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off the visor, creating—just for an instant—an illusion of life and movement. Annie wondered sharply what it must have been like for the owner of that suit of mail. Damned hot and uncomfortable. The owner had been small to heft such a load, not more than five and a half feet. But dangerous. In one steel hand, supported from below by a stand, lay a mace, a heavy, medieval war club crowned by a spiked metal head. Annie shivered. What destruction had that weapon wrought centuries ago? How bizarre it was to view its killing weight on display during a night of gaiety in celebration of love. The faint sound of orchestra music from above mingled in her mind with the imagined grunts and clangs of mounted combat.
    She and Max and Laurel reached the foot of the stairs.
    Sydney murmured, “So very glad you could come. Everyone is gathering in the third-floor ballroom for dancing, but do feel free to wander about as you please. Howard has so many lovely works of art, and he does enjoy sharing them with our friends.” She took Laurel’s hand, but her eyes moved past Laurel and Annie to Max and fastened there with a hopeful eagerness that would have infuriated Annie, had she not been too startled by the look on her mother-in-law’s face.
    Laurel glowed. Although Annie had always accorded her mother-in-law full marks for extraordinary beauty, she hadn’t realized just how lovely Laurel could appear, her lake-blue eyes filled with warmth, her perfect mouth curved in gentle wonder, her classic profile softened by emotion.
    Oh, dear Lord. Because it was only too obvious to Annie who was the object of this adoration.
    Howard Cahill’s face, too, revealed a man Annie had never glimpsed—or imagined. As she watched in horrified fascination, Cahill’s normal appearance of icy reserve melted, replaced with intense absorption. Annie had always appraised their new neighbor as a man to be reckoned with. A fabulously wealthy shipowner, their host had a reputation as an aggressive, combative businessman, never willing to lose once he joined a battle. But the tentative warmth in his dark eyes as he looked at Laurel revealed a man longing for intimacy.
    It was only an instant of time that the tableau held, Laurel and Howard looking at each other without pretense, as if they were alone.
    Laurel said softly, “I knew we should meet again. Fate has ordained it.”
    Over the chatter of newcomers behind them, Annie heard his gruff reply that was a dramatic beat slow in coming. “Perhaps you’re right. Though I’ve always said a man holds his fate in his own hands.”
    “We shall see, shan’t we?” and Laurel swept on up the stairs, in an alluring rustle of satin.
    Cahill turned to watch her go.
    Annie and Max followed Laurel up the stairway. Annie grabbed Max’s arm and hissed, “That’s the man!”
    Max looked at her in surprise. “Sure. You’ve met Howard. Hey, listen to that music.” Max had a passion for slow dancing, although she’d never been altogether sure it was the music that entranced him.
    “Listen, Max,” she began, but her protest was lost in Max’s whistle of surprise when they stepped into the immense ballroom. Sydney had taken her and Max on a tour of the Cahill house shortly after the Darlings had moved into their new home. But the ballroom had undergone a magical transformation from an echoing, cavernous, empty room to a brilliant mélange of color, light, movement, and life.
    The change was extraordinary. Crimson velvet curtains decorated with lace-edged satin hearts marked alcoves alongthe walls. Artfully placed lights illuminated brightly colored ceiling frescoes, vivid scenes of exotic ports: Zanzibar drowsing under a torrid summer sun, Marseilles abustle with shipping, San Francisco wreathed in fog, New York a hundred years ago, a fleet of Roman warships taking on stores at Alexandria. In each fresco stood a couple, not part of the central vigor and movement, but separate, absorbed in each other, lovers soon