The wood nymph

Chapter 1

JULY AND AUGUST

“Do stand still, Melissa," the Countess of Claymore said to her daughter. "Your ribbons are not tied properly in front. The bow is decidedly crooked."

"Whatever I do with it, Mama," the girl complained, "it is still askew just a few minutes later. I do believe Miss James was at fault when she made the dress. I wish we did not have to rely on rustic dressmakers. We are never fashionable."

"I do think Papa could take us to Harrogate occasionally," Lady Emily Wade agreed. "Surely twice a year would not be beyond our means, Mama. We have been stuck in the country here forever, and never meet anyone even remotely distinguished."

"There is nothing wrong with Miss James's workmanship," the countess said firmly. "It is merely that the ribbon has been tied wrongly, Melissa. Stand still and I shall retie it for you."

"Papa said that Mr. Mainwaring is very fashionable," Melissa said. "Perhaps he really will be, Emmy. Perhaps he will also be young and handsome. Papa said he is young, of course, but that could mean any age below fifty."

"I would not raise your hopes too high, Melly," her sister warned. "Have you ever known anyone both young and handsome to settle in this neighborhood?"

"No," Melissa agreed, "but that does not mean that one never will. We know that he is very rich, at least. He owns Graystone and Papa says that he owns a great deal of property in Scotland and the south of England as well. I think it would be most appropriate if he also turns out to be handsome."

"You are too romantic by half," Emily said scornfully. "If he is eligible, Melly, it is fitting that we should meet him. After all, we owe it to our positions in society to make suitable marriages before much more time has elapsed. And if Papa will not take us to a place of fashion, we shall have to make the most of what we have here."

"I have asked and asked Papa to take us all to London for a Season," the countess assured her daughters, "or to Harrogate at the very least. But he cannot take his horses and his dogs to London, you see, and you all know that hunting is the breath of life to your father."

"Mr. Mainwaring really is coming this afternoon, Mama, is he not?" Melissa asked anxiously. "Papa was quite definite about it?"

"Oh, yes," her mother said. "He has been in residence at Graystone for several days, you know, and has been called upon by most of our neighbors. Papa was the first to call, of course. It is time Mr. Mainwaring returned the calls, and he did assure Papa that he would wait upon us this afternoon. I really am most anxious to make his acquaintance, though I feel quite vexed that he has waited all these years to visit his property. We see little enough of good company as it is without a perfectly good estate remaining unoccupied by its master for several years."

"Perhaps it will give a more superior tone to the neighborhood to have Mr. Mainwaring among us," Emily said, "though he would sound a great deal more distinguished if he had a title."

"Pooh," her sister said, "a title is not important, Emmy. He is of impeccable lineage, Papa says."

"Anyway," the countess said decisively, "I want you all to look your best this afternoon. You are all remarkably fine girls, even if I do say so myself, and surely Mr. Mainwaring must show interest in one of you. Your new dress looks quite elegant, Melissa, now that the bow has been straightened. And your hair looks most becoming, Emily. You have had Matty dress it in a new style?"

"I consider it looks less frivolous than the old style," said Emily, turning her head first one way and then the other so that her mother could see the total effect. "After all, I am three-and-twenty already. Will it do for our visitor, do you think, Mama?"

"I am sure he will be most impressed," her mother replied. "And, Helen, when do you plan to dress for the visit?"

The countess's youngest daughter was sitting in the window seat, her head bent low over some embroidery. She looked up when her name was mentioned, a vacant expression in her eyes.

"What?" she asked.

The countess tutted impatiently. "Really, child," she said, "I suppose you have not heard a word of what we have been saying. How can you be in a room with other people and not know what is going on? I asked you when you plan to dress for our visitor."

"We are expecting visitors?" Helen asked in some alarm.

"Oh, Helen," Melissa said with a giggle, "you know we are expecting Mr. Mainwaring this afternoon. We have talked of little else for several days. And you know you are as interested as we are in discovering if he is young and handsome."

"Mr. Mainwaring?" said Helen, frowning slightly. "Is he the owner of Graystone who has recently arrived?"

"I declare, Helen," Emily said coldly, rising from her chair and crossing the room to her sister, "you live entirely in a world of your own. I think you have been indulged far too long. A child who daydreams can seem to be a sweet creature, but when you are approaching twenty years of age, it is time you learned to accept your social responsibilities."

"I am sorry, Emmy," Helen said, "but no one told me about Mr. Mainwaring. I do not wish to meet him, though. He has come from London, has he not? I would expect him to be very different from us and difficult to talk to."

Emily tutted and then put her hands on her hips as she looked down at her sister's embroidery. "Really, Helen!" she exclaimed. "Look at this, Mama. Helen is not following the pattern at all. She is supposed to be stitching dainty anemones, and instead she has embroidered a huge dandelion. A dandelion! How ridiculous you are. You will have to unpick the work, you know."

"Dandelions are the prettiest flowers I know," Helen said evenly, apparently undisturbed by her sister's outburst. "They are like the sun. It is their ugly leaves and stems that make people dislike them. I am tired of creating pretty, dainty things."

"There is no time for one of your arguments now," the countess said impatiently. "You must go upstairs immediately, child, and get ready. Mr. Mainwaring will be here within the hour."

"I will do as I am, Mama," Helen said, putting aside her embroidery and smoothing her skirt over her knees. "My dress is clean."

"You will not do at all, child," her mother said firmly. "Your new muslin will suit very nicely. And I shall send Matty up to try to do something with your hair." She sighed. "Why is it that it will hold into no style, Helen? No matter how carefully it is curled and confined with pins, a half-hour later you have a halo of fine hairs standing all around your head. I am sure you do not take after me."

"It really does not matter, Mama," Helen said placidly. "I am not intending to ensnare Mr. Mainwaring, you know."

"Your trouble is that you have forgotten that you are almost twenty years of age already," Emily said. "We must all be looking for husbands at every opportunity, Helen. It is our duty, you know."

The countess clapped her hands. "Helen, move!" she said. "And remember-it is to be the muslin."

"Yes, Mama," Helen said.

But when she was in her room, Helen did not immediately change her clothes. She wandered to the window and looked up at the sky. The clouds were low and heavy. They promised rain later. It looked like a chilly day for summer. Even so, the outdoors looked inviting. She gazed out across her father's fields to the east, to the large grove of trees that was just across the boundary from their land, on the land belonging to Mr. Mainwaring.

She had not been to her private place there for three whole days, and she was beginning to chafe against the restrictions of home. She knew that Emily was right. She was a grown woman now, and she should be taking an interest in the activities of womanhood. She should be interested in her appearance and in visiting and attending all the social activities that rural living could offer. She should be interested in finding an eligible husband. She should be joining wholeheartedly in the feminine chatter of her mother and her two older sisters. But, oh, she could not.

Her own world, the one she had built up through the years of her girlhood, was still far more attractive to her than she could imagine the real world ever being. Reading and painting and writing could still inspire her with more passion than the prospect of a new gown or a ball. And sitting and gazing at nature around her was infinitely more exciting than sitting in the drawing room listening to the polite conversation of her family and the current visitors. She found it all painfully boring and unsatisfying. If matters were left to her, they would never either visit or entertain.

She hated the prospect of having to sit through a visit by Mr. Mainwaring that afternoon. He was the owner of Graystone, the neighboring estate, and had been for some years, but he had never been there before. Now he had arrived from London and was being made much of by everyone within a ten-mile radius. She had no right to judge someone she had never met, of course, but she had taken a strong dislike to the man. He doubtless thought a great deal of himself. She could almost picture him looking down the length of an aristocratic nose at all the rustics in this out-of-the-way corner of Yorkshire. If he was from London, he was probably a dandy and a man of frivolous tastes. She seemed to remember Papa saying that he was a fashionable man.

She knew what the visit would be like. Papa would be there, but he would not say much. He never did. Papa had really only two topics of conversation: horses and hunting. If it happened that Mr. Mainwaring had little interest in these, then Papa would have nothing at all to say. The conversation would be left to Mama and the girls. Mama would be slyly hinting at the various accomplishments of her daughters-she was bound to have Emily sing for the visitor. And Emily would be more than usually dignified, trying to impress the man with her breeding and maturity. And Melissa would be silly, and would use wiles to try to draw compliments from the unsuspecting visitor.

Helen had seen it all before. She loved them all, of course. They were her family. But she had never been able to understand why they could not behave naturally in the presence of gentlemen. Why must every single man be seen as a matrimonial prospect? Was there nothing more in life for a woman than to find a husband? It seemed that she was the odd one, though, to imagine that there must be something else. Mama and the girls appeared to accept the necessity of matrimony without question, and so did all the other girls and mamas of Helen's acquaintance.

She turned sharply as the door to her room opened.

"Oh, Matty," she said. "I am not ready to have my hair done yet. I shall ring when I need you."

The girl curtsied and left the room again.

Helen still stared at the closed door. She could not face that visit. She could not get herself all dressed up like a sacrificial offering and be polite all afternoon to a man she was sure to despise. She could not. She turned her head to glance again in the direction of that beckoning grove of trees and up to the sky, which was still holding its rain. Then she rushed over to her closet and dragged out her moss-green velvet riding habit and her black leather boots.

They would scold all evening, she told herself as she changed quickly into the chosen garments. Mama would talk about duty, and Papa would threaten to lock her in her room without supper. Emily would remind her that at her age she should have a stronger sense of family duty. But she would prefer all that to an afternoon of confinement with Mr. Mainwaring. Even the name she disliked. He sounded stuffy.

She picked up her riding whip from a corner of the closet and let herself quietly out of the room. A quick glance to left and right assured her that there was no one in sight. She ran lightly to the servants' staircase at the back of the house and quickly down to the back entrance. A few minutes later, Helen was emerging from the stables, seated sidesaddle on her horse. She took him around behind the house and headed for the fields to the east. She did not look back as she spurred the horse to a gallop. She would think of the scolding later.

William Mainwaring saw Helen go as he rode slowly up the driveway to the Earl of Claymore's home. She was certainly able to handle her horse well, whoever she was, he thought. For one envious moment he wished he could join her or at least gallop away on his own flight to freedom. But he was bound to make this visit, the first of many. His neighbors had been attentive in the five days since his arrival at Graystone and he appreciated their kindness. It was not their fault that he was of a reserved, unsociable nature.

Even so, Mainwaring drew his horse to a stop and gazed at the figure in green as she galloped across a field to the east. Melissa was destined to be pleased by his appearance. He was a good-looking man, tall and straight in the saddle, his hair dark and quite long beneath his hat, his face thin and almost austere in expression, yet handsome for all that.

It was strange really, he supposed, that he had been surprised by everyone's attentiveness. He should have learned a year before that a new arrival in a neighborhood was bound to arouse interest and speculation among the families for miles around. It was the home of his childhood and younger manhood that had been the strange one. He had grown up in the Scottish home of his maternal grandfather with almost only the old man and a rather crusty elderly housekeeper for company. They had had virtually no contact with their neighbors and had participated in no social activities. Even when they had gone to church on Sundays they had never lingered to talk with other members of the congregation.

Nothing had changed even when his grandfather had died. He had been one-and-twenty at the time, and he had spent eight more years there, almost totally alone. He had been so used to it, he supposed, that his youth was gone before he had begun to wonder what the outside world had to offer. He was a wealthy man, both as his grandfather's heir and in his own right. He had properties both in the north and in the south of England. He really should visit both.

But first he had gone to London and had lived there for a few weeks in something like shock. He really had not known how to take his rightful place in society. He had found it very difficult to converse with people or to relax and be at his ease. Had he not struck up a conversation with Robert Denning, Marquess of Hetherington, at White's one rainy afternoon, he might well have returned to Scotland and become as much of a hermit as his grandfather had been. Hetherington was his opposite in personality. He was as sunny-natured and as gregarious as Mainwaring was reserved and antisocial. Yet for some reason they had become immediate and fast friends.

Hetherington had gone with him to his southern property, Ferndale, along with a few other acquaintances with whom he had learned to be comfortable. And there he had had his first experience of the kind of welcome a new member of a community could expect to receive. He and his houseguests had become involved in a constant round of activities. Invitations had been endless. And he had enjoyed it all, surprising himself with the sense of belonging that he had felt almost from the beginning.

He might have settled there at Ferndale had it not been for that unhappy experience with Elizabeth. She had been a paid companion at the time, but he had been instantly attracted to her quiet charm and tranquil manner. It was only when he was already in love with her, he was sure, that he had realized just how beautiful she was too. It was only then, too, that he had discovered that by some bizarre twist of fate she was the estranged wife of his friend Hetherington. It still seemed impossible, even now, to believe that such a thing could actually have happened.

In his innocence he had not recognized the fact that love still existed between those two. Although Elizabeth had told him that she still loved her husband, he had tried to persuade her to let Robert divorce her so that she might marry him. Hetherington was no longer at Ferndale at the time. And she had agreed, though he realized now that her acquiescence had been a muddled and unhappy one. So, like a knight crusader, he had ridden off to ask Hetherington for the simple matter of a divorce for his wife.

Mainwaring took one hand from the reins of his horse and ran it along his jaw. He could almost feel that first unexpected punch that Hetherington had thrown in the middle of the drawing room of Hetherington Manor. They had fought doggedly and silently for several minutes before the butler and Robert's secretary had rushed into the room to pull them apart. Hetherington's voice had been cold and expressionless afterward when they were straightening their clothes and wiping blood from mouths and noses.

"Elizabeth is my wife and will remain so, Mainwaring," he had said. "You had best forget her. I will not tolerate your touching her, and if I find that you have already done so, I shall kill you, my friend."

Mainwaring had left without another word, and he had seen neither one of them since. It was not that he was afraid of Hetherington's threats. Rather, he was a man of high principle. If his erstwhile friend chose to claim his wife, he had every right to do so. Mainwaring himself must not interfere.

He had never been back to Ferndale. He had spent the winter and the spring in London, though he had not involved himself to any large extent in the social life there. He had tried to adjust himself to the first real setback that life had offered him. He had never loved before. Indeed, he had had almost nothing to do with women before. Consequently, when he had fallen in love, he had fallen hard. And he had found that it was impossible to forget Elizabeth. He would love her all his life. No other woman could possibly mean anything to him.

Instead of dismounting at the entrance to the earl's house, Mainwaring rode on to the stables. He should have expected the welcome he had been given at Graystone, then. Perhaps its closeness to Scotland had led him to expect that he would have quiet and privacy here. But maybe it was as well that matters had turned out this way. Shy as he was, he really did not wish to be a hermit. He had learned to value the few friends he had made since leaving Scotland, though he had permanently lost the two dearest friends he had had. He had heard since leaving Ferndale that they were together again, Robert and Elizabeth Denning, though he had not tried to contact them.

Being here at Graystone was more unnerving than being at Ferndale had been the year before, though. Here he was alone. The burden of the conversation would be on him. He dreaded the prospect. The earl had said that he had a wife and daughters-Mainwaring could not remember how many. And he had no idea of their ages or matrimonial status.

Having turned his horse over to the care of a groom in the earl's stables, Mainwaring checked the folds of his neckcloth and fall of lace over the backs of his hands and strode across to the main door. There was no point in delaying the moment any longer. Perhaps the next visit would be easier, once he had got through this one.

A stream wound its way through the dense trees and wild undergrowth that formed the western border of William Mainwaring's property. It gurgled past some large stones that had somehow embedded themselves along its path, and it played with some leaves and twigs, which had fallen from the trees that overhung its waters, twirling them, stranding them against a stone for a few teasing minutes, and then carrying them onward again. Most of the trees were old and gnarled, uncared for. But the very wildness of the scene had its charm.

At some time in the past, a gamekeeper's hut had been built in a small clearing on the bank of the stream. There had been no gamekeeper employed for many years, and the hut was old and dilapidated. The wooden walls and roof were bleached and weathered; the door hung crookedly on its hinges and had been wedged shut at an awkward angle. Long grass and weeds grew up all around it, and there was only the faintest trace of the path that had been worn to its door.

Yet Lady Helen Wade was clearly familiar with the scene. She entered the clearing on foot and walked without hesitation to the hut. She wrestled with the door for only a few moments before it swung open with a loud squeak. Clearly she was accustomed to its awkwardness. She disappeared inside.

