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expensive.
    â€œGood day, Mrs. Winters,” she said. “I trust you did not take a chill from riding home in the vicar’s dogcart last evening? It is a pity you do not keep a carriage, but I do not suppose you would have much need for one.”
    â€œIndeed not, ma’am,” Catherine agreed, entertaining herself with a mental image of a carriage house in her back garden—twice as large as her cottage. “And it was a very pleasant evening for a drive, provided one was dressed appropriately.”
    â€œWhat a delightful cottage,” Lady Baird said. “It is in a quite idyllic setting, is it not, Eden?”
    â€œThere are many people in London,” Lord Pelham said, his blue eyes twinkling down at Catherine, “who would kill to have property on the river, as you have, Mrs. Winters.”
    â€œThen I must be thankful I do not live near London, my lord,” she said.
    â€œI do not believe such a small property would be of interest to anyone in town, Pelham,” Mrs. Adams said. “Though it must be admitted that the river makes a pleasing setting for the village. And the stone bridge is very picturesque. Did you notice it when we arrived two days ago?”
    â€œWe will ride on and pay homage to it,” Mr. Adams said, “andallow Mrs. Winters to return to the warmth of her cottage. You are shivering, ma’am.”
    Catherine smiled at him, and generally at all of them as they bade her farewell and proceeded down the street toward the triple-arched stone bridge at the end of it. Yes, she had shivered. And yes, it was chilly standing outside without her cloak and bonnet.
    But it was not the cold that had been her chief discomfort. It was
him.
Perhaps it was nothing at all. Perhaps she was being girlishly silly over a handsome man. She would be very annoyed with herself if that were really the case. She had thought herself past all that. She was five-and-twenty years old and she was living quietly in the country for the rest of her life. She had resigned herself to that, adjusted her life accordingly. And she was happy. No, contented. Happiness involved emotion, and if one was happy, then one could also be unhappy. She wanted nothing more to do with either. She was content to be content.
    Or perhaps she was not just being silly. Perhaps there really was something. Certainly he had spent a great deal of last evening looking at her, even though he had made no attempt to converse with her or to join any of the groups of which she was a part—except before dinner, when he had had no choice. It surely could not be coincidence that every time she had glanced at him he had been gazing back. She had felt his eyes even when she was not looking at him. And whenever she had looked, it had been unwillingly to try to prove to herself that she was imagining things.
    The same thing had happened today. He had not spoken a word to her but had hung back behind the rest of the group. Whilethey were all glancing about them at her cottage and garden, at the village, and at her, his own eyes had not faltered. She had felt them even though she had not once glanced at him.
    And that was ridiculous, she told herself, letting herself back into the house and suffering the excited assault of Toby, who had been denied the pleasure of barking at strangers. She had looked quite easily at all the others, including the other three gentlemen, and had felt no awkwardness or embarrassment at all even though Mr. Adams and Lord Pelham were equally handsome as Viscount Rawleigh and Mr. Lipton too was a good-looking gentleman. Why should she feel embarrassment? They had called on her. She had not presumed to invite them.
    Why had she found it impossible to turn either her head or her eyes in the direction of the viscount? And how could she know that he had looked steadily at her with those hooded dark eyes of his since she had not looked to see? And how would he construe the fact that she had not