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Lewes. Is one to assume Lady Eleanor rejected your offer?”
    Penfel’s jaws worked in silent annoyance. “We found we did not suit. Kind of you to ask. Delightful to see you again, Susan.”It did not help his mood when he noticed Miss Fairchild biting back a smile—not of welcome, but of amusement at the public announcement of his jilting.
    Penfel presented his brother, Lord John, and his tutor, Mr. Singleton, who was some tenuous relation, a second or third cousin.
    Abbie stared to learn that this awkward young cousin was the man who had written sohaughtily, denying her access to the da Vinci cartoons. She had pictured A. Singleton as an older, austere gentleman who delighted in thwarting her wishes. She had also understood he was Lord Penfel’s secretary, but very likely he filled dual functions at the Hall.
    “Johnnie will be going up to Oxford in the autumn,”his proud mama announced. “If Singleton can ram Latin and Greek into his head,”she added.
    Lord John was smiling a bewitched smile in Kate Fenshaw’s direction.
    “Poor you!”Kate said to him. “I hate Latin and Greek worse than blood pudding.”
    Mr. Singleton made a demurring sound in his throat at this heresy. He was a better communicator with pen and paper than with the spoken word. When ladies were present, he did most of his communicating without actually opening his mouth. Once he had muttered, “Happy to make your acquaintance,”he seemed to fall mute. It was a malady common to tutors and governesses when they were allowed into their employers’company for a purely social occasion.
    “You seemed curious about our schoolmistress,”Susan said to Penfel. She was a lady much burdened with facts, but not much attuned to people’s feelings. She presented her school friends first, however, as she knew a schoolmistress was only a servant, whereas she and the students were well-dowered ladies. “And this is Miss Fairchild,”she ended, nodding to Abbie.
    “Fairchild?”he asked, frowning.
    Abbie assumed his mama had used some other name. “Fairchild,”she said, loud and clear.
    He gazed into her eyes while a slow smile grew on his lips. “The sins of the parents ought not to be visited on the children—even those older than ten,”he added, to remind her of their meeting at the tent. “I am not the one who called you Fairychild. You must not hold me to account for the misdeeds of others. No doubt I shall have plenty of my own to account for soon enough.”
    Abbie steeled herself against his insidious charm. “You need not feel any need to account to me. You are not one of my pupils.”
    “One never knows. We might teach one another something,”he replied. “I have never been much good at writing, for instance. Singleton is kind enough to be my scribe.”The words were innocent enough, but the mischief in his eyes left no doubt that he was flirting. Did he know she was the one who had written asking to see the cartoons? She was surprised he would remember her name. Abbie was not accustomed to flirting, certainly not in front of her girls, and especially not with such a dasher as Lord Penfel. With a warm flush rising up her throat to color her cheeks, she turned aside in confusion to speak to Kate.
    “Let us eat,”Lady Penfel said, giving her hand to Lord John to assist her from her comfortable seat. “We don’t want to be late for the circus. I have not seen a circus since I sneaked out on Penfel and went to Astley’s Circus in London. Goodness, it must be more than a decade ago. How you loved the ladies in white face and short skirts, eh, Algie?”
    “Ladies in any guise, especially short skirts,”he murmured.
    “And that funny little monkey, Jacko,”Lord John said.
    “And Grimaldi!”his mama cried, smiling in fond memory. “No, that was at Sadler’s Wells. We took you lads for Johnnie’s sixth birthday. How he had us roaring with laughter at his stunts.”
    “What stunts do you do, Lord John?”Annabelle asked.
    Abbie