Finally Charlotte dutifully kissed her mama good-bye. Adelaide departed with a muddled lecture about pregnancy, birth, midwives, doctors, and wet nurses. Charlotte listened numbly. She still couldn’t believe she was having a child. There had been no sign, unless one included her fainting spell. She began to think that fainting must be a sign of pregnancy, because every time she rose too quickly she felt as if the room were spinning. But she didn’t want to see a doctor yet. Charlotte shuddered. She was perfectly healthy; she must simply remember to stay seated or risk making a fool of herself.

So that afternoon Charlotte smiled engagingly at her husband’s brother and waved him to a chair without getting up.

“You see,” she confided, “I, or rather Alex and I, are having a baby, and it seems to make me rather lightheaded.”

Patrick’s eyes cleared. He was relieved to hear that his brother hadn’t married a vaporish woman whose sensibilities were so fragile that she fainted constantly. Although he wouldn’t have blamed him, Patrick thought. Lord, but Alex had found a dark beauty.

“Alex will be pleased.” Patrick grinned. “He always wanted a large family. I used to twit him about it because it didn’t seem to fit with his …” Patrick trailed off. He had forgotten that one didn’t make jokes about one’s brother’s propensity for wild starts in front of his new bride. Let alone acknowledge that Alex once thought family life was pretty flat.

But Charlotte heard only confirmation of the fact that Alex wanted children. “Yes, it is splendid, isn’t it? He doesn’t know yet.”

“I won’t tell him. What the devil is he doing over in Italy?” Patrick asked.

Charlotte swallowed. Alex said not to tell anyone, but surely he didn’t mean his own brother?

But Patrick continued without pause. “I know: winding up the affairs of that virago he married,” he said. He changed the subject politely, and they talked of his travels for a few minutes, but the atmosphere was strained.

Finally Patrick said bluntly, “I suppose you know the stories that are circulating about us.”

“Oh, no!” Charlotte cried, looking up suddenly. “I forgot to ask you to send away your horses!”

“Do you really think that’s necessary?” Patrick said, his brow darting up in a gesture of aristocratic disbelief that was so like Alex that Charlotte couldn’t help smiling.

“My mother thought it would be a good idea.”

“In that case I’ll send them off directly.”

Charlotte rang the doorbell but no butler appeared, only a rather flustered-looking housemaid.

“Don’t you have a butler?” Patrick inquired.

“I dismissed him, and the new one hasn’t arrived from Scotland yet. Molly, will you ask a footman to attend us, please?”

“Yes, my lady.” Molly dropped a curtsy. Then she hesitated.

“Molly?”