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knowledgeably on the subject of sheep raising and the wool industry. She was surprisingly well-informed and could answer every question he put to her, and by the time he turned his team down the lane leading to Oakwood Manor, he felt himself quite thoroughly prepared to discuss such matters with his bailiff.
    Assuming, of course, that his estate, about which he as yet knew nothing except the yearly income, actually included a sheep or two.
    Miss Jolliffe’s excitement grew more obvious with each turn of the wheels, and when her father’s house came into view in the distance, she leaned forward, as if her eagerness were so great she would have preferred to jump out of the carriage and run ahead of the horses.
    What would it be like, he wondered, to spend Christmas in the bosom of a loving family? It was an experience he would never have, since his own relatives would never accept him. Not that he cared tuppence about them either.
    But then a little voice in the back of his mind asked how much of Miss Jolliffe’s excitement was caused by eagerness to see her family, and how much was triumph that she was bringing home a peer of the realm to parade before them all.
    But Miss Jolliffe, as was apparently normal for her, did not do the expected. No sooner did he pull his team to a halt beside the front door, than she said, “You will doubtless not wish to keep your horses standing, so I can manage from here.”
    Something in her tone of voice and the way she turned her head made him suspect that she was deliberately trying to get rid of him, which made him equally determined not to vanish politely on cue. Without needing to rack his brain unduly, he surmised that she was having second thoughts about the wisdom of accepting rides from strange men, and did not wish her parents to know that she had behaved in such an unladylike manner.
    Well, Miss Jolliffe, he thought with a smile, now it is time to pay the piper. “On the contrary,” he said, “my horses could well use an hour or two of rest if it would not be too much trouble.”
    The dismay in her eyes made it quite clear that he had judged her correctly, but she was not brave enough to utter any objections.
     

 
    3
    Climbing out o f the chaise, Gabriel tied the reins to a hitching post, by which time Miss Jolliffe had climbed down unassisted. Without a word to him, she rapped on the oaken door with the lion’s head knocker. When no one appeared, Gabriel banged it with considerably more force.
    The butler, when he finally deigned to open the door, looked at the two of them disdainfully. “Oh, so it’s you. I’ll thank you not to pound on the door with such violence in the future.”
    Sidling past him into the house, Miss Jolliffe said timidly, “If you please, Hagart, send word to the stables that Mr. Sherington’s horses need to be tended to.”
    Hagart drew himself up stiffly and said, “Indeed, I’ll do no such thing. It is not my responsibility to go traipsing out to the stables on your behest. If you wish to speak to a groom, then go out there yourself.”
    Gabriel was amused by Miss Jolliffe’s assumption that Sherington was his family name rather than his title, but he found nothing funny about the way the butter had responded to her request, which had been quite reason able. Were all the servants in England as insolent as his own? Gabriel would not have suspected such a thing was possible.
    He had been told by numerous people that he could be quite intimidating. He saw no reason to doubt that it was a fair observation, because one black scowl from him, and the butler at once lost his air of pompous self - importance and seemed to shrink in upon himself.
    “On the other hand, Miss Jolliffe,” the man said, cringing away from Gabriel as if trying to ward off a blow, “you are doubtless chilled from your journey, so it might be better if you joined your family in the drawing room, and I’ll just see to the gentleman’s horses myself.” Making a wide