," Penelope shrilled. "We must visit Ruff too."

Lady Mary dropped the viscount's arm, and moved to Sabina's side. "A charming notion," she said. "Grosvenor Street is only a step from the viscount's Hill Street house. Nothing could be more convenient."

Portia wondered if she had made the hound's acquaintance. With interest she watched Lady Mary, with some decision, detach Sabina from the group and hold her in close conversation at the head of their party. Lord Stadbroke had been neatly trapped by the young ladies' manoeuvrings, she thought.

"I shall be delighted to show you the house," the viscount said to the party at large as it reorganized itself. Melicent ed Sabina and Lady Mary in the front and Penny clung to her father's hand.

Portia placed her gloved hand reluctantly on the arm he offered to her.

Stadbroke's voice, when at last he spoke, was strained as if it was an effort to make polite conversation with her. "Do you often bring your charges to London, Miss Crossmichael?"

"Every three weeks or so I bring several of the girls to some improving display or museum, my lord." Portia was all too conscious of the play of muscle under his superfine sleeve and consequently her voice was particularly brisk.

"And do the parents know of this?" The viscount's glance was disapproving and accusatory.

Portia might have expected his concern. "Their parents trust me to do what is best for their girls, Lord Stadbroke. In nine years, I have never before encountered a parent on one of these excursions, no child has ever been injured or lost, and no parent has ever showed the slightest interest in or concern over how I educate their daughters."

"More fools they."

"Contrary to your belief, my lord, I do not object to your interest in your daughters' schooling. Likewise I hope you will not baulk at my suggestions to you as a parent." Portia ventured on a veiled warning. "Your young ladies may hear all sorts of gossip from their friends and the families of those friends. It is important for parents to conduct themselves in a manner that will not embarrass or hurt their children. I have had to tend more than one broken hearted pupil whose parents could not be bothered with discretion. I hope your children will

not suffer this fate."

A dark flush crept up the viscount's lean cheeks. "My behaviour is none of your concern, Miss Crossmichael." He glanced down at his youngest child humming with pleasure, oblivious to the conversation above her head.

"And I thank heaven for that, my lord. Do, please, ensure that it does not become your daughters' concern."

The unpleasant interval was ended by their arrival at the home of Lady Mary. The viscount stepped forward to hand her up the two stairs before her door, and he pulled the bell.

Portia could only be glad that she and the girls could not hear the inanities he was no doubt whispering in Lady Mary's ears. If she was the young woman's mother, she would not permit a liaison for her daughter with a man old enough-nearly--to be her father.

The viscount reed them when the door closed behind Lady Mary.

"Ith Lady Mary to be our step-mama?" Penelope was fairly quivering with anxiety.

"I have no intention of taking a wife, Penelope." Stadbroke tugged at his neckcloth to the detriment of its intricate folds.

"Papa wouldn't pick such a widgeon for our stepmother, Penny," Melicent's words followed close on her father's suppressive comment.

"She's only a little older than I," Sabina said, her eyes round.

The viscount looked harassed. "Do you wish to see the house or not? If you continue all this palaver, it will be time for Miss Crossmichael to convey you back to Hornsey. Now come along, do. I am sure Cook may be convinced to provide us with a substantial tea; she has a fine hand with pastry."

Though Portia was politely given the of the viscount's arm for the rest of the walk to Hill Street, she had nothing of his attention. Indeed, she was unwillingly impressed by his interaction with his daughters and envious of their ease with him.

The exercise of only a few minutes saw them established, with the dog, in the drawing room of the Perringtons' new London house. Portia was surprised by its excellent proportions and tasteful decoration. She had, in her perception of the viscount as a man about town, thought that his faults would include a slavish attention to the latest whims of taste and style be they never so atrocious. But the house displayed an elegance and charm that she could not fault. It was a modern construction, every material of the finest, and the workmanship was clearly superb. Fine silk decorated the walls, even in the corridor and landings, and the paintings that hung upon them displayed the eye of a connoisseur with an interest in the coming artists. The viscount lived in some considerable style and comfort.

The hound had greeted them rapturously in the entry and the three girls had responded with at least as much delight. Portia had been urged to submit to a lick of his broad tongue; she could see why the girls were so devoted to the creature,

but she feared her second best kid-skin gloves would never be the same.

"Papa it looks so much like home," Sabina revolved in the middle of the spacious chamber, leaving the Ruffian to her younger sisters. "Indeed I see a davenport, pier glass and table, and a sopha that are from home!"

Melicent flung herself down on the aforesaid sopha and said, "I'm ever so hungry."

Lord Stadbroke had had a word with the butler who had opened the street door, and was able to reassure his middle daughter. "Be brave, Mel, and sustenance will be forthcoming. Cook has been baking, Richards tells me."

"May I thee my bedchamber, Papa?" Penelope stood with her arms wrapped around the big dog's neck.

"After tea, poppet. Miss Crossmichael, have you constraints upon your time? Are we taxing your patience?"

Portia appreciated his concern, but also disdained it as an effort to be done with them. She forced a smile. "Not at all, my lord. We are to meet my brother at five o'clock. I have only to send a message to my coachman at the Fox and Grapes in Berkley Square to command his attendance for the journey home. "

"This is home, ma'am," Sabina said. Her happiness was reflected in her sisters' faces.

"I am glad you approve," Lord Stadbrooke inclined his handsome head at his eldest daughter. "Some of our pieces at the Place seemed well-proportioned for a townhouse, so I had them shipped here to town. And added some new purchases. Empty spaces at Stadley have been filled by some of the old, massive items that had been consigned to storage. I would not have everything new there."

"Mama wanted everything new. She required everything up to the minute." Melicent muttered.

Portia was intrigued by this suggestion of dissension in the Stadbroke marriage. But her ungenerous reflections were cut short by the arrival of the tea tray and a substantial repast. When the girls had eaten their fill, they clamoured to be taken above stairs to see their chambers.

"If you would care to take your ease here, Miss Crossmichael, you would be most welcome. I will keep you from your schedule very little longer, but I have promised."

"We must always keep to our promises, my lord. No, I should be delighted to accompany you all." She did not add that she wanted to see more of the girls' interactions with their father, and his reactions, but as he was not deficient of understanding, she was certain he knew her motives. And disliked them, for he wanted her to remain in the drawing room.

They trooped out and above stairs.

"I had thought you should all be in the nursery," the viscount said provocatively.

His words were met with groans and Portia was surprised by his teasing.

"But then I thought, no, they are all grown and as Sabina will be making her comeout when you are next in residence, she shall have her own chamber and Mel and Penny can share. A townhouse is not so very large you know--not like the Place where you may each have a room without any trouble."

Portia remained silent as they mounted to the third floor, and the girls examined the clean, airy chambers assigned to them. There were charming dressing tables in some light wood already in place, and matching bedsteads with thick mattresses waiting only upon the occupants. To her surprise the viscount took out a pocket book and, after commanding his daughters to state their needs and wishes for colouring the walls and preparing soft furnishings, he took notes. Finally, he tucked his pencil back into the folder and said, "We have taken long enough now, and dusk is coming on. You must be away..."

"Please Papa may we not stay?" Melicent's words were followed swiftly by reinforcement from the other two sisters. "Please Papa, please."

The viscount looked harassed. "But your rooms are not prepared!"

"There are beds; we could help make them up. The lack of decorating is no bar to our comfort." Sabina was as eager as her younger sisters. "We can make lists to add to your notes."

"I can thleep in my chemise," Penelope offered. "And Ruff would be delighted!"

"I had arranged to attend at the theatre with a party of friends," Stadbroke was weakening; it was apparent in his tone.

Almost Portia could pity him. He stood little chance of success against his three determined offspring.

"You may go to the theatre anytime. We are so very busy that you have not the opportunity to have us all to yourself so very often." Melicent was firm and judicious.

Genuine amusement, and unaffected love, softened the viscount's angular face.

The change made Portia catch her breath.

"That is true, Mel, very true. But what shall Miss Crossmichael do?"

"She could thleep in her chemise," Penelope said.

The viscount turned a chuckle into a cough.

Portia felt herself colour an almost certainly unbecoming red. She hurried into

speech. "If Lord Stadbroke will return you to Hornsey on the morrow, there can be no objection to your staying for a visit." And I hope that disrupts your evening plans completely, she thought with unusual venom. "Will you send for my carriage, please, Lord Stadbroke?"

The viscount's eyes were still alight with laughter when he bade her farewell at the front door of his house half of an hour later. His daughters were loud in their regret that she would not overnight with them.

"I must meet Mr. Dent at the Fox and Grapes and we must return to Mansion House." Portia bade the viscount a stilted farewell, and accepted his footman's help into her carriage. With an effort she directed her thoughts away from the Perringtons, to her brother. I hope his news may not be dire.

* * * *

One glance at Caldwell's face told Portia that her hopes were unrealized and her fears fulfilled. With the city traffic about them however, their intercourse had to wait. Portia was fully occupied in bowing to those of her acquaintance who spied her within her closed carriage.

Despite her prosaic calling, she was respected by her pupils' parents and not without her own circle of friends and connections in town. A drive such as this down Bond Street, even though she sat well back so as to be out of sight, ensured that one would encounter acquaintances.

Caldwell sat sunk in depression in his corner of the carriage and did not speak until they reached the edge of the city. Then, with the clamour of the streets

reduced, they were able to talk.

Portia kept her voice low, for her coachman must not have gossip to relay to his fellow servants.

"What has happened, Cal? You are so out of countenance as to frighten me."

He roused himself from some unhappy reverie with a travesty of a brave smile. "My father, when accused of misrepresentation, revealed his true colours."

"And?" Portia's concentration on her step-brother was undisturbed by a light rain that began to patter on the carriage roof.

"He wants money."

"Well, that is not unexpected. And perhaps it is his due. He did provide for us..."

"Grudgingly and inadequately, and only until you received your inheritance. And that was so modest that his continued would have been welcome. He should have paid for my schooling, not you."

"What amount does he need?" The carriage lurched over the softening ruts in the road and they both reached for the hand straps for .

"I don't know that he needs anything. It is what he wants, and his method of obtaining it, that is our problem."

Portia could feel her patience strained by the obscurity of his explanation. "Caldwell! Explain, please." Her tone never failed to galvanize her students.

It did not fail her now.

"He wants ?100. Each quarter--" Caldwell was concise and imive.

Portia was struck dumb by the enormity of the demand. She understood then that Cal was not apathetic but was in the grip of a profound anger. "But...but that is a fortune. We can spare nothing like that amount of money. Had we funds like that, we should both be managing things quite differently than we are."

"We shall have to find it, Port." Her brother met her eyes then, his own full of regret and apology. "If we don't, he threatens to tell the ton that we are in no way related, that our connection is unsavoury and disreputable in the extreme. He will broadcast that we are in fact cohabiting, and placing their daughters in the most compromising and scandalous of situations."

Revulsion overwhelmed Portia. This was her worst nightmare, all her fears and concerns combined in one horrific threat. "But...but he knows that is a lie. He knows--he must know--how we feel about each other. That we are more siblings than those ed by blood, that any other relationship would be abhorrent to us."

"He knows. He knows it all very well. But that will not prevent his spreading his nasty tales."

"It will ruin us. It will destroy your career, and be the end of Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies." Portia lapsed into despairing silence, and the minutes and miles sped by in the rocking carriage. The rain was harder now and it was quite dark without. Portia could not have told whether it was night or full daylight. Her eyes were full of tears, though in general she despised them. She thought of Heloise, dependent upon her employment, and of Gavrielle, of Miss Gosberton, Mr. Billockby and the other teachers, as well as the matron, the housekeeper and the other staff all of whom needed their positions for survival. One man's greed could deprive them all of their livelihood. It was so terribly unjust.

Portia roused when they turned at the corner of Cress Lane. The signpost of which Hornsey was justifiably proud flashed past the coach window, pale in the rainy dusk. "We must do nothing immediately," she told her step-brother. "We shall reflect on the matter, think about it, discuss it."

"I cannot see that there is anything to consider," Caldwell said with grim maturity. "We have no choice but to pay his demands."

"There must be another choice," Portia declared as the carriage turned into the drive of Mansion House and then drew up before the door. "There is always another choice."

There was no opportunity to examine the matter further; in the bustle of arrival, Caldwell slipped away. Portia knew that he would lose himself in painting, submerging all concerns in his art. She could wish that she had so powerful an opiate.

Instead she had her staff to interview. She ushered Mrs. Yaxham and Mrs. Shap into her study, where she removed her bonnet and cloak, and drew off her gloves, conscious of a pervasive weariness.

The housekeeper's report of the day's activities was succinct. She divulged that meals had been prepared and consumed without incident, that the afternoon's activities had occurred without mishap and that Madame and her daughter had recently gone home. She advised that the junior girls had retired for the night, and Miss Gosberton was overseeing the senior girls' recreation in the parlour.

The matron had less happy news. Henrietta Cathcart had been ill--a surfeit of sloe jam was the suspected culprit. Portia commiserated with the lady's concern, and in her turn told of the Perrington girls' absence for the night. She bade the ladies a good evening, and managed a smile on their departure. She took her chatelaine from the top drawer of her desk and fastened it to the band of her mulberry merino gown. It jingled satisfying as the chains settled themselves.

Then she made her way to the parlour where she heard all the news and reports from various of her senior pupils. As soon as she could, she bade them a good night and urged them to seek their beds within the hour. Miss Gosberton assured her that she would see to it.

Portia took a candle in a chamberstick from the hall table, lit it at the Argand lamp that stood there, and checked the locks on the stout front door. Her familiar evening round had begun. A quick observation of each ground floor room told her that everything was in readiness for the next day. She made her way upstairs to ensure that all was well in the junior dormitory. As she ed, she glanced in each classroom, at the fittings she had purchased, the pictures she had chosen, the appurtenances she had acquired to better educate and inform the young minds entrusted to her. All was well but for the dark threat that now hung over

everything. Her step faltered. She took a deep breath and went on.

The dormitory was quiet; she paused for a moment listening to the deep, even breathing of the children.

Her children, she thought. The only ones she was ever likely to have. And wasn't it a noble calling to nurture so many minds rather the few that one's own body could produce? She had always thought so. She had always delighted in the youngsters that had ed through her classes, the young intellects she had stimulated.

Now she was vaguely dissatisfied at the thought of a future peopled by others' children. A wish for her own offspring bothered her anew and, for some reason, her thoughts travelled to the Perrington sisters. Were they even now having supper with their father? Had he forgone his trip to the theatre? Did they like their new chambers in their new house and was Ruff indeed delighted by their presence?

She withdrew her thoughts with a grimace. The Perringtons were not her children either, and she had best quash all maternal desires once more. She closed the door to the dormitory softly and made her way back downstairs, reaching her study just as the parlour door opened. She closed her door quickly, unwilling to engage in further conversation.

Portia listened to the senior girls chatter and giggle their way upstairs as she settled herself at her desk. Her mind still showed a disturbing tendency to dwell on the Perringtons, and she called herself sternly to order. She had more important things to consider than Lord Stadbroke and his daughters. There was a vast quantity of clerical work--marking of papers, balancing of household s, correspondence--to be done. And there was lesson planning and

scheduling to check as well as lists to con. She might not have an artistic preoccupation, but she could lose herself in work. There was never a dearth of it.

* * * *

Portia was up betimes the following morning escorting her pupils to Matins at the church presided over by its vicar, Rev. Sainsthorpe, who also instructed the girls in studies of religion and Latin. The rain of the previous evening had subsided, to be replaced by a sullen sky and a chill autumnal wind. Portia found her mood very little better than the previous evening; she had suffered a disturbed night. When Caldwell ed them at the front door, she saw that he too had not slept well.

They met Heloise and her daughter at the gate of their cottage next door to the school property, and processed in an orderly fashion into the stone Gothic structure which had served Hornsey for several centuries. Portia was preoccupied during the service and would have been hard put to recite the text or the essence of the vicar's learned sermon.

Fortunately Heloise, on their return to the school for a nuncheon, did not have the sermon in mind.

"Gavrielle tells me the girls did not return from the city with you, but spent the night with their father. Where did you encounter him? What a coincidence! Did you see his house? Is it very grand? Was he dismayed by your meeting? Was it convenable for him to entertain his daughters, do you think? When will they return? Will you entertain him then?"

Portia thought she had rather deal with the sermon than Madame's onslaught of questions, queries and wonderings? She answered as best she might, in an undertone, and with no more than a modicum of detail until they returned to the house. The sight of the housekeeper and maids waiting to take cloaks and usher young ladies into the dining room was very welcome. She slipped away as Caldwell ed her friend in the entry, and closed her study door on all the ensuing hubbub.

She heard the noise subside as the young ladies undertook their light repast and had just put off her bonnet when Lord Stadbroke was announced. Dismay knotted in her stomach. Rather than sit behind her desk as she had been going to, she peered in the glass of her secretaire, which stood her in stead of a mirror, and poked a wayward curl under her cap. A wan reflection peered back at her; her restless night was writ on her face and she looked more plain even than usual, she decided. Her thoughts still were occupied with Caldwell's disclosures and various mad solutions to their problem. The last thing she wanted was to entertain the viscount.

But Stadbroke, accompanied by his hound, was even at that moment being ushered into her study. She summoned a smile, straightened her back and offered her hand.

He held it for a moment longer than necessary and she thought he looked unusually uneasy beneath a forced bonhomie. "I have brought back your pupils, Miss Crossmichael! Their eagerness to return speaks well for your establishment. They've ed the other students."

She said nothing.

"I've said my farewells. They are all impatience to visit Hill Street again."

His joviality rang false to her ear. Her own response was cool. "How nice for you, my lord. It was fortuitous that the young ladies were able to overnight with you in their new home."

"Indeed, indeed, it was." The viscount fidgeted about the room followed closely by his dog, who sniffed at Portia's prized possessions, his paws treading faint damp marks on her carpet. "I wondered if I might beg a moment of your time?"

Despite her fatigue and preoccupation, Portia began to be amused. The viscount as supplicant was as unexpected as it was comical. She began to suspect what were his motives. "Won't you sit down, Lord Stadbroke?"

She led him to the fireside and took one of the wing chairs that waited there.

He took the other with alacrity, but poised on the edge of its seat, stiff with tension. The Ruffian, lugubrious but bright-eyed, pressed close to his side. "Your comments yesterday... The girls--Sabina--told me that she saw me early in the morning yesterday in town. And that you also glimpsed me and my...companion."

"I did, yes." Portia said no more; she had no intention of making this interview easy for the viscount. She did not dare to question her own motives.

"You were quite right in speaking of...of gossip and discretion. I should be sorry for my daughters' to be harmed by any such rumour."

He was attractive in his earnestness, Portia thought detachedly. His brown eyes pleaded for her understanding, his handsome head was tilted at a perfectly appealing angle, and his broad shoulders were bent with some degree of submission.

She was suddenly impatient with subtlety. "I can relieve your anxiety, my lord. Yes, I did see you strolling abroad with your...your cherie-amie yesterday. Your daughters fortunately did not. You are a fool to behave so when they reside not so very far from town, and you will be fortunate do your exploits not reach their ears." Portia found satisfaction in voicing the concern that had bothered her since she had heard of his reputation. "I know you value plain speaking."

The viscount flushed darkly and stirred in his chair.

"Oh, and I would be extremely offended if you asked for assurances that I should not mention the matter to them. I do not engage in salacious gossip with my pupils, especially when it concerns their parents." Portia knew she sounded starched up and priggish but it was only the truth.

Stadbroke seemed to pull himself together at her sharp words. "Selfrighteousness does not become you, ma'am. I deserve your strictures no doubt, but I do not offer myself for your rebuke. I thank you for your reassurances and your advice. You may be assured in turn that the girls will hear nothing of me from their friends." He rose unexpectedly.

"You look tired," he added abruptly. "I am sure it is no sinecure, this establishment. Is it a family business?"

"Not at all, my lord. I studied here, and eventually was able to buy the business with the help of a small inheritance. My paternal grandfather, though he did not acknowledge the connection, was the Earl of Auchterader."

She wondered at herself, puffing off her titled relations in a way that she never had before in her life. What was it about this man...?

"I had my season, made my bow to society, and as promptly retired from it. No this school is not an easy task, Lord Stadbroke," Portia was surprised into saying. "But it is one I love." The thought that she might lose the school suddenly overwhelmed her, and to her horror tears filled her eyes.

Ingram was appalled by her sudden weakness. He had been embarrassed by her frankness and infuriated by her high-handed moral smugness, but he had no wish to hurt or distress her. He had found himself concerned over her apparent fatigue when he had first entered the room but his own concerns had occupied his mind. Now he saw that she was weary to her bones, and very, very worried about something.

To see her fine grey eyes swimming with tears disturbed him. He was accustomed to women's tears, tears that manipulated, manoeuvred and controlled. But he knew somehow that Portia Crossmichael did not cry without reason, that she never wept in public, and that she would never resort to tears as a weapon. Therefore, something was seriously wrong. And he found, to his surprise, that though he had frequently crossed swords with her, he had no wish to see Miss Crossmichael in trouble. In fact he discovered that he respected, even liked her, and now--because of her revelations--was intrigued by her. The Earl of Auchterader must be all about in his head to deny the connection.

"Is there something wrong? Something I can do to be of assistance?" he asked, despising the hesitation he heard in his voice. Ruff whined softly.

Portia had extracted a fine lace-trimmed handkerchief from her sleeve and was pressing it impatiently to her eyes. Ingram found himself suddenly aware of the grace of her slender hands and the narrowness of her delicate wrists. He met those fine grey eyes--now devoid of tears-- again. They were beautiful eyes, the grey of still winter water, birch bark in shadow and silver in reflection, fringed with long, long lashes.

He shook his head in puzzlement at his unexpected reaction.

"I am fine, Lord Stadbroke. I have my brother, and I have an excellent staff who me." She rose to indicate that their conversation was at an end. "I will keep your daughters safe, and I am certain that you will protect them also. Good day."

He had been dismissed, thoroughly and peremptorily. Ingram's temper rose again and the Ruffian stood and uttered a short, sharp bark. "Good day to you, ma'am." He added with sarcasm born of confusion, "It has been a pleasure discussing matters with you."

The door opened as he strode to it. Dent was on the point of entering, but hesitated at Ingram's ferociously controlled greeting and the dog's minatory look.

"The viscount is just leaving, Caldwell. Do come in."

Stadbroke tightened his jaw on the pleasant welcome given to the other man. Miss Crossmichael had a captivating, mellifluous voice--a silk and satin voice-he realized with sudden unwilling acuity.

He nodded to Dent and contented himself with banging the door behind him. It was only as he accepted his tall hat, and his gloves from the porter that he realized that Dent had looked every bit as haggard and weary as did the schoolmistress. There was trouble, it seemed, at Mansion House School, and a mystery. He wondered about it, all the way back to London, as he drove his phaeton into the teeth of a nasty east wind with Ruff at his side.

CHAPTER FIVE

Though her attention was alternately consumed by thoughts of the trouble Harold Dent was bringing upon her school, and the difficulties Lord Stadbroke threatened to bring on his children, Portia was by the middle of the next week aware that there was a new problem.

On Wednesday two of the young ladies in Melicent Perrington's class had taken to their beds, and were being cosseted by Matron and her maids, drinking quantities of barley water and having cool clothes placed on their small foreheads.

On Thursday, little Penelope burst into tears doing her sums, and Portia was summoned.

With a comprehensive glance around the classroom, she noted one or two abnormally flushed faces and one small nose hidden by a deplorable handkerchief. She swept Penny up, and exchanged an expressive glance with her teacher of arithmetic, Mr. Gamston. She said, "Young ladies, I wish those of you who are not feeling well to retire to the senior dormitory chamber. Those of you who feel themselves in good health should retrieve your needlework or your books and retire to the parlour. And I wish everyone to ask those staff you see to attend me in my study."

Within half of an hour, most of Portia's staff was assembled before her. She sat at her desk still nursing Penelope, whose flushed face was pressed firmly into her shoulder. "It seems we have an epidemic of sorts amongst us."

There were nods of agreement from all sides. Caldwell groaned.

"You may take yourself to your studio and stay there until you are notified!" Portia informed him; he knew as well as she that the students' health must take priority over any of their other problems. "Mr. Gamston, you are likewise relieved of your classes until further notice, and if you will advise Mr. Billockby when you his dancing class, I will be in your debt." The gentlemen withdrew, their relief apparent. The female staff urged them on their way.

"Now ladies, I think we should separate the well from the infirm, both for ease of tending and to preserve the health of the well. We have done this before, and we have had success with this scheme of separation if you will . As usual the senior girls' dormitory would seem best suited to tending the sick. Mrs. Yaxham, you and Mrs. Shap will know how best to effect the transfer. If you will take your maids, and be about this? And do help the girls to find whatever they need to keep them occupied and happy--well or ill. Well in the junior dormitory, ill in the senior."

The matron and the housekeeper bustled off, trailed by the three maids.

"Mme. Montlucon, is Gavrielle well or ill?"

"Well, Miss Crossmichael. She is to me shortly." Heloise was all business; they had discussed and refined their plans for such an eventuality.

Portia was grateful for her friend's . "Then if you will keep her with you,

and act as my secretary here in my study, I would appreciate it. Have Mrs. Yaxham provide you with a list of the sick, and write to their parents, the usual notification. I think there is no serious danger from this illness, but a few uncomfortable days must be expected. No one should be unduly alarmed." A maid was sent to find Gavrielle. "Once the letters are gone out, I think you should, with Gavrielle, retire to your home and preserve your health."

"Of course. Though I hate to leave you with all the work." The Frenchwoman smiled at her friend.

"We have been through it before, have we not?" Portia reminded her. "Oh, we must advise the Rev. Sainsthorpe that Latin and religious studies will not be required for the duration of our immurement."

"I shall write to him also." Madame moved to Portia's desk before the window.

Portia vacated her chair with a smile, lifting Penelope to rest on her hip. There was a clattering of feet to and fro overhead, and a growing din in the parlour next door as the girls who were in good health gathered there.

She turned to the remaining teacher. "Miss Gosberton, have I thought of everything? You will as usual be my prop and mainstay. May I ask you to oversee the young ladies who are feeling well? Direct them in whatever studies you see fit, take them for refreshing walks in the garden and keep up their spirits, you know better than I the requirements. And probably they should confine their activities to the parlour, the junior dormitory and the dining room; it will be easier for you than using the classrooms. I will help you as I can, of course." The teacher agreed with a nod and a word of agreement and took her leave. The noise in the parlour next door quieted after only brief minutes.

"Now, little one," Portia was touched by the unusual dependence of feisty little Penny. "Let's get you to bed." She left the chamber still carrying the child.

The child burrowed her head further under Portia's chin. "I want Papa."

Portia heard her with surprise; usually an ill child would ask for its mother. "Papa will certainly be told you are not well, but we wouldn't want him to take the catarrh from you, would we?"

"Papa alwayth cometh when I am ill."

"Well, we shall see what we shall see," Portia suggested with appropriate obscurity. She could not imagine the impeccable Lord Stadbroke in a childish sickroom; in her experience, parents were more than happy to allow someone else to deal with the illnesses of childhood. "Meanwhile here is Mel."

Melicent appeared from the bustle of young ladies milling about the entry, and rushed up to her sister's side. She sneezed explosively.

"Handkerchief, Melicent," Portia said automatically, and watched the child search her apron pocket, her sash and her sleeve before locating the square of linen.

The porter sneezed and Portia sighed inwardly. This looked to be developing into a difficult few days. If her staff was disabled by illness life would be fraught

indeed.

Sabina appeared at the top of the stairs. She appeared to be in good health as she hurried down them.

Portia said, "Sabina, you should go with the other girls who are not ill, to the parlour."

"No Miss Crossmichael, I shall stay with Penny and Mel." Sabina took Penelope from Portia's arms.

Portia repressed a sense of loss upon Penelope's transfer. "Sabina, we don't need another girl to be ill. In our experience, if you stay with the well girls, you will remain well yourself."

"My sisters need me, ma'am. I will stay with them." With calm determination, Sabina stared at her over her small sister's head.

Portia could not mistake the resolve in the girl's voice and gaze, and she ired the self-less sisterly affection that put herself in harm's way for the good of her siblings. "Very well, my dear. But I would not have you in the midst of the dormitory surrounded by sniffles. Where can I put you? I've not had sisters here before."

"We shall do very well with the other girls, ma'am," Sabina said.

Melicent sniffed tremendously, coughed and asked, "Will Papa come?"

"I am sure he will if he thinks it necessary. Madame is writing to parents even as we speak. Come along--upstairs, ladies." Portia urged the girls gently toward the staircase.

By the time she and her staff had all the girls settled in their new arrangements the evening was well advanced. Madame and her daughter had retired to their home, the letters had been long since taken by one of the grooms to be delivered in the city, or posted to distant parents. A light supper had been served to the young ladies who were in good health, and the girls who were ill were tended by Matron and her maids, aided by Portia.

She was sitting down to a much delayed supper of cold meat and bread with a wedge of cheese when the door knocker crashed with authority. The clock had just chimed nine on the chill autumn evening, and Portia was reviewing her arrangements as she ate. She heard the porter in discussion with another deeper male voice and then without ceremony, the viscount strode into her study.

She had half expected his arrival, but not so soon. He must have left the city immediately upon receipt of Madame's careful note. Portia had hoped, irrationally, that her letter would not reach him, despite the girls' evident need of him. She closed her eyes briefly on his immaculate person. She knew all too well that her hair was coming down, curling out of her cap, the pocket of the sensible apron she had donned bulged with fresh handkerchiefs, and that her fingers were ink-stained from earlier g Madame's impeccably penned notes to parents.

She swallowed the mouthful of bread and butter she had just taken and rose. "Lord Stadbroke."

"Miss Crossmichael! Please take me to my daughters." The viscount brought with him a gust of fresh, chill air, and looked inexcusably hale and vigorous.

