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And of course, I brought my family connections, as awkward as it was to trade upon them, showing up at house parties to which we had not been invited.
    As a result, I tried to be as pleasant as possible to our hosts. M. van der Sleijden, my distant cousin, was married to a woman of my mother’s age, who immediately bade me call her Aunt Sofie. Their eldest daughter was a lively dark-haired girl of fifteen named Maria.
    Maria and I shared many interests, including a love ofearly-morning horseback rides—Jan was never even up at that time, having stayed up until the wee hours talking politics.
    The second day after I arrived, we had a very nice ride, cantering across the fields in the gray morning, the mist rising off every stream and canal, doves calling and crossing the pearly sky. We stopped at the top of a gentle rise and watched the sun come up. Neither of us said anything. It was too beautiful.
    Along the line of the canal a man was riding toward us on a black horse, his shadow flung out before him in the morning. I sighed. It was too early for social pleasantry.
    “Oh!” Maria said, and I was startled to see her blushing.
    I looked at the man again. It was General Moreau. “Do you know Moreau?” I asked Maria.
    She bit her lower lip. “I’ve just met him this week. He’s terribly gallant, don’t you think? And a bachelor.”
    “Maria, he’s forty if he’s a day,” I began, but could not finish because Moreau rode up, doffing his hat and making a pretty bow from the saddle.
    “My dear ladies,” he said.
    “Good morning, General,” I said.
    Maria blushed again. “It’s nice to see you again.”
    “The pleasure is mine,” he said. “Surely your fair countenance lends more to the day’s beauty than does mine.”
    I made some sound that might have been a snort.
    He raised black eyes to mine, a look of amusement rather than insult there. “Perhaps my countenance does not give Madame Ringeling the same pleasure. The last time we met, she roundly whipped me on the subject of feminine virtue.”
    I lifted an eyebrow. “I would hardly characterize our brief conversation that way.”
    Moreau inclined his head. “Believe me, Madame, being whipped by you gave me the greatest pleasure.”
    “There’s no accounting for taste,” I said tartly.
    Maria was gaping. Her eyes were huge, and she stared at me as though to send me some secret message. “If your presence does not please my cousin, it certainly pleases me. I am by no means ready to return to the house. General, would you accompany me on the rest of my ride? Elzelina was just saying how tired she was.”
    Moreau inclined his head politely. “Of course, Mademoiselle. I am sure that such an independent woman as Madame Ringeling will have no objection to returning to the house alone.”
    “Of course,” I said sweetly. “I am on my way just now to take breakfast with your mother, Maria. Shall I tell her you will be returning soon?”
    “Fine,” Maria said. She was looking at Moreau as though he were made of marzipan, a look I distrusted immensely.

    A t luncheon, Maria would not speak to me. And that evening Jan wanted me at his side constantly to run off anyone who tried to impede his progress at political conversation. I had no chance to talk to Maria until late, when she had already retired. As I came along the corridor, I saw the light under her door and knocked.
    “Come in?” she said.
    I opened the door. Maria was sitting up in bed, her dark hair braided for the night in two plaits. She was writing in a little journal by the light of a candelabrum beside the bed. “Oh, Elzelina!” she exclaimed.
    I shut the door behind me and came and sat on the end ofthe bed. “Maria,” I said, “I feel that I should warn you. You are very young and—”
    Maria turned scarlet. “You know nothing about Victor! Nothing! He’s one of the finest men ever to walk the earth!”
    “I do not doubt it,” I said carefully. “And you have told me that he is