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have left already. I do hate being the last person at the ball. Not good ton.”
    Bill balled a fist behind his back. Did she never let herself go?
    “Why don’t you come home with me, Bill? Where are you staying tonight? Freddie’s?” Henry said with a frown.
    Bill nodded. Freddie, Lord Lassiter had included Bill in his circle of guests ever since James, his brother, had given Bill the Brambridge estate. Or more precisely, Lady Stanton, James’ wife had given Bill the estate. Bill closed his eyes. Harriet had had a lot to answer for.
    “Good, then you can have a nightcap with me, and my carriage will take you home. Victoria, I assume your outrageous vehicle is waiting outside?”
    Victoria nodded. “I will leave you two to it.”
    Both men watched as she swept away, her petite figure casting large shadows on the hall wall.
    “It’s a dangerous game you are playing with my sister,” Henry murmured as he and Bill climbed in a carriage. “If it all goes wrong you will have me to answer to.”
    “I’m not quite sure what you are talking about.” Bill sat on the hard leather seat of the cab, grabbing hold of the side as the carriage started to move.
    “We’ve all noticed your interest in her. Dammit man, when we were down in Brambridge you spent every day with her. Gods, she came back with a lilt in her step and a song in her voice. And then there were the weeks when you kept turning up at my door every day waiting for an audience with her. We had to start giving away the flowers you brought because there weren’t enough vases in the house.”
    “She refused to see me.”
    “Oh.” Bill had never seen the renowned spymaster so disconcerted.
    “Yes, and in fact she informed me not an hour ago that she would not accept my advances because I was a bastard.”
    Henry remained silent in the dark recesses of the carriage. He coughed as the carriage came to a stop outside his house in Mount Street. As Bill made to get out, he shot out a hand and, with surprising strength, captured his wrist.
    “She wasn’t always like this, Bill.”
    “You mean parading around with an iron pole for a spine and a lemon in her mouth?” A bitter taste filled Bill’s mouth. He knew that it wasn’t so. In Brambridge in those brief halcyon weeks of wooing, Victoria had started to open to him, her usually indolent expression showing occasional flashes of keen perception. He knew he had pushed it too quickly. He hadn’t planned to kiss her so soon, but strangely he hadn’t been able to stop himself. It didn’t matter now. She had fled like a hare sensing a hound.
    “No. It started with her marriage to Colchester. Before then she was more open-minded. When I took Agatha Beauregard on as a ward after the death of her grandfather and at the request of her brother, Victoria did not bat an eyelid.”
    “Agatha was not a bastard.” She was instead a very novel lady whose interest in science had caused Henry a few grey hairs and lost eyebrows. Especially since they had been married.
    Henry drew in a breath. “No-oo. Not as such. But she was a flighty madam wearing what seemed to be a harlot’s outfit and had no seemly grief towards her grandfather’s death. Victoria took her at face value.”
    “And you say then she met Lord Colchester.”
    “Yes. Agatha fled to Brambridge leaving Victoria alone with me. I am afraid that I wasn’t quite as attentive as I had been. She lost her best friend and her brother’s companionship in one fell swoop. I believe Lord Colchester took advantage of that.”
    “How can a seventy year old man take advantage of an eighteen year old girl?”
    Lord Anglethorpe chewed at his lip. “I think only she can tell you that.” He swung out of the carriage and looked back at Bill. “After marrying him she changed. She wouldn’t see me. We didn’t attend the same dinner parties. Although from everything I heard, she had the most wonderful marriage and was thoroughly enraptured with her husband.”
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