A few minutes later a completely different young lady emerged from the hut. This girl wore a shapeless cotton dress, which was too short for her. It reached barely to her ankles. It covered her to the neck, but its sleeves, which were meant to reach the wrists, ended just below the elbows. It had been washed and bleached so many times that it was almost impossible to say which shade of blue or green it had once been. Light tawny hair fell in loose and tangled curls over her shoulders and partway down her back. The girl was barefoot. In one hand she held a leather-bound book.

Helen crossed to the stream and stood staring down at its moving waters. She tested the water with the toes of one foot and seemed to be satisfied with her findings. She lowered herself immediately to the thick grass of the bank, hitched her skirt almost to the knees, and lowered both feet into the water. She swished them around for a while, enjoying the delightful coolness after the confined heat of her boots.

She looked around her at the wildflowers that were almost lost in the long grass, at the heavy summer foliage of her favorite tree, the old oak, which grew close to the bank, and up to the sky, which still swirled with heavy clouds. She breathed deeply of the heavy summer scents of it all and closed her eyes with a smile of satisfaction. Oh yes, it would be worth every moment of that scolding she was bound to be subjected to.

Finally Helen opened her book, a much coveted copy of Mr. Wordsworth and Mr. Coleridge's Lyrical Ballads. Soon her mind was in a totally different world, a world

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

Everything was forgotten: her feet gradually growing colder and colder in the water, the grass and trees around her, the clouds growing heavier with the promised rain, her father's drawing room where the rest of the family was gathered, and Mr. Mainwaring.

Chapter 2

“A ladies' man," said the Earl of Claymore.

"A most genteel sort of a man," said the countess, "though his manners are a little stiff."

"Very handsome," sighed Lady Melissa Wade, "with those brown eyes and that dark hair. And so very tall!"

"Toplofty!" said Lady Emily Wade decisively. "The man thinks himself superior just because he has acquired some town bronze."

Helen heard all four opinions of Mr. Mainwaring during dinner that evening. Their new neighbor dominated the conversation, even if the opinion of him was not altogether favorable. She gathered that he had not shown sufficient interest in her father's talk of horses and hunting. It was shocking enough for even a lady to admit to the earl that she had never hunted and, indeed, even disapproved of the sport'. But for a man to do so was clearly a testimony of his basic effeminacy. Mr. Mainwaring had even dared to express sympathy for the fox!

"It is surely not unmanly to hate killing for the sake of killing, is it, Papa?" Helen was unwise enough to ask.

"We all know your strange views, child," he grumbled. "Can't think where you acquired them. Certainly not in this house. I am certainly thankful you did not turn out to be the son I hoped for. I should not be able to hold up my head in the neighborhood. Feeling sorry for the poor fox, indeed! The animal is a nuisance, child, with no right to live. Its only use in life is to provide pleasure to the hunter."

Helen nodded her head to the footman who was offering her wine. She did not this time answer her father. There was no point in doing so. It was always useless to try to discuss any topic with him. He took any disagreement with his opinion as a personal affront. But she did find herself warming unwillingly to the neighbor whose acquaintance she had avoided during the afternoon. The man could not be all bad if he had the courage to oppose blood sports in an age when the willingness to hunt was a badge of manhood.

She soon understood the differing opinions of her sisters. Emily had sung for him, accompanying herself on the pianoforte. She was generally accounted the best musician for miles around. No entertainment was complete without a musical selection from the eldest Lady Wade. But Mr. Mainwaring had not appeared suitably impressed. He had apparently nodded his approval and complimented Emily on the song, but he had kept his seat and he had not smiled. And he had committed the unforgivable sin of expressing interest in Melissa's watercolors when Mama had mentioned them to him. And he had spent all of five minutes with his head bent over the pictures after the younger sister had been sent to fetch them.

But Helen could not escape indefinitely the scold that she had known was coming.

"I did not take kindly to your absenting yourself this afternoon, child," the countess said, fixing Helen with a severe eye. "You knew very well that we were expecting a visitor, and you know that I sent you upstairs for the express purpose of getting ready. You are no longer a schoolgirl. You are expected to do your duty as an adult member of this family, just like the rest of us."

"Maybe if I took a strap to you, you would learn to heed your mama," the earl added. "I can't think where you disappear to half the time, Helen, but you had better not let me ever find out that you have left our land or mixed with any company beneath your station."

Helen lowered her eyes to her plate and ate steadily through the next few minutes while the scold proceeded. She was used to it. She had heard the same complaints and the same threats many times. But she could not feel sorry that she had not stayed for Mr. Mainwaring's visit. She would have been dreadfully bored and she would doubtless have been called upon to show him her embroidery. She would have had to endure the sight of his lip curling in disdain when he saw that dandelion. No one ever understood her vision of life. No one could see beyond prettiness to the true beauty all around them. She did not regret her afternoon spent in an area that most would consider wild and quite worthless.

William Mainwaring spent the next two days getting to know his own property. His estate manager had worked there for years and had clearly done a good job. The land was prosperous, the tenants contented. Although he had never visited the place before, Mainwaring had always meticulously examined every report he received from his various properties. He was satisfied with this man and saw no reason now to begin to interfere. He contented himself, then, with wandering around, sometimes alone, sometimes with the manager, looking and listening. He enjoyed meeting his tenants, most of whom treated him with marked friendliness, having found him to be a generous and a just man, even though he had always been an absentee.

By the afternoon of the second day, there was only one part of the estate that he had not explored. It was the dense wood that ran almost the complete length of the west side of his property. There had used to be a gamekeeper there, the manager had explained, until it became obvious that there was no longer enough game in the area to keep the man busy. The previous owner had once considered clearing the trees away so that the land might be cultivated, but it would have been too huge an undertaking. The trees were large and old. There was a great deal of undergrowth. And even if the task could be accomplished, it was doubtful that it would have proved to be worthwhile. A stream meandered through the woods. Its presence would complicate the matter of cultivating the reclaimed land. The scheme had been abandoned.

Mainwaring was glad. He welcomed a place that was likely to give him some privacy. If his neighbors continued to be as attentive as they had been thus far, he would be thankful to have a private place to which to escape, a place where he could be alone with his own thoughts occasionally. Not that he resented the visits of his neighbors. In fact, he was touched by the friendliness of most of those who called and by the flood of invitations he had already received. It was just that he had not expected it.

He needed solitude on this particular afternoon. He had had a completely unexpected letter that morning from the Marquess of Hetherington. It had been a painful experience breaking the seal, knowing from whom the letter had come. They were in Sussex for the summer awaiting the already overdue birth of their first child. Mainwaring had put down the letter at that point, finding that his hand was shaking. When he took it up again, it was to find that this was by no means the first letter Robert had sent him. Others had gone to Ferndale, to Mainwaring's former address in London, even to White's Club. Both Hetherington and Elizabeth had been puzzled and a little hurt by his silence.

"We keep telling ourselves that perhaps these letters have not reached you," the marquess had written, "and we cling to the hope that this is so, because we do not like to think what your silence might mean otherwise. However, Prosser called on us a few days ago while on a journey west and we have finally discovered from him exactly where you may be found. You can have no idea how elusive you are, my friend.

"Let me repeat yet again what I have written in every letter to you. Both Elizabeth and I grieve over the lapse in our friendship and both of us have a very real sense of our own guilt. Can you forgive me for the way I treated you when we last met? I have long been sensible of the fact-indeed, I knew it even at the time -that your intentions were perfectly honorable and your behavior above reproach. I can excuse myself only with the explanation that I was an extremely jealous husband.

"What I should have explained, of course, is that I loved Elizabeth perhaps more than was good for me at the time. Fortunately, I later discovered that she returned my feelings equally and that the whole of our separation had been caused by a ghastly misunderstanding. We both feel that we owe you this much of an explanation, though the details, of course, are known only to my wife and myself. Elizabeth herself wishes to write to you. She feels, I know, that she treated you with less than complete honor. But she values your friendship as do I, my friend."

The letter went on to explain that they were planning to be in London for the winter, but that it was likely that they would return to Sussex as soon as next spring came, though it would mean missing the Season. Both he and Elizabeth preferred life in the country and they felt it would be better for their child to live there. They wanted William to visit them in London, if he would not find the meeting too painful. They wanted to be given the chance to show him that they still considered him to be their dearest friend.

Mainwaring was badly shaken by the letter. He had accustomed himself to the unhappiness of having lost these two friends. He had always convinced himself that he had been the guilty party, deliberately trying to come between a man and his lawful wife. And he had reconciled himself to the belief that he would never see Elizabeth again, although he would love her all his life.

Now he discovered that in fact Hetherington had been trying to contact him for most of the past year and that they both still valued his friendship. They wanted him to visit them.

He did not know how he felt about it all. The knowledge that they were not still angry with him, that they had not deliberately cut the acquaintance, was remarkably soothing. Yet he was cautious. Elizabeth had been a friend, yes, a very dear friend, one to whom he could talk at his ease. But far more than that, she had been the woman he loved, the woman he still loved. Could he see her again without showing that she still meant a great deal more to him than she should? Could he invite such personal pain? Could he bear to see her with Hetherington, to see the love that they clearly felt for each other? Could he bear to see their child, when once he had dreamed that she would bear his children?

He wandered toward the wood on foot, taking the letter with him. He must reply, and soon. But he did not know exactly what he would say.

Helen had managed to slip away for the afternoon. Mama and the girls were going on a round of visits, mainly to boast of the news that they were to entertain Mr. Mainwaring for dinner, she suspected. It had not been difficult to avoid being made a member of the party. It was becoming an accepted fact that she did not participate with any regularity in the afternoon social rituals of the neighborhood. She rather believed that her own family welcomed her absence. She did not offer much support in the conversations anyway.

She had already shed her riding habit and was dressed in the shabby old cotton dress again. One day soon, she knew, the garment was going to fail to pieces around her and she would have to find something else to wear when she wished to be totally comfortable and free. But she hated to think of its happening. She had worn the dress since she was in the schoolroom, first as a day dress, and later when it became too short for her, as a painting smock to save her good dress from the splatters of paint that were inevitable when she began work.

She intended painting that afternoon. But painting for Helen did not necessarily mean dragging out easel, paper, and paints and setting to work to produce a picture. Sometimes it could mean doing nothing for a whole afternoon but observing. And that was the case on this particular afternoon. She had decided to paint the stream. But having set herself that task, she realized that she had never really seen it at all. It would have been easy ten years before or even more recently than that. Children always took for granted that water was blue. Her brightest blue paint would have been pulled out and in no time at all she would have had a satisfactory blue streak across the paper.

But, Helen realized, standing barefoot on the bank and gazing down at the water which flowed past, it was not blue at all. The realization would not have been so bad perhaps if she could have satisfied herself that it was gray or brown or gold or silver or any other color. The truth was that it was all those colors. And yet it was none of them. When she stooped down and scooped some drops into her palm, she found that they were completely colorless. And the water looked quite different from this close than it had looked a moment ago from the doorway of the hut. She looked up. Would it look different again from the branches of the old oak tree, which she had climbed many times? She hitched her skirts and climbed up to see.

Ten minutes later, Helen was back on the bank of the stream, lying on her stomach, her face propped up on her hands and suspended over the water. Her feet, crossed at the ankles, were waving in the air above bent knees. She was observing with all her senses. When she finally came to paint the scene, she wanted to be able to feel the water from the inside. She wanted to reproduce all the colors and shades, all the movement and life that were engrossing her full attention now. How wonderful nature wasl How could she possibly reproduce any of it with her brush without simplifying it beyond all meaning?

Her legs stopped moving suddenly and her back stiffened. She could feel prickles along her spine. There was something behind her. She had heard nothing, but she felt a presence very strongly. She hardly dared turn her head. Heaven knew what kind of vicious beast might be there just waiting to pounce at her smallest movement. She turned her head and glanced cautiously over one shoulder.

A man was leaning one shoulder against a tree some distance away, arms folded, watching her. She knew at a glance that he was Mr. Mainwaring. This was his land, after all, and one could hardly expect to find another strange and fashionable young man wandering in this particular area, especially when the young man was tall and dark. Yes, and handsome. Melly had been quite right. Helen did not move. She just continued to look.

Helen could feel her face flushing. She felt horribly embarrassed to be caught thus, in this position and in these clothes. She, Lady Helen Wade!

"Is it a wood nymph?" he asked. "Or is it human?"

"Oh," she said, and rolled over onto her knees, "you did startle me. I thought you were a wild boar at the very least." In self-protection, almost without realizing she did so, she used the North Country accent that the servants always used, instead of talking in her own voice.

He raised his eyebrows and moved forward to stand beside her on the bank, looking down into the water. "It is a lovely spot you have chosen," he said. "Do you make it a habit to come into the woods?"

"They are yours, are they not?" she said. "Would you mind if I said that I come here often?" She sat back on her heels the better to look up at him.

He smiled, and the expression completely transformed his rather austere features, she found. He stooped down on his haunches. "Do you like to be alone sometimes too?" he asked. "Or do you have the evil intention of burning my woods to the ground one of these days?"

"I like it here," she said, her cheeks still aflame. "This is my own special place, and if you were to forbid me to come, I should have to disobey you."

He chuckled. "Well, you are honest at least," he said. "And tell me, what is it you have to escape from? What are you supposed to be doing at this moment?"

Helen gazed back into his dark eyes, on a level with her own, her mind fast inventing a story that would sound plausible. But he went on to answer his own question.

"You should be helping at home, is that it?" he asked. "Baking bread, or doing the family wash, or scrubbing the floors, or some other activity that is supposed to keep females happy?"

"Yes," she said vaguely, and she began to feel her heartbeat return to normal. "I slip away whenever I am able."

"And suffer later, I suppose," he said, and smiled again. "Who are you?"

"Nell, sir," she replied with only a moment's hesitation.

"And you have only one name, Nell?" he asked. "But no matter. That is enough. It is a pretty name. It suits you, wood nymph. What were you doing when I came upon you?"

"Learning water," she said earnestly.

"Learning water?"

"Yes," she said. "Tell me if you can, without looking, what color is water?"

He looked amused. "Blue sometimes," he said. "Sometimes green or gray. It depends upon the sky."

"But what if it is not exposed to the sky?" she asked. "What if there are trees?"

"Then perhaps brown or green," he said.

"You are right," she said excitedly. "All your answers are right all of the time. And yet you missed light and shade and movement and all the differing tones of the colors you named."

"Indeed?" he said. "You intrigue me." But he was amused, teasing, Helen could see.

"Look," she said. She became so engrossed in her subject that her embarrassment of a few minutes before and her awareness of the impropriety of her appearance and behavior were forgotten. She rolled Over onto her stomach again and leaned over the water. "Look and tell me what you see."

He followed her example and stretched out beside her. "What do I see?" he asked. "Let me consider a moment. Ah, yes. I see a wood nymph with lots of fair hair and large gray eyes. She looks just like you."

Helen laughed with delight. "You will not believe me, will you?" she said. "It is true, though, as you will see if you but take the time to observe. There is a great deal to learn about water."

"Yes," he said more seriously, "you are quite right, Nell. Many times one thinks that one sees nature and appreciates its beauty. But most of the time our senses but scratch the surface."

"Oh, you do understand!" Helen exclaimed, turning a glowing face to him. "Most people think I have windmills in my head when I talk that way. You like to be alone too, do you not? Is that why you came here? Or did you merely feel that you must explore every part of your property?"

"You know who I am then?" he said. "But I suppose it is common knowledge in the village that I have come at last."

"Oh, yes," she said. "Everyone knows, sir."

William Mainwaring sat up on the bank and looked around him. "That hut must belong to the gamekeeper who used to be employed here," he said. "I wonder if he left anything inside."

"Oh, no, he did not," Helen said quickly, catching at his arm as he made to rise. "There is nothing at all inside, sir, and the door is stuck."

He looked at her and the amusement was there in his eyes again. "Nell," he said, "you are lying to me. Why must I not look inside?"

