There were bookshelves filling every wall, except the one that was graced with an ornate ivory fireplace. Beside the impeccably neat desk, a massive piece of polished mahogany, a colorful globe spun on its tall, carved stand, aided by a graceful masculine hand.

The hand was connected, Maggie soon discerned, to a towering, well-built man with chestnut-colored hair and piercing green eyes. He wore a tailored suit of lightweight tweed, and when he smiled, she saw that his teeth were white and even.

“Miss Chamberlin,” he observed in a low and smooth voice. “Do come in and sit down.”

Hearing an American accent after all her time abroad was balm to Maggie’s spirit. She felt herself relaxing slightly, even though there was something about this man, as handsome as he was, that warned her to stay alert.

The clerk drew up a chair for Maggie, much as a waiter in a fine restaurant might have done, and she sat down gratefully. Her knees were wobbling and even though her eyes were dry, there were tears burning in her throat. The incident in Reeve McKenna’s office had taken a higher toll than she’d thought.

She started when the office doors closed with a genteel click behind her, and her prospective employer smiled at the reaction.

“My name is Duncan Kirk,” he said, slipping out of his costly tweed jacket and sitting down in the enormous leather chair behind his broad and quite intimidating desk. “I presume Lady Cosgrove explained my need to find a governess and companion for my sons?”

Maggie nodded. She had to forget that all her dreams had been dashed in the space of twenty-four hours and pull herself together. If she didn’t get this position, she would probably end up as a scullery maid. Or worse. “Yes, sir, she did.”

“I am a widower, Miss Chamberlin,” Mr. Kirk went on. “My sons are seven and ten years of age and I’m afraid they’ve suffered some for lack of a mother’s guidance. I, of course, am inordinately busy most of the time, and yet I hesitate to send the little scamps away to school, where they might have proper supervision as well as a first-rate education.”

Maggie was warming toward Mr. Kirk; his concern for his children touched her, as did the familiar pattern of his speech. “It’s very difficult for little people to be away from their homes and families,” she agreed, remembering her own years as an intermittent orphan. “Though that’s quite the custom in England, I’ve noticed.”

Mr. Kirk settled back in his chair, playing with a small silver ruler he’d taken from his desk. “How do you happen to be here in Australia, Miss Chamberlin?”