"You have had our note."

"I have!" His tone was inimical.

"Then you will know this is a simple attack of feverish colds, a straightforward catarrh. The children are not in danger, and we can better nurse them without the interference of parents."

"In my opinion, Miss Crossmichael, a parent can never 'interfere' in their child's well-being; it is a parent's right and duty to be involved in their child's care. If you refuse me access to my daughters I will remove them to my Hill Street residence."

"Bona Dea, my lord, of course I will not refuse to let you see your daughters. You must see my difficulty however. They are being cared for in a dormitory with ten other girls in varying states of discomfort, undress and affliction. Other parents would rightly be offended by your presence there."

The viscount was appropriately abashed. "Oh. Of course. But you misunderstand me. I do not wish simply to see them. I am here to care for them."

Portia inelegantly goggled at him, bereft of speech.

"It cannot be that unusual, Miss Crossmichael. You cannot yourself know the concerns of a parent, but one cares for one's children to the exclusion of everything else."

Portia found her tongue. "It is not only unusual, Lord Stadbroke, but in my experience, unprecedented. However, far be it from me to interfere with your parental impulses. You have not brought the hound?" She added the last with a momentary flash of apprehension.

He shook his head with a flare of amusement in his eyes even in the midst of his concern.

She was certain her relief was writ large on her face. "Well then, grant me a few moments if you will and I will make arrangements."

Portia let herself out of the room, and leaned back against the door she closed behind her. Drat the man; she would grant him no iration for his parental devotion. Now she had to find a place to put him so that he could help care for his children. There really wasn't a spare room in the house, but one guest bedroom kept for the male teachers in the event that they had to stay over night. It was next to Caldwell's chamber and would do very well for the viscount, but it was totally unsuited for the girls.

The porter, handkerchief in hand, was watching her; Lord Stadbroke's portmanteau sat by his feet. She pushed away from the door and gave Euston a faint smile.

Very well, there was only her own chamber; it would do. She could sleep in her dressing room on a cot with a locked door, and his sick daughters could share her large bed while Sabina slept at their sides in another cot. The viscount could make shift between the wing chair and the guest bedroom. At least he had not brought the dog.

She went to seek out Mrs. Shap and effect the changes, and all was organized when she returned to her study.

Before she could speak, the viscount was apologizing. "I interrupted your meal. I do beg your pardon."

Portia was again bereft of speech. This kind thoughtfulness was unexpected; it did not fit with her view of the man she privately called the venal viscount.

But he was continuing. "I thought it ought not to go to waste, however, so I ate your gammon and a biscuit, having missed my own dinner, and I took a cup of tea." He appeared quite serious and without regret. "There is a biscuit left for you."

Portia's overtaxed temper flared. Then she saw the twinkle in his eye, and she relaxed into brief laughter. "Come along, my lord. I will show you to your room, and then into your daughters' company."

Stadbroke carried his portmanteau above-stairs himself after advising the heavyeyed porter to look after himself. He was pleased to approve the guest chamber, and Portia was altogether in charity with him as she ushered him--with some consciousness--into her own bedchamber.

A quick glance about told her that Mrs. Shap had done an irable job; personal artifacts had been removed from the tops of her dressing-table and various chests. Her books and her needlework had vanished, and an open door revealed that the press had been hastily emptied. It was possible, she thought, that the viscount would never know it was her chamber.

Melicent and Penelope were tucked into the clean sheeted bed, and Sabina sat upon a cot which had been moved in. The young ladies were waiting expectantly.

"Papa! Papa!" The cry rose from two clogged throats and Sabina hurried to throttle her father with a desperate embrace. "We knew you would come."

Portia took only a moment to observe the reunion on the pretext of removing the empty jug that had held refreshing lemonade. The viscount could not be faulted; he did not recoil from his daughters' sneezes and coughs. He laid them down again with practised ease, and patted Sabina's shoulder encouragingly. By the time she left the room, he was removing his coat and, ignoring her departure, was bending to make up the fire.

* * * *

The week ed in a blur for Portia. Dividing her time between the young ladies who were ill and those who were not was a tiring but necessary task. It gave her little opportunity to wonder how the viscount was coping, but last thing before she slept she was ever aware of him in the next room. His deep voice was quiet in reassurance, firm in discipline and, above all, tender as he cared for his children.

So she was surprised when she encountered him in the kitchens at two o'clock one morning.

"Do you never sleep, Miss Crossmichael? You check on my daughters at least three times a day; I hear you on the floor above comforting the sick girls, on the floor below rallying those in health, holding discussions with Mrs. Shap, Mrs. Yaxham, Miss Gosberton and Mr. Dent."

Portia flushed. She was uncomfortably aware of the thick plait of sandy hair that hung over her shoulder, and the soft slippers on her feet, not to mention her enveloping wrap of deep blue challis. Her deshabille was echoed by his own; he wore but shirt and breeches with a low shoes and a loosened neckcloth. He was attractively approachable and Portia had never seen a man so comfortably attired and so unconcerned by his dishevelment.

"Needs must, my lord. But yes, I do sleep."

"In the dressing room--beside your bedchamber--which we have stolen from you. I do apologize. When you intimated that my presence would be inconvenient I had no idea we would roust you from your own refuge. Selfishly, I considered only my own needs." He ran long fingers through his already disarranged hair.

"You were considering only your daughters' needs, and that, my lord, is irable, not selfish. And you may have noted I have no need of my bedchamber presently. I have time for no more than sleep and the cot in my dressing room is perfectly adequate for that." Portia recalled that she had come to the kitchen to prepare more barley water for the girls still sneezing and

coughing in the senior dormitory, and whisked herself into the pantry. Contrary to her wish, he was still there when she came out again.

He was squeezing lemons. "Sabina has a desire for lemonade. I thought she would not suffer the catarrah, she often does not, but she has been most uncomfortable. The other two are nearly well though."

"I think we are nearly through with this miserable illness," Portia was measuring and mixing her own brew, and was surprised to find the viscount at her elbow. She paused and looked into his face. She found there an expression she had never thought to see, a kindness--indeed a gentleness--that she thought could be her undoing if she was not careful.

"You work too hard," he said, touching the tip of one of those long fingers to the dark circles under her eyes.

She ducked her head away, all too aware of the ravages of busy-ness upon her ordinary features.

"I don't. At least not usually." The intimacy of the dim kitchen lit only by the banked kitchen fire and a single lamp made her uneasy. No doubt the viscount was accustomed to unchaperoned meetings in dark rooms--she tried to rally herself with venom--but she was not. "I have a splendid staff and I rely upon excellent organization."

"You are too young for the burden of responsibility you have taken on."

"I am nearly nine and twenty, my lord." She edged away from him, but he followed her until she was backed up against the cook's marble pastry slab. She wondered wildly if he was missing his usual flirts, his female companions.

He brushed back the fine curls at her temple, and held her gaze with his own inscrutable one. Then, just when she thought she bear the tension no longer, he turned away to his own task.

Portia released a breath she had not realised she was holding, tried not to feel disappointed, and could not conceal a slump of relief.

"You are not yet thirty and a female and you are providing the livelihoods of at least, what, a dozen people--fifteen? As well as having responsibility for some thirty young women. That is a significant burden, Miss Crossmichael, one most ladies of my acquaintance would decline to undertake."

"The women of your acquaintance, my lord..."

"Ah, I think I have finished," he circumvented the hasty words on her tongue, by preparing for departure. He poured his lemonade into the pitcher he had brought down from his daughters' sickroom. "Good night, ma'am."

She saw nothing of him the following day though she kept a eye out for him on her trips between the three floors of her small empire. She wondered what Heloise would say about the kitchen encounter, but even as she wondered she knew she would never tell her friend. It was a precious, private memory. She could pretend even that he liked her in those quiet moments, and that she liked him, despite her odd panic.

Late the next evening she took herself to her study. She was tired but determined to consider the stack of household s that had accrued during the busy days. She sighed and took up the first sheet from the pile. She had had a brief conversation with Caldwell during a rare shared dinner that day. He had heard from his father, and they discussed again the inevitability of paying his demands. When the wave of ill health was over she would have again to confront the threat of extortion that awaited them.

She worked for two hours or more, then rose and stretched her cramped shoulders. She blew out her lamp and lit a chamberstick at the candelabra before extinguishing its lights. Soft footed she checked the locks of all the doors-Euston the porter had taken to his sick-bed under protest--and then, above-stairs, she reconnoitered the dormitories. All was reasonably well; Matron was up tending one or two small sufferers but a whispered conversation indicated she would soon retire.

Thankfully, Portia headed for her own cot, pulling off her cap as she trod the familiar corridors. She ed her bedroom without hesitation and had her hand on the door which gave onto her dressing room, when a soft sound behind her alerted her to another presence. She whirled, sending her shawl and her skirts flying. She dropped the cap and her hand flew to her throat.

The viscount stood closing the door to her bedroom behind him. "I am sorry. I would not have startled you for the world," he apologized sotto voce. He was a little less dishevelled this evening--his neckcloth was nicely tied and he wore a finely embroidered waistcoat--but still with a casual and comfortable air.

She berated herself for her edginess, and relaxed, welcoming his presence. These meetings, his presence, made her wonder if married life was like this: the comfort of having someone about to share burdens, the unexpected visits, the

companionship, the sharing of the day.

Her mind wandered to the sharing of the night and she tensed again snapping at him. "What can I do for you, my lord?" Even when she spoke she did not like her word choice. She was such a spinster she did not even know what she could do for him--what his other women did for him. For the first time in an age vague longings awoke within her; longings that she ed recognizing long ago, during that single ill-fated season.

He seemed to read nothing into her words, though there was laughter lurking in his rich brown gaze, dancing there with the reflected candle flames. "Nothing," he whispered. "I was going to find my bed. My daughters have allowed me a little sleep each night at least. I was longing for adult company earlier and looked in on you but you were deep in your work."

She could scarcely believe that she had not heard him, but supposed her weariness had contributed to such preoccupation.

He bent and picked up her cap, holding it out then withdrawing it. He stretched out his empty hand instead and withdrew the loosened pins from her heavy, coiled hair. It cascaded with a susurration to her shoulders, her bosom and nearly to her waist.

She was immobilized, her lips parted on an astounded yearning. From some distant place, she watched him transfer the pins to the hand with which he still held her muslin cap, then she felt his fingers tangle in her hair. The intimacy of it was astonishing, the silence in the corridor profound but for the sound of their breathing. His knuckles grazed her throat then his hand slid under her hair to cup her head.

She woke from what seemed a dream when a drop of hot wax landed on her hand. She had tilted her chamberstick dangerously, and that danger had saved her from another more profound. She snatched her cap and her pins from his hand and withdrew in a cloud of flaxen strands to a safe distance. "You, my lord, have been too long from the company of your lovely lady friends!" she spat out.

His dark eyes narrowed. "And you, ma'am, have a distorted view of your own charms. And woman-like you seek to blame me for your desires. But I agree I was distracted into the inappropriate. I do apologize for that."

Portia retreated to her dressing room door once more. "The sooner your daughters are well, my lord, and you leave us, the better it will be for my school. And I could wish you had not come to London, so that your daughters had not had need to follow you."

"I came to London, Miss Crossmichael, to experience freedom and joy. Two things of which I fear you have little knowledge."

She was cut to the heart by that slashing statement.

He seemed to realize it. "Portia, no, I did not mean that! You cannot understand what my marriage was, what it lacked, but you must believe that I had need to discover what I had missed and what I most valued."

"Your problems, Stadbroke, must remain your own. I acknowledge only my duty to your daughters. They, God bless them, idolize you. And you disdain their very

sex. That is a sad conundrum, my lord."

"One I seek to solve, ma'am." He drew himself up. "And I think I am coming to a new understanding."

She could not bear his company longer, and could make no sense of his words. She opened her door, shook her thick hair over her shoulder, and with one backward glance entered her room.

The glance told her he still stood there and, that when her candle was removed, the light and the humour died from his eyes.

* * * *

Two days later Stadbroke stood before Miss Crossmichael's desk. "I shall remove the burden of my presence from your establishment tomorrow." He crossed to the window so that he would not have to meet the schoolmistress's calm gaze. "Penny is well, Mel nearly so, and Sabina had only one or two difficult days after all. I must thank you, ma'am. The attention and caring of your staff, and your own tenderness, towards your ill pupils has been impressive. A child would scarcely receive such excellent care in her own home. I shall not be silent in my praise for your school, Miss Crossmichael."

"Thank you, my lord. You are very kind. I would expect nothing less from my staff and myself than complete attention to our pupils' needs."

Her words were as stilted as their relations had been since his damnable slip three nights earlier. He had spent every unoccupied moment since wondering what had come over him. It was true that she was possessed of the most glorious hair it had ever been his privilege to liberate. But that could not explain the craving that had possessed him. It had been a brief hunger dissipated quickly by her intemperate accusation. He had recalled that he did not care for her, that she was a blue-stocking, and worse than all else, an intelligent woman.

He cleared his throat. "Well, I do thank you, ma'am." His words were inadequate and he turned to leave. He was conscious that he was less than honest with himself in claiming to dislike her.

He paused at the door. "And Miss Crossmichael, if I may be of any service in solving the problem that has also occupied you and Mr. Dent during this time, I should be most happy." He looked back at her.

The head teacher seemed momentarily frozen in place. Then she forced a smile to her lips. "Problem, my lord? Surely you are mistaken."

"I overheard, quite inadvertently, part of your discussion with your brother on the 'necessity for speed', the 'urgency of delivery' and the requirement of 'utter secrecy'. Likewise I happened upon Mme. Montlucon and Mr. Dent in the yew walk in the midst of an apparently acrimonious discussion. I dislike secrets. If you are in trouble, Miss Crossmichael, it is to my benefit and that of my daughters' that I be of assistance."

"There is no problem, Lord Stadbroke. You must have misunderstood our discussions. A kitchen crisis, nothing more. And, forgive me if I am wrong, but you keep your own secrets, do you not?"

A diversionary tactic, Ingram told himself, though a clever one. He would not be distracted, but she was right, he did have secrets. However, she was lying about her problems. He knew the signs as well or better than any man, and this woman was lying. For what purpose, over what matter, he could not tell. "I bid you good day, ma'am. And as on the morrow you will likely be busy, I add my farewell now." He would have to keep a closer eye on the Mansion House Establishment while his daughters were in residence. Something was sadly awry.

Portia watched the door close after the viscount with relief. She would never it to regret. Concerned that he had scented their trouble, she was delighted that he had decided his daughters could be left to her care.

She was aware of the time of his departure the following day, but beyond a quick word with the Perrington sisters, she made nothing of it. The school's usual schedule was being reinstated as young ladies returned to health, and she was busy. She did however seek out Caldwell at her earliest opportunity, hurrying into his studio, interrupting his work without compunction. "He overheard us. Stadbroke overheard our conversation, and is drawing his own conclusions." Portia paced her brother's workroom in agitation. "He will be watching us, I am sure of it."

Caldwell stood at his easel, tension visible in every line of his compact frame. "Why should he care what happens in the school unless it affects his daughters?"

"I don't know... I don't know. He happened upon your discussion with Heloise also."

"He was omnipresent all the days he was here. I cannot fault his devotion to his

children, but I shall be glad now that he is gone. If only we could return to normal in every way."

"I don't know why Harold Dent had to appear and threaten to destroy my livelihood and your happiness. Perhaps you should go, Cal. Disassociate yourself with me; try to convince Heloise to marry you and leave the school. You have such a successful beginning of your career. It would be a crime for that to be lost."

"If I go my father will still spread rumours about what was going on here; he will say my departure proves our guilt. We shall have to pay what he asks again, Port, I don't see anyway around it."

"But it won't stop at two payments or three, you know that." Portia gripped her etui so tightly that her knuckles showed white.

"Well, he is drinking himself to death, if that is any comfort. His time on this earth may be limited. We can only hope." He surveyed his canvas narrowly as he spoke.

"Cal!"

"He is my father by birth, nothing more. I will not pretend that I love him. We were singularly unlucky in our parents, you and I. I can see why Heloise will have no part of me."

"Stadbroke said you had had words. What happened?" So great was her distress that Portia thought nothing of breaking her vow of non-interference in Caldwell's affairs.

"She wanted to know about my father, why I look worried, why you look worried. I wouldn't tell her." Caldwell laid down his palette, and stalked to the fire that danced with contrary gaiety on the hearth.

"You should, you must. Where there is love, there must be honesty. And your resolution will wear down her scruples eventually. So will success in your career. Arguing with her will not further your cause."

"I do not want her to worry about my father's threats. It is for her own good that I tell her nothing. If she will not love me without a villainous parent, she will not love me with one."

"She does love you, I know she does." Portia followed him to the fireplace and laid an appealing hand on his arm.

"You know more than I do then," he said, his despair evident in every dejected line of his body.

Portia took a deep, sustaining, stabilizing breath. "We shall pay. You are correct, we shall have to pay him again. Then perhaps the matter will be done with; no one hurt, no one the wiser. Perhaps he will not pursue us indefinitely. We cannot risk destroying your future for want of spending a few pounds." She shook his arm in her intensity.

"Spending those pounds--hundreds of pounds--may destroy your future, this school!"

"After these months dealing with the wretched viscount, I could almost decide to close without regret." She sighed deeply. "Oh, I don't mean that. It is all I have, this school."

"I had a notion you liked the viscount rather better than you indicated." Caldwell was searching her face with a keen gaze.

Portia released him and turned away. "No, Cal, you are quite mistaken. I can have no iration for him." She straightened her slender back and squared her shoulders. "Make the arrangements, my dear. Pay Harold Dent his money, but he must understand our pockets are not deep."

"Indeed he must," Caldwell muttered in agreement, aiming a kick at a firedog that threatened to topple.

"He must," Portia echoed, her head aching.

CHAPTER SIX

The viscount was among them again.

Portia stared from her study windows at the vision of Ruff, the Perringtons' hound, cavorting over the lawn with nearly every girl of the school in pursuit. The day was a fine one, crisp and clear, repayment perhaps for the weeks of autumn rain that had plagued the countryside. She could not fault the students for finding their way out of doors. They had been scheduled for other activities but their instincts told them to be outside, and she would not argue with it.

But if that dog was at her school, so too was the viscount. She could see Sabina among the girls streaming across the lawn, and Melicent; she watched for another minute or two and Penelope arrived in a tumble of youngsters giggling and bouncing about the hound. It was all very unladylike, but the only parent present--the viscount--would not berate her for that. Somehow she was certain of it.

She turned away from the window to return to her desk, but was halted by a knock upon her door. She straightened her cap, twitched her cap and fichu into faultless order. Every unexpected visitor these days frightened her. Every caller had the potential to be Harold Dent, demanding more money, threatening the worst kind of lies, the most devastating exposure. It was nonsensical, for he had never done other than communicate with Caldwell, and she had no reason to think that he would change that pattern but still there it was...the fear. She took a deep calming breath and reluctantly opened the door.

Lord Stadbroke was there, she should have expected it. He was, as ever,

elegantly turned out, and he inclined his head in a polite gesture and greeted her casually.

Portia's breath caught in her throat at the sight of his elegant figure, and she was conscious of deep relief that her worst fears--that Harold Dent--had not been realized. Her well-schooled face showed none of her thoughts, but she extended a hand to the viscount thoughtlessly in her relief.

She could not snatch it back; he pressed her hand--for a moment longer than necessary she thought--and then looked for a moment from the window. He moved to rest against the mantel piece after watching the heaving crowd on the lawn, endangering a small oil by Caldwell that she had recently placed there.

"What can I do for you today, my lord?" she asked, her tone even and unexpressive. "Have you just arrived? May I offer you tea?"

"Thank you, no tea. I have been here an hour, I've seen the girls, and I have turned that hound loose for their entertainment. I see everyone is diverted. I have need to disturb you because I received this last week a cryptic note from Mel," he informed her with equal blandness. "To the effect that Penny is wreaking mayhem in her set, and that Sabina is mooning about. I understand, Miss Crossmichael, that my eldest daughter is in love with your brother."

"No, my lord, Sabina thinks she is in love with Caldwell. There is a vast difference. And I suspect Melicent of undertaking something of a diversion. She did not, in all likelihood, mention that she threw her needlework in the midden, Lord Stadbroke?" Portia felt unequal to immediately explaining Sabina's infatuation, and tossed out Melicent's reprehensible act as a distraction of her own.

"Ah, I see. She has sought to distract attention from her own iniquities by calling others into question." His angular face was suddenly full of laughter. "Just as you have sought to distract me."

Portia coloured. She might have known he would immediately see through her ploy. She quite understood what all the society ladies saw in the viscount, and willed her heart to a more normal pace. No matter how attractive his lordship might be, he was not and never would be for her.

Fifteen years of masculine indifference--since she had first become aware of the male sex--had taught her that the attractive of that sex viewed her without interest. But she had recently learned that although she was without attraction herself, she was not beyond being attracted to a handsome gentleman. Oh, it was all pointless, she thought hastily recalling her attention to his words.

"Well, I would not have reported such an act to you, but of course she has no way of knowing that. It was theatrically done," Portia's face unknowingly softened, as she described Melicent's rousing denunciation of all needlework and her dramatic storming of the kitchen yard where she had snatched up a stick, impaled the hated sampler upon it and thrust it into the heart of the midden.

The viscount was helpless with laughter by the time she finished the tale and she was more deeply attracted to him than ever. He retrieved a snowy handkerchief from a pocket concealed in his deep green tailcoat and wiped his eyes.

"She has been relieved of all needlework classes and reassigned to an advanced mathematics class--one given to the fourteen year olds," Portia completed the tale.

"She will enjoy that," Stadbroke nodded. "You don't miss a trick do you, ma'am. Except where love is concerned."

Portia froze in the act of straightening the papers on her desk. "Love?" She was aware that she made the word sound like something vile and loathsome.

"Your brother and my daughter?" he reminded her, his acute gaze alert on her face.

She bent her head so that she did not have to continue to reveal her commonplace features to his examination. "My brother does suffer from unrequited love, my lord, but not for your daughter. Since he met her five years ago, Caldwell's affections have all been engaged by my school's French mistress Mme. Montlucon who, you will , is a widow."

"So my daughter is to suffer a broken heart?"

"It is preferable in my mind to a disastrous association. She is altogether too young to be thinking of any such emotion. In any case, they all--the older girls-fall in love with Cal. He does nothing to encourage them, and much to discourage, and they are none of them harmed by the experience."

"Good, then I need not worry. As with everything, you have the matter well in hand and you have no need of my interference." He pushed away from the mantel and returned to stare from the window.

Portia thought of Harold Dent, and how little control she had over that situation. And how much she longed to pour out the tale to someone--no, particularly to this man--and have him take the burden of the problem from her. She realized suddenly that Stadbroke was watching her reflection in the window glass. Once more she concealed her face by staring at the papers on her desk.

"And Penny?"

His soft-spoken words drew her back from her worries. "Penelope?" she managed to say. "Penny is planning a raid upon the larder followed by a midnight feast in the junior dormitory. But the girls will find nothing in the larder that might be too rich or filling, only a substantial cake suitable for consumption in the middle of the night. As I assume they will be adventuring with their candles, they will be closely observed for safety."

"You make it dashed hard for a man to fault you, ma'am. And a knight errant could starve for want of derring-do because of your omniscience." He invited her participation in his laughter.

Little does he know, she thought, how much I need just such a hero. If only I could bring myself to confide in him.

"I had another small matter, Miss Crossmichael." He drew her from her thoughts with quiet words and an enquiring glance.

She pinned an expression of mild curiosity to her face; she had to conquer this

longing to be rescued from her difficulties she scolded herself. Deliverance from her problems would occur only by her own efforts, as always. "Your brother accepts portrait commissions, does he not?"

"He does," she confirmed.

"I wonder, would he accept a commission from me to paint my daughters and I, en famille?"

"You would have to ask him, my lord. I am in no way his agent."

"Of course not. I do apologize. Would it be possible to speak to him now?"

Portia glanced at the long case clock that rested near the door to the corridor. "I believe he will be in his studio at the moment. I shall summon Penelope to guide you to him. That way they can also show you her progress in drawing, as you have not had opportunity to see her talent."

He lifted his hands in a graceful gesture. "I am rebuked. I it I have not made the effort to view Penny's work. I do love my daughters, Miss Crossmichael."

Portia stepped to the terrace door and, opening it, called to Penelope. The child did not hear her, but Melicent did and paused in her capers to find and direct her younger sister. Portia turned back to the viscount with a guileless look upon her face. She had only a moment before Penny would arrive. "I know you do, Lord Stadbroke. It was very apparent when they were ill. That is why I know you will

wish to attend our Christmas ball, to see Sabina make her small come-out in our restricted society. You should receive your invitation within the week." She could have laughed long at the expression of horror on his mobile countenance.

"Christmas Ball?" he uttered in horrified accents.

"Christmas Ball," she reiterated. "We hold it every year for our pupils aged fourteen and older and their parents. Sabina is the only one of your daughters old enough to attend. We find that a little exposure to polite gatherings helps the older girls to make the transition to what will surely be their futures."

Portia had initiated the ball when first she had assumed directorship of the school. She would herself have benefited from such an introduction to social events eleven years earlier. Her awkwardness and confusion on her brief foray into society at seventeen would have been much alleviated had she been introduced to the niceties of such occasions before being thrust into them.

"The young ladies all take a hand in decorating our music room; we lay supper in the dining room, and have just enough space for the fifty or so guests and staff who attend the ball each year."

"Dancing?" he asked, with faint reproach.

"Dancing, and conversation, as with any ton party. The young ladies enjoy it immensely and their parents seem to appreciate an opportunity to see how their daughters present themselves."

She eyed the viscount who, she fancied, had paled and rested again against the mantel. "Are you well, my lord?"

"I am overcome by the thought of fifteen or so giddy, capricious schoolgirls, giggling and preening, dancing with each other's fathers and such of your masters as you can coerce into attendance."

"My pupils are neither giddy nor capricious, Lord Stadbroke."

He gave her a slightly scornful look, and gestured to the open door and the shrieking mass of femininity that was streaming over the sun-lit gardens.

"High spirits do not equal unreliability. You malign them and reveal your own sad prejudices by such a statement. I pity the ladies of your association if you have such a poor opinion of them. Or perhaps you associate with the wrong sort of women?"

Portia was suddenly furious; he could irritate her more violently than anyone she had ever met. "I hope you will do Sabina the courtesy of attending. Yes, you will be expected to dance with the young ladies. And for your information I coerce my masters into nothing. If they chose to attend, I do ask that they dance with the mothers of my pupils, otherwise those ladies would have a very dull evening." She heard the ice in her own voice, and was delighted to see the viscount narrow his eyes in a manner that said her barbs had gone home.

He opened his mouth to retort but the arrival of his daughter interrupted whatever he might have said.

"Come in Penelope," Portia said. "I'm sorry to take you from your revels, my dear."

The child gave her a beaming smile. "I had rather be with Papa, Mith Crossmichael."

The viscount flung Portia a triumphant look.

She ignored it resolutely refusing to be drawn into an acrimonious exchange. "Well he would like to see your art, and talk with Mr. Dent. Will you take him upstairs to Mr. Dent's, please?"

She dismissed the viscount with a pleasant nod. "Do watch for your invitation to the ball, my lord."

The viscount looked to be seething over her abrupt dismissal, but he went with his daughter without further comment. As the child ushered her father from the room, Portia prepared to enter the gardens to bring order to the delighted chaos that reigned there.

An hour later, all was calm and returned to contented quiet. The viscount and his hound had gone, and the girls were busily occupied in making decorations for the ball as the November dusk closed in.

When Portia returned to her study, she found her brother waiting for her. His

expression was happier than it had been for weeks, and grudgingly she thought she must thank the viscount for that.

He burst into speech before even she had closed the door. "I'm to do a portrait of Stadbroke and his daughters, Port! And the viscount is desirous of being a sort of patron to me. He will also have portraits of each girl, and recommend my work-if he is satisfied--to his friends."

"This is good news indeed!" Not without difficulty, Portia forced herself to pleasure. "And no more than you deserve. What did he think of Penelope's work?"

"You never saw a chap more astonished. He kept asking her 'did you indeed do this?' Penelope was become quite irritated with him at the end and demanded if he thought she would gammon him. Or if I would. He was at last convinced and wonders what will best foster her talent. I suggested that more lessons and unlimited materials and opportunity would be the best thing for nurture of her talent. She is very young of course."

"Very young," Portia reflected on the child to whom she was becoming much too attached. She had not previously found herself drawn to any of her pupils in quite this way. They all were good girls, nice girls, every year but they had none of them the wit nor the charm of the Perringtons. She was quite enchanted by them and pitied their motherless state. That Lord Stadbroke was their father had nothing to do with her attraction to them, she assured herself.

"Portia?"

She drew herself from her impromptu reverie. "I beg your pardon?"

"You were a million miles away just then," Caldwell eyed her curiously. "I said, wait until Heloise hears of this. Surely it will convince her of my worth. "

"I think it is not your worth that concerns her, but your youth. And the secrets you keep from her."

"You keep the same ones from Lord Stadbroke."

"That is totally different. You wish to marry Heloise! Stadbroke is no more than a client, the father of three pupils. There is no reason why he should know anything of my private business."

"No reason at all."

"None at all," she confirmed bleakly.

* * * *

There was never a question in his own mind, but that Ingram would attend the Christmas Ball at the Mansion House Establishment. Despite that he understood his daughters less as they matured, and expected them to display the characteristics he deplored in every other women of his intimate and casual acquaintance--foolishness, manipulativeness, and greediness--he loved them and

wanted only their happiness.

From Sabina's letters she was not happy, and he was glad of an opportunity to observe Caldwell Dent's manner towards the older pupils. That he would be equally glad of the chance to meet Miss Crossmichael in a purely social setting, he would not it.