She blushed. "Please," she said, "I use it sometimes. I do not do any harm. Such a ramshackle building cannot be of any use to you, can it? Please do not go inside."

He relaxed into a sitting position again. "Well, wood nymph," he said, "are you allowed to accept gifts from gentlemen? I hereby make you a present of the gamekeeper's hut and I shall never trespass without a personal invitation. Will that make you happy?"

"You are very kind," she said earnestly.

They looked at each other in silence for several moments, without embarrassment. Each was assessing the other.

William Mainwaring finally got to his feet and brushed grass from his buckskin breeches. "I must be going, wood nymph," he said. "I shall leave you alone to learn water."

"Good-bye, sir," she said, "and thank you for the present. It is one of the most precious I have ever received."

He laughed. "Au revoir, Nell," he said.

William Mainwaring found that he was still smiling as he walked through the woods in the direction of home. The letter from Hetherington lay in his pocket forgotten for the moment. What a delightful little creature! She really did seem more wood nymph than woman. Learning water, indeed! Now, what did she keep in the gamekeeper's hut that was so important? he wondered. It had sounded as if she came often to the place.

She must have indulgent parents if she was allowed to escape the day's chores without punishment. Perhaps, though, she thought the punishment an acceptable exchange for a few hours of freedom. In fact, maybe it was not parents she was escaping. Perhaps it was a husband. He did not think she was as young as he had at first thought her. She did not seem married, though.

Helen was still sitting on the bank of the stream, hugging her knees. She was no longer studying the water. She was gazing across at the trees on the opposite bank. The man was not at all as she had expected. He certainly looked every inch the proper gentleman, and his face in repose was severe. But there was warmth and humor in him, and an understanding of what depths were in nature for those who cared to observe. She liked him. Yes, she thought, her eyes widening in surprise, she liked Mr. Mainwaring. She could never remember liking any man before, and precious few women.

But what a coil! She had deliberately deceived him into thinking she was a village wench. She had talked with that accent all through their conversation and she had not contradicted the suggestions he had made about what she should be doing that afternoon. Her appearance, of course, would have completely deceived him. The dress, her loose, tangled hair, her feet and legs bare to above the ankles-none of them would betray her true status.

What was she to do when he discovered her real identity? What an embarrassment it would be! Would he look at her with amusement as he had done a few times that afternoon? Or would it be with disgust that a lady could have appeared and acted as she had done? Either way, it was going to be hard to face him. That evening! Of course, he was to dine with them that evening. Helen groaned and put her forehead down onto her raised knees. She couldn't. She just couldn't face him, least of all with Mama and Papa and her sisters looking on. Why, oh why, had she not simply revealed her identity immediately?

The afternoon was clearly ruined, she thought, getting to her feet and crossing with lagging footsteps to the old hut. Her hut. Her precious gift! A slow smile lit up her face. She was going to have to think of some course of action, and fast.

Chapter 3

It was five days later before Helen was able to return to her private place in the woods, the longest absence she could remember since she had started to go there two years before. It seemed that everything conspired against her.

First of all, she had to play sick for the whole of a glorious midsummer day. She had feigned a headache on the night when Mr. Mainwaring had been invited to dinner, and Helen never had headaches. She had finally convinced the whole family after wandering around the house frowning and clutching her temples for more than an hour and had been packed off to bed with lavender water and vinaigrette, warm milk, and a hot brick for her feet. Mama herself had come to bathe her temples with the lavender water.

"Poor child," she had said. "I do hope you are not going to become a martyr to the migraines as Emily and I are. You lie there and do not worry about a thing. I shall make your excuses to our guests. It is provoking that yet again you will miss Mr. Mainwaring, though. Such a gentlemanly man, and just the person for one of you girls. Of course, I believe he already favors Melissa, but he has not yet met you, child, and you can be quite prettily behaved when you set your mind to it."

Helen moaned and her mother leaned over her and kissed her forehead. "There, there," she said soothingly, "you go to sleep now, child."

Helen had felt very guilty after her mother had left. Mama did not often treat her with such gentleness. It seemed unfair to have won sympathy through a deception. She had sat up in bed and clasped her knees. It was all very pointless anyway, this feigned illness. She would not be able to avoid meeting Mr. Mainwaring forever. Sooner or later he would know that Lady Helen Wade ran around in the woods in rags that barely covered her decently and spent her time doing undignified things like lying on her stomach by a stream, bare legs waving in the air.

Perhaps it would have been easier to have dressed for dinner and met him after all. She could have put on her very best chilly manner, the one she used with that horrid Oswald Pyke, who fancied himself such a ladies' man. Mr. Mainwaring would not dare look at her with contempt if she treated him so. Helen had sighed. Truth to tell, it was not so much the embarrassment of having her identity revealed to Mr. Mainwaring that bothered her. It was more the ending of an intriguing situation that she could not bear to see. She wanted to meet him again in the woods, just to see if her first impression of him was correct. She did not know that he would come ever again, of course, but she was almost sure he would.

Mama insisted on fussing over her all of the next day, too, the day when the weather was so glorious. And she could not even read a book or write in the journal where she kept copious notes on all her thoughts and feelings. Melissa kept tiptoeing into the room and gazing solicitously at her, and asking in a stage whisper if there were anything she could do. It was all very touching and preyed heavily on her conscience.

And then for two whole days it had rained, the sort of fine misty rain that soaked one's clothes and one's hair and seemed to get right through to one's skin and even under the skin. It was the sort of weather in which it was impossible to remain cheerful.

Helen had shut herself into the music room for much of the first day and hammered out a tune on the piano. She knew the piece without the music. She always learned by heart the music that she liked, so that she could then close her eyes to play and learn to feel the melody. She was not content to sit back and listen to the music she produced. She wanted to be inside it. The result was not necessarily what the composer had had in mind when he wrote, but it was marginally satisfying to Helen. Not totally satisfying. She was never quite sure that she was there inside the music. But then, she was not certain that she wanted to be. Perhaps it would lose its fascination if she ever felt that she understood it completely.

That activity was stopped abruptly when her mother appeared in the room and suggested very gently that such violent playing would only bring about a recurrence of her headache. Helen had no choice but to meekly agree.

Sunday came finally and it was necessary to go to church. Helen always looked forward to the outing. She was not at all interested in the bonnet parade, which seemed to be the chief interest of most of the female part of the congregation, or in the game of attracting more admiring male glances than any other young lady present. Helen loved the building and the ritual of the service.

The church was ridiculously large for such a small village. It was never more than one-third full, though everyone within a five-mile radius came on Sunday mornings, come rain or shine. But to Helen its very size was its attraction. It was a cold stone building, uncomfortably cool even in the height of summer. Its Gothic doorway and stained-glass windows, its high arched ceiling all reached toward heaven. She loved to see the vicar in his vestments. Dull, ordinary Vicar Brayley became in church a figure of great dignity, and his voice, hesitant and monotonous during conversation, took on power and authority when he read from the Bible or chanted a psalm.

On this particular Sunday she was not so eager to go. Mr. Mainwaring was bound to be there. He would see her, and her humiliation would be very public. Miraculously, though, he did not see her, not to recognize, anyway. She wore her bonnet that had lace piled on the crown and she pulled the lace down over her face when they went into the church. He was indeed there but sat at some distance from the earl's family. After the service was over, Helen made an undignified bolt for her father's carriage while the rest of the congregation stood around in groups for fully twenty minutes.

"I was afraid that the sunshine would bring back my headache," she explained feebly when the rest of her family joined her.

"And what on earth were you doing with the lace from your bonnet all down around your face?" Emily asked. "You did look a fright, Helen. You looked as if you were in deep mourning, except that the hat is blue and not black. I was quite mortified to be seen sitting in the same pew as you."

"Mr. Mainwaring must think you quite a freak," Melissa added. "You ran away like a frightened rabbit, Helen. You will have us all thinking that you are afraid to meet the man for some reason." She turned to her older sister. "Mr. Mainwaring has offered to take me driving this afternoon, Emmy."

Helen wished suddenly that she had walked home instead of waiting twenty minutes in a stifling carriage.

And so it was Monday afternoon before Helen finally managed to escape to the woods again'. She changed into her cotton dress, loosened her hair, kicked off her shoes, and pulled off her stockings. She wanted to read; she wanted to write; she wanted to paint. But she would do none of these things. If Mr. Mainwaring came, he would know immediately that she was no village wench if she had a book or a brush in her hand. And she wanted him to come. She had tried to tell herself all morning that she wished to come here merely so that she could be alone and free from the fetters of her life again. But she wanted to see him.

She paced the bank of the stream, dangled her feet in the water, twirled around the trunk of a tree, and finally climbed the branches of the old oak tree, which had been created for that purpose. She wedged herself high up, her back against the sturdy trunk, her knees drawn up, and her feet resting on a branch. She watched and watched for him. And finally she looked up and became absorbed in the pattern the branches and the leaves made against the sky, and in the changing face of the wide blue expanse above her as wisps of cloud scudded across it.

It had not been an easy week for William Mainwaring. He had read and reread the letter from Hetherington, feeling alternately comforted that they still wished to be his friends, and yet hurt to know that they were apparently happy together, that they were expecting a child. The child had probably been born already, in fact. In some ways it might have been better never to have known how their marriage was progressing. He had to feel happy for Elizabeth. After all, he loved her, and love could never be a wholly selfish emotion. And he had known even when he planned to marry her himself that she loved Robert. He was glad for her that her story had had a happy ending at last. But his own pain was not therefore lessened.

He loved her still. The longing only became stronger with time, in fact. He dreamed frequently of what it would be like now to live at Graystone with Elizabeth as his wife. With her perhaps he could enjoy the social life of the neighborhood, which he was finding something.of an ordeal. There were several families here that he could like if only he had her with him to please them with her warm charm and her never-failing ability to converse with even the dullest person.

He had finally written back two days after receiving the letter. It was a reply that accepted unconditionally the renewed offer of friendship and that accepted a full measure of blame for the unpleasantness that had happened in the past. He congratulated them on the expected birth. But the letter was noncommittal about their invitation. He could not yet contemplate the thought of seeing them, of knowing beyond a doubt that he was nothing more than a friend to the Marchioness of Hetherington.

Mainwaring made an effort to appear agreeable to his neighbors, most of whom had devised some entertainment for his benefit. He had even forced himself to invite Lady Melissa Wade to go driving with him after church on Sunday. It was true that he had been almost maneuvered into doing so when she had answered with alacrity the question he had put to her father about the best direction to take if one wanted to see some attractive countryside. But even so, he did not try to avoid the excursion. He must somehow force himself to live on, he supposed, and the girl at least was willing to do most of the talking with only the occasional prompting from him.

He had still not met the youngest of the earl's daughters. It seemed almost as if she were avoiding him, though he could not imagine why she would do so. A few of his new acquaintances, though, had hinted that the girl was "strange," something of an eccentric. If only she knew how little she had to fear from him.

Always through the week his thoughts came back to the little wood nymph. After a few days it was difficult even to believe that she had been real. How delightful it must be to belong to the lower classes, with nothing to worry about but the day's chores. The girl had seemed so free from care. He constantly felt himself resisting the urge to go back to the woods to see if she was there, and to see if his first impression would remain. Perhaps if he saw her again, she would appear merely dull or vulgar.

He did not wish to go. It would not do to become involved in any way with a girl of a different class. Mainwaring had always frowned heavily on those men – and there were many-who felt that women of a lower class were theirs for the taking, that virtue counted for nothing if the female were not a lady. He had never been able to bring himself to use even a dancer or a prostitute. He could see them too clearly as women, persons, who at some time had been down on their luck and forced to sell the only commodity that was wholly theirs. His little wood nymph should be left alone to enjoy whatever solitary pleasures she gained from her "special place," as she had called it.

Yet he found that by the Monday he could no longer stay away. He needed to be alone, he told himself. It was a beautiful day and a walk would do him good. She would probably not be there anyway. After all, it could not be easy for a girl to get away from home in the middle of the day. But it was a pretty place, her spot by the stream. He would go and see it again.

At first he thought that she was not there. There was no one today leaning over the stream studying the colors and movement of the water. He tried to convince himself that he was not at all disappointed. And then he saw her, perched high up in an oak tree, apparently perfectly relaxed, not clinging for safety by so much as a single hand. She was gazing upward, quite unaware of his presence.

William Mainwaring smiled with genuine amusement. He had to quell the desire to laugh outright.

"Hello, wood nymph," he called. "Are you learning sky today, or is it branches?"

She looked down. "You are mocking me," she said. "If you were up here, you would see that the clouds are moving fast across the sky, but it is not windy here. Is not that extraordinary? Do you imagine there is a gale blowing up there?"

"I can only be thankful that there is no gale down here," he said. "You would be blown out of the tree like a leaf in autumn."

"Nonsense," she replied. "I am perfectly safe. I have climbed this tree a thousand times or more."

"Wood nymph!" he said. His voice was almost a caress. "Would you please humor a poor earth-bound mortal and come down from there?"

He marveled at how surefooted she was as she descended quickly. She must be very used to walking in bare feet, he thought, if she did not hurt them against the bark of the tree. He held up his arms when she reached the lowest branch.

"Let me help you," he said.

"I have jumped it safely a thousand times," she replied, but she put her hands on his shoulders and allowed him to swing her to the ground.

She looked delightfully wild, he thought, with her large, rather dreamy gray eyes and tangled tawny hair and with her faded shabby dress that ended a full inch above her bare ankles. He reached out to take a leaf from her hair.

"Am I disturbing you, Nell?" he asked. "Would you prefer it if I went away again?"

"That seems a strange question to ask when I am the one trespassing on your land," she said, her voice a little breathless. "But no. Come and sit on the bank. I need to wash my feet in the stream."

He watched her settle herself on the grass and dangle her feet over the edge after hitching her skirts almost to the knees. He smiled, crossed to her side, and sat down. She was really very beautiful in her own way. Untamed beauty. He hated to think of anyone trying to force her to be a conventional barmaid or scullery maid or whatever other occupation must be open to her. He hated to think of her drudging over household tasks. She should always be free. The thought passed unbidden into his mind that he had it in his power to free her. He could set her up in comfort if he wished so that she would always be free from any chance of a life of drudgery. He quelled the thought.

"Do you know any poetry, Nell?" he asked.

"Poetry, sir?" she asked, looking across at him wide-eyed.

"Probably not," he said, answering his own question. "I must bring some books and read to you. You would like the works of some of the new poets, I believe."

"Why?" she asked.

"I think some of them share your complete absorption with nature," he said. "William Wordsworth, for example. He believes, you know, that there is a spirit behind all of nature. A tree is not just something pretty to look at. It somehow has a spiritual force." He laughed. "You probably do not know what I am talking about, do you?"

"Oh yes, I do!" Helen said eagerly. "Yes, I do, and that is exactly how I feel. Do you too?"

William Mainwaring smiled again into the bright face so close to his. "I admire his poetry and read it quite frequently," he said. "But I must confess that I have not given a great deal of serious thought to his philosophy. But then I have never known the man. I do know you, wood nymph, and I believe your passion might be infectious."

He had not meant it quite the way it sounded when it came out of his mouth. The girl looked intently at him. Her cheeks flushed and her lips parted, but there was nothing coquettish in her manner. Perhaps it was his realization of that fact that made her so irresistible. Mainwaring leaned forward before he had any conception of what he was about to do and kissed her.

He lifted his head almost immediately. She had offered no resistance. Her lips had been warm and soft beneath his. Those rather dreamy eyes of hers were still looking into his.

"I wanted you to do that," she said unexpectedly, and she leaned imperceptibly toward him.

This time he put an arm around her shoulders and turned her to him before kissing her. And he could feel the blood pounding against his temples as her breasts came against his coat and her lips parted beneath his. He threaded his free hand through the loose tangles of her hair and tentatively explored her lips with his tongue. The soft warmth drew him in and soon he was reaching into her opened mouth, touching her tongue with his, stroking the roof of her mouth until she shivered against him. He kissed her closed eyes, her chin, her throat, and finally, her mouth again.

