“This is one of the chains with which I intend to bind you to me for life!”

Honora remembered giving a little cry.

“Oh, Mama, how romantic! I can imagine Papa saying lovely things like that.”

“He always says lovely things to me,” her mother replied in a soft voice.

“I hope it fits,” the Duke said, bringing Honora’s mind back to the present.

“Yes, perfectly, thank you.”

“I am pleased you like it,” he said briskly. “My mother was the last person to wear it and she always believed it was a very lucky ring.”

“I hope that is what it will be for me,” Honora said, looking down at her hand.

She did not, however, think that the Duke had heard her, for he had opened the door and walked back into the drawing room where she thought her aunt was waiting for him.

*

The preparations for the wedding filled everybody’s mind and conversation for the next three weeks until Honora felt that there could be nothing more left to say.

Every night at dinner parties the people talked about it and every day she was occupied with fittings and shopping for her trousseau.

Sometimes her uncle took her driving with him or because she begged him to do so, he rode with her either in Hyde Park when they were in London or in the country at Langstone Hall.

They were not entertained again at The Castle and the reason for this, although Honora did not know it, was that her aunt could not bear to think of her being fawned upon as their future hostess by the Duke’s relatives and friends.

She had seen it happen all too clearly on their first visit and realised that she had been brushed on one side as unimportant.

Honora in the future would be the Duchess who would invite the Duke’s friends to The Castle and they therefore wanted to make certain that they ingratiated themselves and would not be forgotten.

The idea made the Countess want to scream with fury, but years of scheming to get her own way had taught her not only how to act, but also how to control her feelings.

“There are so many people in our County who want to meet the future bride and bridegroom,” she said to the Earl, “that I have no intention of boring myself by staying at The Castle again until after the wedding is over.”

He had looked at her in surprise.

“You always told me how much you enjoyed the Duke’s home,” he said. “In fact you have in the past compared it rather unfavourably with mine.”

“I find it uncomfortable,” the Countess said.

Then, because she felt the Earl found it hard to believe her, she said in the caressing tone that always captivated him,

“I am not envious, darling, of anything anybody else has. You have given me everything I could possibly desire. Langstone House is home to me and that is where I want to be.”