“Are you all right, Miss Chandler?” West asked.

Her hand flew to her throat. “I—I’m unharmed. I think.”

At least she hadn’t fainted. Betsy had gone too far this time.

“If you hadn’t caught that ball, Your Grace,” Mrs. Chandler cried, “it would have smashed directly into my darling child’s face. Oh, my Vanessa. This is . . .” Her cheeks were reddening to match her husband’s. “This is too much!”

Betsy’s head appeared in the center of the jagged edges of the window. “I’m terribly sorry, everyone,” she called merrily. “That one got away from me.”

“Betsy Grace Delamar.” A more unsuitable middle name could not have been assigned. West rose and shook the cricket ball at his sister. “Come inside this instant.”

“Crikey, I’m sorry. Didn’t mean for it to happen.”

“Well, I never!” Mrs. Chandler was not to be mollified. She was still gasping and fluttering about her daughter’s near escape. West had to admit it had been a close call.

Betsy entered a few moments later, the hem of her gown covered in grass stains, fingernails dirty and ragged.

“You nearly hit Miss Chandler with that runaway ball,” West said sternly.

Betsy hung her head. “I’m sorry, Miss Chandler. I didn’t mean to. Moresby was teasing me and he made me lose my temper and I hit the ball hard as I could, but I was so angry that I smashed it in the wrong direction completely.”

“If that ball had struck my darling girl it could have broken her nose. Or worse,” Mrs. Chandler wailed, wringing her hands.

“I’m awfully sorry, Miss Chandler. I didn’t mean it.”

“Well!” Mrs. Chandler harrumphed. “I was led to believe, and indeed I have witnessed firsthand, that the English nobility are restrained and refined. Not here. Such goings-on! Dried beetles and runaway cricket balls. And not a teapot or crumpet to be seen.”

“Here’s the tea now,” said West with relief, as several footmen arrived bearing the tea things.

“No thank you, Your Grace.” Mrs. Chandler grabbed her daughter’s hand. “We’re leaving. I’ve just remembered we have another engagement.”

“Try one of these cherry tarts,” pleaded Belinda. “We promise that everything will be ever so calm and refined from this moment forth.”

A footman swept up the glass from the window while another pulled the curtains over the jagged hole.

Miss Chandler glanced at the pastry longingly, but her mother caught her by the hand and led her toward the door.

“I’ll meet you for tea in a restaurant, shall I?” he asked. A public outing would be a more easily controlled situation. A date was arranged. West made his bows and escorted them to the door.

Then he assembled his sisters in the parlor.