A village girl. Just a poor village girl. What was he doing taking advantage of such innocence? He put her head against his shoulder and held it there while he looked up into the branches of the trees, trying to impose sanity on his mind. Had he completely taken leave of his senses? He had never before allowed himself to be carried away by sheer desire. He had never had a woman. He had kissed only one other. He closed his eyes tightly. Elizabeth! How could he sully his love for her with these feelings of mere desire for a young girl with whom he could have nothing in common beyond a fondness for a wood and a stream?

William Mainwaring put the girl gently away from him and smiled at her. "I should not have done that," he said. "I am sorry, Nell. I do not wish to frighten you into believing that you are no longer safe here. I assure you that it will not happen again."

She gazed seriously back at him. "I am not sorry," she said, "and I am not frightened. Are you going to leave now?"

"Yes," he said, "I think I had better go."

"Will you come again?" she asked. "Will you read me those poems?"

He had stood up. But he stooped down now and put a strand of hair behind her ear. "Yes, wood nymph," he said softly. "I shall come and read to you. There is a whole world of which you must be unaware that I would wish opened to you."

He smiled at her and drew his thumb lightly over her lips before straightening up again and turning to stride away through the trees and quickly out of her sight.

Helen did not immediately leave. She noticed, in something of a daze, that one of her feet was still dangling in the water. She pulled it out and tucked both feet under the hem of her dress, not bothering to dry the wet one first. What a coil she was in! In the past half-hour she had broken just about every rule that should guide her actions as a lady. The first meeting with Mr. Mainwaring could be discounted. She had not expected him then. She could not be expected to feel any guilt about talking to him on that occasion. Mere civility had demanded it, even if not the deception. But this time!

She admitted to herself quite freely that the hope of a meeting with him was what had really brought her there. And she had deliberately invited closeness. She could have stayed in the tree and talked to him from that safe distance. But no. She had descended as fast as her legs would carry her as soon as he had suggested it, and she had invited him to come and sit with her on the bank. She had used feminine wiles that she had not known she possessed. It was most improper to sit on the bank of a stream in the midst of a dense wood with a gentleman, unchaperoned.

And that was not all. She had felt the spark of something between them when he had said that he might learn her passion for nature. She had known he was going to kiss her for a full second before she had felt his mouth on hers. And she had done nothing to avert the peril as she could quite easily have done by laughing or breaking eye contact with him or doing any of a hundred and one little things that would have broken the tension of the moment. If she were a lady, she would have done one of those things. And she would have been walking away from there just as fast as her legs would carry her.

Truth was, she had wanted him to kiss her. What a shocking admission! They had not even been formally introduced. And even if she could be excused for that first kiss, about which she had had only a second's warning, there was no excuse at all for the kiss that followed. She even had the uncomfortable feeling that she had invited it. The first one had not been enough, a mere brushing of lips. But the second! She did not know by what instinct she had parted her lips, but she could feel now the intimacy of his open mouth against hers and of his tongue touching her own. She could feel her breasts pressed against the hardness of his chest.

And she had reveled in the feelings. She should have been deeply shocked. She should, in fact, have swooned quite away at having done something she should not even have dreamed of doing outside the marriage bed. But the only fact that made Helen feel guilty was that she did not feel ashamed. The day was brighter for the embrace. She was the happier for it. She lifted her head and gazed at the sky, where the same powerful gale was blowing wisps of white across its surface. She wished she were up there so that she could feel the wind in her hair and on her hot cheeks.

She wondered if she was falling in love. Helen believed very strongly in love. She had always thought it must be the most glorious and sublime feeling of which one could be capable. But she had never expected it to be part of her experience. She had never felt even a mild liking for any of the men she had met since she left the schoolroom. But this could not be love. It had come too suddenly. She hardly knew the man. He I probably be quite different if he knew her real identity. He would then surely be as prosy and as starchy as all the other gentlemen of her acquaintance.

Helen's face suddenly felt hotter than ever. Of course, soon he was bound to find out. There was no way she could escape indefinitely meeting him in public. There was a ball at Lord Graham's house the very next night, and she was bound to meet him there. The ball was being given largely in honor of his arrival in the neighborhood. How would she be able to face him? What would his reaction be when he knew that the girl he had teased and kissed in the woods was really Lady Helen Wade? He would probably feel obliged to do something stupid like offer for her. And how mortifying it would be to receive an offer of marriage for such a reason. Especially when one was beginning to imagine oneself in love with the man.

Helen frowned and rested her chin on her raised knees. Was Mr. Mainwaring a rake? she wondered. Was he out to take her virtue just because he believed her a village wench, someone who did not count? She would hate to think so. Undoubtedly, though, he would not have behaved so had he known that she was a lady. But then, she had behaved so, had she not, knowing that she was a lady? The problem was just too complicated. Anyway, if the man were a rake, he would not have been contented with the kiss they had shared. And he was the one who had ended it. Helen did not like to examine the question of when she would have put an end to the encounter.

Of one thing she was sure. She wanted to see him again before the inevitable exposure of her identity the following evening. She should not, of course. She should not play with fire. But he was going to read her the poems of Mr. Wordsworth. She smiled guiltily and glanced in the direction of the hut. She could have produced her own copy of Lyrical Ballads and read to him. Would he not have been surprisedl

Looking at the hut made her consider another problem. What if she returned tomorrow to find that he was already here? Either he would see her in her everyday clothes and know the truth, or she would have to steal away and miss the chance of a meeting with him. There was only one solution. She would have to take the dress with her and hide it somewhere else so that she would be wearing it already when she arrived.

Ten minutes later Lady Helen Wade emerged from the hut wearing the same riding outfit as she had worn on the previous occasion. She carried the faded cotton dress over her arm. She gazed lingeringly in the direction of the riverbank before walking away toward the western edge of the wood, where she had tethered her horse.

Chapter 4

“Mr.Mainwaring has asked me for the first set this evening," Melissa announced with studied casualness at the breakfast table the next morning.

"I think it only right and proper that he should," her mother replied. "He has singled you out quite markedly, my love, and I think everyone would expect that be will show you deference tonight."

"He has also suggested that we ride together one morning," Melissa continued, "but I told him that I would have to consult Papa."

"Young puppy would probably fall off at the first fence," the earl grumbled into his beefsteak. "Or else he would ride an extra two miles to avoid the fence. Ride with him, Melly, if you must. You will be as safe with him as with a nursemaid."

'"It would not surprise me in the least if he were to declare himself before the week is out," the countess said. "It would be a splendid match for you, my love, for all that he is only a mister. He must be worth twenty thousand a year if he's worth a penny."

“More, I shouldn't wonder," said the earl. "The fella owns half of England and Scotland."

"I think you exaggerate somewhat, my love," his wife suggested. "But really, Melissa, it would be a grcat triumph to have a daughter married to a man of such consequence. Now, if only we could find someone equally distinguished for dear Emily."

“I am not at all in a hurry to fix my choice, Mama," that young lady was hasty to add. "I have not yet met the man I consider worthy of my esteem. I would think it somewhat vulgar to snatch the first presentable man to appear in the district since we emerged from the schoolroom."

"Quite right too, my love," her mother agreed, not appearing to notice the slur that had been cast on her younger daughter. "And then, of course, there is Helen. I really do not know what we are to do with her." She gazed hopelessly and fondly at her youngest, who had sat silently through the preceding conversation.

"You need not worry about me, Mama," she said now. "I shall stay a spinster and remain with you and Papa."

"Yes, but you see, child," her mother said quite seriously, "you will never be a comfort to my old age if you continue to play the pianoforte as if it were your mortal enemy and work your embroidery as if it called for your undivided attention and wander, off whenever your presence is most called for."

Helen lowered her eyes and crossed to the sideboard for more coffee.

It was going to be the most awful day in her life, Helen reflected somewhat later as she wandered to the stables to watch the grooms brush down the horses and clean their stalls. This evening she was going to have to bear the introduction to Mr. Mainwaring. That was bad enough. But through a restless night she had reconciled herself to its inevitability. If she could only meet him once more during the afternoon, before he knew the truth, she would be satisfied. If only he would kiss her again… But she did not dwell on the thought. Just to see him and talk to him would be enough, and to hear him, perhaps, read to her some of Mr. Wordsworth's poetry.

But now to have found out that he had promised. Melly the first dance and had already asked her if she would ride with him one morning! And he had taken her driving the Sunday before. Was he developing a tendre for Melly? Was Mama right, and they might expect a betrothal between Mr. Mainwaring and her sister in the near future? Somehow the thought made her feel slightly sick. She wandered over to her own horse, which had been led out of its stall. She patted its nose and buried her face briefly against its mane.

Of course, it was all very possible. He knew her only as a rather ragged girl. He had talked with her twice, kissed her once. It was ridiculous to dream that perhaps his thoughts were centered as much on her as hers were on him. If he did think of her, it was probably with some amusement and perhaps with some interest in carrying on a mild flirtation. A man of his class just did not lose his heart to a lower-class girl. And a man of his class would see no dishonor in flirting with a servant girl, or even in having an affair with her, while conducting a serious courtship of a lady who was his social equal. There was nothing especially inconsistent in Mr. Mainwaring's behavior.

But there was something upsetting about it. She so wanted him to be perfect. Helen had long ago lost faith in the people of her class, both male and female. But he had seemed different. Despite the fact that he looked stern and almost morose at times, she had seen humor, kindliness, and intelligence in him. She had dreamed that he was like her, dissatisfied with the rigidity of the code of behavior by which they were expected to live, eager to find out some of the deeper meanings of life that must be hidden behind the superficiality. And, of course, she liked to believe that the man to whom she was so strongly drawn physically was worthy of her regard.

Helen dreaded now to find that he was really no different from any other man. It would be almost impossible, of course, for him to fall in love with the girl he thought she was. But sometimes it was pleasant to dream that the impossible could happen. Now the afternoon had been somewhat spoiled for her. She did not know whether she still wanted to see him. It would be painful to discover that perhaps her suspicions were true, and that he was interested only in the rather interesting physical relationship that had budded the day before.

Yet she knew that she had to go. Tonight he would know the truth. For the rest of her life, long after he was married to Melly, perhaps, she would wonder what would have happened had she gone to meet him. It was altogether possible, of course, even probable, that he would not come. He must have a great many social commitments with which to fill his afternoons. She would go and consider herself fortunate if he did not appear.

William Mainwaring was in a similar quandary for different reasons. He had suffered a half-hour of guilt and remorse as he had walked home across the fields the afternoon before. He should not have gone to see her. Meeting a young girl alone in the woods was a potentially dangerous situation under any circumstances. In his case it was perhaps doubly so. He was unhappy; for almost a year he had been separated from the woman he loved and would never possess, and he had recently been reminded very forcefully of the fact. He was lonely and felt more so among these strangers who would not leave him to his own solitude.

She had come almost like a gift from heaven, his little wood nymph. A gift from the devil, more like! She was beautiful and she was very unusual and he wanted her more than he had imagined he would ever want a woman after Elizabeth. He had wanted very much earlier to lay her down on the bank and to lift her skirts and bury all his hurts inside her. He could only imagine what it would be like. He had lived an almost totally womanless existence despite his one-and-thirty years. But he had wanted Nell, had been closer than he cared to think to giving in to the temptation. And he did not think that she would have resisted. That fact alone scared him. The responsibility, the decision, was entirely his.

He could not do that to her. She was probably an innocent. He would have all the responsibility of having taken her virginity if he gave in to his desires, and would perhaps ruin forever her chances of making a contented marriage. If he felt an honest affection for the girl, perhaps there would be some excuse for him. But how could he offer any woman even the smallest part of his heart when it all belonged entirely and forever to Elizabeth? He would be using the girl purely to soothe his physical frustrations. Somehow he felt that Nell deserved better than that. For all that she was a poor and uneducated girl, she had feelings as he or anyone else had and she deserved to be loved by the man who would possess her first.

By the time he reached home after his encounter with Helen, Mainwaring had decided that he must go no more to the woods. He must not see the girl again. He must make a more determined effort to mix with his neighbors, to keep himself occupied so that he would not have the time either to brood about his lost love or to think with lust about Nell. In an effort to put his resolve into immediate effect, he had stridden to the stables, saddled his horse himself, and ridden into the village to return a book that the vicar had loaned him the previous week.

It was while he was riding down the village street that he had met the two elder daughters of the Earl of Claymore. He had raised his hat, made his bow, and prepared to ride on. But Lady Melissa Wade had stopped with the obvious intention of conversing with him, while the other girl had bowed rather haughtily and passed into the milliner's shop behind her. Lady Melissa had asked him if he was to attend Lord Graham's ball the following evening. Her intention had been obvious. She must have known very well that he would be there.

Nevertheless, Mainwaring had fallen into the trap almost willingly. If he must forget the past, and if he must resist the temptation presented by the little wench, then what better way was there to do both than to attach himself to another lady? He must only be careful not to so single her out as to feel himself honor-bound to offer for her.

"May I hope that you will reserve the first set for me, Lady Melissa?" he had asked, smiling down at her. "Or am I too late and your card is filled already?"

She had tittered. "Really, sir," she had said, "you are not in London now. We do not generally choose partners before the ball begins, you know. But I should be delighted to reserve the set for you. What a delightful horse you have, Mr. Mainwaring. He is very obedient despite his great size and strength."

"We have been a long way together," he had said, patting his horse's flank.

"Indeed?" she had said. "I was under the impression, sir, that you did not have much love of horses. Riding is one of my greatest pleasures. I insist on exercising my horse myself each morning, no matter what the weather."

"Perhaps we could ride together one morning," he had suggested politely.

"Oh," she had said, raising surprised eyes to his, "what a perfectly splendid idea. I would have to ask Papa if I may, of course. But I think he will agree, provided I take a groom with me."

"Until tomorrow evening, then," he had said, raising his hat and bowing to her again before riding off to the vicar's house with the grim satisfaction of having done the right thing to try to set his life in order.

That had been the day before. But somehow matters did not appear so simple in the light of morning. It was a particularly beautiful day. He had no commitments until the evening. And when he went into his library to select a book to read on the terrace outside, he took down, without conscious choice, his, copy of Lyrical Ballads. The volume opened on its own to a much-loved poem-one about Lucy. And he smiled as he read about her:

William Mainwaring looked up and smiled. The poet might almost have been describing his wood nymph. Nell. And she would be waiting for him that afternoon perhaps, wondering if he would keep his promise to read her some of these poems. There was something of a poet in her, something of an artist, he felt sure. If only she could have had the benefit of an education, she probably would have been a very interesting person. Not that there was anything dull about her now. She would enjoy hearing these poems, he was convinced. Should he go and read them to her?

Could he go and keep himself from touching her? Just yesterday at this time perhaps he could have answered in the affirmative with some confidence. But he had touched her already, and that brief embrace had awoken a hunger in him that he did not believe he could easily quell. It would be far safer to stay away. Far safer for her and far better for his self-respect. He did not like himself for hungering after one woman while loving another.

Perhaps the very best thing he could do with his life would be to marry Lady Melissa Wade. He did not think he was flattering himself to believe that she would accept him. She was a pretty girl with her fair hair and blue eyes, and she seemed amiable enough. He could never love her, or feel any deep affection for her in all probability, but then, chances were that she would not expect any such devotion. With her his life would take on some stability. With her he would be able to satisfy those physical cravings that the girl in the woods had just reawakened. And with her he would be beyond temptation. He did not believe that his conscience would allow him ever to stray to another woman if he had a wife to whom he owed his loyalty.

He got up from his seat on the terrace and wandered back to the library. But he did not put the book back on the shelf. He tapped it against his free hand and stared sightlessly at the titles before him. If it was to be so, if he really was to take such an irrevocable step, perhaps it would be safe to see Nell one more time. After all, he had almost promised her that he would go. He would see her that afternoon and begin his serious courtship of Lady Melissa that evening at Lord Graham's ball. It was very possible that the girl would not be there, anyway, and then matters would be taken out of his hands.

William Mainwaring strode out of the library and took the stairs up to his room two at a time, the volume of poems still clasped in one hand.