He drove himself to Hornsey on the prescribed day in the last week of November for the cold was dry and the ground suitable for tooling of an open carriage under a clear sky. The ball was to begin at five o'clock and end at nine so that the parents of the young ladies would have no difficulty in finding their way back to London. In addition care had been taken to schedule the party with an eye to the full moon, a benefit ed by the lack of cloud.

He did not really know what to expect from Miss Crossmichael, on such an occasion. He had become accustomed to consider her possessed of qualities he had long believed to be in the masculine domain: forthrightness, business acumen and an impressive intelligence. If she could likewise display a feminine talent to entertain a company with a comfortable party, he would consider her a paragon among women.

Before the massive door of Mansion House, he gave his curricle into the care of his tiger and trod up the steps. Every window of the house's substantial façade showed a light, but there were no sounds of merriment to be heard. He was ushered in by the porter who gave him a respectful bow and a sympathetic grin. He responded with a slight shake of his head, allied in masculine understanding with the man. After all the poor old chap had to deal with the throng of silly females day in, day out. He deserved every kindness, and Ingram pledged to himself to bestow a handsome vail on the man when he departed.

A maid he had seen on previous visits took his greatcoat and his beaver and directed him to a short corridor at the back of the hall. It led to an open door from which spilled light and scent and the sounds of excited voices.

When he approached the doorway he could see that Miss Crossmichael stood just within with her brother at her side. He would have owned himself surprised that the schoolmistress could look so well. He had previously set her down as a woman of no more than able looks--her nose slightly too long, her mouth too wide, her face too elongated for beauty. There was the glorious though undeniably flaxen hair, but it was always covered by utilitarian muslin caps. But this day, all was changed. Her hair displayed a lively curling habit in its loose, crowning knot and plentiful waves and the candlelight teased out golden gleams from the pale colour. Miss Crossmichael displayed an unexpectedly elegant figure--and a handsome bosom--in a high-waisted silk gown in a shade of blue that enhanced the azure lights in her grey eyes. The dress was fashionably ruched about its hem and she wore with it golden earrings and a delicate gold necklace set with moonstones.

Stadbroke noted absently that her brother presented a very gentleman-like appearance in a good evening coat and pantaloons. He reflected once more that he had seldom seen a brother and sister so little alike, but then perhaps a half relationship was all they claimed and so the difference might be explained away.

He bowed politely before them both, and when Miss Crossmichael offered her hand, he raised it teasingly to his lips. He met her eyes as he did so, and was struck with a completely unexpected surge of longing. Oh, there had been an awareness between them before, certainly the 'corridor encounter', as he thought of it, had confirmed that. A small current of cognizance had swirled around their every meeting. He had believed it was because she disliked him so much. Now he wondered anew. And wondered how he could have been so blind. Miss Crossmichael was a very attractive woman, not beautiful, but with a combination of intelligence, womanliness, charm and understanding made her well-nigh irresistible.

Caldwell Dent cleared his throat, and Stadbroke realized that he had been holding Portia's hand far too long. He kissed the air above it, and restored it to her while avoiding her gaze. He turned his attention to Dent.

"Good evening! This must be the highlight of the festive season for you." He was pleased to note that his sardonic words made Portia bristle.

Dent chuckled his understanding. "'Tis a necessary bore," he nodded. "But the ladies all enjoy it, and we men must wish to keep them happy." His gaze was wandered to Mme. Montlucon, standing with a brace of proud parents and their budding daughter.

"Exactly so," Stadbroke agreed, and bowed politely to his hosts, He found himself, as he forged into the room, wondering involuntarily what would keep Miss Crossmichael happy. He had thought of several things when he found his eldest daughter. She was standing on tiptoe searching the crowd.

"Looking for me?" he grinned as he came up with her. "Or for Cal Dent?"

Her eyes rounded. "You, Papa. We are not allowed to dance with the masters. Papa, is it true Mr. Dent is to take our portrait--all of us?"

"It is. We begin sitting for him next week."

"Oh, splendid...I thought p'raps it was a hum--or Penny being wishful." She

clapped her hands in delight. "I shall see him--you--more often. Once a week or twice?"

The orchestra--comprised of the music master and two other musicians, one each at the pianoforte, a violin and a flute--began to tune their instruments.

"Once at first, beginning Tuesday. Should you like to dance, poppet?"

"Yes, please, Papa. It has been so wonderful seeing more of you since we came to school, sir. Mel is not nearly so unhappy, and Penny is always of a flutter for your next visit."

Stadbroke was smote with a pang of regret. He had not realized three years ago that his search for his own happiness would affect his daughters so much. He had departed Lincolnshire in confusion and had thought his children content with their home, their governess and their grandparents nearby. He had thought only of himself, it was true but surely that was no crime? He shook his head at his own thoughts and led Sabina onto the polished wood of Miss Crossmichael's music room floor to a set for the country dance.

"If you meant to ignore us when we grew up, you should not have made our childhood so very fine," Sabina said with uncanny acuity.

Ingram had the time it took to complete their separate movements in the dance to recover his composure after this facer from his child. It seemed his mistakes were visible to everyone and that everyone understood his designs better than he did himself. He was appalled but had no leisure to consider the matter. "I have not ignored you and your sisters," he said in his own defence.

"Oh, not Penny. And not Mel, too much. But you never talk to me anymore. Except now," his daughter grinned. Her eyes, he suddenly realized, were the mirror of his own. "Never mind, Papa, Miss Crossmichael says fathers are frequently confounded when their daughters become young ladies. They do not know what to say or how to behave around them. And they detest their beaus. Shall you detest my gallants, Papa? You quite like Mr. Dent, do you not?"

Ingram had his choice of topics to pursue with this onslaught of Sabina's chatter. "Miss Crossmichael is a fount of wisdom, child, and I think she has too good an understanding of fathers--or at least your father. And yes, I like Dent--and he thinks of you as nothing more than a student, which is what I should expect." He was disturbed to see his child's eyes fill with tears. "He's as good as promised to Mme. Montlucon, Sabina!"

"Oh...I didn't...oh..."

He could that Sabina was trying to control her trembling lips and sought to comfort her. "I thought you must know. Miss Crossmichael says it is nearly a settled thing. I am glad their discretion is so complete as to keep you in ignorance, but you must realize that a rather younger gentleman would be more suitable."

He knew immediately he had said the wrong thing. Suitable was an unappealing term; in fact, he recalled having the word thrown at him repeatedly before he had married her mother. Theirs had been an eminently suitable match.

"What of Christmas?" Ingram offered a desperate distraction. "Shall you enjoy Christmas in London?"

"Won't we go home to Stadley?" Sabina seemed to be recovering her composure.

Stadbroke was relieved, though there was a desolation at the back of her eyes that disturbed him. Across the chamber he could see Miss Crossmichael still besieged by parents. He had no doubt they all were looking for reassurance that their daughter was the most talented of the school's inhabitants. "No, my dear, we'll celebrate in Hill Street. I have experience of the trip north to the Court in December. last year when my arrival was so late? Not a journey I wish to repeat. And I would not for the world expose you three to an expedition like it."

"It will be different celebrating in town," Sabina unconsciously displayed a struggle to mature acceptance of the news.

"Not very. And you have done such a fine job of decorating for this ball, that you shall have charge of decorating the Hill Street house, with Mel and Penny and the housemaids to assist you."

"Really, Papa? When may we come? It is five weeks until Christmas; shall we come tomorrow? Where does one find holly in the city? And we must have mistletoe. A Yule log... Shall we have a Yule log? But we have no bit of last year's log with which to light it; they are at home. May we ask Miss Crossmichael to us, and Mr. Dent? Oh, and Madame with Gavrielle."

The dance slowed to its end to Stadbroke's relief. He had not at all considered Christmas as yet, having been occupied with the opening of Parliament, and was unprepared for the flood of questions. But his daughter's last question he could parry. "I am certain Miss Crossmichael and her brother have their own

celebrations here in their home."

"But we could ask!"

They exchanged courtesies as the music stopped, and Ingram escorted his prettily flushed daughter from the press of dancers to the side of the chamber. "We could ask, of course."

Stadbroke was offered a reprieve from her questioning when another beknighted father came to solicit Sabina's hand for the next set. He leaned against an unoccupied chair and mulled over the many topics of his daughter's conversation. Half child, half woman, he thought with a private smile, and with less of her mother's nature and her grandmothers' faults than he had dared ever to hope. He could deal with her better than he did, he realized.

Then he was aware before even she spoke, that Portia had approached his other side. He swung round slowly to consider her.

"Sabina dances very prettily, Lord Stadbroke. May I find you another partner?"

"She does indeed Miss Crossmichael, thanks I think to you. She has been telling me of her studies here, and they are not all classroom fare. And no, I will have no other partner, unless you will dance, ma'am?" The little orchestra had struck up a quadrille.

"I don't dance, my lord, especially not this evening."

"On the contrary, I suspect you dance very well." He smiled, wondering at his desire to tease his daughters' teacher.

"I do not flirt either, my lord, especially with my pupils' fathers."

"A wise decision, no doubt. And there's not many here worth employing a teasing smile." He glanced around at the self-satisfied of his sex in the music room; they were on the whole a comfortable, homely group of minor aristocrats.

"Really, Lord Stadbroke!"

"That's better, I feel much more at ease with your temper than with your civility." His ission surprised even himself. "Just the quadrille, ma'am, just to keep your hand in. No one will fault you for taking a little enjoyment for yourself. You work very hard, all your parents know it."

He smiled his most charming smile, little understanding why it was important to him that she stand up with him.

And after staring into his eyes, she gave him her slender hand, and walked with him onto the dancing floor.

* * * *

Two days later Portia was still wondering why she had done so. She never danced at the Christmas ball, and she did not understand why she had broken her own rule for Lord Stadbroke. And to make matters worse, she had enjoyed the dance too much.

Stadbroke had made her feel desirable, womanly in a way she had experienced only once before, in the upstairs corridor with his fingers tangled in her hair. She had found, in her observations of her sex, that there were women who simply did not attract male attention. She had never been able to discern why that was. Those women were perhaps on the whole less pretty, less flirtatious, more candid and more astute than their peers, but not so much that it precluded their selection as spouses or even lovers.

Why it should be she could not understand, but she knew that she was one of their number. Her circumstances of course had militated against her. But even in her salad days, and her one unmemorable season, she had not taken, had not appealed to the gentlemen's tastes.

So that now when Stadbroke stirred up responses and urges that she had well buried in the last ten years, she almost resented it. She believed she had grown beyond the need for physicality, but with the viscount she found herself longing for his embrace, wondering about his kiss, thrilling to his touch. Like one of my own pupils, like Sabina mooning after Caldwell.

She stared at the neglected ledger before her, and thumped it resolutely with her closed fist. It would not do. She was a woman without appeal and, if Heloise's gossip was to be believed, he was a connoisseur of female beauty. Her notion that he enjoyed her company, even when they sparred, was nonsense, and any hopes she might be so foolish as to harbour were ridiculous.

She was relieved to attend to a knock on her door. "Come," she called, dismissing her wayward thoughts.

Sabina Perrington entered at her words, a Sabina with a pink nose and redrimmed eyes.

Portia was sorry to see it. She thought something had occurred at the ball to distress Sabina and she had wondered if it had to do with the girl's infatuation for Caldwell. She had waited only upon Sabina's approach to discuss the matter.

Hovering just inside the door, twisting a handkerchief in her small hands, Sabina asked, "Is it true that Mr. Dent is promised to Madame, Miss Crossmichael? Please I must know."

"Sabina, come and sit down." Portia felt a new pity for the girl and a better understanding of the pangs of unrequited attraction. And the irony of it--she entranced by Sabina's father and Sabina infatuated with Portia's brother. It had all the elements of farce.

But it was all too real for this young woman who now sat before her.

"Papa told me so and I know he wouldn't lie to me." A few tears escaped Sabina's brown eyes.

God bless the viscount, thought Portia ironically, he had been cruel while

intending to be kind.

"I have watched them closely but I cannot think it true, Miss. Madame shows no consciousness in Mr. Dent's presence; I...I flutter when he enters a room. I blush when he speaks to me, and my hands tremble, Miss...tremble. Surely she does not care, and I do, so very much." Sabina mopped the wayward tears and cleared her throat.

Portia glanced at her own hands and ed the dance with the viscount and his touch. She thought she concealed her reactions well however. "It is true, Sabina, that my brother loves Mme. Montlucon very much, has since the first month she ed me here to teach. And she does care for him, but she--and I tell you this in confidence--is older than he and has Gavrielle to care for. So she feels that she will not burden him with her acceptance of his suit. It is a difficult time for them Sabina, though I have no doubt that they will resolve their differences and win through to happiness."

The girl looked distraught. Portia recalled how many other young ladies she had ed through this same crisis without fully understanding their pain. How odd that she should achieve nine and twenty before experiencing a need, an infatuation like theirs.

"Sabina, every young woman and man will experience emotions they will believe to be love many times before they settle upon a life partner. Love has many faces. And you are not alone in thinking my brother is your heart's desire; many of your classmates have felt the same. Some of it has to do with propinquity, some with inexperience." She lifted a hand as Sabina showed an intention to burst into speech.

"I know you believe your love to be strong and true. And it is not for me to say

that that is not so. But whatever your feelings you must believe that his are already bespoke. He will not return your affections. So that is an end to it.

"That sounds stern I know, but such is life. Yours is the heroic role of living life in the face of unrequited love." Portia had found this grandiloquent statement had bolstered young ladies in the past. She could see the effect of it in the straightening of Sabina Perrington's shoulders and the drying of her eyes.

"Have you ever been in love, Miss Crossmichael?"

Portia was taken aback. It was not a question anyone had asked her ever before. She could reply in the negative; whatever her unsatisfactory, inconvenient feelings for Lord Stadbroke were, they surely were not love.

"No, Sabina."

"My papa has not either. He and Mama did not love each other, not really love, I mean. It was just that they were convenient if you understand me--our lands ran together, and it was just accepted that they should marry. That is why he has come to London I think; he is looking for love."

Portia choked back a cynical laugh, and thought that love was the last thing that Stadbroke was looking for in the women he chose to companion. "It is not appropriate for you to speculate about or comment on your parents' marriage, or on your father's actions. The older one becomes the better one becomes at dissembling. One adult will never know what another truly thinks, nor is it proper that one should. You cannot know anything of your parents' relationship or of your father's nature."

The tall case clock chimed three o'clock.

Sabina's mouth circled to a moue of dismay. "I am meant to be at a geography lesson. Excuse me, Miss, please... But thank you for listening to me. I shall be brave, now that I know there is no hope."

"You may go, my dear." Portia dismissed the child thinking to take Sabina's words to her own heart. She would need to be brave, for there was no hope.

There was another knock. Caldwell opened the door in time to hold it for Sabina; she thanked him in a trembling voice, and fled. His bow, unnoticed by her, was avuncular in the extreme.

"The latest victim of your fatal charm, my dear," Portia said with a sorry attempt at levity.

He grimaced at her. "I know it. It is easily the most difficult thing about teaching here, Port. I shall be glad when I earn enough from my portraits to supply my wants. I enjoy teaching but young ladies are sadly volatile."

Portia rebuked him gently. "Not all, Cal. You know that."

"You have never shown a sign of volatility," he agreed. "But you and Heloise are each unique."

"Thank you, my dear, but save your flattery. Have you told Heloise of Mr. Dent yet?"

"You would know if I had. Does she not confide everything in you? You must know better than I how she feels about me." He took up his pipe from the mantelpiece, but made no move to fill it.

"I betray no one's confidences," Portia said. "Is it as cold today as it appears? I've not ventured out."

"No need to change the subject quite so drastically, Port. I was about to abandon it." His young face took on an unusual grimness. "I have heard yet again from my father. He wants another �100."

"Oh, dear heaven," Portia stared blankly at the wainscot on the far wall from her desk. She saw nothing of its rich, gleaming oak. "It is Christmas, Cal. I am pressed for funds always in fall term. I had dared to hope he had forgot us, or had a run of luck in some gaming hell."

"We could not be so fortunate. No, the demand and the threat is the same as before. We did expect it." He looked mortified.

Portia's heart ached for him. He should not have to suffer so just when his career looked so promising. "I have fifty pounds." She opened a drawer of her desk and drew out the stocking purse in which she kept funds for the school's day to day management. She withdrew a roll of banknotes and held it out.

He laid aside his pipe again and took the notes, though his every fibre seemed to resist the outstretching of his hand. "I will repay you. I shall ask Stadbroke for an advance on my commission. He will be coming soon to sit for his portrait with his daughters. It cannot be thought strange; artists must buy supplies after all."

"I hate to be beholden to that man." Portia allowed the confusion of her emotions to distil into venom.

"I cannot pretend to understand your antipathy to the viscount. Unless he has offered you some insult?" Caldwell tapped the roll of notes into his left palm. "If so, he will answer to me."

Insult? Was withdrawing her hair pins and threading his fingers through her hair with something like wonder an insult? Dancing with her as though he enjoyed it, holding her hand, twining his arm with hers during the movements an affront? Making her feel fully a woman and fully alive an offence?

"No, of course not. He has not insulted me, merely irritated me. Never mind Stadbroke. We shall pay Mr. Dent until we cannot. Then...then we shall have to think of something else."

Madame popped her head in at the door. She grimaced on seeing the serious faces of the study's occupants. "Secrets, mes amis? I take offence at being excluded from your conclaves, I really do. If there is a problem, I might be of some assistance, you realize that? I am not without ingenuity. It is money of course. It must be, for the students are well, the staff without concern. Unless the difficulty lies with the so-delectable viscount and his delightful daughters, it must be money."

"Delectable?" said Caldwell in a dumbfounded tone.

"He is very attractive, mon pauvre, " Heloise teased her devoted irer. "And vigorous and charming. Had Portia not already captivated him, I should be tempted to try my own luck."

"Heloise, don't!" Portia said in a strangled tone. "We are not trying to exclude you. You must not be offended."

"Well, I am clearly an outsider to your concerns. Oh, and I came only to say that dinner is served!" She withdrew as abruptly as she had arrived, revealing a brief glimpse of the hall.

Portia and Caldwell were left staring at each other.

Portia realized that there had been young ladies clattering down the stairs and streaming into the dining room opposite her study, but she felt suspended in a dreamlike moment.

"I have not captivated Lord Stadbroke," she said in a shocked tone.

"And surely he has not captivated her," Caldwell said, sounding nearly as shaken.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The third time Stadbroke left London for Hornsey and his portrait sitting with his daughters, he was surprised and more than a little concerned by the anticipation he experienced. He was concerned because the anticipation had nothing to do with seeing his children, or watching their portrait advance, but with seeing Miss Crossmichael...Portia. She occupied altogether too much space in his thoughts, and try though he might to catalogue her negative qualities, he always ended by ing her swift intelligence, her touching, not-quiteconcealed vulnerability, and her pliant figure in his arms at the Christmas Ball.

His matched bays broke stride with his unconscious tug of their reins. It was an overcast day, crisp and cold but dry. The Ruffian, seated at his side, uttered a short, sharp woof. "Very well, I shall take more care," he told the beast. "But why my girls must now have you in the painting, I shall never understand. Thank heaven they did not decide to have the whole damned pack of hounds in it. I suppose I would not have refused them that either."

He took his thoughts in hand, and his horses. He almost could wish that he had not thought of having his daughters and himself immortalized by Caldwell Dent. No, he didn't mean that--he could not regret having a portrait of his daughters to capture the beauty and innocence of their youth.

To include himself in the picture had been a selfish conceit, but likewise he could not regret it. He had been the parent who could claim to have moulded them, if either mother or father could ever claim it. Left to the care of nursery staff himself, he had vowed on marriage to have more involvement with his own children.

Certainly, Celia had not wished for any involvement with the girls. She had undertaken every social engagement in a fifty mile radius of Stadley Court, but she had seldom made the journey above stairs to their own nursery. She had resented pregnancy and endured it sullenly. She had displayed no interest in her babies or in their development. She would have left them entirely to a nurse or a governess if he had not interfered.

And how they had argued about his devotion to his daughters. They had both been too young and too immature to make a success of their marriage, he knew it now. He had often regretted that he had given in to the pressures brought to bear by his own mother, and Celia's. He had suffered much, he felt, at the hands of women's deceit. Even his attraction to Portia could not convince him to make himself vulnerable to it again.

Thus armoured against Miss Crossmichael's appeal, he drew up before her establishment and gave his carriage into the care of her groom. Ruff jumped down with every appearance of eagerness and climbed the steps before he did himself. Upon his ittance to the house Ingram surrendered his greatcoat and his beaver to the porter.

"I'm to show you to Mr. Dent's studio, my lord. The young ladies have been sent for." The porter led the viscount to the stairs even as he spoke. Despite his recent resolution, Ingram found himself craning his neck for a glimpse of the door of Portia's study, and scanning the corridors for the sight of her graceful figure. Then he realized his actions and, full of censure for his own weakness, he was delighted when Penny appeared at the end of the corridor.

She hurtled its length to leap into his arms. "I can show Papa the way, Mithter Euston. You need not climb all the thtairth," she piped to the porter before strangling her father with an embrace.

The old man grinned his thanks and turned back to retrace his steps.

"He thufferth with rheumatism thomething terrible, Papa. Sabina said that you said we could ask Miss Crossmichael today, Papa, about Christmas. May we?" She squirmed to be set down, and when Ingram released her she bestowed a rapturous welcome on Ruff. He licked her face extravagantly. Casually she wiped her face with her sleeve and beamed up at her father. "You like Mith, do you not Papa? She is lovely, you know; like the very best kind of mama."

Stadbroke was flummoxed by his little girl's chatter. How could he respond? Could he imagine Miss Crossmichael as a mother? Oddly enough, he thought he could. "And what do you know of mamas, my love?"

"Well, I 'member our Mama only a little, telling us not to muss her hair or wrinkle her skirts."

Ingram winced at the childish candour.

"And Mel and Sabby have told me how she would bring us bon-bons but was too busy to spend much of her time with us. And the girls here talk of mamas who are unkind or disciplining or pushing--do you know, Papa?"

Her bird-bright eyes twinkled up at him, and Ingram's heart contracted with a fierce spasm of love.

"You underthtand me? Making their girls do things correctly always and punishing them for mistakes?"

"I understand," he managed to say.

"Well, Mith Crossmichael asks only that we do our best at our lessons, and she makes certain we are never too busy to read or sing. She is never too busy to talk to us and even takes part in our games and romps. She is like you, Papa!"

Penelope caught his hand and tugged him up the second flight of stairs. "Mith would like our conservatory, Papa. She is very fond of flowers." The Ruffian trotted obediently after them, submitting to the pats and cries of joy that the girls who ed them bestowed.

Ingram began to enjoy these revelations about Portia Crossmichael. His daughters were in good hands. And if Portia liked flowers, then certainly he must show her the conservatory of the Hill Street house. They had not toured it on her first visit. He recalled Penny's comment on that occasion about Miss Crossmichael sleeping in her chemise, and experienced a surprising rush of heat.

His daughter recalled him to the present.

"Do you like sitting for our portrait, Papa? I do but Mel doesn't."

With gratitude Ingram seized upon Penny's prosaic words. They poured cold water on his sudden fantasy. "You do very well...sit very still, my little eel. I

think Melicent finds portrait sitting annoying, but she will like the result as much as I shall."

"Ethpecially now that Ruff is to be in it."

Ingram took up his daughter's hand and squeezed it understandingly as they neared the studio door.

A voice--Miss Crossmichael's--made intelligible by an excess of emotion, was audible from just the other side. "We are precisely positioned where he wishes us. We can do nothing other than pay his demands. Come down for the draft when you are finished this sitting." The door opened and the speaker confronted them.

Ingram could have laughed at the expression on Portia's face if he had had any inclination at all to merriment. But her words had been too serious, too distraught to allow of any levity.

"Mith, did you thee my picture of the swans on the pond?" Penelope was unconscious of any constraint.

Her unconcerned chatter gave Ingram a moment to watch the schoolmistress. Portia recovered her equanimity so rapidly that he wondered if he had overheard her aright. Then he caught the faintest glimmer of-- What? Fear? --in her eyes, and knew that he had not imagined her distress. Something was sadly awry at Mansion House.

He made his greeting easy however. "Your servant, Miss Crossmichael." He put a restraining hand on Ruff's collar, for the hound showed a determination to bound into the studio and examine every oil and brush.

Dent came to usher them in. He looked taken aback at the sight of the dog, but responded appropriately to Penny's sunny greeting.

"Ruff is to be in the picture, Mr. Dent!"

"If you will, sir," Ingram added.

The painter nodded his agreement with something of abstraction.

Ingram was aware that Portia was slipping away. Over his shoulder he said, "Miss Crossmichael, will you stay for a moment?" As she re-entered the lightfilled retreat, he saw fear flare again at the back of her grey eyes. "My daughters have a request they would like to make of you... And Mr. Dent," he hurried to add, regretting her concern.

The two older girls erupted into the room, and embraced their father and their dog with enthusiasm. Ingram, watching carefully, could see no consciousness between Dent and Sabina. He relaxed a little and watched Melicent politely greet her teachers. His little enigma, he called her, and indeed she was often a puzzle.

Aware that his daughters were directing questioning looks at him, Ingram nodded his permission.

The three girls turned to their schoolmistress. "We wondered if you, Miss Crossmichael, and Mr. Dent would care to us for dinner on Christmas Day." Sabina made the invitation with great correctness and no untoward simperings to Caldwell Dent. She had told her father on his last visit of her conversation with Miss Crossmichael, and he had been pleased to encourage her brave recovery.

Portia seemed fully to have regained her equanimity and her smile embraced all three girls. Ingram found himself wishing it included himself.

"How kind of you. But I must tell you, we have our own traditions here, and have had since we began the school. We celebrate the holidays together with those of our staff who wish to us and who have no other family to claim their time. We are a family more than employers and employees. Indeed, my brother and I have celebrated the day alone on more than one occasion and find that our family connection is strengthened by the holy day." Her words were full of apology and affection.

Stadbroke sensed that her regret was not completely sincere however. He had warned his daughters that their invitation might be declined, and he was pleased now when they did not press their suit. He had told them what he would do if they were refused.

He said, "Then would you me and my guests for a dinner party on Boxing Day, Miss Crossmichael? You and Mr. Dent. It is a small party--perhaps a dozen guests. Mrs. Perrington, my aunt, is acting as my hostess."

He caught the agonized glance Portia shot Caldwell and the imperceptible shake of the head with which he answered her. "It is my intention to introduce Mr.

Dent to certain people I think might be able to advance his career," he added persuasively.

Miss Crossmichael seemed immediately to lose her hesitation. "That would be very nice," she said.

Caldwell Dent reinforced her response. "We should be delighted."

Despite his words, and Portia's forced enthusiasm, Ingram still doubted their sincerity. He allowed his daughters to wax lyrical over the projected visit and closely considered brother and sister. I don't think either of you are pleased. And I want to know why.

* * * *

Caldwell managed to schedule two more sittings for the portrait before the Christmas holidays were upon them. Portia regarded each one as a penance for her sins, and tried to avoid Lord Stadbroke if she possibly could. The pleasure she experienced on the mere sight of his laughing countenance and well-knit frame was mixed with distress, and the urgency to keep the secrets of the extortion cost her dearly.

She welcomed the bustle of departures for Christmas as it caught up Mansion House School. All the young ladies this year were to go to their homes; occasionally over the years Portia had been required to entertain one or two girls unable to go home for one reason or another, but this year all was well. She was glad of it.

Harold Dent had begun as she prophesied, to make untenable demands. He had asked for a little extra to tide him over Christmas. Caldwell had obliged with a twenty pound banknote.

When the school was silent at last the day before Christmas Eve, she allowed herself the luxury of a few tears in the privacy of her bedchamber. Each of the Perrington girls had pressed a small package upon her before departing with their father and they were now arrayed on her dressing table. Penelope had fashioned her a pen wiper, Melicent a blank journal of costly hot-pressed paper. Sabina had evidently had pin money to spare and had purchased her a diaphanous scarf in a silvery blue-grey silk. The tears welled up anew as she touched the gifts in turn with a gentle finger. She hoped they would have a happy Christmas, Stadbroke as well as his daughters. The girls had come to mean a great deal to her.

Portia wished she might have accepted their invitation to Christmas dinner, but she knew that it would have been one of the greatest errors of her life to have done so. Their family circle was not hers; to it and then to relinquish its warmth and tenderness would have undone her. She had now more than ever to stand firm upon her independence and self-sufficiency. Nevertheless the look of concern and inquiry in the viscount's dark eyes when he had come for his daughters three hours previously had disconcerted her. His impatience with her she could endure, his kindness she could not. And she had to be so careful, for there was no doubt that he had overheard her talking to Cal about payments. He knew something was amiss, and though his solicitude seemed genuine, she could only think that his disgust at her duplicity would destroy any sympathy he experienced.

Her Christmas was a jumbled mass of emotion, vastly different from her usual tranquil enjoyment of the festive and holy season. Heloise and Gavrielle ed them for the celebrations. They all attended midnight mass conducted by Mr. Sainsthorpe, they exchanged small gifts on Christmas morning, and they enjoyed

a Christmas dinner shared with Miss Gosberton, Mrs. Yaxham, Mr. Billockby and Mrs. Shap. By the time Portia retired on Christmas Day her face felt frozen in a false smile, and her head ached with the effort of appearing carefree.

A night's sleep--though not sound--revived her. She and Caldwell presented their servants with their Christmas boxes and then it was time to enter the coach for the drive to London and the dinner party at Lord Stadbroke's establishment. It was very cold and the moon, rising in the east, tangled in the bare branches of the great trees that edged the lane.

Portia shivered within her fur-lined cloak, sought the hot brick at her feet with some urgency, and twined together her gloved hands within her rabbit-skin muff. She was happy to be in the privacy of the coach with her brother so that they might discuss their affairs.

