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and for a moment her flashing smile made her seem as pretty as she would be if she were not so painfully thin.
    Meg remained at the table until everyone had finished, watching her soup congeal in front of her and listening to the crew joke around. When she finally returned to the house, she found her eldest brother in the kitchen, microwaving the dinner Mrs. Wilson, the daily woman from the village, had left for him. His two Springer spaniels were eating out of large china bowls and didn’t even look up when she came in.
    “You should have eaten off the catering truck, Harry,” she said as she went to the refrigerator and took out a bot tl e of diet soda. Two large windows, which were set above eye level, let the dying light into the room. “I did. They have buses fitted up as dining rooms. It was super.”
    Henry Oliver, fifteenth Earl of Silverbridge, poured himself a beer and sat down at a large scrubbed oak table. “What did you eat?” he asked casually.
    “I had some soup.”
    He frowned.
    The microwave beeped. “I’ll get it,” Meg said, and lifted the plate out, peeled off the plastic wrap that covered it, and put it in front of her brother. He began to eat hungrily.
    Meg leaned against the old but immaculately clean sink. “I met Tracy Collins. She’s super nice. And she’s even more beautiful than she looks in her films.”
    Lord Silverbridge took another bite of chipped beef. “Would you like some of this, Meggie? It’s quite decent.”
    She opened a cabinet and took out a glass. “No thanks, I ate with the movie people.”
    Behind her back, her brother closed his eyes.
    Meg measured out a half a glass of soda and turned to face him. “Was that Gwen Mauley’s horse I saw coming in an hour or so ago?”
    “It was.” He took a swallow of beer and produced a grin. “And he’s even more beautiful than he looks in his films.”
    Meg giggled, then took a tiny sip of soda. “It’s good to see you smile.”
    He shrugged wearily. “There hasn’t been much reason to smile so far this year, Meggie.”
    “I know. But landing this film was a good thing, wasn’t it?”
    “It will put on a new roof, at least.” He finished the chipped beef and took another swallow of beer.
    Meg brought her soda to the table and sat across from her brother. “This house is such an albatross. If you sold off some of the land, Harry, it would make life so much easier. Mr. Mauley’s offer is tremendously generous. You’re not likely to get a better one.”
    “We have been through this before, Meg, and I am not selling off my land to some developer,” he replied evenly. “The Olivers have been at Silverbridge for four centuries. This land is in my charge, and I will do everything humanly possible to keep it.”
    Meg looked at his set face and prudently did not reply.
    One of the spaniels had already finished dinner and gone to lie on the old corduroy sofa that stood under one of the high windows. Now the second one finished and ambled over to the sofa to join her brother.
    Harry got up and carried his plate and beer glass to the sink, where he left them for the housekeeper to deal with in the morning. “I’m going upstairs.”
    “I’ll go with you.” Meg followed him, leaving her virtually untouched soda on the table.
    The kitchen they had been using was the original and was located in the rustic, or half basement, of the house. The apartment where they lived was upstairs, and brother and sister had to climb two flights of the narrow back stairs that had once been used by servants, to access it.
    Their father, the fourteenth earl, had had the apartment built in the west wing when it became prohibitively expensive to live in the original rooms. A sitting room, called the morning room, a drawing room and six bedrooms had been closed off from the rest of the house, and central heating had been installed.
    Brother and sister made themselves comfortable in the morning room, which was at the top of the stairs. Three