Read 106. Love's Dream in Peril for Free Online Page B

thoughts.”
    Jane looked pale and solemn.
    “What do you wish for, Adella, in the years that are to come?” she asked.
    “Oh, I don’t know,” Adella replied. “I’ll wait and see what happens. What do you wish for, Jane?”
    “It will never happen, I don’t suppose, but I should like to fall in love, like Mama told me happened with her and Papa. Fall in love and live happily ever after.”
    The soft light had come back into Jane’s eyes.
    “And would you like him to be handsome? And dashing?” Adella asked.
    Jane shut her eyes for second and Adella wondered if her dear, sensible and quiet Jane was thinking about the handsome stranger she had taken tea with yesterday.
    “Adella, it will never happen. I shall earn my living as best I can and, if I am very lucky, when I am a middle-aged lady, perhaps some old footman will ask me to be his wife!”
    Adella picked up one of the pillows from her bed, and threw it at Jane.
    “Rubbish!” she cried. “You are far too pretty. Jane, you will find a beau and be married within a year!”
    “We are too old for pillow fights,” Jane laughed, catching the pillow. “But then what about you? Don’t you want to fall in love?
    “I suppose so,” Adella answered dreamily.
    What did it mean – to fall in love?
    Was that what had happened to her yesterday in the Botanical Gardens, when Digby had kissed her?
    Was that why she had lain awake for half the night, unable to forget his warm blue eyes gazing into hers?
    And why had she been waiting ever since the sun came up this morning for the note he had promised her?
    And was that why she felt an uncomfortable, almost panicky sensation in her chest as she rushed to the window every time she heard the squeak of the front gate when someone came to the door?
    Had she fallen in love, completely out of the blue, without meaning to at all?
    “Jane – I – ”
    She was about to tell her friend all about Digby when there was a sharp rap at the bedroom door.
    “Miss May?” It was old Pargetter, the maid.
    Adella’s heart leapt in anticipation.
    “Pargetter! Has someone brought a letter for me?”
    The maid shook her head.
    “No, indeed, Miss May. Your uncle’s carriage has arrived to take you to London and very fine it be too, Miss May. Fit for a Princess.”
    Adella suddenly felt as if she could not breathe and the tight panicky sensation that had been plaguing her all morning threatened to overwhelm her.
    “The carriage has come too soon. I can’t go yet – ” she stammered.
    Where was Digby’s note?
    “Adella, what can be wrong?” Jane was at her side. “You look very pale. Shall I fetch the smelling salts?”
    “I am fine. It’s just – I am waiting for – a letter. Or a message – I cannot leave until it has come.”
    Mrs. Mottram had joined Pargetter on the landing.
    “What was that, Adella?” she wanted to know. “A message? From whom? Your uncle? He will be able to give it you in person just as soon as you arrive in London. Hurry along now, your coachman is waiting.”
    She felt dumb with pain and disappointment. She was going to have to leave without the letter that Digby had promised.
    He had lied to her!
    There was a bustle on the landing as the gardener and his boy came to carry the trunks down.
    “What a long face that is, Adella! I suppose you are sad to leave us. But one must count one’s blessings,” Mrs. Mottram said. “And you have many to be grateful for. Come quickly now.”
    This was it. The time to leave had finally come and with a hasty goodbye and the quickest of hugs for Jane, Adella found herself stumbling down the stairs, her heart filled with despair.
    As the carriage drew away, Jane stood on the front step to wave.
    ‘Adella is utterly miserable,’ she thought, seeing her white strained face through the carriage window. ‘I have never seen her like this before.’
    Could it have something to do with that fair-haired man who had walked with her in the Gardens yesterday?
    Was it