Miss Yate clasped Captain Hathersage’s free hand, and drew it to her wet cheek. Lord Henfield made a decision.

‘I would prefer not to discuss matters in the street, Hathersage, but needs must. Forgive me for asking you, Miss Yate, but how old are you?’

‘Two and twenty, my lord.’

‘Thank heavens for that. It makes things simpler.’ He looked past her to Captain Hathersage. ‘I take it that you and Miss Yate have an understanding of some duration, thus far unpalatable to Lady Leyburn?’

‘Yes. I came today with some news. I have inherited a small property in Cambridgeshire, not huge, but … Lady Leyburn scoffed at it and said that I was too late anyway, since Dorothea was about to marry you.’

‘Well, I think I can safely say neither of us have the inclination, nor is there any need, since we can be vouched for by Leyburn here that we went to his aid. If you can afford to keep Miss Yate in a sufficient degree of comfort, and I take it that is what you came to tell Lady Leyburn, and Miss Yate is not a minor, why not obtain a special licence from Doctors’ Commons, and marry her anyway. It will be legal, and if Lady Leyburn, forgive me, Miss Yate, never speaks to you again, I can see that as an advantage.’

Captain Hathersage blinked, then looked down at Miss Yate.

‘It answers, indeed it does. I had not got further than imagining being accepted when I presented my new circumstances and … I cannot offer you luxury, Dorothea, but I can offer you comfort. You may choose to “follow the drum”, and we have not just my pay but income from the estate rents and the house rented out, or I will buy myself out and we will live in Cambridgeshire, as you wish. Would you accept that?’

‘I would have accepted without your recent good fortune, Clement, you know that.’

‘Then the only problem remaining is that obtaining the special licence must wait until tomorrow, and if Miss Yate returns to Lady Leyburn there will be the deuce of a lot of unpleasantness this evening.’ Lord Henfield was thinking ahead.

‘Yes, and mostly directed at me,’ declared Lord Leyburn pettishly, but he then brightened. ‘However, if I tell her of Dorothea’s p—’ He stopped, as Lord Henfield and Captain Hathersage glared at him in such a way that he felt extremely intimidated.

‘I do not care.’ Miss Yate lifted her chin, and gripped Captain Hathersage’s hand tightly. ‘I have never stood up to my mama, ever, and I have paid heavily for it. Now, I shall be brave. What can she do to me, when tomorrow I can leave her?’

‘She could lock you in your room?’ Captain Hathersage suggested.

‘Oh.’