"I wish you will tell Heloise of your father's duplicity," she said to Caldwell, watching the moon struggle free of the trees. "I cannot like to keep anything from her; she is such a good friend to us."

Caldwell was frowning at the opposite wall in the dim carriage. The new muffler that Gavrielle had knitted for him was wound warmly about his throat but his ears, revealed by his low crowned beaver, looked cold. "I will not tell her anything that may colour her decision regarding my suit," he said.

"Have you reason to think she is considering your suit?"

"I have hope--she seems just a little more easy, a little more inclined to believe that I know my mind and have proved my constancy." He turned to her, lost in

his expectations.

Portia put a gloved hand on his arm. "I do hope you are right. I long to see you settled and happy, both of you, and Gavrielle. And this party of Lord Stadbroke's may well set the seal on your acceptance as portraitist to the ton."

"Shall we tell him of my father's threats?" Caldwell returned to practicality.

"No! Why on earth should we do that? It can be none of his affair."

"So vehement, Port! Why?"

"Oh, I don't know. He...he rubs me the wrong way, catches me wrong-footed. I always feel gawky and gauche in his company."

"You don't look it. You are one of those women who improves with years, relaxing into elegance, ed by taste and intelligence. And you look particularly nice in that costume." He gestured at her, indicating that he meant the fine mulberry hued merino crepe evening gown now concealed by her furlined Nicholas blue cloak.

"Yes, well, it may be the last new gown I can afford, if Dent keeps up his demands. I knew how it would be. We should have refused to cooperate--bow to his demands--when he first began this. I cannot see how we can go on. First one hundred pounds, then another one. He has three times asked for small amounts like that twenty pound note. In the new year, I think we must tell him to do his

worst."

Caldwell was silent for long minutes. The only sounds were the coachman's tuneless whistle from his cold lips, and the horses' hooves racketing briskly on the frozen road. "The scandal will destroy the school."

"But we have done nothing wrong. How can people believe such wickedness? We have lived exemplary lives. We are brother and sister in all but blood. We have witnesses to our innocence."

"People love a juicy scandal, whether it is true or not."

"Well, at least if we defy him, we shall have money to retire in comfort. If we go on in this way, we shall be without money, he will still do his worst, and we will lose the school anyway." Portia felt tears threaten her carefully created façade of elegance. "And possibly your clients--your career..."

"Oh, everyone expects an artist to be scandalous." He was determinedly cheerful. "I expect it will add a fillip of excitement to my commissions."

She sniffed, and searched her reticule for her handkerchief. "But...Heloise...she must not be surprised by the scandal."

"Come along, Port. It will not do to give way to the dismals. I will tell Heloise when I think the time is right."

"Very well. But I shall have to tell Miss Gosberton if the payments go on, and she may tell Mrs. Yaxham. We must preserve their positions at all costs."

His grunt was impatient. "No more, for here we are."

The coachman drew the horses to a halt before a handsome establishment, ablaze with flambeaux and lighted windows.

"Pin on a smile, Portia. Time enough to worry after the seasonal festivities are over."

Portia did as he bid as her groom handed down from the coach. She and Caldwell hurried up the steps and out of the cold. They were greeted by the viscount's austere butler and their cloaks and appurtenances were tenderly born away by a footman. The austerity of their welcome diminished as the three Perrington sisters scurried down the staircase to stand before her.

"Oh, Mith Crothmichael, you do look beautiful." Penelope's greeting was sincere if, Portia thought, excessive.

Melicent was eyeing her gown, and Sabina her hair, free of a cap and handsomely dressed.

"You do ma'am," Sabina reiterated.

Portia was conscious of a blush heating her cheeks.

"You see? From the mouths' of babes," Caldwell murmured in her ear.

"Perhaps not beautiful, but superb," Melicent added her opinion when she caught sight of the garnet necklace that adorned Portia's bosom, and the exquisite matching earrings.

"Thank you, young ladies," Portia swept them an especial curtsey.

"We are to escort you to the drawing room," Melicent said.

"And we may thtay for half of an hour, and then retire," Penny parroted from someone's instructions.

"How delightful," murmured Portia, allowing herself to be led above stairs. She indulged a desire to stare about her once more. The house was all that was comfortable yet very fine.

The drawing room was likewise a display of good design and excellent taste, a fitting setting for the company which seemed to crowd it. When she was introduced and the girls had said their good-nights and withdrawn, she realized that there were, as the viscount had promised, only ten other guests besides she and Caldwell. Those present were among the bluest blood in the country, and the most interesting of minds. It was an assemblage that could not disappoint and it was receptive to newcomers within its company.

Portia, against all her expectations, enjoyed herself. The viscount was a superb host, his staff served a memorable meal, and the conversation was a joy, wideranging and challenging. It changed at a stroke her perception of the viscount's public face. He was not, it appeared, simply a philandering fribble. She had thought that he cared for his daughters but nothing else; now it appeared he was a man of intelligence, distinction and discernment, and well respected in his world.

She was so absorbed in these revelations that when he drew her aside to a private conversation when the company again retired to the drawing room, she did not protest.

"I should like to show you my conservatory; I think you did not see it when you accompanied the girls that day in October," he said. "The rest of my guests here are familiar with it, and they will not object if I disappear briefly. Indeed, they will focus on your brother, and that can only be of benefit to him."

"You have been very kind," Portia managed to say, placing her hand on the arm he offered. "To my brother, I mean." She tried again, "You have a conservatory? In London?"

He was leading her from the drawing room, their departure scarcely noticed, down the staircase and into the library, which opened from the marble tiled foyer.

"I bought this house from a crony of Joseph Banks. Like Banks, he travelled all over the world collecting plants, but he had no country seat at which to nurture them. So he built a conservatory here, in his back garden. A novel idea but one I

applaud. I miss the countryside when I am in London, almost as much as I miss my daughters."

"Parks cannot compensate," Portia said, gamely contributing to the innocuous conversation. "Hornsey offers many benefits to its residents among them proximity to both city and country." She stared about the led library and the well-filled bookshelves. "Such a library is itself enough inducement to enjoy this house."

"Ah, but look to your left."

Portia beheld glass doors through which was displayed a wilderness of greenery. "Oh," was all she said, softly.

The viscount urged her on, and opening the door, led her into a summer world. Portia was entranced. It smelled wonderful, redolent of wet earth, green exhalations of leaf and vine, and the sweet unseasonable smell of flowers. There was a narrow path between the ranks of vegetation which eventually opened to a small seating area warmed by braziers and lit with lanterns.

Intoxicated with the delight of summer within the winter, Portia smiled at Stadbroke. "It's wonderful! What a joy, and what a delightful thing for the girls to enjoy."

"They seem to like it very much. But they like your school better." He stood before her, at ease and far too attractive for her peace of mind. "Portia, you have been a true inspiration to my daughters. You have been their friend and an ally when they could not depend on me--or thought they could not."

She sidled away from him, and was disturbed when he followed.

"I wanted to thank you, for your understanding. And for helping me to better understand them."

He gathered up her hands, and when she would have withdrawn them he held them more tightly.

"You do so much for everyone, and so little for yourself. You have every confidence in your abilities, and none at all in your personal attractions. Portia, you are a handsome woman, perhaps not beautiful in the manner you believe you should be, but you have more lasting qualities than simple prettiness."

Portia was horrified by the turn of the conversation. He seemed to know too well her insecurities and her concerns. She tried again to pull away and he responded by drawing her into his arms.

"Portia, be still, and be told. You are an attractive woman. Why my compeers don't appreciate that, I will never understand. They look for superficialities I suppose. You offer true gold," he bent his head, and coaxing her with a questing finger under her chin, pressed his lips to hers.

Portia had been kissed once or twice, and assumed she had been found wanting as the experiments had never been repeated. She had tried so hard. This time she did not try at all, but followed her senses in appreciating his hard, yet tender mouth, and all the sensations it conjured within her.

When he ended the kiss, his breath came quickly, and Portia stared at him, overcome by a wash of desire and a surge of love. No, surely not love... Lust perhaps. She had known so little of these emotions, how could she tell one from the other? She closed her eyes to will away her confusion. "I should like to return to the drawing room, my lord."

"I should not," he said. "I should like to remain here and explore the interesting possibilities we have just discovered."

That brought Portia to her senses and a quick flare of annoyance. "It was a kiss, my lord. Nothing more or less, not a possibility at all."

"That's better. If we return to the drawing room with you all dreamy-eyed and bruise-mouthed, everyone will know what we have been doing. The spark in those wide eyes will convince them we have been at odds discussing gardening, nothing more."

To her horror, Portia began to laugh helplessly and continued to laugh as he led back into the beguiling library and up the broad stairs.

"You are utterly without judgement and conscience, my lord," she accused when at last she could command her voice to calm and quiet. She did not really believe her harsh words. "You take your pleasures wherever you wish."

"And you take yours not at all," he said, ushering her with a flourish back into the drawing room and into the conversations burgeoning there.

* * * *

On the sixth day of the new year, Portia with Caldwell and Helene at her side, welcomed their pupils back to the Mansion House Establishment. The girls came in ones and twos at first, and then in a flurry together, until the entryway was awash with portmanteaux and bandboxes. Servants scurried back and forth, and among them were housekeeper Mrs. Yaxham and matron Mrs. Shap directing, chivvying and organizing.

Into the mayhem another knock at the door heralded the arrival of Lord Stadbroke, dressed in a caped greatcoat and a scarlet muffler, and his three daughters bundled in warm cloaks with velvet bonnets and fur-lined velvet muffs. The girls hurried to Portia, all talking at once, their young voices high with excitement. She responded as best she could with her attention demanded a dozen different ways by parents, servants and students. Gradually they wandered away greeting their particular friends, chattering, exchanging holiday stories. Only then did the viscount stroll up to bow over Portia's hand, shake her brother's and incline his handsome head to Mme Montlucon.

Portia had not seen him since his dinner party and the fatal kiss. She had had time to consider and reconsider all that had taken place and all that had been said, and she had come to the conclusion that the entire matter had been foolish in the extreme, unworthy of further consideration. She did not allow herself to dwell on the delectable qualities of that kiss or the tenderness, and possibly the emotion, that it described. Instead of considering the intimacy of that moment, she had decided that the viscount should be met with particular formality and unbending punctiliousness.

She greeted him politely, with a distinct lack of warmth, even as his well-shaped lips attracted her gaze. She shook herself mentally. "You had a pleasant holiday, I

hope, my lord?" Her tone, which hoped nothing of the sort, was at variance with her words.

His lazy grin indicated he was all too aware of her turmoil and the reasons for her icy decorum. "I think my daughters enjoyed themselves, and that was the intent of the exercise. The twelve days of Christmas went too quickly, and it is Twelfth Night, Miss Crossmichael. I see you do not follow tradition and remove your decorations on the twelfth." He waved an indolent hand at the fir boughs, holly and ribands that still adorned the mantel, the door frames and the pictures.

"The young ladies appreciate the colour and warmth, I think," she replied aware of the stiffness of her response. "It makes their return less formidable, more comfortable. They will help us remove them later in the week."

He nodded indifferently. "Had you a refreshing break?" he asked suddenly.

"I?" Portia, taken aback, pretended to consider deeply. "It was quiet, my lord." She looked about her, seeking some reason for escaping his company. None immediately offered itself. The young ladies all had put off their cloaks and redingotes and were instructing servants about their trunks and baggage and bidding farewell to parents.

"I have your first term invoice prepared, Lord Stadbroke, if you will wait for a moment." She made for her study to fetch the s.

His laugh and his reply were interrupted by another knock at the door. It resonated through a sudden silence in the vestibule, like a knell of doom. Portia was overtaken with a premonition of disaster. She looked over her shoulder. The

viscount and all the young ladies remaining in the entry had turned to the door. Caldwell and Heloise were frozen in quiet conversation near the door of the dining room. Even the servants carrying trunks to the dormitories seemed to halt their upward progress laden though they were.

Euston the porter opened the door and in the aperture stood Harold Dent.

Portia had never fainted in her life, but she wondered now if the odd sensations she was experiencing were precursors of that event. A grey shade came over her gaze, a sinking sensation clutched her stomach, and she put out a hand rather blindly.

It ed the viscount's arm, and before she could withdraw it, he had placed his own hand over it. She could not imagine how he had so quickly crossed to her side.

Her weakness ed, and she dared to flick a glance up to the viscount's face. He was gazing with keen curiosity at the newcomer.

She transferred her own gaze reluctantly.

Portia would have known him anywhere. Caldwell's father had not changed overmuch. Only, as Cal had said, he was older, heavier and more dissipated. Otherwise he looked like a prosperous tradesman, with stout boots, a frieze greatcoat and a shallow-crowned beaver set firmly on a round head upon a thick neck.

Caldwell's similarity to his father began and ended in their comparable height and curling brown hair. The son's features had all the character and intelligence which the father's lacked and where Caldwell's eyes were well-opened and frank, Harold Dent's were narrowed and never met another's, but constantly shifted.

Portia saw the cold assessment in that wandering gaze. Harold Dent was noting the opulence or simplicity of each fitment and piece of furniture in the entry. He was computing the number of servants, the affluence of the students, calculating the cost of the carpet, the value of the paintings. She was certain he had noted her hand on the viscount's sleeve, and his son's proximity to Mme. Montlucon.

When little Penelope Perrington ran suddenly to cling to her father's leg, Portia would have given anything to shield the child from that narrow, predacious gaze.

Portia took Penny's approach to her father as opportunity to free herself from the viscount's grasp. Caldwell seemed frozen with dismay and she disciplined herself to get them out of this appalling mess.

She stopped a maid who was ing. "Massey, please see Mr. Harold to my study." She was pleased that even in her shocked state she had the sense not to use the name that would identify his relationship to her brother. Now that she had moved, had spoken, she felt a ferocious strength flood her. She felt like an Amazon, a Boudicca, and in that moment was utterly fearless in her anger. She took a step toward the man that had blighted her youth, daring him to destroy her before all the assembled company.

Dent seemed to wilt before the force of her personality, and he did not protest as the maidservant led him away. Caldwell and Heloise were galvanized to action, though Heloise was looking perplexed. Portia's staff--aware of their mistress' distress perhaps--threw themselves into clearing the entry hall of people and

paraphernalia. No one else seemed to notice anything amiss. What seemed like eons of time to her had been the age of mere seconds.

Parents took their leave and their daughters drifted up the stairs or into the parlour. The last of the baggage disappeared to the dormitories, and the housekeeper and the matron removed to their more usual apartments. Caldwell ushered Heloise, who was cross-questioning him in an urgent undertone, up the stairs with Gavrielle trailing behind them.

Portia stood silent, watching the activity around her, automatically responding to farewells and issuing instructions. She noted the Perrington girls embracing their father, heard his assurances that he would call upon them within a se'enight. Melicent and Sabina headed above-stairs and Penelope ran off with one of her cronies.

Portia spared a moment's concern for her brother, but was left alone with the viscount, who had resolutely ignored all attempts to dismiss him.

"Who is Mr. Harold?" he asked bluntly.

She put her hands behind her back so that their shaking should not be evident.

"A...a tradesman." She crossed her fingers childishly against the lie.

"An uncommon nasty looking one. What does he purvey?"

"Ahh...meat." Portia momentarily thought she might shriek at him to go away. All her power had left her, and she was weak and in an agony of worry. "He is a...a butcher, and I have recently advised him that we no longer require his services. N-no doubt he wishes to argue the point." Her voice strengthened as she spun the tale, and she could at least meet his gaze.

His own look was quizzical, kind and concerned. "You allow your tradesmen the front entrance?" he asked. "No, never mind. You need not extend your powers of invention further. But know this...since our second meeting I have been aware of some concern underlying your every word and action. And I mean to get to the bottom of it before it harms my children, or you."

As he stalked to the door, he drew out his purse. "Run along and fetch my reckoning. I shall give you fifty pounds on ...in case the butcher should want paying."

He was pleased to be sardonic, Portia thought, but she found herself obeying. She returned quickly and coloured with embarrassment as she handed him the folded statement.

After a brief glance, he exchanged it for several banknotes. "You shall have the remainder on my next visit." He caught her hand. "I have demanded honesty of you before, and I think I still am denied it. But things have changed, have they not? And you should know that if you have need of me, I should be only too glad to be of service to you." He released her abruptly and bowed.

He wheeled and the porter opened the door. It shut with a click upon the viscount's exit. Portia sagged briefly, then straightened her shoulders and managed a wobbly smile for the porter.

Now she had to deal with Harold Dent.

Caldwell came down the stairs, reluctance and discouragement in the slump of his shoulders and the heedlessness of his steps.

"What did you tell Heloise?" she managed to ask, putting the viscount out of her mind.

"That our visitor is my father, as she had immediately suspected. Nothing more. She wants to meet him." He snorted. "As if I would permit it. I have told her she must settle the children; that there will be another opportunity."

"You should have told her of his purpose. What use is secrecy? It will only separate you." Portia felt her words made no impression on her brother. "What if he is come to expose us? What if he wants more money? I thank God Stadbroke has given me this." She held out the notes with a shaking hand, "But we have expenses. I can afford to give Dent next to nothing. Dare we tell him to do his worst?"

"We cannot!" His face held the imagined horror of the scandal his father's falsehoods would create. "It will be very bad."

"It will, and I have not the courage." Portia thought of Stadbroke's scorn and distaste. "But I see no other solution."

"Not yet." Caldwell offered his arm. "Let us hear what he demands first."

Portia took her place by his side, and set her cold hand upon his arm. They crossed the entry to the door of the study and, after exchanging a despairing glance, they entered.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Heloise ed Portia in her study at the end of classes on the verge of yet another cold winter night. "So Caldwell's papa has visited the school at last, m'amie. He has a common look. Is this why Caldwell has been so reluctant to introduce him? If so, he should know I am not so proud."

She had allowed considerable time to elapse before mentioning Harold Dent, and even now she did not come directly to the point. But she was nothing if not tenacious. Portia could see no escape from her questioning. Cal, with his reticence, had put her in a difficult position, to be sure, she thought with no little resentment.

Two weeks had ed since Dent's visit and January, with its chill winds and flurries of icy rain and snow, was advancing relentlessly. Its darkness of mood reflected Portia's with precision, and only the most steadfast will kept her purpose steady and her disposition equable before her students and her employees.

Privately, she was consumed with worry. Harold Dent had taken forty of the precious fifty pounds Stadbroke had advanced her. She struggled every evening with the s, paying what she could to the most deserving or demanding of creditors, fearing for her future. When she had purchased the school, it had taken all of her modest inheritance. The fees she received from her pupils' parents covered the running expenses. Things were never precisely hand-to-mouth, but her monetary affairs were always carefully balanced.

"Yes, I think Cal might be rather ashamed of his father." Portia tried to speak

with calm, to conceal rather than to lie in of her step-brother. "He is so eager to impress you with his suitability he is bound to err on the side of caution."

"He has little more persuading to do," Heloise itted. Her pretty face was shy, but glowing.

"Oh, my dear!" Portia was pleased to have good news amid her dreary thoughts and complex planning.

"You must say nothing yet to him or anyone. I must believe Gavrielle well satisfied with Caldwell as her beau père. Certainly, she was happy at Christmas with his constant companionship of us. Her gift she liked very much, and I did not advise him on it, you know. He seems content to be a father to my poor child, who is not so very young anymore. I cannot like my Guy to be replaced in her life, but she has so few memories of him..."

"The decision has not been an easy one for you."

"It has not. Not least because the two of you are unhappy and have been since the viscount and his family, and the senior Mr. Dent, entered our milieu. I have wondered which arrival caused you more distress but I have come to no conclusion. There are many things you are concealing from me."

"I am sorry, I truly am. Of the viscount, I will say nothing, ce n'est pas important." Portia spread her hands helplessly. "For the other, yes, there is a problem. But it is not mine alone to share. It does not alter the fact that Cal does love you, both of you. I know he longs for a family circle of his own." Portia

thrust away her own constant wish for a loving family, and the increasing realisation that the Perringtons were the family she wished for.

"Then you should confide in me. And Caldwell should introduce us to Mr. Dent. What is a family without the grand-père? No matter if he is humble."

"Cal must do things in his own time," Portia said, knowing her words were feeble.

"So he must," Madame rose. "And so must I..." On those enigmatic words, she gathered up her books and, offering Portia a somewhat enigmatic smile, crossed the room to open the door.

On its other side, hands raised to knock, were the Perrington sisters. They stood aside for Madame Montlucon's exit, and then looked expectantly at Portia.

She sighed soundlessly, and bade them enter. While they did, she rose and lit a lamp or two and the branch of candles on the mantel against the deepening gloom without. She had tried to reason away her empathy for the charming Stadbroke family, had tried not to care more for them than any of her pupils. She had not succeeded. They had become special, and she could no longer deny it.

She loved these three girls with an unexpected warmth. Why, of all the girls that had ed through the school, it should be this trio that caught in her heart she did not know. She found herself wanting to watch Penny's artistic talent develop over the years, to guide Sabina into her come-out, and to help Melicent to understand herself and deal with her formidable intelligence.

That she could do none of these things, she was all too aware. If she dwelt upon the matter, it would break her heart. Yet she could not suppress her emotions. She could, however, still deny her feelings--whatever they were--for the viscount and she would, most fervently.

"What may I do for you, ladies?" she asked, her nervous fingers busy with her chatelaine.

Penelope was quick to the point even as she watched Portia's long fingers on the pretty etui. "Mith, will you come and see our portrait tomorrow, when Papa cometh for our sitting?"

Portia forced her mind to equal agility. "I believe I have appointments with...with tradesmen all the morning, my dears. It will not be possible. I have popped in to see the portrait's progress, however; it is very fine." She could not tell them that she gloated over it; delighted in each painted face, each nuance that her brother captured on the canvas. "Ruff looks amazingly like, and Mr. Dent tells me he poses very well."

"He does," Penny was obviously eager to expand on the matter.

Melicent interrupted her. "But, Miss Crossmichael, you have not seen Papa since Twelfth Night. He commented on it his last visit. Don't you like Papa, ma'am?" This was an eloquent speech for Melicent, so reserved, so quiet.

Portia was confounded as to her response and she sought to avoid the question.

"Sabina, ring the bell for Massey to come make up the fire, will you, please? Melicent, draw the curtains, the evening comes so early. And do sit down, girls."

She failed to distract her interlocutors. Penny and Melicent sat but she could see the questions still in their youthful faces.

"You do like Papa, don't you, Miss?" Sabina crossed to the bell pull but did not touch it.

"Of course I like your father. I like all the parents of my pupils. Everyone is pleasant, conversable and kind." She tried for an authoritarian, remote tone.

"But our papa is special, Mith." Penelope melted her resolve with her innocent earnestness.

"We should not object to a new mama, Miss Crossmichael." Sabina abandoned the bell without exercising it.

Portia sought refuge in obtuseness. "Does your father have the intention to marry again? How delightful for you all, I'm sure. Lady Mary perhaps?" She felt sickened by the thought.

Melicent eyed her with adolescent scorn. "My father would never marry a widgeon like Lady Mary," she said. "And he has said nothing of his intentions. But we...we think he is planning something. He asks ever such funny, offhand questions. Questions about the school, about you. With such a look of--"

"Of intensity," Sabina supplied. "He is preoccupied, Miss Crossmichael, and quite perplexing."

"Well, I think you should wait until he makes his wishes clear," Portia cautioned the child. " It is inappropriate for you to speculate on his choices and decisions. I think we have spoken of this before. You might be totally incorrect about the matter. And then how would you look?"

A knock at the door gave Portia the release she needed. "Come," she called, trying not to display her inordinate relief.

Caldwell opened the door, and she cast him a glance full of meaning. He raised his brows at the sight of the young ladies, but said only, "Good evening. Cook is even now serving up chicken with dumplings. I think you all should withdraw to the dining room."

The Perringtons made an orderly but concerted rush to the door and then to the vestibule. Sabina closed the door on their farewells. There was a clatter in the hall that spoke of the girls' dash to the dining room and their classmates' arrival from above-stairs.

"Thank you," Portia leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

"You looked in need of rescue, but you won't thank me when you hear why I have come," her brother said grimly.

"More?"

"More," he confirmed. "I have just been in receipt of a note. He is staying at The Three Comes. And he wants fifty pounds."

"We shall have to refuse," Portia said. "You must tell Heloise the whole so she is informed. I must tell the staff. Then we shall have to refuse to pay him further, and we must suffer the consequences. This cannot go on."

"I cannot tell Heloise. I have reason to think she is smiling on my suit at last; the truth could be the ruin of everything." Caldwell paced the room, his normally cheerful face drawn and apprehensive.

"Better to build a relationship on lies? There is a happy thought. Stadbroke thinks me a liar, Heloise might as well be gulled too." Portia thrust back her chair with such force that it toppled.

They both stared at it. Portia was so seldom brought to abrupt actions that it discomfited them both.

"What did the Perringtons want?" he asked after a moment of portentous silence.

Portia governed her sudden rush of wrath with stiff determination. "They wanted to know if I fancied--at least I believe that is the vulgar phrase--their father. Oh, not in so many words, but the intent was there. They think he means to marry

again. How they can imagine that he would ever find me attractive in any way, I do not know. Had they overheard some of our conversations they would think differently." Almost she was talking to herself.

"I have myself wondered..." Caldwell was rash enough to say.

"Well, do not!" Portia rounded on him. "Your own liaison is confused enough. You need not reflect on any non-existent relationship of mine. Lord Stadbroke remains one parent among many, unremarkable, though irritating and overbearing. I have no interest in him." Her voice broke, to her shame. "Leave me be, let me think. Take my place in the dining room, and go away!"

Caldwell seemed to take her at her word, starting for the door without hesitation. She knew she had hurt and surprised, not to say horrified, him. Portia searched in vain for conciliatory words. "This must end, Cal. Think on it. Think on telling Heloise, denying Harold, and dealing with all the trouble that will ensue."

He opened the door to make his escape.

"Think on it!" she called as the door closed after him.

Portia raised up her chair and sank into it. With her elbows inelegantly upon her desk, she sank her face into her hands and despaired.

* * * *

Ingram Perrington was very certain that Portia Crossmichael was avoiding him. All three times he had visited the Mansion House Establishment in January the schoolmistress had been notably invisible. His daughters had commented on it as though it might have escaped his notice. They could not know that, after the fire and depth revealed by her kiss at Christmas, Portia was far too often in his thoughts. She was, he worried, fast becoming an obsession with him.

She and his daughters were not his only concerns at the Mansion House Establishment. The mystery exposed on Twelfth Night by the arrival of Mr. Harold, the putative butcher also kept his thoughts preoccupied. He did not for a moment suppose Harold to be butcher, or even that he had been divulged the fellow's real name. There had been a scent of fear in the air upon his arrival, quickly subdued by Portia's militancy. She had spirit, Ingram reflected, fortitude as well as her other myriad attributes.

Even social events such as Lady Dartington's salon, at which he had just arrived, could not completely distract him. He did hope it would divert his thoughts. Invitations to these salons had arrived each month in the past two years or so. From one reason and another he had never before attended. But this evening, because he was without other amusement and was unwilling to spend the evening musing unproductively on the people and the activities at the Mansion House, he had determined to attend.

Ingram greeted his hostess and accepted her delight in his presence with appropriate modesty. Gazing about the crowded drawing room, he spotted the reformer Jeremy Bentham and the young scientist Michael Faraday, as well as several famous ladies among whom he recognized Hannah More and, most unexpectedly, Sarah Siddons. Had he known Lady Dartington could command such a diverse gathering, he would have attended upon her much sooner. The room was like a buffet supper spread with interesting topics of discussion and fascinating people to meet. And just as he approached a buffet, he wondered now where to begin.

From the corner of his eye, as he surveyed the vast chamber, he spied a tall lady on the opposite side of the room. He swung round the better to ascertain her identity. Yes, he was not mistaken. Here, to his utter surprise, was the object of many of his waking thoughts and some of his most interesting dreams.

He crossed the room as quickly as he could without making himself conspicuous, and was bowing over her gloved hand before she herself was aware of his arrival.

"Miss Crossmichael, it is a pleasure to see you. I have inexplicably missed encountering you on my visits to Mansion House, and here we meet unexpectedly." Ingram watched the play of expressions cross her face. Her fine eyes revealed, in turn, dismay, consternation, regret and, he thought, pleasure.

She belonged in such a setting, he realized even as he bowed over her hand. Her sharp wit, her wide ranging opinions and well-educated intelligence could only add to such a gathering of scholars, litterateurs, and intellectuals. He wondered how long she had been attending Lady D's soirees, and again condemned his own dilatory participation. "Is all well at the school?"

She visibly gathered her composure and with it an air of preoccupation. There were lines of strain about her grey eyes, and her clear, pale skin held an ashen tinge, as though she had been keeping late hours. But she said, "Oh, very well. Yes, indeed."

"Have you known Lady Dartington long?" He tried again to engage her attention. The crowd surged about them in a mannerly fashion. Glasses of wine were being offered by discreet footmen, and their hostess flitted about her guests, performing introductions, encouraging discussions, and assessing the mood of the company. "She seems the perfect cicerone."

"She loves people nearly as much as she loves ideas," Portia replied. "I have had her acquaintance quite some time. Her daughter attended at the Mansion House for a year. We became friendly and she has ever since sent me an invitation to her salons." Her words were almost absent-minded, polite to the edge of vagueness. "I attend when I can."

Stadbroke was troubled by her courteous ambiguity. He preferred her hostility, he thought. "You look very lovely this evening." He thought the words might fire her temper, but he spoke them in all honesty. Her gown of silver-grey crepe was enhanced by a tunic-styled overdress of deep blue with side openings caught by silver clasps. The plain bodice left her smooth throat bare to the swell of her bosom and only a shapely silver necklace adorned her pale skin. A twist of the blue silk caught up her abundant hair with an attempt at confinement that did not quite succeed. Ingram found the fair curls escaping on her temples quite remarkably distracting.

