George looked on too, then whispered to Mary: ‘Ned has asked for her hand, don’t you know? Lady Elizabeth, that is. Can’t fault my brother’s ambition!’

At which moment, Mary found the heat of the room had become a little too much for her. She begged George take her outside for a breath of fresh air, turned for the door and heard a musical laugh cut through the air.

CHAPTER XXI

Over the following autumn and into the long, bitter winter, Mary became increasingly conscious of change, in both herself and her life. She had dined, she had danced and, to her own great astonishment, been decreed a success – by all but one gentleman, anyway. She was out of the nursery and into her very own apartment in the main part of Hatch. And there Mary now sat, on the last day of January in the year 1825, looking into the new glass on her new walnut table, from which a new, proper, young lady smiled back.

The Mother had vanished into confinement soon after Christmas. Of course, the child was a girl (Mary knew He would punish her eventually), and also called Fanny (an absurd act of vanity even if it did follow a long Knight tradition). And though it might not look very much – not to Mary, at least – this baby had somehow contrived to upend the whole household and in myriad ways. One was that the Knight siblings suddenly flocked about Hatch to care for their sister. The place was a-buzz! Another was that Mary did not have the time to truly enjoy the pleasure of their company. Indeed, so busy were her days, there was barely a moment even to even flirt with dear George – which did seem a shame, with him so very convinced she still needed more practice.

Instead, she was now expected to take on her stepmother’s duties while the lady was absent, some of which proved to be more enjoyable than others. For instance, Mary was delighted to take charge of her own brothers and sure they were all five Knatchbulls much the better for it. She loved visiting the village children down at the school and was diligent in getting aid to the poor; could hardly believe herself trusted with that weightiest of issues: the Indigent Blind – Fanny’s particular project – and threw herself in.