Despite the precaution she had taken of hiding her shabby cotton dress close to the western edge of the wood and putting it on before going to the clearing by the stream, Helen was again the first to arrive there. Indeed she thought he was not coming. Time seems long when one is waiting for someone one is not even certain will come, especially when one dare not fill in the time with a book or a sketchpad. She was sitting a little back from the stream, sheltering from the heat of the sun beneath the shade of a large tree, when he came. She sat cross-legged, her chin resting on one fist. She did not move when she saw him come.

"Hello, wood nymph," he said, stopping when he was still several yards away from her and smiling.

It was the smile that did it. She knew beyond any doubt that the unthinkable had happened. She loved him. She could not believe ill of his motives. There was such gentleness in his smile. "Hello," she said.

"You see?" he said, holding up the volume he clasped in one hand. "I have brought the book. You will like some of the poems, I believe." He came and sat beside her under the tree so that she felt suffocated, unable to breathe freely. "You do not look very pleased," he added. "Am I forcing myself and my interests on you, Nell?"

"Oh, no," she said, and looked up into his dark eyes, I disturbingly close to her own. "I thought you were not coming, and I would have been disappointed if you had not. Please read to me."

"Would you?" he asked. "Have been disappointed, I mean? I would have been here sooner, but I had an unexpected visitor and had to stay and be civil."

He looked across at her as if he expected her to say something, but she looked back silently. Finally he opened the book and thumbed through the pages. She waited with great interest to see which poem he would choose to read first.

"Here it is," he said at last. "This, I think, you will appreciate. It is one of my favorites."

And he began to read her the poem about the rainbow, which was not one of her favorites-it was her very favorite.

He read slowly and distinctly, savoring every word.' By the time he had finished, Helen had her eyes tightly closed, enthralled as much by his voice as by the sentiment of the poem.

"Do you like it?" he asked.

"Oh, yes." Her eyes flew open and looked into his. "It is just exactly as I feel, you see. But people keep telling me that I shall grow up one of these days and that I shall then become interested in the more important things of life. I shall not. I would rather die!"

He smiled gently and his eyes dropped involuntarily to her mouth. "You need not fear, little wood nymph," he said. "You will never change. At least, you will never lose your love for what you have now. It is too deeply a part of your nature, I think."

She could feel tears welling to her eyes and dropped them hastily to look at the grass between them. No one had ever understood before, and no one had ever spoken with approval of her strange tastes. Was it possible that he felt about her as she felt about him? But, no. He was to dance with Melissa that very evening, and ride with her one morning soon. He would perhaps be betrothed to her before the summer was out. And she herself was a mere village wench, as far as he knew. She jumped to her feet suddenly and moved away from him among the trees.

"What is it, Nell?" he called after her.

She did not answer. But she did not run far away, either. She merely wanted a few moments to collect herself. She did not want their afternoon to end so soon, their last afternoon. Within a few hours he would know who she was, and his approval would turn to amusement at the best, contempt at the worst. It was perhaps acceptable for a serving girl to love the woods and the sky and the stream, but there was something definitely odd about a society girl who preferred those things to. fashion and gossip and visits. She stopped at the big oak that she had climbed the day before and leaned against it, resting one cheek against the rough old bark and wrapping her arms as far around it as she could reach. She closed her eyes.

"What are you doing now?" William Mainwaring asked from behind her. His voice held a mixture of concern and amusement.

"This tree was here for hundreds of years before you and I," she said, neither moving nor opening her eyes. "Can you imagine all the life it must have seen and all that it will see long after we are dead and buried? Sturdy as an oak' is such an apt phrase. It lives, you know. If I were led here blindfold and did not know what I clasped, I would know it was a living thing."

"Would you, Nell?" he asked gently.

"Oh, yes," she said. "It is so full of life. If we could only understand a tree! Do touch it. Run your hand over the bark. You will see what I mean."

She felt his hands touch the tree on either side of her, just above her own hands. He did not touch her, though every inch of her body was aware of the closeness of him. Neither of them moved-or breathed, it seemed-for several seconds, and then she turned, or he turned her, she was never sure which.

He threaded his fingers through her hair and held her face turned up to him. He was looking deeply and questioningly into her eyes. She gazed back, not even trying to hide the longing and the love that she felt. She closed her eyes.

"Nell," he murmured, and he was kissing her throat, her cheeks, her eyes, and finally her mouth.

Her arms went up and around his broad shoulders and she let her body sag against his so that she could feel the strength of his chest, the powerful muscles of his thighs against hers. He was so much taller than she. She felt small and very feminine in his arms. Her mouth opened beneath the pressure of his and his tongue came inside again, but more knowingly this time. He found and teased the soft flesh beneath her tongue, stroked with agonizingly light touch the roof of her mouth. Helen moaned.

He raised his head and moved his mouth to her throat again. She inhaled sharply as his hands came away from her hair and clasped her breasts, massaging them slowly beneath his palms.

"Nell," he said, lifting his head again and resting his forehead against hers. "Stop me. Stop me if you do not want this."

For answer she put her hands over his against her breasts and turned her head so that their mouths met again. She was in a strange world. Much as she was involved in the embrace, she was still quite aware of what was happening, knew with perfect clarity what was about to happen, and could foresee without any doubt how horrified she must feel afterward. She knew that she was about to lose her virginity, that she was about to give away all chance of making a good marriage, unless she were to lie to her prospective husband, that she would be outcast if the truth ever became known. She knew all this, but she did not care. She was powerless to prevent her own ruin because she had no wish at this moment to prevent it.

William Mainwaring shrugged out of his coat while continuing to kiss her. She could feel his movements though she did not open her eyes. She opened them only when he raised his head, took her gently by the shoulders, and lowered her to the grass, the coat that he had dropped beneath her head. He raised her skirt to her waist with gentle hands. She averted her face and closed her eyes as he removed her thin undergarments. She kept them closed as she listened to him shed his own clothing. And she lifted her arms up for him when he came down beside her.

He kissed her again and reached under her dress to touch her unconfined breasts, but he made no further attempt to prepare her. He moved across her and lowered his weight onto her unresisting body. She parted her knees beneath the pressure of his and allowed him to spread her legs wide on the grass. And then she felt him and knew with something almost like triumph that it was too late now to change her mind.

It hurt and hurt. She was unaroused and dry, and his slow entry seemed to tear her apart. She bit her lower lip and felt as if she must cry out in panic until the pain crested and he continued his entry unimpeded. She forced herself to relax when he stopped, forced herself to realize that she was a woman and shaped for such sexual activity, that no damage could be done. She forced her body to push against him. This, then, was how it felt.

She cried out in protest when he began to withdraw. Not yet. It could not be over yet. But he eased his hands beneath her to cushion her against the hard ground and thrust himself in again. And he repeated and repeated the movement, slowly, but with deep, hard thrusts, until she was moist and could delight in the discovery of her own sexuality. She was not fully aroused. She was not herself headed toward any climax. But she clasped her arms around him, twined her legs around his, and watched the treetops above them, waving in the gentle summer breeze, while he repeatedly, and with growing urgency, drove into her body. She smiled and caught her lower lip between her teeth once more.

It seemed to go on for a very long time. But finally his movements slowed and he shuddered deep inside her. Then his full weight relaxed on top of her and he was still.

Helen continued to watch the treetops and she continued to hold her man with arms and legs. She felt very tender toward him. She loved him. She did not want him to move, ever.

Chapter 5

William Mainwaring was walking home through the woods. He did not see his surroundings. He took no conscious direction. Mere instinct took him in the direction of home. He did not know yet if he regretted what had just happened. He suspected that he would bitterly regret it once he had emerged from the state of pure feeling and rational thought took over:. But that moment had not yet come. He knew only that he had a wholly new and exhilarating sense of his own manhood.

He could not feel guilty-not yet, at all events. He had not gone there this afternoon with the sole intention of possessing Nell, though he had been fully aware lie dangers involved in seeing her. And the whole thing had come about so naturally, without any forcing of the moment. She had not been reluctant. Indeed, he had given her ample opportunity to stop what was developing. And there had been nothing the 1st bit sordid about their coupling. Though there had been no love involved, of course, there was a certain degree of tenderness and awareness of the girl as more than just a body.

He found her irresistibly attractive. As soon as he had touched her that afternoon, he knew that he did not want to stop, that he needed to take their embrace to completion. She was so beautiful despite the shabby dress and the wild, loose hair, so soft to the touch. She smelled clean and wholesome, though she wore no detectable perfume.

She had said afterward that he had not hurt her. He did not know. He had been so intent on the sensations of his own body as he entered a woman for the first time that he had not closely observed her reactions. He would not even have known for sure that she had been a virgin had he not seen the streaks of blood on her legs as he lowered her skirt when it was all over.

It had been a beautiful experience. He had never imagined that there would be such warm, moist softness and such exquisite pleasure in releasing all his manhood into a woman's body. He had certainly not dreamed for the last year that any woman could bring him that sense of release and well-being when all his love was focused on someone unattainable. It was an unexpected delight to know that despite his love, he could still live a normal, healthy life. He would always remember his little wood nymph with gratitude.

She had told him, when he asked, that he had given her pleasure. He did not know the truth of that, either. He knew nothing about pleasing a woman sexually. She had lain still for him and had opened herself fully and sweetly to his every demand. She had held him afterward until he had lifted himself away from her and lowered her skirt, and even then she had rolled onto her side and lain against him while he closed his eyes and drifted into sleep for several minutes. He had certainly not displeased her.

He had left her with reluctance a few minutes before. If he had ever imagined that sleeping with her would be like slaking a thirst, he was very mistaken. Having her once had merely awakened an appetite that he knew would continue demanding satisfaction for some time to come. He had arranged to meet her the following afternoon again. Sooner or later his conscience was going to remind him of ail the moral arguments he had used on himself earlier and of all the practical solutions he had decided upon for his own future.

But he would not think of these things before he must. He wanted Nell and she wanted him. He would carry on this affair with her as long as they both wished it. Already he could hardly wait for the next day. He wanted to make love to her more consciously. He wanted to be more aware of her reactions, more aware of her needs.

Mainwaring stopped walking. He was already at the eastern edge of the wood. He put his head back and gazed up at the branches and the sky overhead. He turned around and around until the branches swirled dizzily above his head, and laughed at the picture he must make. It was a good thing that there was no spectator close by to wonder if he was returning to his childhood. And then the toe of one boot caught against the gnarled root of an ancient tree and he fell heavily and awkwardly, his foot twisted beneath him.

He continued laughing in self-conscious embarrassment and rubbed his boot at the ankle ruefully, waiting for the sharp pain to recede. After several minutes it still had not done so, and when he raised himself to a standing position on the good leg and lowered the injured one gingerly to the ground, pain shot up his leg and set him to biting his lower lip. Dammit! It served him right for behaving like such an imbecile. However was he to walk home? There was over a mile of open country between him and the house. He hopped and hobbled for a few yards until he finally had the idea of using a fallen tree branch as a crutch.

It took him well over an hour to reach home, and another half-hour for his valet to remove his boot from a foot that had swelled alarmingly around the ankle. He was forced to agree reluctantly to sending a groom in search of the doctor. The ankle could be broken, and the sooner it was set, the better it would heal.

There was no broken bone, only a bad sprain, but before the evening was half over Mainwaring was forced to realize that he was going to be house-bound for the next few days at least. No ball at Lord Graham's tonight. No ride with Lady Melissa one morning in the near future. And no lovemaking tomorrow with Nell.

Helen was dancing with Oswald Pyke. It often struck her as a great blessing that she was not as smitten with him as he was with her. Even if she were head over ears in love with him, she could never bring herself to marry that name. Imagine being Mrs. Oswald Pyke. Helen Pyke. Master Egbert Pyke, Miss Georgiana Pyke. And all the little Pykes. Fortunately, it was no great sacrifice to refuse him just on the grounds of a ridiculous name. She liked the man no better.

It was not just his looks, though she found nothing attractive in his short, rather pudgy figure, his thinning fair hair, and his plump hands that always seemed to be moist. He was a bore. If it were not his hounds he was talking about, it was his crops or his new hunting jacket or some other topic of no possible interest to her. Or else he was proposing marriage to her, one of his favorite hobbies. He was doing that now, despite the fact that it was the opening set of the ball and despite the inconvenience of the fact that it was a country dance and they were frequentlyy separated by the figures of the dance. Every time they came together for a few seconds, he was at it.

"If I have a good crop of turnips this year, I shall be able to afford a new ladies' maid," he said. "She could be assigned wholly to you if you will marry me, Lady Helen."

They were separated by the dance.

"Do give me an answer," he begged the next time they came together. "Do not keep me in suspense like this."

"I have told you at least fifty times, Mr. Pyke," she replied, "-or is it fifty-one?-that I will not marry you. Or anyone else at the moment," she added when she saw his crestfallen face as he turned away to twirl with another lady belonging to their set.

She answered mechanically. One did not even have to listen to Oswald. He rarely had anything new to say. She even danced mechanically, her mind and her eyes on the doorway into the ballroom. Any second now he would appear. Already he was late. Melly was fuming on the sidelines. Anyone who did not know her might not know that she was angry, of course. She smiled with dazzling brightness and her fan was waving at a sprightly pace. One of her feet kept time to the music. But Helen knew that she was furious. She had refused more than one partner on the grounds that the set was already spoken for, and now she was left standing like a wallflower.

But Helen had little sympathy to waste on her sister. Her heart was beating like a sledgehammer on her own account and she was in danger of losing her step every time someone new appeared in the doorway. For how long after his arrival would she be able to escape his notice? On the way here in the carriage she had been cautiously hopeful. Surely if she were careful enough, she could keep the length of a room between them for the whole night. The weather was warm. She could perhaps persuade her partners to take her walking in the garden.

But she knew it was hopeless as soon as she arrived. She had forgotten how small the Grahams' ballroom was. The man would need two cataracts not to see and recognize her even if they were squeezed into opposite corners of the room. She would try, of course, but she knew it would be no good. And she dreaded the moment when their eyes would meet and recognition would dawn in his. What would she do? Smile and wave? Blush and bite her lip? Walk over to him, hand extended in sociable greeting? Rush crying into the garden? Swoon? Well, she would soon find out, she thought gloomily as she and Oswald came together again and he renewed his persuasions.

When the set ended, Helen crossed to the French doors and stood against the heavy draperies that had been drawn back from them. If she stood very still, perhaps she could blend into the background. Her gown was not a very different shade of primrose from the curtains. She watched the doorway to the ballroom as if she expected her executioner to come through it at any moment.

She had tried to avoid the meeting. She had never been very good at faking a cough or a sneeze. She had had to use the headache story again. But no one had believed her.

"Nonsense, child," Mama had said, looking impatiently at the drooping eyes and wan expression of her youngest daughter. "It is a very strange headache that attacks only when there is some entertainment approaching. You always seem in bouncing health when you leave the house in the afternoons for one of your walks or rides."

"How strange you are, Helen," Emily had said. "Have you no interest in elevated company and superior conversation? Why must you always try to avoid any activity in which you must meet people-and the best people that this part of England has to offer, at that?"

"You are going tonight and that is that!" the earl had said, and Helen could tell by his tone that there was no point at all in trying to argue further.

She had wanted nothing more than to crawl to her room, where she might spend the evening and the night digesting what had happened that afternoon. She could not yet feel any guilt, and surely she should. All she could think of was the terrible disaster of the ball tonight that would prevent her from ever meeting her lover again and experiencing the great happiness of making love with him once more.

"Oh, yes, it would be my pleasure," she said now with a wide smile as another young man of her acquaintance bowed before her and solicted her hand for the next set. And another for the next. By the time the music began for the fifth set, the one before supper, Helen found herself tense with hope. He was not going to come! It was incredible. He must know that the evening had been arranged for his benefit, the Grahams having a marriageable daughter, whom a Season in London during the spring had not succeeded in removing from their hands. He must realize that he would be committing an unpardonable social sin in omitting to put in an appearance. Yet surely he would be here by now if he were coming at all.

It was only well after supper, when Helen was flushed and delirious with joy, dazzling her present partner with her vitality, though she did not realize the fact, that she discovered that Mr. Mainwaring had sent his apologies to his hosts early in the evening. He had a sprained ankle and was unable to walk.

