‘That’s point five,’ he said. ‘We neither of us like being touched like that. I don’t mind my sisters, and I don’t mind you. But I cannot stand being pulled about by girls. I don’t like how they look at me. I don’t like how they stroke my sleeve or find ways of touching my shoulder or standing close to me. I just don’t like it. And I know I’ll never get married if I have to court someone and kiss them and pull them about.’

I nodded. I understood well enough. It was my own prickly independence but perhaps a little worse for a young man who would be expected to fondle and fumble and get his face slapped for his pains.

‘If we married we’d have to get an heir,’ he said bluntly. ‘But once we had a son we could live as friends. I thought you’d like that, Sarah.’

I drew my knees up to the ache in my chest and hugged myself for comfort.

‘I don’t know,’ I said softly.

Perry closed his eyes and turned his face up to the sunshine. ‘I thought it would be a way out for both of us,’ he said. ‘I know you’re afraid of going into Society, even with Mama there. This way, you’d be known as my affianced bride. You’d not have to go around so much. Men wouldn’t trouble you. My mama or my sisters could always be with you. And you could always have me there.’

I nodded. Deep inside myself I had been dreading the London Season, and cursing the obstinacy in myself which had insisted on moving in the best of circles when I was no more fined for it than any bareback dancer.

‘I’d like that,’ I conceded.

‘And you could run your own estate,’ Perry pointed out. ‘As you wanted, without having to wait all that time.’

I nodded. Five years was an unimaginable lifetime from my sixteen-year-old viewpoint. I could not imagine waiting until I was twenty-one. And the shrewd business streak in me warned me that five years was a long time to leave Will Tyacke and James Fortescue in charge of my fortune.

‘And we’re neighbours,’ Perry said. ‘If you marry anyone else they’ll take you away to live in their house. They could live anywhere. You’d only be able to get back to see Wideacre when they let you.’

‘Oh no!’ I said suddenly. ‘I hadn’t thought of that!’

‘You’d have to,’ he said. ‘And your husband would put his manager in and he might do it even worse than it’s being done already.’

I put my hand out and turned his face towards me. He opened his eyes.

‘Kiss me,’ I said.