Carina had no idea whether the lady in question was married or a widow, but despite the sheltered life she had led, she was well aware that Mrs. Featherstonehaugh was the type of woman that her mother would not have had in the house. Apart from anything else, the paint and powder that she wore on her face proclaimed her to be fast and what Nanny would have called ‘no better than she ought to be’.

The luncheon downstairs had been such a nightmare that she could hardly bear to think of it. She had been ignored completely by the two ladies present, while the men had looked at her with a mixture of familiarity and speculation that had made her long to insult them just as they were insulting her.

They were all, she thought, the type of roistering, rakish, men-about-town that her mother had most abominated and with whom she had only come in contact occasionally in her father’s company.

Sir Percy Rockley was indeed the worst of them and he had done everything to make the luncheon uncomfortable and almost intolerable.

At first he had invited her to sit beside him, but Lord Lynche had saved her from that and pointed to the places at the end of the table for Dipa and herself.

In this way Sir Percy was opposite her, although a little further up the table, and she had known from the way he looked at her that everything he said and did was in some way a performance for her benefit. He was, she was sure, watching her reactions to his stories with their double entendres and to the cynical manner in which he referred to women.

With an effort Carina had kept her eyes downcast, sitting in silence except when she addressed Dipa, helping him to his food and showing him how to use his knife and fork.

But she had known all the time that her body was tingling with the humility of it. Were all Governesses subject to such misery?

She knew the answer was that she was too young and far too attractive to be a Governess in a household like this.

If, in fact, she had been one of those poor put-on women she could doubtless have suffered it more easily. But as it was she was seething with anger by the time luncheon came to an end and it was with a feeling of thankfulness that she was able to hurry Dipa upstairs to the nurseries, which seemed in contrast the very haven of peace and security.

‘I will say that it was the luncheon that upset Dipa,’ Carina thought to herself now. ‘If I am clever about it, they will believe me and then we need not go down again.’

They reached the first floor and the broad high corridor that led to the Dowager’s apartments.