But at last he had all her attention. His flattery had certainly drawn her out of her abstraction.

Her wide eyes flashed scorn. "You are in the wrong place, my lord, if you are looking only for beauty. You will not find it in my company, flatter as you will, and a salon such as this has more important things to discuss than the physical attributes of its denizens. These," she swept an expansive gesture, "are the women you don't believe exist. These are women of intelligence, wit and learning. The sort of women I try to nurture in my school. The women you don't believe your daughters can become. I am surprised to see you here, given your opinion of my sex."

"My opinion of your sex is undergoing a drastic alteration, Miss Crossmichael, due to your influence. I have come to see that I judged all women on the strength

of one or two, and I am now fully alive to the possibilities of excellence existing in my daughters. I am learning, I hope, to communicate as easily with my young ladies as I did with my little girls." His words seemed to puncture her irritation and she relapsed into apparent apathy.

Stadbroke was alarmed by her lack of spirit. Suddenly impatient with the weak lies with which she had kept him at arm's length since before Christmas, he said, "Portia, I can see that something is troubling you. I want only to be of assistance. For God's sake, will you not trust me? Tell me what is wrong."

She stared at him as though seeing him for the first time that evening. "You cannot help me, Lord Stadbroke."

"Surely matters cannot be so desperate." A cold chill crept up his spine at the desolation he glimpsed at the back of her eyes.

"No of course not." She seemed prepared to agree with whatever he said for the express purpose of being rid of him.

He had no intention of leaving her until he discovered her problem. He leaned closer. "Portia..."

"My lord, just because you once kissed me--testing the waters, as it were--you have no license over my concerns, my thoughts or my affairs." She roused from her lethargy again. "Your continued harassment this evening is destroying a much-needed change of scene for me. There is nothing wrong, not with me, not with your daughters, not with my school. I will be obliged if you will abandon the matter!"

Ingram straightened. "My apologies, madam, for my importunities. I had thought we had achieved some sort of mutual esteem if nothing else. I will relieve you of my presence." He bowed and, turning on his heel, ed a group of scholars who he knew would be discussing the latest of scientific findings.

Portia watched him go with a mixture of relief and regret. She had decided to attend Lady Dartington's monthly salon this evening to escape for a little the worries that beset her. It was typical of her luck recently that an unkind fate should present her with Lord Stadbroke. The pleasure that had swept over her at the sight of him had frightened her. She disliked the man, she told herself. She had either to drive him away or confide in him, and the second was not a possibility. Why should he care? How could he understand the disaster which had befallen her, when she little understood it herself?

It seemed incredible that someone like Harold Dent could have so little human kindness and so much greed in his makeup. How could he compound the tyranny of a despotic parent with the viciousness of a grasping individual? Her supposition that he had been left far in their past had been laughably wrong; he over-shadowed their every waking moment. Caldwell's consistently drawn face haunted her at Mansion House and her own concern was affecting her relations with her staff and her pupils.

Her gaze followed the viscount across the chamber. He was very angry with her now; he would judge her harshly on this rebuff. He, who had all the forbearance in the world for his young daughters, had none at all for her.

But he gave no sign of his displeasure. The ladies in the chamber despite their age, learning and sophistication fluttered about him as butterflies to a particularly succulent flower. They drew him away from the scholars of his choice to an impromptu poetry reading at the other end of the large chamber.

Portia found Lady Dartington at her elbow.

"Should you like to the poetry reading, Miss Crossmichael? Are you as surprised as I to see Lord Stadbroke here? I have invited him persistently to my evening affairs for an age, but had quite given up his attendance. His attendance must always be a triumph for any hostess but beyond that, his views and his breadth of knowledge are so wide that he can only be a valuable addition to such a gathering as this."

Portia was speechless in the face of this information.

"You are surprised?" Her ladyship was rattling on. "He gives every appearance of a sporting gentleman without two thoughts to rub together does he not? But his society is valued as much by the scientists and philosophers gathered here as by the less judicious ladies." She nodded down the room where the poetry reading had been abandoned for a declamation by the viscount.

"I would rather Mrs. More and her companions," Portia managed to say. She ignored the subject of Stadbroke's predilections. Her hostess appeared unoffended by her apparent lack of interest in the viscount, and led her to a group of educators who wished to discuss theories of moral instruction.

Portia briefly forgot her troubles in a stimulating debate with her peers. When next she looked about her the viscount was again at her elbow.

"Will you take a turn about the room with me?" he asked, offering his arm for

her , showing no sign of his earlier anger. She placed her hand upon his superfine sleeve with a show of unwillingness. She hoped that only she was aware that her reluctance was false.

They perambulated in silence for some minutes, bowing to acquaintances, exchanging greetings with friends.

"I spoke hastily a little while ago," she began, awkwardly, to apologize. She had had no notion that she intended to do so. "I beg your pardon. I am become, I think, a crusty old schoolmistress."

He brushed off her apology granting her, it seemed, all the tolerance she had thought she had forfeited. "There is someone here I would like to introduce, if you will permit?"

"Of course," she said, summoning an interest she did not feel. He led her across the room to a gentleman of medium height who was as fair as she was herself. He was accompanied by a handsome well-dressed lady whom, Portia noted, was undoubtedly enceinte.

She had seen this couple before at these salons, of Lady Dartington, but had somehow never had occasion to be introduced. Now Portia discovered them to be Lord Francis and Lady Dorothea Lanark. They were kind and conversable, and when someone drew Stadbroke away, demanding his opinion on a new theory of combustion, she was less disappointed than she might have been if left in anyone else's company. The Lanarks had dozens of questions about her school, and about her methods of education, and quite monopolized her for the rest of the evening. Portia was not unhappy with the development; she had the notion that in Dorothea Lanark she had discovered a true friend. But she had to wonder how long the lady's friendship would last in the face of the scandal that

Portia could not think how to prevent.

Lord Stadbroke did not approach her again that evening so she was left, as she drove home with an aching head, with a lingering regret. She wondered if she had given him a profound disgust of her with her accusations of harassment. Surely not. After all he had chosen later to walk with her and to introduce her to his friends, the Lanarks.

Portia leaned her head against the plump squabs of her carriage's seat, and itted the truth to herself. She wanted Stadbroke's approval, his friendship, and more, much more. Now that he had awakened her to a knowledge of desire, she wanted to explore the experience further. ing Lady Lanark's interesting condition, she thought even of that eventuality with something of envy.

She stirred uneasily. The chill of the winter night was biting close and she was returning to Mansion House where all her problems awaited her. Daydreams about love and desire offered no solutions to her difficulties. But her evening in different surroundings had given her--as she had hoped--a new perspective.

She and Caldwell had to face up to Harold Dent, and defy him. They had to weather whatever storms his lies brewed. They would find out who were their true friends, and had to face the possibility of the ruination of their careers. There was no other way.

Stadbroke had been correct in at least one of his assertions; it was time to be done with lies.

* * * *

A few days later when Caldwell invited her to his studio to voice her opinion of the portrait he had begun of Penelope, Portia was glad of the opportunity to be private with him. The winter term was always a difficult one for the young ladies and their teachers. Foul weather contrived to dampen spirits and to confine everyone to close quarters without adequate exercise. Tempers were short, and all of Portia's energy was directed to preservation of an atmosphere conducive to learning.

She closed the door to the studio behind her with a sigh. Her brother stood at his easel, regarding his portrait with a critical eye. He was capturing the child as she worked on her own art, small tongue pinched firmly between her teeth, but had ed the need for her presence.

"Will Stadbroke like it?" he asked.

"How should I know what the viscount would like?" she said, with a purposely obtuse air.

"You have seemed--forgive me if I am wrong-- in harmony at times. There is an air of...understanding between you..."

"The only air of which I am aware between us, is a rancorous one." She strolled over to examine the nearly completed portrait of the viscount and his daughters, uneasily aware that she was not itting the truth. She stared at Stadbroke's painted face with avidity, iring every angle and plane. She could never stare so openly at him in company.

"But you said he was at the salon... He introduced you to the Lanarks." Caldwell appeared confused.

Portia knew herself to be just as confused. "We were civil, between exchanges of insults," she itted, ing Stadbroke's apparently sincere appreciation of her appearance. "He knows something is wrong, Cal. He will not rest until he discovers it for he fears it endangers his daughters. I do not wish to lie anymore. And we cannot afford to pay Harold Dent anymore money."

Caldwell laid down his brush and fidgeted uncharacteristically about the room. "He is staying at The Three Comes in the village, you know--my father, that is. He sends me notes..."

Portia drew in a quick sharp breath of dismay. She had not known the man was still established in Hornsey. "So you have been keeping secrets from me," she said, her voice flat with despair. "Does our circle of deception never end?"

"I knew it would only upset you."

"It upsets me if I cannot trust you, Cal. Perhaps I know how Stadbroke feels, wondering what is truth and what is lie!"

"The only other prevarication I have perpetrated is that Father has asked, here and there, for more payments, small ones, a guinea here, a pound there. I did not want to worry you." Caldwell paused before her, defiance, anxiety and supplication in his pleasant face. She recalled him with just such expression

when he had stolen pasties from the kitchen at the age of nine.

"You have to worry me; you must," she said more gently. "Your future and mine are both at risk here."

"I knew you would be intent upon revelation. I cannot..." He swung away again.

"You must. We have to end this. We must tell Harold Dent that we will pay him no more money, and that he must do what he will." Portia turned away from the portraits, straightening her slim shoulders, already bearing the weight of her decision.

"It will be ugly. It might be the end of Mansion House, and it might be the end of my career."

Caldwell began to clean his brushes, avoiding her gaze, avoiding agreement.

"Those are risks we shall have to take."

"But Heloise...she will never..."

The door opened suddenly after a brief rap and a brief interval. Heloise Montlucon, her head tilted with an appearance of intense curiosity, entered and closed the door firmly behind her.

"Heloise will never what, mon bravez un? Are you ready at last to tell me what draws Portia's face to creases and lines, and marks your brow? Gavrielle asks if you are annoyed with her, and I... I wonder if you have thought better of your avowals."

Portia's heart ached to see her friend so uncertain, and her brother so tormented. She knew without doubt what she must do.

Heloise sank into a chair beside the fire, and Caldwell dropped to one knee beside it, gathering her hands in his. "Never, you must know that, my darling. Never will my love for you change."

"Then what is it?" Mme. Montlucon looked to Portia for her answers as if sensing Caldwell would not tell her.

Caldwell shook his head despairingly. Portia took the gesture as permission to speak in spite of his reluctance to divulge their difficulties.

She took a deep breath, and gripped her chatelaine tightly. "My dear, as you know, Harold Dent is Caldwell's father, and my stepfather. He... He has been extorting money from us. He will tell the ton, he says, that we are living here together in defiance of propriety, not half siblings as they think, no blood relationship between us, unless we pay him whatever he demands."

"Oh, phoooo," Madame swept her hands apart, releasing Caldwell's, in a very Gallic gesture. "Is that all? Everyone can see that you are brother and sister in

spirit if not in blood. No one will believe that there could be anything présomptueux--immodest--or...or immoral between you."

"Yes they will!" Caldwell leapt to his feet. "They will believe it. The beau monde will believe any scandal it can sniff out. There will be oohings and aahings in every drawing room in Mayfair. The school will be ruined for Portia, and my career will be ruined for us."

"Us?"

"How can we marry with such a cloud hanging over us? Why would you wish to marry me with such a father as I have? Now that Portia has told you, she has destroyed all my hopes of convincing you of the rightness of my affections."

"Has she?" Heloise rose as well.

Portia made herself small, withdrawing behind an easel. She could offer nothing to the discussion but much as she felt an intruder in this encounter, she could not leave the room without causing disruption. She could only hope to tender them her .

"I care nothing for your father, and I do not believe his petty allegations will cause the school or you any trouble whatsoever. You are foolish to be so fearful. And you must not give him money we can well use after our marriage." She looked demure, and Portia could only ire her handling of Caldwell.

He surprised them however. Heloise's accusation of fear seemed to have stung, despite the joy that was dawning as he realized her intentions. "If you had accepted my hand anytime these three years, we should not be in this mess," he snapped, then paused in seeming astonishment at his own words.

"You cannot think to blame the venality of your own father on me," she retorted in outrage. "Even were we wed, if he is so desperately mauvais, he would have found some way to besmirch the name of this establishment. I tell you--you were both wrong in the beginning to submit to his demands."

"And you are right--so very right," Portia said. "Please do not quarrel between yourselves. Cal, you know your father would not be stopped by anything so trivial as marriage lines. He would have found another way to steal our money, to poison our lives. I do not pretend to understand him."

Caldwell paced the room, back and forth, window to door. "I'm sorry, I am sorry." He paused briefly before Heloise, met her gaze earnestly and then sped on. "I scarcely know what to think when my father--my own father--would destroy all that I hold dear. Your own future, Heloise, will be besmirched by his lies. It is a poor thing, I know, but I offer you my hand again. I will ensure that you always have a home, that Gavrielle wants for nothing. You may even choose not to live with me, but I will see you come to no harm by Dent's actions."

The Frenchwoman's face softened. "You would do this?"

"I would do anything." He dropped to one knee before her again, and took her hands in his once more.

"Then I accept your offer of marriage. And I will never live apart from you, and we will prove to any of those who would believe such vile untruths that we, all of us, are innocent." They fell into one another's embrace.

Portia had been stunned to silence by the tableau before her. It was the ultimate oddity that this disastrous turn of events could lead to the very dearest wish to Caldwell's heart and her own. Her step-brother and her best friend allied at last. She was torn with a desire to laugh and a strong wish to give in to hysterics.

"What shall I do?" she asked at last. She answered her own question as her companions continued to gaze at each other with deep satisfaction. "I can only tell the truth. Assure everyone that there is no veracity to the rumours Dent will unleash. We are step-brother and sister and no impropriety has ever been considered between us. "Tell the truth and shame the devil"; Shakespeare had the right of it. We are, after all, guilty only of striving to provide an excellent education for young ladies with parents unappreciative of our efforts."

Her best friend and her brother rose and ed hands. She stood also, to honour them and their decision. "Congratulations, my dears." After a long moment, she added, "Invite your father to call upon us, Caldwell."

CHAPTER NINE

Harold Dent came to the Mansion House so soon as he was summoned. As instructed he arrived at the tradesmen's entrance, where Caldwell met him. He was ushered to Portia's parlour in haste, without encountering any of the pupils or employees of the school.

Portia was waiting there with Heloise, both of them tense and anxious. They made their guest no greeting at all, but stared at him warily.

"You are taking almighty precautions, my dears, to keep your precious inmates from with me." Dent looked much as he had on his previous visit, his square unlovely face pugnacious, and his attitude truculent. "Except for this one." He stared in his turn at Heloise. "Will you not introduce me to the charming lady?"

Heloise had been invited to them if she wished and she had accepted with alacrity. Caldwell stepped to her side now, and took her hand as if the could protect her from his father's sneering assessment.

Portia spoke at last. "I think you do not need to know her name. Suffice it to say she is my brother's intended and so has a right to be present. We want you to know, Mr. Dent, that we will not supply you with any more funds. It is beyond our power to do so."

"So formal, dear child," Dent said chidingly. "You was used to call me Father."

"You forfeited the right to that dignity long ago," Portia was in the grip of a cold anger and a courage that brooked no nonsense. "Even before you decided to extort money from Caldwell and me."

"Extortion is a nasty word, my dear. Surely it is within the duty of the child to look after the parent in times of trouble, as it is the reverse duty of the parent during the child's minority."

Dent was infuriatingly tranquil. Portia gritted her teeth. She had forgot how the man's language was more educated than his appearance, and how his flowing periods and endearments could grate.

"You never spent a penny more on us than you absolutely had to. You have had more money from us in these past months than you ever expended on us in our entire lives." Caldwell's restraint on his temper was obviously slipping.

Portia was pleased to see Heloise tightening her grip on his arm. An ugly brawl between father and son would damage the school as much as any other eventuality. To curtail the interview she said again, "We will not pay you any more. Surely you have no need to blacken our names; spread lies that you know, implicitly, to be untrue. I am hoping that was simply an empty threat to ensure our compliance."

Dent's pale eyes quartered the room, ever shifting. "I don't make empty threats. You see, I have no certainty that my information is untrue. I shall tell the ton that, sadly, my son and my step-daughter were always unnaturally close. And I shall mention that I, in fact, cut the connection because I could not suffer any longer the unsavoury suspicions that your behaviour caused me. The world

should know about my qualms, for there are innocent children involved now, under your doubtful guidance."

"I cannot believe you would serve your only son so. He is on the brink of a great career. He is a fine artist. You never liked me; heaven alone knows what my mother saw in you, God rest her soul. But your own son!"

"One hundred pounds will keep me silent." The extravagant words were gone, as was the false geniality. "By the end of the week or I take my story to London and be-damned to you all. I've debts that won't wait."

Portia exchanged a speaking glance with her brother and Heloise. She knew that they ed her fully and she took a deep, sustaining breath. Then she said, "Do your worst, Mr. Dent. Your demands will ruin us, your lies may not. We will take the risk. You need not wait out the week, you will not see that hundred pounds."

He ranted and raged then of thanklessness and old grievances, and finally whined about ingratitude and injustice. Finally he left, threatening them anew. "You need not think the ton will not listen. They love to tear down those they've built up; you've a popularity they'll delight in destroying."

Caldwell saw him out then. Portia saw the flaring anger in his eyes, and the pitiless grip he took on the older man's arm. Dent was hustled out of the room, across the entry and, from expediency, out of the front door. She and Heloise sank into the nearest chairs and stared at each other.

"We have burned our bridges, cherie," said Heloise.

"With a vengeance," Portia agreed, pressing a hand to her cheek.

Caldwell flung back into the room, banging the door and dusting off his hands ostentatiously. "They won't believe him," he declared. "He is a nothing; they will not listen."

"We will live in that hope," Portia said. "For now, we must continue on as usual."

The next few days were uneventful. Portia found her spirits cautiously recovering, found herself daring to hope that Harold Dent had been making empty threats. The future seemed less uncertain, their money at least was safe.

After three days she began to relax but on the fourth Heloise put her head around Portia's study door. She said, "Melicent Perrington should be in my Italian class at this very moment, and she is not, cherie."

Portia groaned and withdrew her attention from the papers before her. "Oh, no, I cannot bear another problem."

Heloise patted her shoulder sympathetically. Portia had not even been aware that her friend had moved to her side.

"Perhaps it was all bluster," Heloise said. "Perhaps Mr. Dent is one of those villains who can only talk of deeds, can only make idle threats."

Portia summoned a travesty of a smile, and said, "Perhaps. But having grown up in his household, I think not. Now, what is this of Melicent?"

"Cal and I have been watching her. She is disappearing for part of every day. And this time it is not the stables--ours or those neighbouring ones--that are attracting her. We have not been able to determine where she goes."

A brief tap at the door heralded Caldwell Dent's arrival. He had evidently overheard the final words of his betrothed. "I have found it out. She is watching The Three Comes."

"The inn? Outside, in February? She will catch her death of cold. What is she watching for?"

"Haven't discovered that," Caldwell was grim; he had lost the last of his boyishness in the past weeks. "She's outside. I've brought her back with me."

"Very well." Portia reseated herself. "If you will both excuse me, and send in Melicent, I will endeavour to discover what this is about."

Melicent Perrington was ushered into her presence in only a moment. Wrapped in her scarlet cloak, she gave an appearance of warmth, but the crimson tip of her nose, and the small rather blue hands she twisted together gave the lie to the illusion.

"You are chilled my dear. Come to the fire." Though weariness and anxiety had worn Portia to a thread, she could not be unkind to any child, much less this middle daughter of Ingram's.

The girl's teeth chattered as she took the small Windsor chair Portia offered. She held out her frosted hands to the blaze and sighed with pleasure.

"What is this about, Melicent? Why in the name of heaven are you lurking about The Three Comes?"

The child was mutinously silent.

"If you will not tell me, I shall have to your father to discuss the matter. I cannot have my pupils run abroad whenever the mood takes them. You have already done this more than once, and I assured Lord Stadbroke it would not happen again. You have broke my promise."

Tears welled up in the child's eyes that were so like her father's. "I wanted to help."

"Help who, my dear?"

"You! I saw that man who came here just after Christmas come again last week. And then, I heard raised voices here, in your study. Everyone--Madame and Mr. Dent and you--is careworn and tired. When I saw that man in the village again, I thought he must be causing trouble. And I followed him to the inn. I thought if I

watched him, I could determine what he was doing to hurt you."

"Oh, Melicent." Portia was overcome by emotion and had to pause to steady her voice. "How very kind... And how very dangerous and...wrong. Promise me you will not undertake this task again. The man's presence need not trouble you, truly. This is work for adults, do you understand me?"

"Yes, Miss. Miss Crossmichael, is Mr. Dent your brother?"

It was then that Portia realized she had to speak with her staff, and tell something to her pupils, before Harold Dent unleashed his lies. She wondered why he was still in the neighbourhood. Perhaps he had thought better of his threats. Perhaps he waited to see if they would reconsider the matter and pay him again. There were so many dire possibilities.

She dismissed the crowding anxieties and concentrated on the child. With care and utter honesty, she said, "Yes, Melicent, he is my step-brother. Though we have not the same mother and father, we were raised together, and he is as much my brother as Penny and Sabina are your sisters. He will never be less nor more than my brother, for I watched him grow from a precocious child to an abominable boy and to a fine man who is affianced to Mme. Montlucon. I can claim only a sisterly affection for him."

"Sisterly affection. That is what I feel for Sabina and Penny."

"It is. And you know how strong it is, how you wish to protect them and love them, even while you might want to smack them."

Melicent giggled to hear her schoolmistress express such emotions. She nodded, her eyes shining.

"That is how I feel about my brother. Now promise me you will not go abroad without accompaniment. You must keep this vow, or I shall ask your father to take you away."

The child rose. "I promise on my honour, Miss Crossmichael. Is Madame truly betrothed to Mr. Dent?"

"She is."

"Oooh, Sabina will be peeved." Melicent's small face contorted with mischievous relish.

"Sabina already knows, my dear." Portia had made it her business to inform Sabina of the engagement immediately upon the decision being taken. The girl had been mature in her acceptance and, to Portia's relief, almost completely unaffected. "And you would not wish to be unkind."

"Nooo," Melicent agreed, a more pleasant expression replacing her impishness.

"Very well, your promises. You may go. Mme. Montlucon is waiting for you."

Portia dropped into her chair as the door closed behind the child. She suspected that she would not have to request Lord Stadbroke to remove his middle daughter. If he found about this start of Melicent's, he would choose to withdraw her.

And if Harold Dent spread his poison as he threatened, Ingram would be on her doorstep before she could bear it, taking away all his daughters.

* * * *

The following week, despite the impending crisis, the life of the Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies continued as it had for fifteen years. Portia dared to hope, dared to plan for the future. Nevertheless, she thought it only right to advise her students and her staff of the possibility of trouble.

Every morning Portia breakfasted with her pupils in the pleasant, north dining room that overlooked the gardens. The Morning Mercury was folded beside her plate always at breakfast. It was her custom to browse through the paper reading to the young ladies such items of national and international news as might benefit their education.

This pleasant start to the day was followed by the dispersion of the young ladies to their classrooms and Portia to her study or her scheduled teaching. On this particular Friday, however, Portia rose at the end of the meal, and tapped her spoon on her tea-cup to gain the attention of the girls.

"I must tell you, ladies, that there may be a little upheaval in our routine over the next few weeks. Someone is spreading stories--stories that are completely untrue--about our school, particularly about Mr. Dent, and about me. Your parents will tell you more if they see fit. But I want you to know that you are not to worry. You may be sure that any ill-natured tales are not true, and that Mr. Dent and I will be taking steps to ensure that they are stopped. You may go now to your classes."

As the girls clattered off, whispering and speculating among themselves, Portia sank back into her chair momentarily. That had gone well enough, she thought. But more was to come; now, at the weekly staff meeting, she must advise her teachers.

When everyone was gathered later in the day as usual, in her study, Portia gave her employees essentially the same message, with only a little more detail.

Caldwell and Heloise stood at her side as she said, "I find it necessary to inform you that we, Mr. Dent and I, as owners of Mansion House Establishment, are facing a slander, a defamation of our characters, which may harm the school. We are taking steps to halt this slur, and we have every hope that our work here will continue unaltered. You may be assured that whatever rumours you hear are completely untrue, but if our denigrator achieves his purpose, there may be unpleasantness. If you would rather not be associated with us during this troubling time, we would accept your resignation."

She looked around the room. There were varying looks of concern on the faces of her staff: anxiety, curiosity, apprehension and disquiet. An expressive chatter of indignation, determination and broke out. She silenced it with a lifted hand. "Please come to me with any worries you have. On a happier note, I must tell you that Mr. Dent and Mme. Montlucon are to be married. They have not set upon a date as yet, but I know we all wish them happy."

Before alerting her staff to the possibility of trouble, Portia had asked permission of her brother and his betrothed to reveal their engagement. She had hoped the news would assuage any lingering doubts her teachers and staff might have about the truth of Harold Dent's claims, and she had thought that good news never came amiss.

She was right. The staff left her parlour more interested in the forthcoming nuptials than in the possibility of tribulation. They filed out, talking animatedly, and Heloise and Caldwell followed them, leaving Portia to stare thoughtfully from her window at the lifeless garden.

The peace held for another day or two, then the storm broke around them. That morning when everything changed, an ordinary breakfast of porridge and boiled eggs graced the tables and a warming fire flared in the grate. Yet more February rain streamed down the wide windows, as Portia opened the newspaper.

She read aloud three items before she turned to the fourth page. There a small line of type heading a short, close-formed column leapt out at her. A quick reading caused her to drop her teacup with a clatter in its saucer. Every young lady at each of the four tables turned to stare. Portia was conscious of the particularly concerned looks of Sabina, Melicent and Penelope Perrington.

"Please do continue with your meals," she said, and drew in a deep, sustaining breath. "There is a matter which requires my attention. You will excuse me."

She got herself from the dining room, she could not have said how. In the corridor, she asked a maid she encountered to have Mr. Dent--and Mme. Montlucon if she had arrived--directed to her study. Making her own way there,

she sank into her desk's chair with relief. After a long moment, she spread the newspaper flat before her on her desk, and read the column carefully.

The headline which had caused her such shock read merely, "Mansion House Establishment". It was the following text that had the power to kill all her dreams.

The parents of those young ladies resident at the Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies should be aware that the moral integrity of the owner and head instructress of the said Establishment may be in doubt. There is a situation of grave immorality in place at the school which each parent would be well advised to question. Further information may be had upon application to an interested party who may be found at the Afrique Coffee-House, St. James, every morning this week.

Harold Dent had done his worst. She felt all the colour drain from her face and wondered, with a curious detachment, if she would faint.

She rather thought not; it would after all be only a brief escape from her problems.

The door burst open to it Caldwell, and close on his heels entered Heloise.

"What is it, Portia?" Heloise's pretty face was full of anxiety.

Caldwell's arm went immediately about his betrothed's shoulders. "Has he made

good his threats?" Caldwell asked. "I discovered yesterday he left the inn two days ago. I feared the worst."

Enclosed in a cold shell of imivity, small details loomed large for Portia. She coolly noted the damp hem of Heloise's wine-red merino gown and the rain seeping, ever so slightly, in the corner of the terrace door. She regarded her friends blankly, envying them their intimacy.

Wordlessly, she displayed the newspaper for their perusal. After reading it, they seated themselves and stared at each other in grave distress.

Heloise was the first to find her voice. "What shall we do?"

"We must expect the first parents tomorrow, if not this afternoon," Portia was surprised by the calm detachment of her words. She did not know if her calm was engendered by strength or shock. "Please tell the staff, show them this." She handed the paper to Caldwell. "I shall go back to the dining room and talk to the girls."

She faced the thirty girls with words of explanation that came to her more easily than she would have thought possible.

"There is an article in the Morning Mercury today which has to do with the falsehoods being spread about our school. You should know that some of your parents might deem removal from this school to be in your best interests. If they make that decision, I wish you to accept the fact without argument or unseemly displays of regret or emotion. In fact, that is how you may best help me through this difficult time. Do as your parents instruct you."

Portia paused and an intemperate flood of exclamation overwhelmed the room. She allowed the girls their indignation and curiosity for a few moments. Then she said, "That is really all I can tell you. Your parents will decide whether or not to inform you further. We shall continue our classes without alteration until there are further developments. You are dismissed."

She watched the girls go, their heads together, chattering, wondering, speculating. She loved them all, she realized, even the dull, the shallow and the foolish. Her eyes filled with tears and she had to turn away before the room was empty. The view from the window before her was awash with rain and her own tears.

She thought she was finally alone when a hand crept into hers.

She looked down to discover Penny Perrington at her side. Her sisters were beside her.

"Don't cry, Mith Crossmichael. Papa will make it right."

Melicent was frowning ferociously. "It's that man, isn't it, Miss? I knew it. I knew he was making trouble."

"Is there anything we can do to help you, Miss Crossmichael?" A sweet new maturity showed itself in Sabina's lovely face.

Portia knew that her feelings for her other students was a pale thing compared to the motherly love she felt for these girls. The surge of emotion was nearly her undoing. "Go about your business, my dears, and help the others to do the same. If your father comes, do his bidding without argument. Now go, please." She urged them away with a wave of her hand, if they stayed she would disgrace herself with an excess of emotion. To her relief, they obeyed her promptly, but not without backward looks.

Sabina shut the door softly after their departure. Portia stared blankly at it for long moments, then a wrenching sob convulsed her.

