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glanced back at the open doorway.
    Nicholas watched her for a moment but he said nothing. Dipping the quill into the ornate ink stand, he put the finishing sentence to his letter. Laura could read what he wrote. With all my affectionate and enduring love. N. Folding the letter and sealing it with his ring, he addressed it to Miss Augustine Townsend, King’s Cliff, Somerset, England.
    For the first time she noticed that the miniature was lying on the escritoire nearby. “Who is she?” she asked. “She is very beautiful.”
    “There is no one more beautiful. Her name is Miss Townsend; she was my late father’s ward and is soon to be my bride.” He stood and offered her his arm. “Shall we go down, Miss Milbanke?”
    The baron sat in his usual place and had almost finished dining. The waiter brought him a glass of kirsch, which he raised to Laura as she happened to catch his eye. She did not smile at him and looked away again.
    “Are you unwell, Miss Milbanke?” asked Nicholas.
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “You look a little pale.”
    “I —I’m quite well, thank you.”
    The band, hitherto silent, began to play suddenly, and she started at a loud clash of cymbals and a drumroll. She was quite on edge now and had little or no appetite, even for the magnificent offerings of the Austrian chefs employed at the hotel. Austrian food, Austrian voices all around, Austrian music drowning out even thought —and one particular pair of Austrian eyes constantly upon her…. Her hands trembled and she pushed away her unfinished meal. How could she endure all this? It was too much and she did not know how to extricate herself from something she had unwittingly managed to get into.
    Nicholas at last finished his coffee and seemed about to take his leave of her, and in desperation she spoke to him. “Sir Nicholas, may I beg a favor of you?”
    “A favor?”
    “Would you please escort me to my room?” Oh, how shameless those innocent words could sound!
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “I —I assure you that I am not making advances,” she said, her face a miserable crimson, “and it is not so very much to ask of you, is it?”
    “I know that you are not and I know that it isn’t,” he said, smilingly disposing of her anxiety on that score. “But nevertheless I must wonder greatly why you ask me.”
    Unwillingly she glanced at the baron. “I wish to avoid any possibility of meeting with the baron,” she said at last.
    “Has he been bothering you?”
    “In a manner of speaking.”
    “It is entirely your concern, of course,” he said, mistaking her reticence for unwillingness to divulge the true nature of things.
    “I have not encouraged him in any way, in spite of what you think of me.”
    “In spite of what I think of you? And what may that be?”
    “I think we both know your opinion of me, Sir Nicholas.”
    “Do we indeed? Well this half of us is greatly intrigued and very much puzzled. However, we digress. I shall, of course, be delighted to escort you to your room, Miss Milbanke.”
    Relief surged through her as she rose to her feet and put a timid hand on his arm. She did not know how tightly she was holding him, her fingernails digging into his arm, until they were ascending the staircase.
    He smiled. “I realize that it is ungentlemanly of me to draw attention to it, Miss Milbanke, but you truly have a grip like a vise.”
    She took her hand away immediately. “Forgive me, I did not mean —”
    She was covered with confusion. She was also embarrassed, afraid, anxious, and she felt very foolish all at the same time.
    He spoke gently. “I know that you did not mean it, but it seems to me that you are unduly upset. Why are you so distraught?”
    “I believe that the baron has been following me since my arrival.”
    “You believe, but you are not certain?”
    She bit her lip. No, she wasn’t certain, how could she be when it was more intuition than anything else. She was not imagining her encounter with the