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mention of horses touch him on the raw? People said he came of lowly origins; perhaps he had been a horse dealer at one time. If so, had Lady Fontclair been purposely twitting him about it? That did not seem like her. If she meant to hurt a man, surely her attack would be private and direct, not public and insinuating.
    Craddock, having made his displeasure felt, put it behind him, and began to talk tersely and sensibly about some local election. Give the man his due: He had courage, and a rough sort of dignity. Lady Tarleton’s disdain could not intimidate him, and neither could the too punctilious courtesy of Sir Robert and Lady Fontclair. If he could not always keep his temper, at all events he kept his selfrespect, and that was no mean achievement in an enemy camp like Bellegarde. The very servants were hostile to him; when they addressed him, they gave a slight, sarcastic emphasis to the “Mr." before his name, as though they thought it a bitter joke that they should have to treat him with respect.
    Julian glanced down the table at Miss Craddock, who was seated next to Sir Robert. How was she bearing up under the veiled hostility around her? He caught her in an unguarded moment, when no one was talking to her. She was lost in her own thoughts, and her face expressed them as candidly as a child’s. She was desperately unhappy.
    Damn, damn, damn! he thought. I refuse to get mixed up in all this. If she doesn’t want to marry Fontclair, it’s no business of mine. Why doesn’t she just cry off?
    He looked across at Craddock. Was he the force behind the marriage? Because if he was, what chance did a meek eighteen-year-old girl have of standing up against a will like his?

*4*  Skirmishes
    After dinner, Julian hoped to get better acquainted with Isabelle Fontclair, but drawing-room company is apt to arrange itself in the most maddening patterns, and he found himself thrown together with Lady Tarleton instead. Her manner toward him was decidedly frosty. She was clearly vexed that he revealed so little about his family background. She dropped questions and insinuations, which he either parried or pretended not to understand. He had no intention of exposing his parents to her scrutiny. He was not ashamed of them, nor (as many of the Quality believed) did he relish making a mystery of his past. He just felt protective of the dead, who could not speak for themselves.
    To distract her, he asked her about a painting that hung over the fireplace. It was a portrait of a man in medieval armour. He was clasping his helmet under one arm and holding up his sword, point downward, so that the jewelled hilt looked like a cross. His long brow and jaw plainly marked him as a Fontclair.
    Lady Tarleton unbent a little. “That’s Sir Roland Fontclair, one of our most distinguished ancestors, and a hero of Agincourt. Of course, the portrait was done much later. My great-grandfather sat for it, wearing assorted pieces of armour from our family collection. But the sword is Sir Roland's own. No one ever used it after his death.”
    She launched into a history of her family's military exploits. Fontclairs, it seemed, had fought gallantly at Hastings and Cr6cy, Blenheim and Saratoga. One Fontclair had championed the cause of Charles II so ardently that he was created a baronet upon the king’s restoration. Lady Tarleton knew all about them: their horses, their squires, their wounds, their decorations. She did not seem to care any longer to whom she was speaking. Her words spilled out faster and faster, her hands were uplifted, her eyes had a feverish gleam.
    A chair scraped. Julian looked around and saw Colonel Fontclair moving toward the door as fast as his limp would allow. Was it Lady Tarleton s stories that had driven him away? She was certainly speaking loudly enough for him to hear every word from his seat nearby. Perhaps her glorification of warfare was exasperating to a man who knew what battle and bloodshed were really like. By all