* * * *

Lord Stadbroke received with pleasure an invitation to dine with the Lanarks and accepted it with alacrity. Lord Francis and his wife laid an excellent table, and he might be sure of meeting congenial company in their home. On the appointed day, he dressed to a nicety in a dark blue evening coat, pearl grey pantaloons, and a finely striped grey silk waistcoat. Then he dismissed his valet, thinking about the note he had received from Caldwell Dent cancelling their portrait sitting the next day.

His daughters would be disappointed, he knew, and he decided that he would see them within the week, whether or not Dent kept the next appointment. He wondered what had interfered with the sitting. Surely a portrait painter cum teacher of art could order his own time without difficulty? He shrugged mentally, caught up his gloves, his beaver, and his walking stick and set out for the Lanarks' town house two streets away.

He had been asked to arrive a little early, for a private chat, but had been delayed by series of small hindrances during an extended ride in Hyde Park. The result

was that when he arrived the guests were mostly gathered. He had only time to extend his apologies to his host and hostess for his lateness before the company went in to dinner. As he had expected, a congenial group was gathered about the Lanarks' mahogany table and he thought no more of the portrait sitting until the ladies withdrew to the drawing room.

The port was presented as the covers were removed, and a selection of snuff, pipes and seegars was laid out for the gentlemen. They redistributed themselves about the gleaming surface, chatting, laughing and drawing about the chairs for comfort and convenience.

Lord Francis drew Ingram aside and said in an undertone, "I wish I might have spoke to you alone, Stadbroke. I was sorry you were delayed."

Ingram stared in some surprise. "It was the most niggling of incidents that slowed me. But what is wrong? Was your need to speak to me urgent?"

"Well, what did you think of the Mercury ment this week?" Lanark was smiling at his other guests, even as he conducted the low-voiced conversation.

"Mercury? What ment?" Ingram made no effort to lower his voice as had Lanark.

They were overheard. "Mansion House," someone said, knowledgably.

"I've no doubt the ladies are talking about it, even now. It'll be a nine days

wonder. Surprised no one mentioned it during the meal." Bluff Lord Isley, half way down the mahogany table, interjected. "Suppose it ain't appropriate for mixed company."

Lanark sighed. "This is not the way I hoped to discuss the matter with you, Stadbroke. I had hoped for privacy, especially as I had touted the school." He rubbed a long hand over his face. "An ment in the Mercury suggested there are problems at Mansion House Establishment for Young Ladies."

Stadbroke narrowed his gaze and clamped down on his sudden anxiety. "What sort of problems?"

Lanark's expression begged his pardon for surprising him.

Isley, however, was before Lord Francis with a reply. "Demmed immoral ones. Seems the schoolmistress' drawing master is not after all her brother, or her halfbrother. Had it from someone who spoke with the fellow making the claim, at the Afrique Coffee-House this morning. M'wife wanted to send our eldest daughter to attend there, but I said, no, no need for a demmed blue-stocking in the family. Turns out I was in the right. Enough demmed depravity in society without exposing our children to it at school."

As most of the gentlemen had no daughters in attendance at the school, and so had no interest in the matter, they began at the other end of the table a conversation on the latest crop of opera dancers to grace the London stages.

Ingram was confounded by the insinuations. "What is being implied?" He kept a close hold on his temper which was mounting by the moment.

Lanark waved his butler over, whispered a command, and that worthy returned shortly with the Morning Mercury on a salver which he presented to Stadbroke.

Ingram took the paper which was folded to the appropriate page. He read the brief public notice with rising concern. "Who was the person that writ this libel? Has anyone here actually seen him?"

The gentlemen at his end of the table shrugged. Isley reiterated, "Friend of a friend stopped in, that's all I heard. " He applied himself to lighting a pipe.

Stadbroke turned to Lanark who looked acutely uncomfortable. "What do you know?"

"One of my other friends went to see the fellow," Lanark said. "Told me the villain looks like a tradesman but stands by his information, and can provide proof. Well, my friend's brother says he is removing his daughter from the school."

"Damnation." There was a wealth of disgust and frustration in Ingram's single, explosive word, but he had the sense to lower his voice. "She's been lying to me. I asked her; I suspected there was something wrong at Mansion House. No wonder Dent cancelled the portrait sitting.

"I trusted her," he muttered, his thoughts in chaos. Portia had been the first woman he had ever trusted and believed honourable, and she had lied to him and manipulated him just like all the others. God alone knew what she and Dent

were to each other. She had feared exposure and she and young Dent had been paying to prevent it.

"She will hear of my wrath. It will be my pleasure to denounce her to her face, pack up my daughters' effects and remove them from her dishonest presence."

Everyone around the table was staring at him now. In an undertone, Lanark said, "You are not helping matters, Stadbroke. Don't do anything rash. And for the love of heaven, mind your tongue. You are condemning them all without facts."

Ingram stared at his friends and acquaintances, his sudden, irrational anger dying. The gentlemen's faces were avid, as keen for gossip as the most cynical crone. "I spoke in jest; it cannot be true," he said loudly, meeting Lanark's comionate gaze.

"I do not think it is. Neither does Dorothea. But we have no right to investigate; we have no children in attendance there." Lord Francis was calm--pacific--and made certain every man at the table heard him.

Ingram picked up a snuffbox and fiddled with it idly. No, he could not believe it, now that he paused to reflect. There was no consciousness between Dent and Portia. They were nothing to each other but step-siblings, he would swear to it. But the fact that they were unrelated yet dwelling in the same house was enough to damn their association.

"You can do nothing else tonight in any event," Lanark said, urgently and quietly. "Except speak with Dora, see what she might have heard."

Ingram rose abruptly, abandoning the snuffbox, and the conversations around the table ceased again.

"Come, gentlemen, let's re the ladies," Lanark said hastily.

Deep in thought, Ingram followed his host and his fellow guests above-stairs to the drawing room. The sensation of betrayal that gnawed at his vitals had more to do with himself than with his daughters. He did not believe for a moment that the girls were in peril, either moral or physical. He knew without a doubt that Portia would never endanger them. But she had endangered him.

She had come close to capturing his heart in a way no woman ever had, and if this gossip was true--or even if it was not--he had been betrayed. If it was true, he had been cuckolded in thought if not in fact; she had been disporting herself with Caldwell Dent while leading him to being enchanted with her mind, her ideas and her slender, shapely, blue-stockinged person. If it was not true, she still had lied to him, avoided telling him the truth, evaded candour and feigned sincerity.

He only withdrew from his absorption when he discovered Lady Dorothea beside him. Her charming drawing room, hung in straw-coloured silk and dotted with comfortable sophas and chairs, was half-filled by the glittering throng of her guests.

"This is not how we would have wished you to discover this trouble at the school," she said frankly, her dark eyes sincere. "We did not wish to communicate it to you by letter, but I see now that would have been better than this." She looked down at her gloved hands. "I feel somehow responsible, Lord

Stadbroke. I encouraged you to trust the school, and I--"

"You have also been betrayed, my lady." Ingram knew he was too harsh, but his anger was too new, too raw to contain. "You need feel no guilt."

"I must say then that I am convinced of the dishonesty of these rumours. And indeed, the evidence of this man who puffs off his slander at the Afrique. Miss Crossmichael is blameless in my mind. I am glad I met her at Lady Dartington's salon for it confirms my opinion. She has not the aura of a wanton, or a trickster."

Stadbroke ed Portia's chaste response to his kiss, her overwhelming discomfiture at her own actions and her anger with his. "I have to agree," he said, his face softening. "But she has at least been less than honest."

"Did she owe us details of her relationship to every member of her staff?"

"But she called Dent her brother. I believed him to be her half-brother."

"The distinction scarcely matters. They feel like siblings, that is the important thing. I had two step-brothers and sisters. I called--still call--them just 'brother' and 'sister'."

His hope, which had flickered at her words, fell back to earth as he thought of the living quarters at Mansion House. "They are not in any way related."

"They feel they are. They probably never gave the matter a thought. He is engaged to be married, I understand. I am told his fiancée stands by him. These are not dissolute people, Stadbroke." Lady Dora's earnest gaze rested on his face, willing him to agree with her.

"I know it; I must believe it," he said. "But I shall investigate. First I will see this tradesman at the Afrique. It occurs to me that he may be the same Mr. Harold I encountered at the school on Boxing Day. I shall not be surprised if he is. But if so, Portia Crossmichael purposely misled me, several times. I warned her that I would accept nothing less than complete honesty."

"What will you do then? Remove the girls?" Lady Dora was moving away, back to her other guests.

Stadbroke knew she would speak to every one of the company in order to help salvage the reputation of Mansion House Establishment.

"I shall go to Hornsey and speak with Miss Crossmichael", he said. "I don't know what I will do about the girls; their happiness will decide my actions. And it will depend if Portia will be candid at last."

CHAPTER TEN

The first pupil was withdrawn two days after Portia had gathered her students together. Now two letters sat on the blotter before her. She called "Come" in answer to a knock on the door, and revealed a face she knew was tired and drawn to Heloise.

"You look as exhausted as Caldwell. He does not sleep, I think." She sank down in the straight chair before Portia's desk.

Portia regarded her friend with comion. "You are weary too. It is a terrible thing that your engagement--such a joyous time--should be overshadowed by such unpleasantness."

"Bah, that is nothing to the anguish you suffer. That this calomnie should endanger all your good work, and your livelihood, it is a crime. Portia, what will you do, if it all fails?" Heloise whispered the last question.

Portia stared from the windows onto a hoar-frosted garden. Every detail of every plant was enlarged, enhanced and invested with wonder. The labyrinth was outlined with silvery magic. Any other time the view would have delighted her. Today it broke her heart, for what if--perhaps in short months--she should never look from these windows again.

"I have not thought. I do not know," she answered her friend slowly. "I cannot-will not--envision the possibility. I can only contend with one day at a time." She

gestured to the letters before her, before picking one up and breaking the seal. She unfolded it slowly, feeling that the news it must contain could attack her physically.

"It needed only that. Here is another withdrawal. First Lady Sarah, now Miss Spofforth. Her parents are arriving tomorrow to remove her from our contaminating presence." She thrust back her chair forcefully and rose to pace, long fingers pressing her temple, where a permanent pain seemed to have taken up residence. "Well, we refused to pay, and told Caldwell's father to do his worst. He has done it, and is more successful I think than he could have ever imagined. No one will listen to me, or believe me; I shudder to think of the gossip in Mayfair."

"Those who know you have listened and believed implicitly. You have the of every neighbour, every true friend is your champion. The idea of immoral behaviour between you and Caldwell is laughable. You are more truly siblings than many I know ed by blood. And my engagement to Caldwell is becoming more widely known."

"My detractors will see your betrothal as a feeble distraction from the truth." Portia drew out the words with painful intensity.

"Well, they shall have me to deal with. I marry no woman's leavings; if I did not know Caldwell to be honourable, upright, and true I would not allow him into my presence, much less my daughter's life."

Portia gazed at her friend with grateful attention. "I do thank you, Heloise. You are my prop and mainstay. I don't know what I should do without you. Lady Dorothea Lanark did write, promising her . Perhaps she has been able to effect a sea-change of opinion." She managed a travesty of a smile.

"And Lord Stadbroke?" Heloise rose and made for the door.

Portia knew that the hour was closing in on her friend's next class. "Nothing. I have heard nothing from him and his daughters are keeping their own counsel," she said briefly.

Heloise slipped away, leaving Portia's thoughts to dwell on the Perringtons.

* * * *

Ingram Perrington's mind was on her, or at least the situation, at the same time. As he strode through a chill and lowering day towards Albemarle Street and St. James, Ingram recalled the letter he had received from his daughters just that morning. The missive had been full of indignation, and a complete report of the calumny visited upon their school. There was no hint of distress, but only wrath and a bloodthirsty desire for revenge on those who slandered their beloved Miss Crossmichael.

He rather thought he might be able to provide them with the vengeance. His actions would be dependent upon what he found at the Afrique Coffee-House.

There was no crowd of curious on-lookers when he arrived before the ill-painted façade of the Afrique. The place was typical of its sort, a coffee-house that had seen better days and a more numerous custom in the previous century. Still they prepared a fine coffee and were patronised by a mixed company who were devoted more to the stimulating drink than to any political party, stratum of

society, or school of thought.

Perrington recognized one or two faces as he entered the lamp-lit interior, and greeted them circumspectly. He quickly located his quarry on a bench toward the north end of the large room near the fire. Only one or two well-dressed gentlemen were seated with him. Ingram had hope that whatever the extortionist's object, society was not overly interested in his tales.

He caught sight then of the man's unlovely countenance and indeed, it was the fellow who had been made known to him at the Mansion House Establishment as Mr. Harold, the butcher. A slow and righteous anger directed at Portia for her lies began to burn through him.

The two gentlemen with Harold stood and withdrew to one side as Ingram strode up. "What is your real name?" he snapped.

The man rose. "Harold Dent at your service, me lord. It is Lord Stadbroke is it not? And you have three daughters in that benighted establishment. Have them out, my lord, have them out."

Ingram ignored the unwelcome instruction. "Harold Dent? Then Caldwell Dent is your son. And Miss Crossmichael?"

"My step-daughter, my lord, may God forgive me. Her mother I married in haste, hoping to give my little son a mother, but the girl--Portia--was ever a conniving, malevolent wench. She led my poor boy astray, my lord--"

Dent was halted mid-sentence by the strangling grip Ingram took of his neckcloth. "Then why didn't you send her away, sometime over the twenty or so years of your acquaintance? Why not take action when you first suspected something amiss? Why wait so long to make public their sins? Has Miss Crossmichael not run this school these seven years or more? Caldwell Dent has been teaching there five or so years, has he not?"

They were drawing a crowd now; the landlord was pushing ineffectually from the far end of the room, the waiters formed a semi-circle about the pair.

Harold Dent struggled to speak, to answer the questions fired at him. Ingram loosened his grip ever so slightly.

"I tried, me lord," the older man gasped. "I tried many times over the years. Finally could take it no more..."

"Have you proof? Servants' gossip? Teachers' suspicions? Letters? And what of Caldwell Dent's betrothed--what does she say?" Ingram shook the man ferociously. "Tell the truth, Dent. You have been extorting money from them over lies. They share no blood, but they share a pure affection, as any of us with a sibling do. Nothing more. There are no servants' or teachers' tales and Caldwell Dent's fiancée has no doubts of her gentleman's honour because there is nothing shameful occurring and never has been."

He shook the man again. "it your lies."

Dent shook his head. Ingram released him disdainfully and watched as Dent clawed at his neckcloth and straightened his waistcoat and his fustian coat.

"Tell the truth," Perrington said softly.

"I have, me lord," Dent croaked. "It's all God's truth."

Ingram fancied there was considerably less certitude now in the fellow's statement. "I'll have the law on you for slander, if you continue with these lies," he said. Then without hesitation, he lashed out with a right hook that Gentleman Jackson himself had deemed punishing. Harold Dent went down, crashing and flailing, among the onlookers.

Ingram did not remain to see what injury he had inflicted but turned and, nodding to those of his acquaintance, strode out of the Afrique Coffee-House and down St. James.

He nursed his grazed knuckles thoughtfully on his way back to Hill Street. He had hardly noticed pain from them so intense had been the satisfaction of connecting them with the jaw of Harold Dent. He supposed that his actions would not convince many of the ton of Dent's falsity, but it was just possible he could turn the tide in favour of Miss Crossmichael.

For himself, he stoked his anger over her duplicity. He did not believe the substance of the slander, but he could not overlook the falsifications and misrepresentations that he had encountered from her. He could not decide if he was pleased that she was brought low, or heart sick that she was defamed.

He strode into his house with relief and called for a bowl of water and a clean

towel to bathe his knuckles. The butler hurried off for his valet, and Ingram made his way to his study. Affectionately he nudged the Ruffian, who lay tumbled on the hearthrug, with the toe of his topboot. The hound muttered a greeting, but did not rise from the comfort of his place before the fire.

While Ingram waited for his valet's attentions, he turned over the post on his desk. There was another letter from his daughters. He broke the seal, swearing softly at the pain of his damaged hand. Sabina had written the missive, but there was no doubt that Mel and Penny had had a hand in the content. They again swore their devotion to their beloved schoolmistress. They wanted to know the details of the problem facing her, they desired he solve all her difficulties, they requested that he bring the Ruffian to defend her. They said that two of the pupils had been withdrawn from the school; that someone said Mr. Dent had killed a man; that their portrait was in danger of being unfinished; and that Gavrielle Montlucon had deliberately thrown ink at a girl who had dared to question her mother's betrothal to Mr. Dent.

Unquestionably they needed him; their small world was in disarray.

He picked up another letter from his desk and read the direction, recognizing all too well the hand that had inscribed it. He sat and, after a moment, reluctantly unfolded the crossed sheet of paper. With displeasure, he read the missive from his parents-in-law in Lincolnshire. The scandal had travelled quickly, and was even now bringing his mother-in-law low with her nerves and fears. She demanded that he remove the girls from the den of iniquity in which he had placed them. She had never understood the laxity of care, the lack of understanding which had allowed him to place the girls in a school, especially a school so very close to London, far from all that they knew and from their loving grandparents. The girls must be returned to Stadley Court; the demand came from them both.

He stood suddenly, shaking off the doubts and indecisions. His daughters'

grandparents--particularly their grandmother--were one of the reasons he had brought them near London, to Mansion House School. His mother-in-law was a damnable influence on them, and Miss Portia Crossmichael, for all the faults of her sex, was a damned sight better inspiration for his daughters.

He would visit Lanark, Ingram decided, and then he would go to Hornsey, and see what he could do. But first his valet bustled in, all solicitous attention, bearing a steaming pan of water, several cloths and a soothing preparation of his own devising. He had attended the viscount many times after violent activity.

Ingram submitted to his ministrations, but said, "Hurry up, man. I've things to do."

"It appears that you have done quite enough, my lord," his servant replied.

Ingram could only laugh. "Not as yet, Turley, not as yet."

* * * *

When she was advised two days later, in the middle of her senior geography class that the viscount was installed in her study, Portia was afflicted with a confusion of emotions. She excused herself and hurried from the classroom. Delight, anxiety, and a wish for the right to cast all her burdens on his broad shoulders assailed her as she travelled the corridors. She was brought momentarily to a halt by the strength of the sensations.

She shook her head and continued on, pausing briefly in her bedchamber to straighten her cap and tuck away the wayward strands of sandy hair that had escaped it. She spared herself no more than a glance in the mirror. She did not need her reflection to tell her that if Lord Stadbroke had found her plain previously, worry and weariness had done nothing to improve her looks.

Gathering her courage in hand, she opened the door to her study with a gracious smile pinned to her lips. It went unnoticed. The viscount was staring through the window at the sleeping garden. As ever, his mere presence in the room brought an aura of style to it and an echo of the beau monde in which he spent his days. He turned from the window slowly, and he studied her from distant dark eyes with no vestige of warmth in his expression.

He nodded. "Miss Crossmichael."

"Lord Stadbroke," Portia inclined her head graciously, though she shivered with sudden unease, her smile fading. "Please sit down."

"I prefer to stand."

"Very well." Really Melicent was very like him, The child had copied his chilling stare to a nicety. Portia sat behind her desk, and took up a paper with no more reason than to keep her hands busy.

"You have been keeping secrets, Miss Crossmichael."

"I must contradict you, my lord. I have been minding my own affairs, and conducting my own business, with my brother's help."

"I am told Caldwell Dent is not your brother, but your step-brother."

"I have never made a secret of that fact. Caldwell is, to all practical intents and purposes, my brother, though we do not share blood. Your informant, whoever he is--"

"My informant, ma'am, was Mr. Harold. Mr. Harold Dent, whom I saw here at your school, when I was told that he was the local butcher. I met him again at the Afrique Coffee-House a day or two ago. I take it unkindly that you lied to me, Miss Crossmichael."

Portia viewed him through the fiery mist of a mounting rage. It wanted only this, this attack on her character and judgement, to set a seal on her humiliation and her ruin. "I kept no secret from you, my lord, that it was your business to know. I did not confide in you because I scarcely know you. And I had right on my side. My step-father's charges were ridiculous. Even had I a tendre for any male in the vicinity, had I ever wished to indulge an affaire de coeur, I should not choose to do so in an establishment overrun with thirty young ladies, five mistresses and masters, and a large contingent of household staff. And who, after all, would wish to indulge in a romantic liaison with me?" The words escaped her drenched in bitterness, their single kiss possessing her memory.

His anger seemed suddenly to dissipate, and he smiled at her more warmly. "I expect you might be surprised. There is no one for whom love is an impossibility. that, Portia."

Despite her relief that his anger was gone, she could not permit his familiarity. "I gave you no permission to use my name, my lord. You have done so before, and I have never given you leave."

"I did not ask for leave," he reminded her. "For I know you would not give it. Now tell me, if you will, why Caldwell's father wishes to destroy his own son, and you, so thoroughly. Perhaps I may be of some assistance." His cold reticence had warmed to something approaching kindness.

"There is no mystery about it. It is a simple greed, a vice well known to many. When we were his children--one by blood, one by marriage--we did not feel his benevolence as we deserved; now we are successful adults he feels we owe him for our prosperity.

"His charges of immorality are lies. I will not close my school because there is no impropriety here. In fact, my step-brother is affianced to Mme. Montlucon." To her dismay, Portia felt tears well in her eyes. She stared down at her desk at the chatelaine which lay there, willing the salted drops not to fall. "I was able, with a small legacy which could not be subverted by my stepfather, to buy this establishment. It is my life; even if I was an immoral and dishonest person, I would not jeopardize it."

Despite her best efforts, a tear splashed onto her history notes; she watched with a cold detachment as the ink spread and spoiled the page.

She felt rather than saw him move. She found him beside her, and was drawn up, into his arms. Her cheek pressed--as in her wildest dreams--against a satisfyingly broad and ive shoulder.

Unlike her dreams, she did not take advantage of his comfort. She allowed herself no more tears and only a moment's respite in his embrace. With a startled horror, and a sickening clarity, she realized that she loved him. Not with an inexperienced infatuation or an immature fascination, but with a womanly depth that embraced his daughters, his faults, his past and his future. And there was no complication that she welcomed less in her life at that moment.

With rigid control, she schooled her voice, and after a moment met his dark gaze. "I thank you for your concern, and I regret that my problems have impinged upon your life. I can assure you that your daughters are safe--in every way--here, but that if you feel it necessary to remove them, I will understand."

There was something of both pity and respect in his face. "My girls will stay, Miss Crossmichael. You have been, I think, the object of a contemptible design. I understand Mr. Harold Dent has left London."

His slight smile coaxed an answering glimmer from her, but Portia could find no comfort in his words. If Dent had disappeared it would only be to wreak more havoc. A cold chill crept up her spine. Surely he would not return to The Three Comes, the inn in Hornsey. She should tell Stadbroke of Melicent's incursion into covert observation. She opened her mouth to do so, but was interrupted.

"I have an idea that it would be politic for you, and possibly your step-brother and his betrothed to be seen in London," the viscount said. "You have nothing to hide, therefore you need not hide. I urge you to attend at Lady Dartington's salon this month without fail, and I shall see what I can procure in the nature of invitations for you."

"I cannot!" Portia panicked. "Students have already been withdrawn, Lord

Stadbroke. I confess I cannot face the cuts direct, the sneers..."

"You must. And I can tell you there is a deal of sympathy abroad for you."

"It will not last. I know the ton too well, my lord."

"You said you had had a season. When?"

His directness and her abasement of spirit conspired to reveal her past again. Before she considered concealment, she said, "Eleven years ago I was a poor relation. I experienced all the embarrassment of that position and all the humiliation of possessing no attraction for the opposite sex."

The viscount's face was unreadable. "Did we meet? My wife and I were not often in London then."

She wondered if he was calculating years and dates. There was no point in adding more lies to her sins. "You and Lady Stadbroke were enjoying that season. I was introduced to you both. In fact, I envied you with all my heart. She was so lovely, and you looked so happy."

He seemed to then, but his memories appeared to give him no pleasure. "Appearances can so deceive. I was concerned over leaving Sabina-little more than an infant--in Lincolnshire, and Eunice was furious for she had just been told she was enceinte again." He gestured rather impatiently. "I do not recall our meeting; I'm sorry."

"Oh, enough of that; it is of no consequence," Portia said. "I do not wish you to take the trouble as to secure my re-entry to society, my lord. In fact, I expected your anger, but not your consideration."

"Have I been so very difficult then, Portia?" He seemed still to be recollecting the past.

Yes, she thought, but gave no voice to the word. "Unpredictable and understandably protective of your daughters, I should have rather said, my lord." A knock sounded and she forced herself to walk calmly to the door.

The three Perrington sisters tumbled in as she opened it. She watched them swarm over their parent in delight.

"Mith, Papa will know what to do." Penny assured her from a perch in her father's arms. "Did you bring Ruff, Papa? He would protect Mith Crossmichael."

"She doesn't need protecting from physical danger, silly." Melicent said. "She needs help to convince society of her...her innocence."

"Papa, you must be able to influence people. Whatever is being said about our school, it is not true. You must stop them." Sabina was pretty in her earnestness.

"I have accomplished some things already, my dears." He patted Penelope's back reassuringly, and winced.

Portia acquitted him of consciously drawing attention to his strong hands. Nevertheless his action had that result, and they all stared at his grazed and split knuckles.

"Papa!" The girls exclaimed with one voice.

"My lord?" Portia questioned more slowly.

Stadbroke set the child on her feet and put his hands behind his back with a reflexive, youthful gesture. "I will only say that Mr. Harold Dent is not so keen now to spread his poison, ma'am."

"Good heavens," Portia said. She found herself at a loss to say more and felt an urgent desire to be alone. "I shall order tea to be sent up. You are at liberty to make yourself at home in my study here. Good day." She whisked herself out of the room before he or the girls could say another word.

After a brief word to the porter, she sped up the stairs to the haven of her own chamber completely forgetful of her geography class.

* * * *

Ingram wondered, as he dressed with his valet's assistance for a rout at the home of his friend Lanark, if the ton would attend the event. He hoped so, for the evening had been arranged by them all particularly for the benefit of the

Mansion House School.

Portia Crossmichael would be in attendance; she had assured Lady Dorothea of it. Her step-brother and his intended had also been invited, and everything possible had been done to ensure an influential gathering.

Lady Dorothea had taken up his idea of Miss Crossmichael's entry into society eagerly, so certain was she that an injustice was being done. When he had revealed Portia's family history, the Lanarks had been confident of success knowing, as he did, that noble connections counted for more than virtue with the beau monde. They were as determined as he to right the incipient wrong, and their good opinion, they had assured him, would be broadcast to all their acquaintance.

Stadbroke could only be glad of it. Though he could not highly esteem her--for had she not deceived him once more?--he did believe that Portia deserved nothing of the calumny and ignominy of her stepfather's insinuations. And Caldwell Dent was too talented an artist to allow petty greed to tarnish his chances. Ingram told himself that it was common justice that excited his concern, and that he would have been as busy about helping anyone of his acquaintance so persecuted. But he could not be free of a niggling apprehension that there was more to his interference in Miss Crossmichael's affairs.

He thanked and dismissed his valet after that worthy spread his evening cloak over his shoulders and handed him his chapeau-bras. Clattering down the stairs, he spared a nod for his footman, waved aside his butler and let himself out into the street.

Deep in thought, he set out to walk to Lanark's townhouse. He had been surprised to learn of Portia's background, though she had told him before of her

connection with Auchterader. As he recalled, the earl was stiff-necked, opinionated and self-righteous, hardly an ideal relation. It bothered him that he could not meeting Portia during her self-described disastrous season. But he certainly had not had the energy to take note of every uncertain female during that season; his marriage had been in disarray and his attention scattered. He sighed, ing it, for that had been only the beginning of his marital challenges.

The short stroll to Brook Street was not long enough to examine all the failings of his life with his late wife, so Ingram cast off his unaccustomed introspection. The autumn air, though too much touched by the smoke of thousands of coal fires, was refreshing. Taking a deep breath, he focussed on the trials of the moment. He would be better occupied, he decided, in devising a strategy for the evening ahead than dwelling on the past. He neared the Lanarks' home with a plan taking shape.

A throng of carriages told of a good attendance in answer to the invitations sent out for the rout. Ingram greeted various of his acquaintances as he made his way with the aristocratic crowd to his friends' entry hall and finally to their drawing room. He spied the Mottinghams, the Dartingtons, and Lady Jersey as he traversed the corridors. It appeared that the curious, the skeptics and the sympathetic ers of Mansion House, were all present.

Lord Francis and Lady Dora were greeting their guests at the salon's open door and their meaningful looks advised him the evening looked to be a success. "We have a good beginning to our campaign," Lanark said to him in an undertone. "And Lady Dartington is emphasizing her soiree next week, ensuring that everyone knows Miss Crossmichael will attend."

"Miss Crossmichael will be indebted to you for your efforts," Ingram said, adding his own thanks. After bowing over his hostess' hand, he entered the brightly candle-lit chamber and prepared to act as Miss Crossmichael's

champion. As he stepped across the threshold, Portia drew his eye. She was in the company of two or three society matrons and she seemed relaxed and at ease.

A closer look showed a tension in her slender body, and slight shadows under her wide eyes. The pains she had obviously taken with her appearance had yielded a good effect, he thought critically. She looked handsome and arresting in a gown of deep rich green, with a twist of green silk containing her abundant hair and a pearl necklace about her long, graceful neck. Her slender height made her impossible to ignore, and the intelligence that gleamed through her hard-won composure touched his heart.

He hardened that annoying organ. His first instinct had been to cross the chamber directly to her side. He was chagrined, however, to discover that she did not require his immediate assistance, but appeared to be charming and positively influencing the company without his . So instead he wandering from group to group, testing the temper of the glittering gathering, putting in a word here and an idea there. He diverted murmurs of displeasure with good humour and circumvented suggestions of gossip with politely worded facts. He informed everyone with whom he spoke that he had three daughters in attendance at the Mansion House Establishment and that he had no doubts of the integrity of the place. For good measure, he talked about the portrait that Dent was undertaking for him, and his iration for the artist's work.