"You see, child," her mother pointed out wisely during the journey home, interrupting a loud and excited monologue that Helen was delivering to no one in particular, "if you just make an effort to go out and mix with people, you find that you enjoy it. I have not seen you so happy for a long time."

"I don't know how you could have enjoyed yourself so much, Helen," Melissa complained. "I thought it a particularly insipid evening."

"Indeed, it was most disappointing to learn that Mr. Mainwaring has injured his leg," her mother agreed. "I hope it does not confine him to home for many days. His presence has certainly livened up the neighborhood in the last weeks. It will be most disagreeable to be without him."

Helen sat quietly for the remainder of the journey home and retired meekly to her room when they arrived there. The great sense of relief that had succeeded upon the realization that she was to be reprieved for that night at least was already wearing off. If it was not now, it would come later. And William was hurt. What had happened? Was he in a great deal of pain? She would be quite unable to see him or even to make inquiry about a man she was supposed not even to have met. She would have to rely solely on the chance mentions of him that her family or their acquaintances might make. And his leg might be broken, for all she knew.

William. She whispered the name. It had never been one of her favorites. She had never thought of it as a particularly romantic name, though it was shared by one of her favorite poets. But how dear the name sounded now, evoking as it did the face and figure of her lover. Helen sat cross-legged on the bed, clad in her nightgown, and allowed her thoughts to dwell fully on him, as she had not dared since she had left that afternoon.

She tried to feel shame. She told herself quite deliberately what it was she had done. She had given what no lady dare give outside her marriage bed. With a man she scarcely knew and one who did not know her true identity, she had lain in broad daylight on the grass and made love. Yes, it was an apt expression. They had made love. He had been very tender and considerate.

She remembered how he had given her a chance to stop what was happening between them before any real harm was done. And she remembered how, after it was all over, he had lain beside her, his arm beneath her head, and held her close, his free hand stroking her head until he fell asleep. And after he had dressed and prepared to leave, he had taken her into his arms and kissed her and made her promise that she would come again the following day.

Yes, of course, now that she could think about the afternoon, she could recognize that he loved her too. He had not been a man merely taking advantage of a willing wench. He loved her! She really need not be afraid to tell him who she was. How could he despise her? There had been nothing sordid in what they had done. He would realize that, would know that she was not normally loose in her morals. He would know that she had given him all merely because she loved him.

She was still thankful that he had not been at the ball. It would not have been a good setting for such a discovery. But she would tell him the next time they met. It was a great trial to know that it would not now be the next day or the day after. It might be a week or more before he was able to walk to the wood again. But he would go there as soon as he was able, she knew, and there she would tell him the truth. He possibly would be angry at her deception, and embarrassed, but all would be well. In fact, once he had got used to the idea, he would probably be glad to know that she was a girl of his own social level. They would marry.

It was a pleasant dream, one that sustained Helen through what remained of the night. She slept peacefully after ten minutes of wondering if William were in pain and unable to sleep himself.

William Mainwaring had, in fact, spent an almost sleepless night. He would never have guessed that a simple sprain could hurt as if it were a dozen fractures. Of one thing only he was thankful. No one knew the truth of how he had sustained the injury. He felt a prize idiot. He had been behaving like a young boy with his first infatuation. In fact, embarrassing as it was to admit even to himself, that was more or less what he was. His very retired upbringing had retarded his social progress by at least ten years. How most of his contemporaries would snicker if they knew that yesterday afternoon, at the age of one-and-thirty, he had bedded his first woman!

And now he had made very sure that the affair would not continue for at least four or five days. He ground his teeth as he was forced to accept the support of his valet down the stairs to the breakfast room. He had refused to stay in bed. The sun was shining with every bit as much force as it had the day before. He ached to be with Nell again. He wanted to make love to her. He wanted to touch her warm and pliant little body again. He wanted to be inside her.

He took the plate of food that the butler had heaped for him at the sideboard and turned his attention impatiently to the pile of mail at his elbow. There was no point in brooding on what could not be. But how provoking it was to think that she would probably be there waiting for him. It was unlikely that she would have heard about his mishap. Would she think that he had abandoned her, that having once tasted of her treasures he had lost interest? He would have to make it up to her when he saw her next.

His attention was arrested by a letter that had been addressed in an unmistakably feminine hand. He felt himself turn cold. What other woman could be writing to him but Elizabeth? He tore open the seal and spread the letter on the table before him, his food forgotten. Yes, it was indeed from her, he saw, glancing to the signature at the end. He had not seen her handwriting before, but he would have known that it was hers. It had all the neatness and elegance and restraint that were so much a part of her character.

They had received his letter, and it had been a relief to them to know that he had finally received one of theirs. It was an equal relief to know that he had not received any of the others. His long silence was now explained.

"I have so much wanted to write to you myself," she wrote. "I have always felt very badly about what happened a year ago, William. I am afraid I presumed too much on a friendship that I held, and still hold, very dear. I should never have agreed to marry you. Indeed, I do not believe that I would have wronged you to the extent of going through with the ceremony, even if Robert had not acted as he did. And it would have been wrong. You knew that I could not have given my heart to you, and you very much deserve to have a wife who is wholly yours. You are a very dear person, William."

The letter went on to repeat the invitation that her husband had extended in the earlier letter. It also told the news of the birth of a son two weeks before.

Mainwaring let the letter fall onto the table when he had finished reading it. He felt sick. He pushed aside the untouched plate of food and pushed himself to his feet. Then he winced and sat down again with an oath. He was forced to accept the butler's assistance to the library, where he sat, his injured leg propped on a stool, staring sightlessly out of the window.

He relived all the pain and the loss of the previous summer as if those events had happened but yesterday. Those first weeks in London had felt like hell itself. He had wandered around restlessly, contented nowhere, avoiding acquaintances, trying to decide whether he should write to her or not, whether he should try to see her or not. She had promised to marry him if he could free her from her existing marriage. And he had been so confident that Robert would raise no objection to divorcing her. He had been so sure that Robert had no feeling for her after having lived apart from her for six years. It was hard to accept the sudden reality of being alone, exiled from her. He had wanted to go to her. He was not sure that she did not wish to see him. But his powerful sense of honor had kept him away. Her husband had refused to set her free, had warned him off, and he had to accept the rights of a husband.

But he had ached for her, as he ached for her now. Elizabeth, with that rare aura of tranquillity that attracted all who knew her. He doubted if she fully realized how much she had been respected and loved by all the families around Ferndale, even though they knew her only as a paid governess and companion. He could not blame Robert for refusing to give her up. It only seemed incredible to him that he had been able to live apart from her for all that time, when they were legally married. But there was obviously a very interesting story surrounding that mystery, a story that he would never know.

Damn Robert Denning! If only she had never met him, perhaps she could have loved him, William Mainwaring. Perhaps they would have been married now and it would have been his child that she had just borne. Foolish thought! He put his head back against the rest of the leather chair in which he sat and stared at the ceiling. If she had not met Robert, she probably would not have ended up in the vicinity of Ferndale as a governess. And she would perhaps have been a different person had she not suffered in the past. In fact, he remembered saying something like that to her when he was trying to persuade her to marry him. No, things were as they were and he would have to learn to live with them.

He closed his eyes. How could he so have forgotten his love as to have become excited by that little wench in the woods? He compared the two women in his mind. Elizabeth, so mature; Nell so childlike. Elizabeth with her beauty, her charm, her social poise; Nell with her wild, untutored grace. Elizabeth's intelligence and good education; Nell's ignorance of all except the wild nature around her. Elizabeth, perfectly groomed and elegant; Nell, shabby and unkempt. How could he have? How could he have so forgotten Elizabeth yesterday as to have violated Nell and even convinced himself that it had been a good experience?

He felt repelled now by the memories. How could he have convinced himself that the girl was a sweet innocent? She was wild and promiscuous. True, she had been a virgin before he had touched her, but it was just pure chance, surely, that he had been the first. The girl would have done as much with any male who happened to come her way. What modest wench spent a great deal of her time alone in the woods? What modest girl offered such an open invitation as a shabby dress that was too small for her and that revealed a considerable expanse of bare leg? He was suddenly glad of his sprained ankle. It offered him the excuse he needed to keep away from his appointment with her. By the time he was recovered, she would have forgotten about him, in all probability. She would probably have found someone else.

Mainwaring was given little more time to brood that day. Although unable to go out himself, he found that almost every man of rank for miles around called on him during the day to inquire about his health and to commiserate with him for having to miss the several entertainments that had been arranged for the coming days.

Chapter 6

The following five days were dreary ones for Helen. She lived in a state of almost unbearable tension. Her last meeting with William Mainwaring had begun something which it was a torture to have to delay. Had she only been able to see him on the following afternoon, all the joy and the excitement of being in love and of sharing of physical relationship with her lover might have been sustained. But she found that as the days crept past she became less confident, more shy of seeing him again. Perhaps for him it had all meant nothing. Perhaps he was accustomed to such encounters. But no, she would not believe it. He must love her as she did him.

She knew from her father's conversation that Mr. Mainwaring was likely to be house-bound for a week. Apparently his leg was badly sprained and he found it quite impossible to put it to the ground. She felt quite safe, therefore, when she returned to the woods two days after his accident, in bringing her books and her paints out of the hut. She decided to paint the stream at last and spent a half-hour vainly trying to capture on paper all the shades of color and light that she had observed the afternoon she had first met William.

She finally gave up the effort in disgust. What she had painted on the paper in no way resembled what she saw in her mind. She could force no communication between mind and hand. Of, of course, she knew the reason. She knew from long experience that she could never produce anything to her satisfaction unless her whole mind was absorbed in the task. And she had not fully concentrated on her painting that afternoon. She was thinking of William. She was wanting him.

She moved to sit on the bank of the stream and rested her chin on her raised knees. She was not at all sure that this love business was good for her. Was this what it did to a person? Was one totally unable to concentrate on any other activity once one loved? Love should enrich life, not impoverish it, she thought. But of course it was her restlessness, her uncertainty that made her so incapable of doing any of the things she had always delighted in.

She tried to picture William's face. It was very handsome, long and rather thin, with a straight nose and firm mouth that gave one the early impression that he was a stern and perhaps humorless man. She had never liked dark eyes. She had always admired blue or light gray. Even her own eyes were too dark a gray to please her. But William's brown eyes suited him. They gave a depth to his glance so that when he looked fully at her, she felt that she was gazing into his very soul. He wore his hair rather longer than was fashionable. It was thick, shiny hair, the sort that made one's fingers itch to touch it. And his smile! It was so unexpectedly warm. It so transfigured his face. Helen smiled and hugged her knees. She remembered the look on that face when it had been close to hers, dreamy with passion.

Suddenly she was on her feet and darting lightly to the hut. A minute later she was outside again, a sketchpad and a piece of charcoal in her hand. For the next hour everything was forgotten: surroundings, loneliness, even longing for William Mainwaring as she sketched his face. Finally it was completed to her satisfaction, though she still wrinkled her nose as she held it at arm's length to view the total effect. She had pictured him smiling. He looked very boyish, not at all the dignified gentleman of her first impression. Was this really he? Or was the other? How could she possibly capture the complete man in one picture? Helen had never been interested in portraiture before. She now began to understand some of the frustrations and challenges involved.

However satisfied or dissatisfied she might be with the sketch she had made, its resting place for that night and the nights that followed was beneath her pillow.

She did not go back to the woods for the next three days. She could not face going there until there was a chance that yet again William would come. Her father reported that he had still not gone out. Her mother too was becoming increasingly cross over her absences during the afternoons, when she might be expected to help entertain guests or to accompany her sisters on visits to various neighbors. For three days she was almost a model daughter.

But finally she could stay away no longer. Mr. Mainwaring was moving around with a cane, the vicar had informed them the previous afternoon when they had paid a call at the vicarage. It was unlikely, of course, that he would attempt to walk all the way to the woods for several more days, but she could not stay away when there was the remotest chance of his coming.

She had three more days to wait.

William Mainwaring's disgust with Helen did not last for many days. The feeling became turned more against himself. He loved Elizabeth. Her letter had hardly left his sight since he had received it, and it had been read over and over again. But Elizabeth was unattainable. And such a love did little to satisfy all one's baser cravings. He found more and more as the dreary days dragged on that his thoughts were returning to Nell.

He despised himself. He had always despised sexual activity that was devoid of love. He had always been determined that he would never be guilty of such a sin himself. Yet he could not get her out of his mind, his little wood nymph. He longed to see her again, to talk to her. He found her fresh and rather naive view of the world quite delightful. She was like a breath of fresh air in a rather stuffy world. He wanted to touch her, to wind his fingers in that wild tangle of hair, to kiss that warm, soft mouth. He wanted to possess her again.

Damn! He tried to repeat the arguments he had used after first reading Elizabeth's letter. He tried to convince himself that in reality Nell was probably little better than a slut, that he was degrading himself associating with her. But it was no good. The craving was too strong to be denied. He was being ruled by pure physical passion, by sheer lust. But he I not shame himself out of his determination to see her again as soon as he was able to hobble as far as the woods.

For two days after he was finally able to get around again he felt obliged to spend his afternoons repaying the visits that his neighbors had been kind enough to pay him during his confinement to the house. He drove himself in a curricle so that there might be less pressure on the still-painful ankle.

He found the visit to the Earl of Claymore rather uncomfortable. The whole family was gathered in the drawing room when he was announced, with the exception of that elusive youngest daughter, and he was faced with all the embarrassment of having to converse with Lady Melissa, remembering how he had begun to set in motion a courtship of the girl just the week before. His injury had put a halt to that, keeping him away from the ball at which he was to have partnered her for the opening set, and preventing him from making a definite appointment to ride with her. But the injury had proved a blessing in disguise. His entanglement with Nell and his feelings for Elizabeth had totally destroyed his plan to court Lady Melissa.

Yet he suspected from the behavior of the ladies that he was being treated almost as the accepted suitor of the girl. He was seated beside her on a sofa; her opinion on everything he uttered was eagerly solicited by her mother, and she always agreed with what he had said. She managed yet again to introduce the topic of riding into the conversation, and there was an awkward little silence when he failed to pick up the cue. He left as soon as good manners allowed him to do so, feeling both relief and alarm. Had he really aroused hopes that he might be honor-bound to revive? He sincerely hoped not. He could not now imagine how he could ever have entertained the notion of marrying the girl.

Finally Mainwaring felt that he was free to spend an afternoon as he wished. His leg felt strong enough. He could walk now without thinking about it. Only the occasional twinge reminded him that he must be careful for a while. Even the weather was cooperating. After a few days that were dull and overcast, the sun shone and only a slight breeze ensured that the day would not be unbearably hot. If only she were there when he came. He had hardly considered the possibility that she might not be. But he had to take the chance.

On this occasion Mainwaring was the first to arrive at the stream beside the hut. He was disappointed. He hoped that she was merely later than usual in coming, not that she was not coming at all. He wandered to the hut and put a hand on the door, which hung crookedly on its hinges. But he removed the hand again. It would not be fair to look inside when she had been so anxious that he should not. And he had made her a gift of the old building. It would not be right to trespass on her property.

He looked around him. The small clearing among the trees almost breathed her presence. The old oak tree would be forever hers. It was in its branches that she had sat the second time he saw her. And it was its trunk she had hugged the last time just before he had touched her. And the stream, where she had been "learning water" the first time he saw her-had she finally decided what color it was?

He wandered to the edge of the bank and gazed down at the water flowing past. She was quite right. It was really not one color or one shade at all. He stooped down and finally sat on the bank. How had she come to notice that when she was but a wild and untutored little thing? But then, he supposed that one did not need an education to observe the world around. He had never thought of really looking at objects of nature until he met Nell. And he had never considered touching in order to learn. Who but she would have thought of leaning her whole body against a tree just so that she might feel its life?

She was probably a girl of some intelligence. She would doubtless respond with eagerness to the chance to learn from books. He could teach her perhaps. She would be an apt pupil. He could probably open up for her a new world as she had done for him. The thought was tempting.

"Hello," she said from behind him. Her voice was breathless.

He turned and smiled. "Hello, wood nymph," he said. "I have missed you."

She moved forward and seated herself beside him. “You hurt your foot," she said. "Is it better now?"

