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he was away, that as the youngest daughter with four much older sisters, she’d grown up as if she were an only child. Bessie, she told him, would always be on hand if she needed anything. Bessie, she said, had always assisted her mother with twelve younger children and, although older than herself, she was not only capable but totally devoted to her. As children, she explained, she had been permitted to spend much of her spare time with the older girl despite Bessie being the daughter of her father’s gamekeeper. Bessie was familiar with all her needs and was as necessary to her as Brook’s valet, Hastings, was to him. But for Bessie, she confessed, she might have felt even more lonely than she did when he was away.
    They did not have many close neighbours and Hunters Hall was quite isolated. Brook’s friends, who he invited to enjoy his sporting occasions, either came on horseback or travelled over the rutted country roads in their coaches. Consequently, the formal half-hour visits by their wives were not, understandably, undertaken very often. The vicar’s wife came up from the rectory in the village once a week on foot, weather permitting. She was a middle-aged, strait-laced, childless woman who, having come upon Brook and Harriet in an unconventional embrace near one of the statues on the terrace the summer they had moved in after their marriage, had made it clear to Harriet that she thought in her position that she needed to be far more circumspect.
    Brook did not object to his wife’s fondness for her maid. He was aware that Bessie thought the world of him. She seemed unusually intelligent and had imitated Harriet’s lady-like manners. He also approved of the fact that the cheerful girl never, to his knowledge, forgot her position, and had made the transition to lady’s maid with very little difficulty. She was popular with all the other servants, even the meticulous housekeeper, Mrs Fraser, whose habit it was not just to find fault but to look for faults in those beneath her. It was partly Bessie’s cheerful company as well as his own which Harriet had needed to help her recover from her grief at the loss of her third baby.
    The sunshine on this beautiful spring morning had raised Harriet’s spirits as, with Brook’s hand holding hers, they strolled down to the rose garden. Brook, however, was far from carefree as he tried to find the courage to tell her what must happen in the near future. It was news he had no doubt would wipe the contented smile off her face. She had discarded the bonnet that females wore when the sun shone as it did now; her dark curls tumbled about her pink cheeks, and the loving, happy smile on her pretty face caught at his heart. He loved her so very much, and had been even sadder for her obvious suffering than for his own when she had lost their third unborn child. Now it was he who was obliged to distress her – something he would have avoided at all costs had it been possible.
    ‘Sit here beside me for a moment, my love!’ he said as he seated himself on the stone seat near the fountain. The roses newly in bud were, he thought, at their loveliest. He drew Harriet down beside him and, putting his arm round her waist, said gently, ‘I’m afraid I have something to tell you that will not please you. I am going to have to leave you for a little while.’
    Harriet’s face paled, and her heartbeat quickened as she asked, ‘But why, Brook? Tell me quickly before I become even more anxious.’ She reached up and touched his forehead. ‘That frown frightens me!’
    Brook tightened his arm round her waist and drew her closer against him. He knew it was unseemly to be having such thoughts in the daytime in such a public place, but he felt the customary rush of desire for her and it was all he could do not to carry her up to their bedroom and make love to her, he thought to himself wryly. There were very few occasions when seeing her, touching her, even watching the smile light up her