At last he saw that his friend Lanark had left his post at the door and stood with Caldwell Dent in a nearby alcove. He threaded his way through the crowd to them and greeted both men with casual warmth.

"I am glad to see you here," he said to Dent. "And I am indebted to you," he reaffirmed his thanks to Lanark, "for taking up my suggestion so thoroughly."

"We cannot like injustice. And Dorothea has a strong distaste for gossip. Besides which, as you know, she wishes our daughters to have the excellent education that Miss Crossmichael offers, so our motives are not without self-interest." Their host invited their smiles and was the recipient of them.

"Is Madame with you?" Ingram asked Dent, glancing about the impressive throng flowing about the silk-hung chamber.

"She is. Her daughter was indisposed and she feared she might have to forego her attendance but Gavrielle was quite as insistent as anyone that her mother attend. I am thankful for it. Heloise's presence is a great to us both."

"Well, I would have understood her decision had she remained with her daughter. After all, I made a similar one when my girls were ill." He grinned at his companions and said with a dis-ingenuous air, "I wonder what society would think of my sojourn at Mansion House? Perhaps I should put my stay into the public realm and let them make of it what they would."

He watched for Lanark's quirked brow and was not disappointed. Dent looked appalled and then recognized the jest.

"That indeed would be helpful," Lord Francis said with his dry humour. "Confuse the issue and supply the detractors with more ammunition."

"They might see the nonsensical nature of their suspicions." Ingram echoed the statement that Portia had made to him days earlier. "As if any sane person would conduct an amour in a residence full of schoolgirls, well or unwell. What can they be thinking?" Surveying the company as they talked, he watched carefully

for signs of slights or insults. He was glad to see that Heloise Montlucon was now at Portia's side. They were conversing with an air of ease, and were shortly accosted by a couple Ingram vaguely recognized but could not name.

Caldwell Dent, watching his betrothed, roused to respond to Ingram's words. "They are not thinking, and it galls me to see Portia treated so badly. She has been the mainstay of my life, and I could never think of her in the way that is imputed."

Stadbroke caught himself, just before he said, "I could." He fell silent, startled by his own thoughts. He could, he realized. He could imagine Portia, warm with desire, pliant with longing, in his arms. He could envision that soft mane of hair in his hands, against his skin, and that wide, mobile mouth hot on his.

He cleared his throat and thrust away his thoughts. "Of course not. Anyone can see that your relationship is familial; there is no consciousness in your interaction." He was very much afraid that there would be such awareness in his own future dealings with Portia...Miss Crossmichael.

It was sometime later that he forced himself to cross the room to her side when she stood momentarily alone. Dent had recovered his fiancée and the company was chattering happily, all sense of discord and disapprobation eliminated.

Discomfited by his own earlier wayward thoughts, he was conscious of awkwardness as he greeted Miss Crossmichael. "I am happy to see you here. Has the opportunity to mingle with the ton helped, do you think?" He cursed his own stilted formality.

She regarded him with those clear grey eyes that had first intrigued him. He had the notion that she could see his discomfiture, and know his salacious thoughts. But she said merely, "It may have. I am very grateful that you prevailed upon Lord Francis and Lady Dora to invite my step-brother and Heloise as well as me. I rely on them so much." Her smile was self-deprecating.

"I think you have had to rely too much upon yourself. You have many friends here, not least our hosts."

"Lady Dora is a delightful person; I ire her greatly. I understand she has experienced tragedy and she shows great strength of character." Portia's praise of her hostess was transparently genuine.

Stadbroke brushed aside a desire to have her think so highly of him. Instead he voiced his own accolade. "To win through privation and tribulation to success and satisfaction requires an equal or superior strength of will. I think you have won over all your detractors." He forgot his discomposure in sincerity.

"I think there are many of those who are not present here tonight. But we have made some progress I believe, and I cannot thank you enough--"

He brushed aside her gratitude. "Do not thank me." "How are my girls this week?"

"Happy and working hard. And making elaborate plans to scotch all gossip and prevent further withdrawals. They are wonderful children." Portia's eyes softened at the thought of the Perrington sisters' anxiety on her behalf, and their pursuit of justice.

"They are indeed. I had come to take them for granted, you know. Their decision to attend at your school has brought home to me how much I rely upon their presence in my life--how much I have missed them these past two years." He was silent, thinking about the girls' visit to the Hill Street house, how their laughter and their chatter had enlivened it, how their companionship had made his social activities seem empty and profitless. He cleared his throat and met her questioning regard. "You should know that my late wife's parents are themselves importuning me to remove the girls from your... 'Decadent sphere', I believe they phrased it."

He watched, fascinated, as a blush of colour stained her cheeks and a spark of anger lit in her pellucid eyes. "I have never in my life had opportunity for decadence. You may assure them of that. I should not like ever to have occasion to experience it!"

"Oh, yes, you would," he said unforgivably. He would have withdrawn the words if he could, when a wash of revealing colour flooded her cheeks. But he found himself compounding his transgression. "I mean you would enjoy dissipation and self-indulgence as much as the next person...at least the sensual."

Her grey gaze grew positively wintry. "You, my lord, can have no knowledge of what I might or might not enjoy." She turned away a little. "And to speak so when I am trying to overcome just such salacious rumours borders on the monumentally insensitive."

"You are undoubtedly correct. But you have no high opinion of my sensitivity anyway," Ingram said. He ed her warm and responsive to his kiss; it had revealed a well-hidden, ionate nature. "And I have a little knowledge of what you enjoy," he added just loud enough for her alone to hear.

She turned away, indignation in her every movement, to greet a lady and gentleman whom Lord Francis was bringing to her notice.

Ingram knew she had heard him. A stiffening of her slender back told him so. It was despicable of him to tease her, he was well aware of it. He laughed quietly, aware of a new challenge in his life.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"My father seems to have disappeared. From all I can determine he abandoned the Afrique after his confrontation with Lord Stadbroke. And he has not visited The Three Comes since the newspaper ment appeared." Caldwell Dent, teacup in hand, wandered to the terrace doors of Portia's study.

"It seems a good omen," Heloise said, reaching for another biscuit from the porcelain plate on the tea tray.

"I hope so," Portia agreed. She leaned back in her desk chair with a long sigh.

The threesome had a brief hour's respite from teaching and business and had gathered, with unspoken accord, in Portia's study to take tea. The young ladies, well bundled against the bright and sunny early March day, were taking a turn in the daffodil-strewn gardens beyond the terrace. The elder girls were as giddy as the youngest by the look of the foolish frolics taking place.

"He must have decided he could not damage you further," Heloise said, watching her daughter skip with her friends on the lawn. "He has done his worst, and he has failed. You have made your position clear: there is no more money to be had, and your reputation cannot be destroyed. The beau monde is having its doubts erased by your confidence and sincerity and the loyalty of your elevated friends. Eh voila, he leaves... Abandons his schemes and returns to whence he came."

"I do hope so," Portia repeated. She sipped her tea abstractedly. "I am growing

weary of this double life I am leading. I never thought to re society, especially at such an advanced age."

"Your friends have been so kind to include us in their invitations," Heloise said. "At Lady Dartington's last salon, there was no consciousness at all, and Caldwell and I were fêted!"

"And Lord Dartington commissioned a portrait," Caldwell added.

"I think it was not kindness led him to that," Portia said. "They have been talking of it for some time. Lady Mottingham's delight with their portrait has influenced many. To say nothing of Lady Jersey's ecstasies as her sittings proceed."

"And Lord Stadbroke's recommendations. The Perrington girls were delighted when their sittings recommenced," Heloise said. "Portia, have you been avoiding the viscount again? He was looking rather like his own hound when he was here the other day."

Portia felt a warm tide of colour rise. "I have not avoided him. I cannot," she said with dignity. "He is at every rout, salon, card party and musicale that I attend. I have been busy when he comes here to the school, and he has not requested to see me."

"He should not have to, Port," Caldwell reminded her. "We owe him everything. It was due to his intervention that the scandal created by my father has resolved itself so well. You need to indicate our gratitude to Stadbroke at every opportunity--tea in your study after portrait sittings, visits with the girls--you even should entertain the blasted dog."

Portia peered at her step-brother wondering if he was in jest, or in earnest. It was bad enough that Lord Stadbroke's image had taken permanent residence in her mind, and that his handsome person walked ghost-like with her during her demanding days. If she had as well to play hostess to him at home, in addition to encountering him at social gatherings, all her fragile comfort would once more be gone.

Even now, after three weeks, she was not confident that Dent had been vanquished. She ed Caldwell's father all too well from her childhood; he had never let a grudge be forgotten and had never abandoned an undertaking even if it appeared lost.

She was happy, though, that her step-brother and his betrothed took such a positive view of recent events. They looked well, more rested, more happy than they had a month previously. She of them all was the least convinced of Dent's defeat. She hoped against hope that they had the right of it. Certainly the tide of public opinion had been turned in their favour; there had been no more pupil withdrawals, and one young lady had been returned to her studies.

Caldwell replaced his cup on the tea tray, and made for the door. "Back to my easel," he said with a jaunty smile. "With so many commissions, we shall be able to afford a wedding before you ladies can prepare for it."

Heloise only laughed. "Then go and labour." She sped him on his way with a delicately blown kiss.

Then she turned to Portia. "You look tired," she said. "You work too hard, and this social campaign adds much to your travail. And you worry... Are you

sleeping well enough?"

Portia shivered. How could she answer? Lord Stadbroke's suggestive words to her at their encounter at Lord Lanark's home had caused her to lose considerable sleep. She ed in its every detail their embrace, and their kiss, in his conservatory. His words indicated that he recalled it also. The thought that he would trifle further with her emotions was unbearable.

Not that he had indicated a desire to do so. He was politely pleasant during their encounters, kind and sympathetic. He took pains to introduce her to every person who might conceivably aid her struggle against the slander and, without making their connection notorious, helped her in every possible way. He had not again said a word to make her uncomfortable.

She owed him too much. When she added her love for him to her debt, the burden staggered her.

Heloise was still waiting for an answer.

Portia summoned a smile. "I wonder about Stadbroke's motives," she managed to say in an offhand manner.

"What should be his motifs beyond a good education for his children? You fear his convoitise--his lust?"

Portia felt the hot flush of colour rise again to her cheeks. "I--no--of course not."

"You might well," Heloise said, neatly stacking the dishes on the tea tray. "I see him watch you sometimes, when you do not. When you wear a new gown, or dress your hair in that new style. I think he did not know that you could appear to such advantage; he finds you tres jolie."

"Don't be silly," Portia said sharply. She rustled through the papers on her desk impatiently. Finding her chatelaine among them, she tied its ribbon to the sash of her work-a-day dimity gown.

"It is not idiot. He told me--I do not know why--that he was used only to look for beauty in a woman, but that now he thinks intelligence, kindness, and confidence are more important attributes. And that those characteristics are what he would wish for his daughters."

"He has been your confidant, indeed," Portia said, unable to keep a waspish note from her words.

"We have spoken often at all these jollities we attend. He needs, I think, to talk to someone he trusts but someone he does not know well. A disinterested stander-by, if you will."

"By-stander," Portia corrected absently.

Heloise waved a hand insouciantly. "He says that he can no longer afford to hold a poor opinion of women, and he finds that he has been wrong all these years. There are plentiful good women and intelligent women; he had only to have his

eyes opened to them."

"I hope he also understands that he can still have a part in shaping his daughters' characters, that they were not formed in some mysterious female mould." Against her will, Portia was drawn into the discussion.

"He says that you have given him back his joy in his children. And that he will always thank you for that."

Portia rose, her colour still high she knew. She had, for her peace of mind, to bring this conversation to a close. "Then why does he not say any of these things to me?"

"Perhaps he is afraid that you will bite his head off," Heloise said with a brisk satisfaction.

* * * *

Another chill March day had faded to a cold night. Portia worked in her study after supper, glad to be free of agonizing worry, welcoming the boredom of s, lists and grades. She noted the sound of a ragged wind without, beyond the warmly curtained windows, and sipped her hot tea with appreciation.

An urgent scratching at the door made her replace her teacup in its finely painted saucer. A glance at the watch on her chatelaine told her the students should be preparing to retire; noise from the parlour had ebbed half of an hour before. She

called a rather impatient "Come".

Melicent and Sabina Perrington tumbled into the room, tripping over each other in their haste. They were dressed in their percale wrappers, though Sabina had as well a mohair shawl drawn over her shoulders, and warm slippers protected their feet. With their dark hair in plaits, they looked very alike. Their faces--Sabina's bearing dawning maturity and beauty, and Melicent's yet unmarked by adolescence--were full of concern.

"We cannot find Penny, Miss Crossmichael," Melicent cried, her voice shrill with tension.

Sabina gulped and said, "I thought I did not see her at supper, ma'am, and I wanted to say good-night to her. I went to the junior dormitory, and she was not there."

The older girl was holding back tears with a great effort. "I spoke with Matron who had just realized Penny's absence."

"Where could she go, Miss Crossmichael? I saw her this afternoon. She and her friends were making believe they were ponies, when we were outside, Miss. They ran off beyond the glass house. That is the last I saw of her." Melicent's lips trembled.

Portia clamped down on her own sudden panic. She rose and, with the abrupt movement, her chatelaine clattered against her desk. "I think she must be about some mischief with her friends, my dears. Just you wait here, while I speak to Matron and take a quick look about for them."

She hurried out of the room, pressing a shaking hand to her mouth. Her first thought leapt to Harold Dent, but surely, surely that was to overreact. Penny was a mischievous child with a dedicated group of followers. They would be busy with some adventure in the attics or even the cellars. Before requiring assistance from her staff, she inspected the parlour, the dining room, and the entry hall. They were empty as befitted the late hour.

Without revisiting the sisters in her study, Portia found Matron, and Euston the porter, knocked on Miss Gosberton's door, and fetched Caldwell from his studio. Separately, and together, they searched the house with care and thoroughness, most particularly the attics, the kitchen and the cellar which abounded with useful hiding places. They met again, well within the hour, in the entry hall. Heads were shaken in response to her quick questions, no clues had been found.

Portia, dismayed by their lack of success, prepared to return to Sabina and Melicent. Caldwell accompanied her; his pleasant face wore a grave expression.

Sabina collapsed into tears at the sight of their concerned faces. "You've been an age," Melicent burst out.

"We have searched the house, and she is not here," Portia revealed the bad news as gently as she could. She gave them the courtesy of absolute honesty. "Every other girl is ed for. The dormitories will be watched for her return. Cook and the maids have been roused in case she comes to the kitchen door. Even the root store has been searched.

"Calm yourselves, my dears. Come sit." Portia comforted each sister with a warm embrace. "Fresh tea is being prepared. Mr. Dent is going to initiate a

search of the grounds; he will rouse the grooms and the gardeners. Euston is going to Madame's home to ask for her assistance." She ignored the clutch of fear at her own heart in order to calm the girls. "Tell me again when last you saw Penny?" she asked.

"She was with her friends this afternoon. Miss Gosberton had taken them outside," Sabina was twisting a handkerchief desperately in her small hands. "We--my friends and I--were watching them for a little, and saw them run behind the glasshouse. Penny was there; I saw her blue cloak, I could not mistake it."

"Gavrielle spoke with her at nuncheon. I know because Gavvy said Penny was still annoyed with me for taking her favourite pencil. Oh, Miss, I didn't, and now she's gone," Melicent wailed.

Heloise slipped quietly into the room. "No news?" she queried, removing her cloak and greeting each girl with a pat on the cheek and a warm glance.

Portia shook her head, glad to have her friend's stalwart company.

"Ah well, she is no doubt in the hawthorn wood, cold and hungry. The men will bring her home, and we shall scold her--after feeding her well, and warming her with hugs and kisses."

The Perrington girls seized eagerly on her words. "Surely, yes, she loves the wood," Sabina said.

"Can you think of anywhere else she might have gone?" Portia asked. Had it been Melicent, she would have checked every stable within the vicinity. Penelope however, other than her abortive trip to London had been a contented child, never wandering far from her friends.

Both girls shook their heads. "Is Gavrielle here, Madame?" Melicent asked.

"She is, my dear. She will be here shortly with some cakes that Cook has found for us."

Gavrielle came, and the cakes and tea, but they were ignored. Heloise's daughter ed the two sisters sitting on the sopha near the fire, and their linked hands showed small white knuckles. They spoke in whispers, and nothing Portia or Heloise could offer comforted them.

Two hours later Caldwell returned and one look at his face told them the news was not good.

A slight shake of his head struck Portia to her heart. She felt a cold anxiety freeze her blood and slow her brain. Never had such a thing happened before. That it should happen to one of the students she most dearly loved was a nightmare.

She tried to speak and failed. On her next try, she managed to summon a calm she was far from feeling, "I think the men are going to have to look a little further afield, my dears. And I think you should try to sleep, so that you will be fresh when Penny comes home." She rose, forcing her fear-stiff limbs to natural movement. "Come now, Madame will take you up to my bedchamber, you may

be together there, just as when you were ill."

"But Penny was with us then," Sabina wailed. She dissolved into tears and leaned into the embrace Madame offered.

"And she will be again soon. Gavrielle will go with you." Portia found her confidence strained by the assurances she had to give. "I am going to send for your papa, so that he can know what is happening. So soon as he arrives I shall bring him to you. And he may sleep in my dressing room, close by so that you need have no worries."

She ushered the girls with Heloise and Gavrielle from the room, and alerted a maid to attend on their wants. Then she turned back to her study and her stepbrother.

"I shall write a note to Stadbroke; please have a groom mounted immediately, Cal, so that he can carry it to London."

He left the room and she heard him in quick conversation with Euston. After a moment only, he returned.

"Did you see nothing at all in the grounds?" she asked as she dipped her quill and began to write.

"Nothing. We shouted ourselves hoarse, and heard nothing." Dent absently ate a cake from the abandoned tea tray. "We took torches and found nothing but a

great many tracks from the girls' earlier chases and capers. There are broken twigs and that early patch of daffodils had been disturbed, but nothing untoward, not a single clue. It's dashed cold out, Port."

"Don't remind me," she snapped. "Oh I am sorry, but I fear the worst, Cal. Surely she will not have gone as far as the Coldfall Wood. But what if she has, or if she has gone as far as Muswell Hill? She might have been taken by gypsies or, or, procurers." She pulled on the quill in her hand and it snapped. Flinging it on the floor she took up another and dipped it in the ink. A large blot appeared on her paper as she began to write and she choked on a sob.

"You must control your imagination, Port!" Her step-brother poured out a cup of lukewarm tea which he gulped down. "You will be no use to anyone if you continue in such a vein. This is not like you. I know you love these girls, but try for composure."

Portia took herself in hand, and inhaled sharply. Caldwell was right, such panic was unlike her and unworthy of her. To be of real use to Penelope, she had to control her fears and use all the resources available to her. She took a new piece of paper, wrote her note, sanded, folded, and sealed it, and gave it to Caldwell.

He returned to the entry hall and she could hear him instructing the groom who had appeared to make all haste to Hill Street. She felt very cold. She could not imagine what had happened to Penelope, but she feared the worst. What would Ingram do if the child was irrevocably lost? It would break his heart as well as hers. She had no doubt that Penny's sisters would be equally shattered. It did not bear thinking of.

She looked up at Caldwell's return. He had donned his greatcoat again, and held his low-crowned beaver in tightly clenched fingers.

It was he who broached the unthinkable. "Port, what if it is my father?"

She shook her capped head. "I must it he was my first thought, but...surely not. What can he have to do with this?"

"If he is truly desperate... And if he is angry enough... You said Lord Stadbroke had confronted him at the Afrique; well, we know Stadbroke struck him. If he wanted to retaliate for that insult, how better than to kidnap one of the viscount's daughters? Even hold her to ransom?" Caldwell was choking out the words, revulsion over his father's wickedness obvious.

"Good God, I cannot imagine it. Revenge? He is not so vile, is he? So lost to all decency as to harm a child? No, surely she has gone to walk to London again, and lost her way." Portia clutched her chatelaine as though it was some charm against harm.

"I hope you are right, but I think not. I am going out again." He slapped on his hat and drew on the gloves he carried. "We'll go east this time toward the villas-Comton Grange--though we have no reason to suspect she went that way. If that is unsuccessful we shall ride out. Thank God for those horses you hired..."

"Let us hope that God takes a hand in this somewhere." Portia bit her lip. "It will take two, even three hours for Stadbroke to reach us. It is just after eleven of the clock. That is ample time to find her surely. I cannot wish to greet him emptyhanded. Do come back, Cal, so soon as you have any news."

"I'll be back," he assured her grimly.

* * * *

The message found Ingram as he returned to his Hill Street house from a ball. He had the intention of changing his dancing slippers for a pair of boots and donning a greatcoat over his evening coat for a visit to Cribb's Parlour. He could be sure of some sporting conversation there, a fitting end to busy, but somehow meaningless, day.

A groom, chilled and be-grimed, was waiting in the entry as his butler opened the door for Ingram. "This fellow is carrying a letter he will not relinquish but to you, my lord," his servant announced. "A message from Mansion House Establishment."

Ingram snatched at the paper, with a quick look at the groom's tired face. Fear clutched his stomach. He read Portia's note, then reread it, and felt all colour drain from his face. Penny...his little one...gone.

"Order my grey saddled. And I want every able bodied man in the household to follow me to Mansion House. Miss Penelope is missing, I may need their help to search. John Coachman can bring the phaeton, Turley can drive with him and they must bring the Ruffian. Mount the grooms and footmen--hire horses if necessary. You stay here in London, I will need the house ready for my return." He took the stairs two at a time.

It was only moments before Ingram was mounted and heading out of London. For the agonizing hour as he rode north to Hornsey and the school, he was

conscious only of anger and prayers circling in his head. He guided his favourite horse with automatic care, intent upon obtaining the maximum in speed from the beast while protecting its endurance.

He burst into the entry hall of the Mansion House School just as the long case clock on the landing tolled one. The porter pointed wordlessly to the study and Ingram flung through the door without knocking. He knew he must be wild-eyed and dishevelled, and he cared nothing for it. If he frightened Portia Crossmichael and Heloise Montlucon as much as he was frightened, it was all one to him.

"Have you found her?" he said between clenched teeth, without other greeting.

"No," Portia replied, as baldly.

He noted her white and haggard face without emotion. "Dear God!" he said and dropped into a nearby chair to cover his eyes with one shaking hand. "My little Penny... Where are Mel and Sabina?"

"In my chamber. I promised that you would go up as soon..."

"You promised? What good are your promises?" Ingram's anger spilled over, overriding his fear, and he did not temper his words. He leapt again to his feet, tension in his every muscle. "You promised you would keep them safe. You said they would come to no harm through you. And now my youngest daughter, my little jewel, is gone."

He stalked across the Turkey carpet to thrust his face close to hers. "Where? Where have you searched? And where are her clothes? My men are bringing Ruff. He will pick up her scent; there is nothing...no one...he cannot track."

Portia looked almost afraid of him, and Madame was definitely shrinking away.

Caldwell Dent hurried in, his greatcoat damp and his face ruddy from the chill night air.

Ingram did not move.

"You are frightening the ladies, Stadbroke."

Dent caught Ingram's attention by his very quietude. He spun on his heels to stare inimically at Portia's step-brother. "You tell me then," he sneered.

"She is not to be found in the immediate vicinity. We are about to extend our search to the Coldfall Wood, and south toward the metropolis. And to the river." He straightened his shoulders, and gave his step-sister an onishing look. "Portia will not credit it, but I think my father--" He spat out the words. "--might be involved in Penelope's disappearance. Before he went to London, he was frequenting The Three Comes. Melicent saw him, and--"

Goaded by the revelation of more occurrences of which he had not been advised, Ingram turned on Portia again. "Dent was in the neighbourhood and you did not tell me?"

He watched her with reluctant iration as she conquered her fear of his anger and faced him with dignity.

"I think Cal is wrong," she said.

"What?" Ingram lost his composure utterly. He roared, "Why should he be wrong and you right? Damned women. Manipulation, prevarication and lies. That is all you deal in."

He had apparently ignited Portia's temper at last. "I have not lied to you!"

Ingram tried to lower his voice, conscious of his daughters above-stairs and the other girls in the building. "You have been damned economical with the truth then, ma'am. You did not tell me that Harold Dent had stayed in the neighbourhood. Or that Melicent had any knowledge of him."

"I tried! I was on the point of telling you some time ago, but you were off on some tangent of your own. And it did not seem important--"

"Of course, nothing is important to your sex but clothes, parties and entrapping men...stupid females!" Ingram knew he was growing irrational, saying things he no longer believed true, but he was unable to stop himself.

"Enough! Enough of this childish brangling," Caldwell's sharp tone put a stop to the exchange of insults. "We could all apportion blame, I think, in this affair.

What is important is that we get Penelope back safely. Stadbroke, I'll await you outside."

"If you will follow me, my lord, I will take you to your daughters." Portia was coldly polite.

She was cold, and Ingram felt frozen as he followed her up the stairs. He had wondered from time to time over the past weeks, if his desire for her had turned to something else, something akin to love. Now he knew that it had not been so. Women were all alike and never, never would he trust one again, be she ever so appealing.

He said over his shoulder to Caldwell, "Two of my grooms, my footmen, my coachman and my valet and my hound should be arriving shortly. You will direct the men how best to help the search. I will take the hound myself."

He addressed Portia's straight back as she led him down the familiar corridor to her chamber. "Miss Crossmichael, you should hope that we find Penelope well and soon. If we do not, I will ensure that you no longer have a school and that you will never operate another in this country, or any other."

Portia flung open her bed-chamber door and defied his threats. "Thank you, my lord, for your intimidation. It displays your true character. I will fetch some of Penelope's garments for your hound and return to the corridor here. When you wish to begin your search I will conduct you to Caldwell. You will be provided with every assistance."

Ingram scarcely heard her; he hardly ed the presence of Gavrielle

Montlucon in the chamber. His attention was all for his remaining two daughters. They flung themselves off Portia's bed and hurled themselves upon their father.

Ingram held his older daughters in his arms with desperate love and fierce protection, his mind churning with anger and self-reproach. Whatever had happened to Penny, he would find her. Whoever was responsible would suffer. And after they all were together again, they would never be far from him.

Ultimately, all that had happened had been his fault, he would have to it it. Had he not wished for excitement, pleasure, and gratification of his baser desires, they should all have remained in Lincolnshire. His girls would be safe, and he would never have met Portia Crossmichael.

Damn her! She had been so clear-eyed, so honest, so good and so true, that he had trusted her. He had never trusted another woman as he had her. And she had proved herself no better than the rest. No better than his mother with her manipulation, his wife with her unreasonable demands or his mother-in-law with her interference.

He pushed the thoughts, the recriminations aside. Penny must be his prime concern, her safety his priority.

He soothed his daughters, forbade their leaving the house, refused their help. "You can best assist by remaining safely indoors. Mel, I mean it. Ruff is coming, you know he can track anything or anyone. He'll find Penny."

"Oh, Papa, he will. He has never failed." Melicent was calmer, confident of the hound's abilities. Sabina was weeping softly.

"Dry your eyes, Sabby. We will find her. And we'll not be separated again, I promise you that." He was rewarded for his words by his eldest daughter's watery smile and the beginning of her return to composure. "I must go. I won't return without your sister." He thought for a moment, then added, "Do as Miss Crossmichael bids you." With a last kiss, he left them.

Portia was waiting in the corridor as she had promised. She was carrying a neat pile of muslin and merino that cut him to the heart. Her inimical stare stiffened his resolve however.

They did not speak as she led him to an open side door of the ground level of the house. She handed him the pile of Penny's clothing and she left him there without a word.

He dismissed her from his mind, and gained the gravelled drive. There he saw that his men had arrived and that the Ruffian was straining at his leash. Caldwell Dent and his searchers, all carrying lanterns and restless in their urgency, milled about the drive.

The night was dark, without a moon, but Ingram thought the cold had alleviated a little since he had entered the house. A slight breeze stirred the horses' tails as Dent informed him of the instructions he had given the men. Dent himself would accompany Ingram and the hound.

They all streamed off, and Ingram gave one last look over his shoulder at the house. He could not tell which window let on his daughters' chamber but at the front door he could see outlined Portia's slender figure. He steeled his heart and shuttered his mind against his own burden of guilt. This was all her fault.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Dawn was breaking on a damp March morning when Ingram called the four searchers with him to a halt. His hound, after examining Penny's clothes thoroughly, had led them unerringly west to the beech wood at the base of Muswell Hill. There they had come to a sluggish stream. They had wasted an hour at the water's edge before Ruff had picked up the scent on the other side and led them still farther, half way to Coldfall Wood. He had hesitated again just moments previously and now Caldwell, his own coachman, and two local men stood around him, cold, hungry, damp and uncertain.

Through the quiet countryside, sounds reverberated in the still air: a rooster's crow, the cautious lowing of a cow, and the steady gallop of a horse.

The sound of hooves drew near and Ingram's hopes lifted. Someone in haste; someone with good news? A roan mare broke into their small clearing; Portia Crossmichael was riding it. The cold dawn air had pinched colour into her pale, weary face, and Ingram bit back a concern for her, recalling his anger. "Have you information?" he called with renewed agitation. "Have the others found anything?"

The little colour she had gained from the ride drained away. "No, I have not."

Caldwell Dent hurried to his step-sister's side and helped her to dismount.

Ingram knew he was behaving badly, but his anger prevented him from assisting

her.

"You have tracked us as efficiently as the Ruffian has tracked Penelope," Dent said with a weak attempt at levity.

"But you have no sign yet?" Portia said.

