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excuse himself. “I’ll have to leave you to make the peace, Mother. I left my horse at Five Oaks yesterday, so I must go back with the carriage as soon as we have unloaded the luggage. Do you go in and settle yourselves, and I shall return in no time.”
    “You need not worry about Ella and Mrs. Coates,” Polly whispered, “for it is exactly the sort of problem Mama enjoys worrying about. If Lord John will not help Kolya, will you bring him back here?”
    He looked at her in surprise. “No, Polly, I will not. It would not be at all proper.”
    “Just for a few days, until I finish the portrait.”
    “I’m sure Kolya himself had rather go on to London to find his other friends,” he said gently, concerned at his usually cheerful sister’s despondency. “You will not wish to delay him further.”
    She sighed. “I suppose not. But you must make him take this money. He is more like to take it from you than from a female, surely.” She pressed three sovereigns into his hand.
    Ned did not know what to say, so he was glad when at that moment Mrs. Howard called Polly into the house.
    Kolya had just helped Nick carry in one of the trunks. Polly met him coming out, and Ned saw them exchanging a few words. However, he was busy giving the groom a hand with the second trunk and did not hear what was said. Soon everything was unloaded. Kolya joined the groom on the box and they set off again.
    Cross-country Five Oaks was no distance, but by the winding lanes it was a good six miles. Ned had plenty of time to wonder how Lord John would feel about the appearance of an out-at-elbows foreigner claiming to be his friend. By the time the carriage rumbled into the stable yard of the duke’s vast mansion, he was decidedly apprehensive.
    While the carriage horses were unharnessed, the head groom sent one of his underlings to saddle Ned’s hack for him, another to the house to report the Russian’s arrival.
    The horse beat Lord John by a short head. Ned was just taking the reins from a stable boy when his lordship strode into the yard and looked around.
    “Kolya? Kolya, my dear fellow, it really is you!”
    The Russian flung his arms around Lord John and kissed him on both cheeks. His lordship fervently returned the embrace, to the fascination of Ned and the stable hands. This display was followed by some back slapping, both men talking at once in an incoherent babble.
    As surprised as he was relieved by Kolya’s welcome, Ned wanted to be on his way. However, he felt that as his lordship had come out, he ought to stayand thank him for the loan of the carriage. Unable to get a word in edgewise, he was about to give up when Lord John said, “But you must come into the house at once, Kolya. Beckie won’t thank me for keeping you from her.”
    “So you marry Rebecca Ivanovna? Congratulations, my dear John. Am very delighted. One moment, if you please.” He turned to Ned. “Must thank you, sir, for courtesy and assistance to unknown traveller.”
    He held out his hand and Ned, bemused, shook it. “It was nothing,” he said awkwardly.
    “Howard brought you?” asked Lord John. “My thanks, Howard. Her ladyship and I shan’t forget this.”
    “I’m happy to be of service, my lord. And I must thank you for lending me the carriage.”
    “Family arrived all right and tight, are they? Splendid. Come on, old chap, we mustn’t keep Beckie waiting.”
    Ned watched them walk away, once again talking nineteen to the dozen. The Russian looked thinner and shabbier than ever beside the strongly built, fashionably dressed English lord.
    Pulling on his gloves, he recalled the feel of Kolya’s rough, hard-skinned hand. As he mounted and turned Chipper’s head towards home, he pondered the mystery of the obviously intimate friendship between the Russian labourer and the son of the Duke of Stafford.

* * * *
    As Kolya followed John into the small, comfortably furnished sitting room, a familiar voice asked eagerly, “Is it really