Mary Balogh: Secrets of the Heart

As shock receded, anger took its place. How had she dared to come to this place of fashion and decency? And under a different name! How could she stand there calmly supporting the weight of her elderly cousin, who must herself be a respectable person if Hannah's grandmother deigned to recognize a friendship with her? Did Lady Murdoch know? he wondered. Of course, Sarah would contrive some way of avoiding future contact with him and the ladies for whose welfare he was responsible. He must at all costs protect Hannah and Fanny from contamination. He felt the old hatred and was as little able to cope with the emotion as he had ever been.

Finally, to the infinite relief of both Sarah and Cranwell, Mr. Phelps made his bow and announced that he was expected back at his lodgings for breakfast, and his departure set everyone to remembering that they had not yet eaten and that it was high time they did. Lady Cavendish and her party set out to walk back to Laura Place, and Sarah helped Lady Murdoch outside, where the carriage they had ordered for half-past nine waited to return them to their lodgings on Brock Street.

LADY MURDOCH declared that they would do nothing more strenuous than visit the circulating library after breakfast. A week of almost constant activity was taking its toll of her energy, and she wished to be feeling well enough to enjoy the pleasures of the Upper Rooms in the evening, especially as she had now discovered her old friend and would have five years' worth of news to catch up on.

"Bertha and I will be quite happy to take tea all evening, I am sure," she said. "But I feel more than delighted that we will not have to bore you with our talk, cousin dear. You are a good girl and have stayed close beside me day after day, but I know that young tastes run to brighter pleasures. Tonight you will be able to join the dancing. Bertha's granddaughter and Lady Fanny Montagu seemed very proper young ladies and very suitable companions for you. And the duke is a very gentlemanly sort of man. I am sure he will be delighted if you join their party."

"Indeed, ma'am," Sarah said in some alarm, "I have no interest in joining in the dancing. I came here to be with you. And we have had a delightful time and made many acquaintances without attending the balls. I really have no wish to impose my company on his grace and the young ladies."

"Sarah," Lady Murdoch said, waving in her direction the knife she was using to spread clotted cream on her scone, "you know I have begun to think of you as my daughter. And my daughter should be attending these twice-weekly balls. I have been thinking, in fact, that I should chaperone you myself. Not that I care to dance, of course, though there was a time when I could have danced from evening to dawn and not paused for breath. Now nothing seems more convenient than that you attend the ball in company with Bertha's party."

Sarah lowered her eyes to her coffee cup. "You are more than kind," she said. "But really, ma'am, I have never danced in public and feel it is far too late to start now. "

"Bosh!" Lady Murdoch said, reaching for the jam.

The circulating library was crowded by the time their carriage deposited them outside its doors. Gentlemen read the newspapers; ladies chose novels, some buying, some sitting to read, others taking books away with them on loan. A few people sat quietly writing letters. Several gossiped. It was a crowded but comparatively peaceful place. Sarah relaxed when a hasty glance around the room assured her that there was no one there that they knew with any degree of intimacy. She was feeling too upset by the events of the morning to cope with meeting any casual acquaintance.

While Lady Murdoch sat down with a novel, frequently glancing over its top to check the identity of every new arrival, Sarah bought pen and paper and seated herself at an empty desk to write a letter to Aunt Myrtle. At least, that was what she intended to do. It was such a relief to sit with her back to other people and know that she had perhaps an hour to herself, an hour in which it was unlikely that she would be disturbed. Lady Murdoch would either nod to sleep behind her book or strike up a lengthy conversation with some new arrival.

She was very badly shaken. Indeed, she realized as soon as she had written the first sentence of her letter that neither her hand nor her mind was steady enough to enable her to continue. But she kept her head bent over the paper, the quill pen clutched in her hand. It just seemed too ironic, too unfair. This was her first visit to a public place in four years, indeed ever. And this was the first time in more than four years that she had dared meet new people and enjoy life. And after only one week she had run into him. George. Of all the places that he or she might have gone, they had been fated to converge on the same place. What made it stranger was that unless he had changed in four years, he had never been a man to seek out fashionable pleasure spots.

If his presence in Bath were not enough for her to contend with, there was her knowledge that Winston Bowen was somewhere there too. She had seen his name in the subscription book when Lady Murdoch was paying their dues on their arrival the previous week. She was not as surprised by his presence as by George's. It was almost to be expected that he would be wherever fashionable people gathered in any num- tiers. It was unlikely that she would see much of him. He probably would not seek her out in such a public setting, and his interests would doubtless keep him away from the places which attracted Lady Murdoch.

Absentmindedly Sarah was dipping her quill in the inkwell and outlining the words that she had already written on the page before her. She could remember the first time she ever saw George Montagu. She had been with Winston, out riding one afternoon. She had always spent a great deal of time with him since she and her brother, Graham, had come to live with her uncle and aunt, Viscount and Viscountess Laing, two years before on the death of their father. Winston was not, strictly speaking, a cousin. He was Uncle Randolph's son by a former marriage. Sarah's mother had been the sister of Aunt Myrtle, who had had the good fortune to make an advantageous marriage. But Winston was kind and had never seemed to mind having her trail around after him, though he was three years older than she. He had been an amiable boy who appeared to take nothing in life very seriously.

She was fourteen when they took this particular ride. It was a hot afternoon and they had stopped for a rest before turning for home again. She was sitting on a hillside, her arms clasped around her raised knees; Winston was sprawled beside her, a blade of grass between his teeth. But theywere not the only riders out that day. A group of four came cantering down the laneway below them, and Winston sat up to watch their approach.

Sarah stayed where she was when he got to his feet and bounded down the slope to hail their neighbors, a twin brother and sister with whom he sometimes associated. While he talked with them, she studied their companions, strangers to her. One was a very young girl who was having some difficulty controlling her pony during the halt. The other was a man. In any other circumstances he might not have drawn her attention. He was not exactly the Prince Charming type around which her youthful dreams were beginning to focus. He looked neither tall nor particularly muscular. His face was not remarkably handsome, nor his smile dazzling. In fact, he did not smile at all.

But looking at him idly, because he was the only real novelty in the scene below her, she was attracted by the grace and apparent ease with which he sat his horse. And she was impressed by the quiet way in which he went to the assistance of the little girl., "Oh, I can manage him perfectly well myself, George," the child said. "Don't fuss!"