"Yes," he replied, "and it was a great annoyance, Nell, because it kept me from you."

She colored and looked at him bright-eyed.

He leaned forward and took one of her hands, which were lying loosely clasped in her lap. "Nell," he said, "I know so little about you. Tell me about yourself."

The perfect opportunity! All she had to do now was to tell him that she was not what he had thought. He would ask what she meant and she would tell him that she was the third daughter of the Earl of Claymore, the one he had not met. He would not mind. He was in a sympathetic mood.

"There is really nothing to tell," she heard herself say, and she shrugged her shoulders and smiled. "My life has been very ordinary. Tell me about yours. It must have been very exciting, I think."

"And you would be very wrong," he told her. "I have a great deal, do I not, wood nymph? Wealth and property and social status. It must seem to you that I cannot fail to be happy."

"And you are not?" she prompted, unconsciously squeezing the hand that still held hers.

"I had a lonely childhood," he said. "My parents died when I was an infant, and my grandfather brought me up in Scotland. He was a recluse long before I came to him. I was educated at home by him-fortunately, he was a learned and an intelligent man. He would not allow me to make companions of any other boy in the vicinity, and he did not wish me to go away to school. He and his housekeeper, who had been with him for years and years, were almost the only human companions I knew until I grew to manhood."

"Poor little boy," she said, her eyes suspiciously bright as they looked into his.

He laughed. "I am not trying to spin a tragedy," he said. "It was a lonely childhood, yes, but there were compensations. I loved my grandfather and I believe he loved me. Even his refusal to let me out of his sight came, I think, from a fear that he would lose the one link with life that had come to him in his old age. It was a very secure childhood. It was not until long after he died and I decided that I should venture out into the world that I realized how ill-equipped I was to become a part of it."

"Where did you go?" she asked.

"To London first," he said. "I found life hard there. It is not easy for me to meet and converse with new people. I find myself frequently tongue-tied."

"Yet you can talk to me," Helen said.

He smiled and took her hand in a warmer grip. "Yes, little wood nymph, I can talk to you," he said, "because I know you are not sitting in judgment on my conversation and my manners. I always used to feel the same way with… with someone else."

"With a lady?" she asked.

"I had one good friend, too," he said, not answering her question. "He was everything I am not: charming, at ease in any company, never at a loss for words. He helped me a great deal."

"Why have you come here?" she asked.

"I wanted a little peace and quiet, wood nymph," he replied. "I thought to find it here. Maybe I am more like my grandfather than I care to admit."

"Have you found it?" she asked. "The peace and quiet, I mean."

His eyes wandered over her face for a while before he answered. "To a degree," he said finally. "I have met you, Nell, and with you I feel I can relax. I can forget that there are such things as balls and assemblies and dinner parties and afternoon visits to be made. You do not realize how fortunate you are not to have to worry about such things."

She smiled. The moment for her great revelation seemed to be slipping farther into impossibility. His hand left hers and reached up to cup the side of her head. His thumb stroked her cheek.

"I have missed you, Nell," he said softly. And he meant it. He knew that he should not mean it, that he should even now be making an effort to remain aloof from her. But the magic was there, as it always was when he was with her. She sat so quietly and earnestly listening to him, this girl who was very beautiful despite the shabbiness of her dress and the untidiness of her hair. Desire was rising in him and he did not have the will to quell it.

"I have missed you too," she said, and she turned her head so that her lips were against his palm.

Mainwaring was lost. His hand slipped through her hair to cup the back of her head and his other hand reached for her shoulder and pulled her close. Ah yes, her lips were as he remembered them, soft and warm, eager to part beneath the persuasion of his tongue, her mouth sweetly responsive to his invasion. He could feel her firm, unfettered breasts against his coat and her fingers in his hair.

But this time he wanted to be quite sure that she had as much pleasure as he. He laid her back against the grass and lifted her dress to her breasts and over her head and free of her arms. He removed her undergarments. He took his coat off and rolled it beneath her head before removing the rest of his clothes. She was beautiful, breathtakingly so. He gazed with wonder at her, not even touching her for a while. And he noticed that she gazed unashamedly back. Nell. His lovely Nell.

He touched her only with his hands, exploring her breasts and her small waist, her inner thighs, and he watched the color mount in her cheeks, and her lips part. When he touched her in more intimate places, she closed her eyes and tipped back her head. She clutched the grass on either side of her. He watched her, his own desire under rigid control, his hand learning with slow patience to arouse her for his entry.

When she looked at him once more and reached up her arms for him, he finally took her, and the taking was infinitely sweeter for the knowledge that their passion was shared. Her hips reached up and found his rhythm, and by very instinct he paced himself to the tension of her body. He knew, he felt, when that tension was ready to give way, and finally, gratefully, he pressed all his weight down on her and drove his own release into her soft and yielding warmth. He heard her cry out and was aware that his own voice had been mingled with hers.

Mainwaring lifted himself off her and drew her into the shelter of his arms. Her body was warm and damp and still shaking with the aftermath of passion. He kissed her closed eyes and her mouth, feeling relaxed and sleepy. He smiled dreamily when she looked up at him, her own face flushed and drowsy.

"Oh, William," she said, "I do love you so." And she smiled into his eyes, turned her head more comfortably into his shoulder, and slept.

William Mainwaring lay taut and wide awake beside her. God, what had he done? Were those words merely spoken in the aftermath of a satisfactory coupling, or had she meant them? Oh, God, no, he thought, and put his free hand over his eyes. He could not have done that to her, could he? He had not put someone else in the same position that he had been put in the year before.

He wanted to wake her, ask her what she had meant. She could not love him, surely. She was just a country girl, he a wealthy gentleman. She must have realized from the start that there could never be any real relationship between them. Surely she had known that the best they could hope for was a mutually satisfactory summer of physical passion. They were mere words she had spoken; they must be. He continued to hold her in his arms while she slept.

But when she woke and looked up at him, her smile was so bright and trusting, her eyes so full of tenderness, that his heart felt like lead inside him. What sort of havoc was he about to wreak in another human's life? He kissed her with a hopeless tenderness.

"I must leave, Nell," he said.

Her smile faded somewhat. "So soon?" she asked. "I wanted to talk to you."

"Next time, little wood nymph," he said, kissing her lightly on the nose and sitting up to dress himself.

"I had something to tell you," she said, reaching for her own clothes. Her voice sounded a little forlorn.

"Then say it." He smiled around at her as he buttoned his shirt.

"No," she said hesitantly. "It is something I find difficult to say. I wanted to tell you when you were holding me."

He laughed and pulled her to her feet. "I really must go, Nell," he said. "Next time I shall hold you and you shall make your big confession. Will that please you?"

"I suppose so," she said uncertainly, and she put her hands on his chest and raised her face to be kissed.

He took her face between his hands and looked down into her trusting eyes so full of… love! God, but he hated himself. He kissed her briefly and very gently on the lips and turned and left her without another word.

Helen was left with an almost empty feeling, which she did not understand. He had come, and seeing him again had made her realize that she loved him far more than she had thought. It had felt so lovely to sit beside him on the bank of the stream, holding his hand and listening to him talk. No one ever seemed to want to talk to her. People were impatient of her strange ideas, her intensity about subjects that did not matter to them. But William had seemed to want to talk to her, and he had talked about himself. He had seemed relaxed, though he had said that he found it difficult to converse with other people. He had made her feel unusually wanted.

And he had made love to her again. She could not have imagined any experience more wonderful. She had loved it the first time, knowing herself possessed by the man to whom she had given her heart. But this time he had done indescribably wonderful things to her body, arousing excitement and longings of which she had not suspected herself capable. And then he had carefully and thoroughly satisfied all those longings. When she had curled against him and slept, she had felt as if they were united forever, as if they could never again be two separate entities.

Why, then, was she here alone, and he on his way back to Graystone? She looked around her. Everything seemed to quiet and so… almost inanimate without William there to share it with her. He had to go, of course, just as she had to go home. It was absurd to expect otherwise. She tried to shake off her mood. Tomorrow he would come back again and they would talk and love. He would remember that she had something important to say to him, and finally she would be able to unburden herself of her secret.

He had seemed to be almost in a hurry to leave. But, of course, perhaps he really did have something important to do. It was quite possible that he had a dinner appointment and would have to get ready early for it. Yet surely he could have spared a few more minutes when he knew that she wanted to speak to him. Nonsense, she told herself. If she had really pressed the point, he would have listened.

Had he said he would come back tomorrow? Had he said anything about seeing her again? He had said he would hear what she had to say the next time, but he had not said when that next time was likely to be. Absurd to worry about that. They had met enough times, and knew each other well enough that they no longer had to make definite arrangements to meet again. He knew that she came here very often in the afternoons. He would come tomorrow, or at worst the next day. Had he not said that he had missed her? And had not his lovemaking shown a very definite regard for her?

Helen turned around with sudden impatience and pulled her dress over her head again. She tossed it down on the grass and jumped into the stream. The water reached to her waist, and she gasped with the shock of its coldness against her heated flesh. Then she took a deep breath and plunged beneath the surface, trying to wash away her uneasiness along with the dried sweat of summer heat and an afternoon's passion.

Chapter 7

It was really a crime that one did not get up early every morning. William Mainwaring thought as he drove his curricle along dusty country roads, expertly maneuvering it around bends that would have taken an inattentive driver quite unawares. There was a quiet and peacefulness about the early morning that was not there later in the day. The sun was still quite low on the horizon, and a haze still settled over everything, promising heat again later. But for now, the air was fresh and cool. He felt almost cheerful for a brief few minutes.

If only he did not feel quite such a failure. It seemed to have become his fate in life to be constantly running away. When he had left Scotland a few short years before, he had thought he was running to life, a life that had passed him by for the whole of his youth. But what had the adventure brought him? Last year he had fled from Elizabeth as soon as her husband made it clear to him that he would not easily leave her go. And he had left London just a short while ago, convinced that he would be happy again in a country setting.

And now here he was again, running back to Scotland because of a little wench whose parents could not afford to buy her a dress that fit or shoes for her feet. Would he ever find a place where he belonged? Had he merely been unfortunate in his relationships, or was there something wrong within himself? He sighed. His housekeeper in Scotland would be surprised to see him. He would probably throw her into fits. His grandfather's old housekeeper had survived him by only a couple of years, and Mainwaring had hired this woman shortly before his departure for London. He assumed that the household was running smoothly, but he did not know how the woman would react to his unexpected arrival.

His decision had been made the evening before after a great deal of soul-searching. He had tried to shrug his mind free of Nell. She was, after all, a creature of no social significance. She had given herself to him entirely of her own will, and she had been foolish enough to fall in love with him. She could not expect anything more of him than some money with which to buy herself decent clothes. Or perhaps she hoped that he would set her up as his mistress. Such arrangements were not at all uncommon. But really he owed her nothing. He could salve his conscience quite easily by going to her the next day and giving her a bag of coins. It was as easy as that.

The trouble was that it was not at all that easy. He had never been able to think of people solely in terms of class. It had appalled him in his time in England to notice with what indifference, even contempt, the people of his class could treat their servants. And women always suffered the most. He had been at one houseparty when he had literally bumped into a maid one morning as he left his room. She had been sobbing into her apron, but would not answer his queries. She had merely rushed past him. Later in the morning, the other members of the party, all male, had roared with appreciation as one of their number had described in graphic detail his rape of the girl the night before. Mainwaring had left the house the same day.

No, he could not dismiss Nell from his mind merely because she was of a lower class. She was a creature of intelligence and sensitivity, he knew, and a woman of deep feeling and passion. If it was true that she loved him, she would suffer when she knew that he did not return her feeling, that he had no intention of making of their relationship anything more than it was at present. She would be hurt, perhaps permanently scarred.

And he knew very well how she would feel. The same thing had happened to him the year before. And there was no worse feeling in this world, he believed, than to know that one's love was bestowed where it was not returned and that there was no hope of any change. The one difference was that Elizabeth had been far more honest with him from the start than he had ever been with Nell. He had fallen in love with Elizabeth, knowing full well that she did not love him. She had never encouraged him, never given away physical favors except that one kiss after he had finally persuaded her to marry him.

He had behaved deceitfully and dishonorably with Nell. Although he had never spoken words of love to her, with his body he had led her to believe that he loved her. He had taken possession of her body twice, taken the privilege of a husband, even though he had had little doubt the first time that she was a virgin. It was no consolation to him that the vast majority of men of his class would have done the same without the merest qualm of conscience. He was not other men. He m as himself, with his own very strict code of conduct and his own very tender conscience. She had every right to love him and feel secure in the expectation that he returned her love.

As he sat in his library alone, not even a drink in his hand to dull the edge of his guilt, Mainwaring felt very ashamed of himself. He had not forced her, it was true. She had made her own decision to allow him to possess her. But he could not excuse himself with such thoughts. He should never have allowed himself to touch any woman unless he was prepared to offer his heart as well as his body.

What was he to do? He could not continue the affair; that much was perfectly clear to him. He would not offer her compensation in the form of money or gifts. He would feel it insulting, and he had a strong belief that Nell would feel doubly hurt if he tried. It would be like offering her payment for services rendered. He would be making a whore of her.

What, then? Mainwaring sat for a long time, an elbow resting on one raised knee, staring into an empty fireplace, wondering whether he should marry the girl. The possibility would not have occurred to most men in his position. Even to marry a governess or the daughter of a cit would have been beneath the dignity of any but those very much in love or very much in debt. But to marry a little nobody who did not seem even to possess a pair of shoes would have seemed downright laughable. And why marry a wench who gave freely outside the marriage bed?

But to William Mainwaring it was a very serious problem. He cared not a fig for social convention. It mattered not to him that if he married Nell, half the drawing rooms in the country would be closed to him. He had no particular wish to enter those drawing rooms. The only questions that did occupy his mind were whether or not he should marry her or whether marriage to him would be the best solution for Nell.

There was really little doubt about the first question. He owed her marriage. He had perhaps taken away her chances of making a decent marriage with any other man. At best, he had placed her in danger of being very severely punished by a future husband who would discover that he was not the first to use her. He could have paused at that point and made the firm decision to make Nell his wife. He would not suffer unduly from the marriage, even if his own happiness mattered in this decision. He liked her and found her attractive. What would it matter to him if he did not love her? It was not as if he expected someday to find a bride whom he could love.

But it was the second question that he pondered long. If she did love him, Nell would be happy to marry him. Her life would change a good deal, suddenly she would be able to have all the things she had only dreamed about. And he would enjoy spending money on her, seeing her childlike delight in the gifts he could give her. Yet was it certain that marriage to him would bring Nell happiness even if he could disguise the fact that he did not love her? Even if their social life was restricted, her life as his wife would be vastly different from anything she had known. And must he assume that the change would be all for the better? She would find the adjustment a gainful process no doubt. She had no training whatsoever for that life she would have to lead.

Marriage was for a long time. All else notwithstanding, it would not take Nell long, sensitive as she was, to realize that his feelings for her in no way matched hers for him. He would not be able to pretend for a lifetime.

And it was on this point that the whole decision hinged. Would the unhappiness of being married to someone one loved but who did not return that love be worse than that of being completely abandoned? A year ago he had pleaded with Elizabeth to marry him, even though she still loved Robert. He had enough love for both of them, he had assured her. And he had believed passionately what he had said. Now he was not so sure. If Robert had divorced her, and if she had married him, would it be torture now to be here with her, seeing her every day, loving her by night, knowing that her heart was somewhere off with her first husband?

For the first time, Mainwaring admitted to himself that he was probably far better off away from Elizabeth. It had been a bad year, but the worst of the pain had dulled. There was just the ache left, the knowledge that his whole life was spoiled by what had happened. But he pain would have been constantly present, the wound would have festered, if he had been daily in a position of intimacy with her.

He could not put Nell in that position, Nell was a free spirit. He would not be able to bear to see the light go out of her eyes and the spring from her step. He could not imprison her soul. She would suffer if he left her. In all probability, if her feelings ran deep, as he suspected they did, she would be badly hurt for a long time. But she would still be free at the end of it all. She would probably be a stronger person for the suffering.