Ingram turned away from the painful urgency of her questioning. He might be deluded into thinking she really cared if he looked at her drawn, anxious face.

"The hound will find her," Dent said. "Stadbroke has assured us of it repeatedly, and I believe him now after seeing Ruff work."

"I have brought a petticoat of Penelope's. I thought the Ruffian's senses might need refreshing." Portia searched in a sack tied to her saddle and came out with a ruffled muslin garment.

Ingram edged near her. "I should have thought of that," he itted, accepting the trifle from her.

"You need not thank me," she mocked him, her distress transforming to antagonism. She turned away to untie the sack. "I brought refreshment as well."

The men crowded around her as she opened the sack she lifted from the saddle. She ed doorsteps of bread spread with dripping and stone bottles of ale

among them. The Ruffian wolfed down the offering of beef scraps Portia held out to him and slaked his thirst at a pellucid pond on the other side of the clearing.

Ingram accepted his share of the victuals, but did not thank her. He chewed and swallowed though he had no appetite; he drank without thirst. "How did you find us?" he asked at last.

"You set off to the west. I've a tongue in my head; and everyone in the vicinity knows the reason for your search," she said shortly.

"How are Sabina and Melicent?"

"Well enough; confident that you will succeed in returning their sister to them. The household is engaged in its daily routine as the best defence against folly and imagination." Her antipathy seemed to drain away, leaving her sombre and downcast.

Ingram could give her no more of his attention without relinquishing his bitterness. He whistled to the dog and offered the petticoat. After a thorough examination, Ruff put his nose to the ground and patrolled the clearing.

Ingram left Portia's side without apology or thanks or farewell. He mounted, all the while watching the hound criss-cross the area.

Caldwell stepped back to speak with her. "You look so tired, Port. You should

not have come out."

"I had to. I cannot turn my hand to anything, Cal. I had a need for activity." Portia watched Stadbroke with a revealing intensity.

"I understand," he said. "Will you be well enough to return home? Will you mount now? Let me leave you a groom. "

"No!" she said fervently. "No, you must keep every man you have to search. There is a stump from which I can mount. I will be fine; the exercise, the fresh air will do me good. I did not sleep. Well, how could I?"

With a sudden, sure bark the Ruffian was off, and Caldwell mounted in a rush as the men streamed after the dog, Stadbroke at the head of the small group.

Portia was left, leaning against her mare's withers, wishing someone had looked back. Stadbroke was so angry, so unforgiving, transformed from the merry, carefree gentleman she first had met. But she could understand and forgive it. Her anguish must nearly match his own.

Loving, merry little Penelope gone... Lost... Taken.

She still could scarcely encom the fact. She did not think she would feel more distress had the child actually been her own flesh and blood.

Her usefulness was done now. The refreshments had given her opportunity to be of use, to contribute something substantial to the search. And she had wanted to see Ingram. Their encounter the previous evening had been terrible. She had expected anxiety, fear and distraction from him, not threats, accusations and blame. She had been prepared to soothe, encourage and comfort him, but she had had no response to his harsh indictment of the female sex. What kind of women had he known?

She had thought, in the dark watches of the night, that her love for Ingram Perrington-- submerged by injustice and prejudice--had died. Yet today she had hoped against hope he would have a kind word for her. That had been a foolish wish, she knew it now. His dislike of her was confirmed anew, immutable, intractable.

Shaking her head at her own thoughts, she led the mare to a nearby stump and mounted. She had to return to the school, and tell the Perrington girls that there was no news, no sighting, no clue even as to the whereabouts of their little sister.

* * * *

A wretched day ed slowly at Mansion House following Portia's return.

She did her best, talking to Sabina and Melicent, to be positive and cheerful. "The Ruffian is very much in control of the search. The petticoat you found for me, Melicent, was just the ticket. When his senses were refreshed, Ruff was away like the wind, with the searchers after him."

"And Papa?" Sabina said, sitting in the middle of Portia's bed could not disguise

the quaver in her voice.

"Your father has every confidence of finding Penelope very soon." If he had spoken to her about the matter, Portia was certain Stadbroke would have expressed that opinion. "You have no reason for hopelessness. Indeed, if you will come with me and re your classes, it will be much the best for everyone."

Both girls made protesting noises, Sabina from under the coverlet she had dragged over her head, and Melicent from her position at the window where she had pressed her nose to the glass.

"Truly, I need your help in this. Everyone--all the students, all your friends, all the teachers--are upset. If you will but come down, talk to them, the time will more quickly for you, and they will feel more at ease, knowing that you do not despair." Portia hoped the girls would listen to her. Their cooperation would ease the dismal atmosphere that suffocated the school, and participation with their friends could only benefit their mood.

In the end, Sabina and Melicent agreed to return to their classes, and Portia was left alone in her study. She was prey then to all the dismay and distress against which she had warned the Perrington sisters. The ordinary sounds of the day: classes and meals, chatter and clatter seemed atrocious to her. That life should continue so normally when the Perringtons' world, and hers, were suspended in terror was appalling. She had to stifle a strong urge to bring the school to an abnormal halt. Only the knowledge that she could not afford to do so, particularly in light of the recent trouble, stopped her.

Eventually, she found the courage and the energy to walk about the corridors and classrooms and offer words of encouragement. Heloise looked on her approvingly and together they set about heartening the staff, the students, and

particularly the Perrington sisters.

The girls were as brave as they could be, though they ate little at dinner and began to look very wan as another evening overtook them. Heloise and Gavrielle continued stalwart in their , but the choking torment of the waiting told on them all.

Another dusk had fallen when a uproar outside the house alerted Portia--sitting in her study with Heloise, Gavrielle, Sabina and Melicent--that the search party had returned.

She went alone into the entry hall, cautioning the others to remain behind. But she found Sabina and Melicent at her shoulders when her old porter tugged open the great front door. On the doorstep stood the viscount with Penelope, wrapped in the blanket he had carried strapped to his saddle, in his arms. She was grubby, white with weariness, tousle-headed and very quiet but she burst into tears of joy at the sight of Portia and her sisters.

The viscount ed into the warmth of the vestibule before handing her into the care of Sabina.

"Take her above-stairs, see her bathed and fed, my dears," Lord Stadbroke said to his daughters. "I will be up shortly; we shall leave for home--for Lincolnshire-on the morrow."

He pointedly ignored Portia as he allowed Euston to take his greatcoat, his hat and gloves.

Drawing her shawl closer about her shoulders Portia, with her heart aching over the rebuff, stepped outside. The searchers were disposed in attitudes of weariness on the gravel sweep. She moved among them impulsively, thanking them, hugging her brother, offering beds and meals and gratitude in equal measures. When arrangements had been made for the comfort of all, Portia followed Caldwell indoors.

"That was a near run thing, Port. We nearly missed them; Dent was on the point of removing the child to London. Even the Ruffian could not have tracked her there," he said, removing his own coat and hat. Euston was there to take them; the viscount had disappeared. "Where is Heloise? Is Gavrielle with her?"

"In the parlour," Portia said, understanding that she no longer held first place in her brother's life. His allegiance--and rightly so--had changed. He gave her an absent-minded hug and removed to Heloise and Gavrielle, establishing their own family circle.

Unaccustomedly uncertain of her duty, she made for her study. Within it, she found the viscount. She gasped and strove for composure as he shut the door firmly after her entry.

Lines of fatigue were etched deeply into his sharp features, his high cheekbones accentuated by hollow eyes and his nose an aquiline slash. Without speaking he sank into a chair near the fire and contemplated his be-grimed boots.

Her equanimity restored by his exhaustion, Portia moved to the tantalus that sat on a small table behind her desk. After unlocking it with one of the many keys on her chatelaine, she chose the brandy and poured out a generous glass.

Wordlessly she handed it to him and he gulped a third of it without remark.

She seated herself at her desk and waited for him to speak.

Finally he said, "Harold Dent was the culprit, Caldwell was right. He had lured Penny from the hawthorn woods and held her for ransom and revenge. I have given him a week to quit this country. He is in the change of the constable at Fortis Green; I shall see the magistrate in the morning." Even his voice was weary, harsh with exhaustion and repressed emotion.

"Is Penny unhurt? He did not harm her, did he? I would have believed him incapable of that, at least." Portia could not suppress the anxious catch in her own words.

"Your suppositions, there at least, are correct. She was teaching him a lesson in vingt et un when we came upon them in a woodsman's cottage in the ash forest by Fortis Green. Even in desperate straits he could not leave the pasteboards alone. It was gaming debts that had been the cause of his financial woes and his extortion attempts--his reason for abducting her--that and, as you supposed, his anger over my public humiliation of him at the Afrique."

"I see. And now?"

"We will spend the night, and take our leave after I see the magistrate. My daughters are hereby withdrawn from your instruction, ma'am. Please make up my , and I will send you my draft in payment." He tossed off the last of his brandy, the strong muscles of his throat working in his open collar. Then he rose. "It has been an education, Miss Crossmichael, knowing you."

With those enigmatic words, he took his leave.

Portia sank into her chair, exhausted and comprehensively enfeebled. Hers had been the education: an education in love, in loss, in disappointment and now--it seemed--in despair.

How could she live without them, the three girls she had come to love?

She again jumped to her feet--Penny, she must see Penny--see for herself that the child had taken no hurt. And she must rejoice with the older girls, returned to happiness. She paused, her hand clenching on her chatelaine. No. No, she must not be precipitate. The viscount would be with his daughters restoring bonds, reassuring them, making plans. She must make do with the glimpse she had had of the child, the knowledge that she was well. She had no claim on Sabina, Melicent and Penelope Perrington, and tomorrow they would be gone.

She sank back into her chair, staring at the flickering flame of a guttering candle in a branch of four.

And so too would he depart. Ingram Perrington, Lord Stadbroke. Author of it all, arrogant, charming, intelligent, haughty and all too attractive.

How could she ever live without him? He had educated her in the warm desires of the flesh with only a kiss and an embrace or two. She had learned from him to hope for a family of her own, a different way of life, a new beginning. Love-that was what he had taught her, a love that for her had not died, never would.

Now she must learn to live with love unrequited. To live without them all.

* * * *

In the end, Stadbroke took his daughters back to London before they all departed for Lincolnshire. They had need to send for Miss Thripton and arrange for the Hill Street house to be closed for the present. He had business to attend to and Parliamentary matters to put in hand. And one of his first duties was to speak with Francis Lanark.

Ingram ran him to earth at White's. At the sight of him, Lanark rose and said, "Where have you been?"

"To hell and back," Stadbroke responded grimly. With a word to a hovering waiter, he ordered a bottle of Madeira and urged Lanark to retake his seat. In a few succinct sentences he outlined the horrors of the past week.

"Good God!" the other man exclaimed at the end of the recital. "I am so very relieved your daughters are unharmed. Harold Dent was a nastier villain than we first suspected, eh? And the magistrate agreed with you?"

"Reluctantly. I urged him for the girls' sake not to bring the matter to trial, or the inevitable execution for kidnapping. Dent remains in custody of the court until he is transported, unofficially." Ingram swirled the wine in his glass. A gentleman of their acquaintance made to approach but was warned off by Stadbroke's curt nod.

"You have done Miss Crossmichael and Caldwell Dent a favour by not pursuing the matter. The whole affair will scarcely make a ripple in the gossip stream and Mansion House School will be untouched. How is Portia?"

"I am not interested in doing Portia Crossmichael a good turn. Is that all you can ask--how is she? I have no interest in her, I do not care whether she is well or ill. She is the author of all this." Ingram found it difficult to feel convinced of his own words.

"I disagree with you there, my friend. I'd say she's been buffeted pretty severely by the winds of misfortune. She didn't plan for her step-father to attempt to ruin her business. She did not look for one of her favourite pupils to be kidnapped. If it comes down to it, she did not ask for your daughters to attend at her school. It was your actions that led them there."

Stadbroke was effectively silenced for several minutes. He disliked to hear his own thoughts repeated aloud. Then he rallied. "She told me Dent was her brother. She told me nothing was wrong."

"And why would she confide in you? She did not know you except as an indifferent father looking to store his daughters somewhere out of his way."

Ingram's temper fired. He set aside his glass and rose. "You and Dora have been Portia's champion from the beginning. I'll listen to no more of it. I merely thought to keep you informed and now I'll be off. We will return to Stadley Court so soon as I can put my affairs in order."

His friend turned conciliatory. "Let's not part in anger. It is true we have ed Portia Crossmichael unreservedly. But Ingram, she's a good woman, and I think you care for her. Don't allow pride to turn you from a future that you and your daughters richly deserve."

Stadbroke rose. "I cannot think that a delusion of intimacy and a hint of rapport are the basis for a future relationship. No. My daughters and I will return to Lincolnshire. We would be happy to entertain you there anytime you care to visit us." With only a few more words, he took an affable leave of his friend, vowing privately to avoid society and concentrate on business matters for the remainder of his stay in London.

His affairs took him three weeks to organize.

His daughters recovered their spirits in that time. Miss Thripton arrived and took them in charge, but he spent part of every day in their company. They talked, incessantly it seemed to him, of their time at the Mansion House Establishment, but they seemed to feel no lingering shadow from their experiences. Even Penelope, sleeping for the time being with Melicent, had no excess of disquiet or unease.

She poured out the full story of her adventure to them all as she sat on her father's knee in the drawing room of the Hill Street house one evening. The windows overlooking the street stood open, itting all the noise of a Mayfair evening, but also a spring wind. The rain and chill of March had given way to the soft air of April and the scents of chestnut trees, wisteria and lilac in bud vied with the less savoury scents of the city.

"We were playing at fox hunt, my friends and I," Penelope said, bouncing on her father's knee. "I was the fox. I ran into the hawthorn wood, and they would not

follow. They hated the thorns. I told them if you are rethpectful of them, they do you no harm. They did not come, but Mr. Dent did. Mr. Harold, that ith. I recognized him from Twelfth Night. And he said he had a kitten that he wished me to have."

Ingram closed his eyes, speechless with ed terror of the horrors that might have been.

Unconscious of his anguish, the child continued, "I walked with him for a little, but then I decided I wanted to go home to Miss Crothmichael. And he would not allow me. And then I thcreamed and kicked him, and bit him too." She paused relishing the memory. "Only hith wrist was dirty." She stuck out her small pink tongue in ed disgust.

Sabina and Melicent giggled, but meeting Miss Thripton's sympathetic gaze, Ingram had no inclination to laugh.

"He put a blanket over my head then, and next thing I knew we wath at the hut. I was hungry so I had bread and cheeth, ever such tasty cheeth. And Mr. Dent said I should go to sleep, next the fire." She leaned her curly head against her father's shoulder and he tightened his arms about her.

"I thought I might escape, but I went to thleep, and next morning I saw a latch on the door, ever tho high up. And then we played at vingt et un and picquet. Papa, he does not play even tho well as I. And Melicent says I am rubbish at games of chance." She stuck her pink tongue out at her sister.

Melicent, leaning against Sabina's shoulder, did not retaliate.

"And then you came, Papa, and Ruff, and Mr. Dent. I thought Mr. Harold would fight or, or, fuss, but he just theemed to fold up, rather. I was every so glad to see you, Papa, and Ruff, and Miss Crossmichael, and Mel and Sabby." Her piping voice trailed off.

Ingram realized she was very near to sleep and that his older daughters were heavy-eyed as well. They were content then to be sent, in Miss Thripton's care, to retire in their fine new bedchambers.

He remained in the drawing room, pouring himself out a glass of wine, and moving to the window to stare into the street below. He would be glad to leave London, he realized. It had lost its charm for him; its delights were nothing compared to the joy of his children's company and the thought of home, of Stadley Court.

The recent events gave him, he decided, more sleepless nights than they gave his daughters. Those events, combined with Lanark's words, caused him to consider with exhaustive attention and meticulous consideration all that had ed in the last four months. His conclusions were not altogether happy. Since the acrimonious parting with Portia, he had been conscious of a heaviness of spirit that all the logic of his temperament and all the righteous nature of his bitterness could not assuage.

Lanark said he cared for her. That was nonsense of course. He would it to lusting after her, but he had been mistaken about any deeper affection.

He did miss their fraught encounters, and he had now come to realize that she had never lied to him. Nevertheless any relationship between them had been

doomed. The circumstances of their acquaintance had been tainted by the unnatural events caused by Harold Dent. Whatever they had in common, whatever they might have enjoyed together would never be enlarged. His feelings were hampered by his disappointment, his regret. He could not doubt that she had done her best to protect his daughters. But it had not been enough, and they had been in danger because of her and her school. His unruly emotions told him that he must hold that against her.

Setting aside his wine, he took himself off to bed.

The next morning when he entered the breakfast room, very little rested, he surprised his daughters in the midst of writing a letter. They looked up at him with varying expressions of guilt.

He seated himself at the head of the table and surveyed the tempting dishes laid out with little interest. "Why the apprehension, my dears?" he asked, a weak attempt at light-heartedness.

"We are writing to Miss Crossmichael," Melicent said with a touch of defiance.

"I see." Ingram could think of nothing else to say.

"To thay good-bye," Penelope added.

"And to thank her, for all her guidance and kindness, and her affection." Sabina dipped her pen in the inkwell, and continued to write. "It was not her fault, Papa,

none of it. She owed her loyalty to Mr. Caldwell Dent; she could scarcely order his papa--her step-father--from her premises. And when things went terribly awry, she tried so hard to repair them. The school is all she has; she was right to try and protect it."

"Not at your expense," Ingram growled, aware that he no longer believed in his own indignation.

"She would never have endangered us, or any pupil," Melicent idly picked at the neatly hemmed edge of the white damask cloth covering the table. "She never thought that Mr. Dent's father could be so very bad. She never thought ill of anyone, really."

"And Mithter Harold Dent was not so very bad--except at games of chance. He apologized for stealing me and assured me he would not hurt me. He only wanted to frighten Mith Crothmichael."

"Well, he frightened me." Ingram tried to summon his outrage to bolster his stern demeanour before his children, and failed.

"Do you forbid us to write to Miss Crossmichael, sir?" Sabina asked.

"No... No of course not." Ingram thought that he should like to write to her himself. But what could he say that would put right the remarks he had flung at her at their last meeting? No, better to leave well enough alone.

"Oh Papa, Mr. Dent--Mr. Caldwell Dent--still has our portrait!" At Melicent's exclamation, three gazes fastened on him. "May we stop for it on our journey? Please? Does not the North Road go closely by Hornsey?"

"He may not have finished it," he prevaricated, gulping a mouthful of hot coffee.

"He has. He said he had finished the very day Penny was..." Sabina clearly chose not to speak of her sister's disappearance. "Oh please, Papa, we must have our portrait."

"It might upset Penny to return there," he said.

"No, Papa, it won't. But it would upthet me not to have our picture," Penelope assured him.

Ingram could not hold firm against the pleading in all three pairs of eyes. "Oh, very well," he said. "We will stop briefly on our way from the city, day after tomorrow. I shall be out this afternoon but I will be home for dinner." He rose without eating anything and caught an exchange of conspiratorial glances between his daughters.

"Mind Miss Thripton, and finish your packing," he onished. "No nonsense."

"Yes, Papa," the young ladies chorused.

* * * *

Portia couldn't forget Ingram Perrington... Couldn't forget his strong arms holding her close, and his warm mouth coaxing hers to life. The memory of their tart exchanges of opinion and their tentative affections would never leave her. He had given her a glimpse of pleasure, of partnership, of ion and of family. She hoped he had learned how precious was this last, how priceless were his lovely daughters and how valueless life in society was compared to them.

She rose from her desk and shook herself.

For herself, she could not afford the time to . She had work, plenty of it, to do and it was a good thing. She would be too busy to think.

With a view to the future, Caldwell and Heloise had set a date for their wedding and the banns were to be posted that very Sunday. Portia suspected they had meant to distract from the Perringtons' absence, but their happiness really only pointed up her own losses. There was no doubt the changes caused by their marriage would mean a good deal of work.

There remained still the repair of the school's fractured reputation to complete. That seemed, however, to be mending more readily than she had supposed possible. There were those of course who--whether from indolence or ignorance of the rumours--had not concerned themselves with their daughters' possible contamination. And there were those few who had stoutly ed her and rejected all suggestions of impropriety. And now that Caldwell was to be wed and removed from her sphere, there were those willing to say it had all been a tempest in a teapot...something and nothing.

Whatever the reason, her enrolment was full again, the school was running smoothly with the stalwart assistance of her staff. She should have been returned to content and satisfaction.

That she was not she put down to Lord Stadbroke, and she condemned him for it. She had had a letter from the girls telling of their departure for home, their delight in their return to Lincolnshire, and their joy that their father was going with them. They had expressed a sadness at parting from her.

Well, she thought, they will soon forget me. The school had been a brief interlude in their young lives, not altogether happy and best forgot.

She could not dismiss them so lightly. Never before had she become so attached to any of her pupils. She could not decide whether it was their intelligence, their bright and lively spirits, or their loving natures that had bound her to them, but there it was. As well as dismissing their father from her heart and mind, she had also to forget those three delightful youngsters.

Again and again s was drawn to Caldwell's studio to survey the portrait that stood finished on his easel. He, with his usual skill, had captured the viscount and his daughters to the very life. Ingram and Melicent stared out challengingly with their so-similar dark eyes. Sabina was thoughtful, her pretty head cocked a little in reflection. Penelope--darling Penny--was laughing a little, her small face merry.

What would happen to the portrait? She supposed Stadbroke would order it sent to him in Lincolnshire. Then, she wondered, where will I find my consolation?

Through tears she gazed from the window at the rose garden, just stirring to life, and beyond the fountain and the labyrinth to where daffodils had swayed before the hawthorn wood.

A knock at the door disturbed her reflections. Aware suddenly of the wetness on her cheeks, she withdrew her handkerchief from her muslin sleeve and scrubbed it angrily away.

"Come!" she called, and the door was opened by the upstairs maid.

The girl curtsied and said, "Visitors, ma'am. Would not give me leave to announce them or alert you. I'm sorry, ma'am." She was pressed against the door by the entrance of the three young Perrington ladies, followed more slowly by Miss Thripton.

Portia stared in stupefaction.

"I told you we should surprithe her!" Penny shouted triumphantly.

"We are on our way, Miss," Melicent said. "We are going home."

"We could not go without taking our leave of you, Miss Crossmichael. We told Papa we would not. We miss you, ma'am." Sabina was quiet and sincere. "And we could not go without our portrait."

Portia looked at the bright young faces surrounding her and raised her grey gaze to Miss Thripton's indulgent one.

"They insisted, Miss Crossmichael. And rightly so, in my opinion. Their sojourn here was most beneficial," the governess said.

"Most beneficial," a masculine voice echoed from the doorway; a welled, well-loved voice, a delight to her ears.

Portia was reluctant to look at its owner for seeing him again would make separation yet more painful.

"Good day, Miss Crossmichael. You will forgive our intrusion, I hope."

She had to look. Lord Stadbrooke leaned indolently in the doorway, smiling at her, his dark gaze gentle. He looked as though he had never said those harsh things, those terrible words that echoed and re-echoed in her dreams. She could not find her tongue.

Sabina broke the taut silence. "Oh look at the garden! The daffodils are finished here and they will just be covering the lawn at the Hall. I cannot wait. There must be primroses left here though. Let's go and look for them. Come along, Pen, Mel. Miss Thripton, do let's cut some for Miss Crossmichael's desk; have you your scissors in your reticule?"

Portia was bemused by Sabina's mature efficiency. The girl ushered her sisters

and their governess out the terrace doors and into the spring sun and left behind a growing silence.

Lord Stadbrooke entered the chamber and closed the door carefully behind him. "Say something, Portia... Anything. Tell me to go to hell--and I'll tell you I have been there these past three weeks. Tell me you never wish to see me again, and I will believe you, after the things I have done and said.

"I tried for a while, since I took the girls to London, to forget you, to uphold my righteous indignation, to remain angry with you. But I could not, because my resentments were nonsensical, foolish. You had done nothing to merit my censure, you were nothing like the other women I have known. I had finally to it that I could not live without you."

He paused and looked uncertain, uncomfortable, then cleared his throat and continued. "Will you forgive me the things I said in a time of fear? Will you tell me if you love me as I love you? Will you marry me and let me tell you I love you every day for the rest of my life? Let me apologize in every way I can think of for all the stupid things I have said and done these past few months?"

"Stop talking and let me think," Portia said, pressing her hands to her hot cheeks as she sank into the nearest chair. She could only stare at him as her mind teemed with questions.

He seated himself in the silk-covered armchair beside her broad desk and obediently held his tongue.

She tried to order her chaotic thoughts. He loved her. He loved her and he

wished to marry her. She couldn't believe... He didn't mean... Finally, she gave up the effort of understanding and blurted, "I didn't lie--I didn't. I couldn't tell you everything. I was torn so many ways."

He nodded. "And I was wrong to accuse you--to ascribe to you the same faults that blemished my late wife, my mother and my mistresses. I have not been a saint, Portia, I cannot lie about that to you. But my daughters--and you--have ensured that I have seen the error of my ways. If you made mistakes, I made more. But I think... I hope...we can put all of that behind us."

Portia took a deep breath and dared begin to hope. She realized her hands were shaking and she clasped them tightly on her chatelaine. "Did you mean what you said?"

"When?" he rose again. "Did I mean what I said weeks ago? No; I spoke in anger, and sometimes in frustration and once or twice in sheer stupidity. Did I mean what I said just now? That I love you and I want you to be my wife? Yes, most emphatically."

"But... The girls?"

"My daughters are aware of my hopes. They were aware of them I think, before I was myself. They enjoyed being your pupils; they have expressed a desire to be your daughters. They have, in fact, expressed a wish to have a baby brother or two... Or failing that, another sister."

Portia flushed rose red, and when he unlinked her clenched fingers, she did not resist. Her chatelaine swung with a clatter to hang among her muslin skirts. He

kissed each of her slender hands.

She lifted them without hesitation to his broad shoulders, at last believing that all her dreams had come true.

His strong arms gathered her close. "I love you, darling Portia. You have educated me in matters of the heart and will, I hope, do so our life long. As I will take pleasure in educating you." His arms tightened and his strong, gentle hands left her no doubt of his meaning.

Portia said, "You wakened me to my senses, when I thought I was cold. I cursed you for that these past weeks, but now I cannot deny that I would enjoy your instruction."

"Could you give up your school?"

"Should I have to?"

"I am not asking you to be my mistress, but my wife. I am asking you to live in Lincolnshire, to be mother to my daughters, to bear my children should we be so blessed. You cannot teach classes from such a distance. But I would not ask you to divest yourself of the school completely. You need only put it in the hands of someone you trust."

Portia rested her cheek on his chest, revelling in his , his nearness and the steady beat of his heart as she thought. "I should like to retain ownership," she

said at last. "It is my...security, you might say. Perhaps Heloise and Cal would care for it. It will be strange to me to put my life in another's keeping. I do appreciate your understanding of the matter."

"Then say it, my darling." He held her a little away, his hands tight on her slim waist.

"Say what, my lord?" She teased him in a way she did not realize she had ever learned.

"What is in your heart..." He looked suddenly uncertain again, and the doubt sat endearingly upon his sharp, decisive features.

Portia relented. "I love you, Ingram." She punctuated her statements with light touches of her lips. "I will always love you. I will be honoured to marry you."

His kiss was ferocious, overwhelming in its demand, in its giving. Portia had no difficulty meeting it with her own need and her own gift.

"Ith it settled?" A small voice finally cut through the aura of devotion and desire that surrounded the pair.

Portia looked to the terrace doors to see Ingram's daughters crowded in the opening, their faces curious and hopeful by turns. She felt shy to be caught in so private a moment, but Ingram did not release her, only allowing her to turn in his arms.

"It is. You shall be chaperones home to Lincolnshire, and we'll be wed in St. Antony's in the village at Stadbroke, if Portia agrees," their father informed them.

The girls burst in and Stadbroke relinquished Portia to their embraces. At last they stood aside and Melicent said, "You shall have to leave off your chatelaine, ma'am. I will miss it!"

"Do not call her ma'am. She will be Mama," said Penny.

Tears of joy threatened to overwhelm Portia. "I shall have to arrange things here," she said in a sudden panic.

"Then we will stay until you are ready to leave. And you will have only to add the keys of Stadley Court to your chatelaine, not abandon it here." The viscount grinned.

The girls shouted their hurrahs in a most unmaidenly manner and streamed past them to request their luggage brought in, reclaim their places in the dormitories, and disrupt classes in a most wanton manner.

"We shall disorder the place entirely," Stadbroke said with a contented chuckle, recapturing her in his arms.

"Mansion House Establishment will survive," said Portia, lifting her face to his.

"It has survived worse."

"I might not survive the next few weeks." His embrace tightened around her.

Portia's forehead creased with incomprehension as she stared at him, loving the openness of his expression, awed by the love freely displayed in his dark gaze.

"I shall have to put up at The Three Comes, and exist without your embraces until we leave the school. 'Tis the worst thing I can currently imagine," he explained.

It occurred to Portia that she had never felt so light-hearted, so expectant, so...joyful. "Me too, my lord. I shall have to work very quickly."

"See that you do," he laughed.

THE END

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lesley-Anne McLeod has loved all things British for longer than she can . So it was natural that when she turned to writing fiction she should write Regency romances, those uniquely English historical romances in the tradition of Jane Austen.

Lesley-Anne has been writing for twenty-five years and has written seven Regency romances and several Regency short stories. She has published articles on antiques and collectibles, and has also free-lanced in business writing. Bookselling was her career for nearly ten years; she owned her own bookstore for three of those enjoyable years. She belongs to the Saskatchewan Romance Writers and treasures the and friendship that group offers.

Lesley-Anne is married and has one daughter. She lives on the prairies of Canada which are distant from Regency England in time and thought, but which retain an echo of Great Britain in history and tradition.

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