He had, in fact, been relieved that she had not been at either of the balls last night, knowing that she would cling to him in her possessive manner which he found extremely irritating.

“You are back, Vargus!” she exclaimed.

She alighted from her carriage and was standing beside him and looking up at him with an unmistakable enticement in her slanting dark eyes.

“As you see, I am back,” the Earl replied.

“Why did you not tell me?”

“I only returned yesterday.”

“You knew that I would be waiting breathlessly for your return! Surely Richard must have told you how perturbed I was at your long absence in the country?”

She paused and looked suspicious.

“If it was the country that kept you – ”

“If there is one thing I find tiresome it’s being expected to make explanations about what I have done or have not done,” the Earl replied sharply.

Then an idea came to him. In a very different voice he said,

“To make reparation for my misdeeds, I will give you a new bonnet. Why do we not repair to Mrs. Burton’s shop and see what she has that will suit you?”

“Vargus!”

For a moment Lady Adelaide’s breath was taken away.

Never until now had the Earl offered her presents of any sort with the exception of flowers, which she knew were ordered for him by his secretary as a matter of form.

“A bonnet!” she went on. “But of course, I would love one.”

It struck her that a bonnet was a rather intimate present, something a man might give to a woman to whom he was attracted, but not if his intentions were serious.

Then she told herself quickly that she was not a young girl to be compromised by a present, whatever it might be, and that the Earl should give her anything was certainly a step in the right direction.

“I can imagine,” she said, “no better way to celebrate your homecoming, and, as you say, Mrs. Burton’s is next door.”

“Let’s go there,” he said. “I have a feeling, Adelaide, that no woman has enough bonnets in her life.”

“Of course not, nor enough beaux,” Lady Adelaide replied with what was meant to be a glance of admiration.

She did not realise that the Earl’s lips tightened for a moment at the name or that he had a strong desire to tell her that he had changed his mind.

Then, Lady Adelaide chattering gaily, they walked into Mrs. Burton’s shop and the Earl, as he had expected, saw a slight figure in a grey gown waiting on a customer.

Chapter Three

The Earl, driving his phaeton down a somewhat scruffy street into which he knew the back doors of the Bond Street shops opened, thought he had been very clever.