There was only one thing that he could do. Much as he disliked having to uproot himself yet again, admit defeat once more, he must leave. If he stayed, he was not sure that he would have the strength to stay away from her. And even if he did, it seemed very possible that he would run into the girl in the village one day. Even the knowledge that he was still in residence would cause her unnecessary pain. He must leave and give her a chance to begin forgetting him.

He did wonder if it was the honorable and the compassionate thing to do to go to Nell the next day and tell her of his decision. He could imagine her perhaps going to the woods for several days before she heard of his departure, waiting for him to come. He could imagine her pain when she discovered that she had been abandoned without a word. He would look the biggest blackguard ever to walk this earth. But equally he could picture the scene if he faced her with the truth. Would she be saved any pain by his presence? Perhaps it would be worse. And, worst of all, perhaps his pity would overcome him and he would take her into his arms again. There was no saying what would happen if he did that. But the end result would still be the same.

There was not much rest that night either for Mainwaring, or for his servants. He wrote notes to all his acquaintances in the area, excusing himself for his hasty departure. He wrote longer letters of apology to the two families with whom he had accepted invitations. His servants packed his bags and prepared his curricle and his horses.

Thus it was that early the following morning William Mainwaring was on his way to Scotland, all but his heaviest trunks strapped to the back of his curricle. His heavier luggage was to be sent on later. It was with a heavy heart that he drove on until the landmarks became unfamiliar. This was a sordid and a shameful episode of his life, and he would not easily forget it. One's own unhappiness was easier to bear than the unhappiness one knew one had inflicted on someone else.

The family was already sitting down to dinner when Helen trailed into the dining room. She took her place without a word.

"Well, miss?" the earl said severely. "Is it customary in this house to come to the table whenever you feel like doing so?"

"I am sorry, Papa," she said. "I was busy thinking and I forgot the time. I did hurry as much as I could so that I would not be dreadfully late."

"Perhaps a removal to the schoolroom without any food or drink would teach you that punctuality is a virtue in this house," her father said.

"Yes, Papa," she replied, her eyes on her empty plate.

"And next time, child, that is exactly what will happen," the earl blustered, unnerved by the docility of his daughter.

"And where were you this afternoon, Helen?" her mother wanted to know. "You know very well that I asked specifically that you drive to your Aunt Sophie's with your sisters and me. It was Cousin Matilda's birthday, and it was only fitting that we all go to wish her a happy birthday."

"I am sorry, Mama," Helen said. "I forgot. I went for a walk."

"There have been altogether too many walks since spring arrived this year," the countess said in exasperation. "Papa and I have been very patient. We know that you are rather strange, child, and that you seem to need to be on your own more than Emily and Melissa. But, really, at your age, you must begin to take an interest in your social duties. If you cannot limit the walks to afternoons when we have nothing else planned, I shall really have to forbid you altogether to leave the house unaccompanied."

"Yes, Mama," Helen answered meekly.

Really, she did not feel like arguing with anyone. She felt mortally depressed, though she had told herself for the past two hours that she was overreacting. William had not been there this afternoon. There was nothing so strange about that. He felt his social obligations, even if she did not feel hers. He was very popular in the neighborhood. Doubtless he had other engagements for the afternoon. She could not expect to see him every day. Tomorrow he would be there.

She must be very careful not to antagonize Mama further. What a dreadful predicament she would be in if her mother's threat were carried out. Not that her parents usually showed such consistency, but she did not want to tempt fate. She would never be able to see William if a groom or a maid were made her constant watchdog.

It would not be so bad, perhaps, she would not be so depressed, if she had not had a presentiment that he uld not come today. She had sat under the oak tree trying to shelter from the chill wind that had arisen since noon and had known that she would not see him. She told herself now, as she had told herself all afternoon, that he would come tomorrow and all would be well. She had nothing to fear until then. They had no engagement for that evening, which might have brought her unexpectedly into William's company.

Helen was so deeply wrapped in her own gloom that she almost missed the interchange between Melissa and her mother. Melly was talking in her complaining whine, Helen's unconscious mind realized, before her conscious mind heard the words.

"But, Mama," Melissa was saying, "I cannot believe that he would have left without a word. Surely something dreadful must have happened to cause him to leave in such a hurry. We were to ride one morning."

"It is most provoking," the countess agreed. "He did appear to show a marked partiality for you. It must have been your excessive modesty, my love, that made him believe that you did not wish the connection. I cannot think what else can have changed his mind."

"Perhaps he thought that because he was a mere mister, he was not good enough for me," Melissa said tragically. "Oh, Mama, what am I to do? We will never find husbands."

"Considering that he is so beneath us in station," Emily added tartly, "I would say that Mr. Mainwaring altogether put on too many airs. He is probably holding out for a duke's daughter. I warned you, Melly, how it would be."

Helen was all attention now. "What has happened to Mr. Mainwaring?" she asked.

"You see, Helen," her oldest sister said crossly, "you will have nothing to do with visiting with us, and then you expect us to relay all the local news to you at the dinner table. Mr. Mainwaring has gone, that is what has happened. The neighborhood is buzzing with the news. He gave no warning, you know, and he had several invitations that he had to decline after already accepting them. For once I must applaud you, Helen, in showing no interest in securing an introduction to the man. He did not deserve such notice."

Helen felt somewhat removed from the scene at the table. Her ears were buzzing. Voices seemed to come from far away.

"He is not much loss to the neighborhood," the earl grumbled into his food. "The fellow's just a city dandy, if you ask me. Won't hunt because of the poor fox! Won't watch a cockfight because of the poor birds! It only made me wonder that he did not carry a jar of smelling salts around in his pocket."

"Is he not coming back?" Helen asked. Her voice sounded surprisingly normal to her own ears.

"It seems not, child," the countess said. "In the note he wrote Papa, he explained that he is going to Scotland for the remainder of the summer at least. And his trunks and boxes were sent away from Graystone this morning."

"Oh, Mama, what am I to do?" wailed Melissa.

"Don't fret, my love," Lady Claymore said. "I talked to Papa earlier about going to London perhaps for the winter. It is only right that you girls should have the opportunity to find husbands worthy of your rank and breeding."

"Mama?" Emily looked sharply at her mother, hope dawning in her eyes. "Is this right?"

"Well," the countess said, glancing anxiously at her husband, "Papa said he would see."

Emily talked about nothing else for the remainder of the meal. It was quite beneath her sense of dignity to appear too enthusiastic about the proposed visit, but it was obvious to all that she was very eager indeed to go to London. Even Melissa's mood seemed to lift somewhat when she was reminded of all the parties and entertainments that winter in the city would have to offer. Why, the place must be simply teeming with gentlemen equally as handsome as Mr. Mainwaring, and a good number of them might even have titles.

Only Helen's mind refused even to consider the delights that might be in store for her if only Papa would agree to let them go. She could not think beyond the dreadful fact that she had been abandoned, left without a word of explanation, by the man who had become her lover. She sat rigidly in her chair while the animated conversation of her mother and sisters continued. She ate without even realizing that she did so.

The days following were the worst Helen could ever remember living through. Outwardly she was more sociable and more biddable than usual. She sat with her mother and sisters in the mornings sewing and listening to their conversations. She even agreed more than once to ride with Melly, usually a great trial because her sister always insisted that they ride at a -sedate pace perched on their sidesaddles. Helen was usually a neck-or-nothing person, and she had a shocking habit of swinging one leg to the other side of her horse despite the restrictions of a long skirt, when she thought herself unobserved.

In the afternoons and evenings she did whatever her family had planned, sitting with apparent cheerfulness through endless visits, listening to the invariable topic of conversation: the strange defection of Mr. Mainwaring. One and all now recalled that they had never quite taken to the man. He had always held aloof as if he considered himself better than they. "Toplofty" was the general term of disapproval for the man whose company and favor they had all courted a mere week before.

And Helen listened to the other topic of conversation, which took precedence even over Mr. Mainwaring when her mother and her sisters and she were alone. Although the earl had said only that he would think about it, it was assumed that the proposed visit to London was quite definite. Mama was excited. She had made only one visit to London since her marriage, and that had been a fleeting one of a mere week several years before. She relished the prospect of bringing out three marriageable daughters and of finding husbands for them. There were many old acquaintances whom she could scarcely wait to see again.

Both Emily and Melissa were almost equally delighted by the prospect. Emily had always considered that she was wasted on the company she was likely to meet in the country. Now, at last, she would find her true environment. She would make a brilliant marriage and would be able to behave with amiable condescension whenever she came home for a visit. She did not, of course, put these thoughts into quite such words, but Helen was able to interpret her sister's feelings with some accuracy.

Melissa was suffering from wounded pride. She had fully expected an offer from Mr. Mainwaring. What was worse, she was convinced that everyone else of their acquaintance had expected the same outcome. It was humiliating to find that he had left without a word to her. It was not that she had loved him. Melissa would have scorned to consider such an emotion when thinking of marriage. But he was a handsome and a wealthy man. He would have made a distinguished husband. It was important, now, for her self-esteem, that she find another husband, equally superior to all their other acquaintances. Perhaps more so. In London she would have a chance to meet gentlemen of higher rank than Mr. Mainwaring.

Helen listened and she behaved correctly. The countess eyed her youngest daughter several times during those days with relief. The mention of London had brought about a noticeable change in Helen. Why had she not thought of it before? Of course, the child was very young and she undoubtedly had a great deal more energy than either of the elder girls. It was natural that she should be bored by the very restricted activities of their lives at home. London was just what she needed. There she would have more activities than even her energy could cope with, and there surely she would find some gentleman who would not look too much askance at her strangeness. The child was daughter of an earl, after all, and she would have a le dowry with which to attract attention.

But Helen said nothing. She did what was expected of her and she spoke when good manners dictated that she speak. But within, she ached with a pain that felt as if it must break out into sheer hysteria at any moment. She would not go to the woods. She would not think about William. But one cannot tell oneself to stop thinking about a topic. In fact, Helen found, the one sure way to ensure that one thought constantly on a subject was to try not to. One week after her last visit to her private hideout, she went back there deliberately, in a determined effort to think through what had happened and come to terms with her misery.

She did not change into the cotton dress. She merely pulled off her riding boots and stockings when she reached the banks of the stream and dangled her feet in the water as she sat down. She had not opened the door of the hut. She had no wish this afternoon to bring out any of her books or paints. She had to think.

There could be only one explanation for his hasty departure. It had to be because of her. There had been no warning that he had been contemplating the move. He had accepted several invitations for dates after his departure. It had to be that final afternoon with her that had decided him. What was it? He had seemed genuinely glad to see her after his week of confinement at home. He had talked to her as if she had been a real friend, and he had held her hand the whole while. There had seemed to be real affection in his manner.

And his lovemaking had been far more tender than it had been on the first occasion. He had not been intent only on the satisfaction of his own desire. She had been well aware that he had used his hands and and lips deliberately to build her own excitement. He had been ready for her many minutes before she was ready for him›, she had known. And even when he had thrust inside her, she had known, somewhere on a more rational level than the one of heightened emotion under which she reacted, that his movements had been controlled. All the time he had been deliberately guiding her to a climax, and only when he knew that she had reached it did he allow his control to break.

Those were not the actions of a man who was considering abandoning her. Unless he was an experienced rake who delighted in his own sexual prowess. Somehow, though, the image did not at all fit William Mainwaring as she knew him.

It was afterward, only afterward, that his manner had been less warm. He had not been cold exactly, or unfriendly, but she had felt a withdrawal. He had been in a hurry to leave. In his earlier mood he would have stayed and held her and listened to the story that she wanted to tell him. He had talked about hearing it the next time, but his failure to make a definite tryst with her had been noticeable. She had felt uneasy even at the time. Now she knew that her instinct had been quite right.

But what had caused the change? Had he suddenly become disgusted with what they were doing? Had she said or done anything to make him feel that she was trying to shackle him? Surely not. She had given herself freely to him on two occasions. He could not have felt himself trapped.

"Oh, William, I do love you so!"

Helen's eyes widened. She had not said that, had she? Oh, surely not. She could not have done so before he gave indication that he felt as she did. Why, then, could she almost hear herself saying the words? When would she have said them? She hid her face against her raised knees and thought her way moment by moment through their lovemaking from the first kiss. No, she had not said a word. And then she remembered curling into the warmth of his naked body after he had withdrawn from her. She remembered him kissing her, warm kisses of relaxed affection, passion gone.

"Oh, William, I do love you so," she had said.

Helen raised a burning face and stared down into the water. For several minutes she could think only of her own shame. Strangely, she felt no shame at all for having given herself to a man who was neither her husband nor her betrothed. But to have told him that she loved him when he had never suggested anything but a physical and perhaps affectionate regard for her was unpardonable. She had been convinced that he did love her, but he had never said so. How could she so demaned herself!

But finally anger took the place of shame. Mr. William Mainwaring had fled from his home, had he, merely because a girl he supposed to be a village wench had tried to lay claim to his affections? He had run like a scared rabbit. It was fine to spend a summer dallying with her in the woods, accepting her free favors, but he was not about to allow himself to be lured into accepting any responsibility for her feelings, He had not even had the courage to say good-bye to her, to tell her face to face that he was going away.

She had loved him and she had thought him worthy of her love. He had seemed a kindly and a sensitive man. She had not suspected him of cowardliness or of moral weakness. But he clearly suffered from both. And cruelty. He was undoubtedly a cruel man. Did he not realize that she would go back to their meeting place and that she would grieve when he did not come?

One thing was now very clear to her. She must not love William Mainwaring any longer. He was not worth the misery that she had suffered for the last week. She was ashamed now to think that she had given herself to a man of his character. For the first time she felt violated and sullied. But there was really no point in brooding on what could not be changed. Only she must be sure that from this moment she looked only ahead. She would not waste another sigh or tear on that man. She would enter wholeheartedly into her mother's plans for the winter. Perhaps in London she would meet a real man, one she could respect as well as love. She doubted it, but she had to have something positive on which to focus her mind for the next several weeks.

Helen pulled her feet from the stream, rubbing them dry on the grass and the hem of her habit, and pulled on her stockings and boots again. She strode across to the hut and wrestled the door open. There was no use in leaving her paints, paper, and books any longer. She would not be coming back. After all, she was trespassing on the land of a man whom she was now pledged to hate. Even the hut belonged to him-she was returning the gift, even though he was not there to know it-and she scorned to use what was not hers.

When she came outside again, she placed her bundle of possessions carefully on the path and closed the door as tightly as the warped wood and crooked hinges would allow. Then she stooped to pick up her belongings again. But she did not do so. She remained bent over them for a while; then she straightened up and wandered with lagging steps and unseeing eyes to the edge of the stream again.

How could she be so self-righteous and so dishonest with herself as to put all the blame on William? She was the one who had led him to believe she was a village girl. She had not told him the truth even when he had asked her to tell him about herself. And what had happened to her was not seduction. She had been a willing partner. William had never treated her with disrespect. And he had never made any promises to her.

What promises had she expected, anyway? Marriage? How absurd! Gentlemen did not marry young girls in shabby dresses who ran around barefoot. Especially when those girls give away their favors freely. She must have been mad to have dreamed that he was falling in love with her.

Perhaps for the first time in her life Helen regretted that she was not like other girls of her class. She had earned correct behavior and attitudes, but she had not practiced them. Instead, she had lived in her incredibly unrealistic and childish dream world, where one could do as one wanted and not have to abide by the consequences.

Except that this time she was being hurled out of the world of dreams and childhood into the one where one's actions had very definite and painful consequences. She had lost her virginity along with her innocence. She had a heart that was painfully bruised. She was beginning to grow up.

And she was beginning to realize that in the adult world one had to take responsibility for one's own actions. She was painfully disillusioned by William's behavior, yes, and she would never be able to trust him again even if he returned now. She still believed his abandonment without a word to her to be cruel. But first and foremost she had herself to blame.

Was she ashamed of what she had done? She was not sure. But she knew that she had done wrong, not just in lying with a man who was not her husband, but in deceiving him. She deserved the consquences that were causing her misery. She had learned a painful lesson.

When Helen finally picked up the assorted bundle from outside the hut, she left the clearing without once looking at her surroundings.