you ever broken your collarbone?” she asked. Her face was white and her blond curls were tumbled.
“No, but I broke my arm once.”
“Falling from a horse?”
“Yes. My pony bucked me off.”
Maria said, “I don’t think I like Candy. She is always jumping at things.”
“Then we’ll get you another pony,” he said promptly.
“She was good when I tried her. It was just when we got her home that she started to act spooky.”
“Then she’s not the pony for you,” he said. “We’ll get you something more reliable.”
She smiled at him. “Thank you, Alex.”
“Maria needs something like my Basil,” said Margaret, Alex’s twelve-year-old sister. “He’s very steady.”
“We’ll see what we can find,” he said.
Alex, Diana, Sally and Margaret were in Maria’s room and Maria was in bed, where Lady Standish had insisted she stay for the rest of the afternoon. Maria’s left arm was in a sling.
“At least it’s your left arm,” Margaret said.
“Yes,” Maria said glumly. “Jeremy is going to make fun of me when he hears that I fell off and broke my collarbone.”
Jeremy was Alex’s brother who was at Eton.
“No he won’t,” Alex said. “I won’t let him.”
Maria’s blue eyes looked hopefully at her eldest brother. “You won’t?”
“No.”
Maria smiled. “I’m glad you’re home, Alex.”
“I’m glad I’m home, too,” he said.
“I think we should all leave and give Maria a chance to rest,” Sally said.
Diana was the first one to turn to the door. She was followed by Margaret, then Sally and lastly Alex. He closed the door behind him gently.
Once they were out in the hall, his eighteen-year-old sister Sally smiled up at him. “We’re so glad you’re home and that you’re safe,” she said.
“I’m glad to be home,” Alex said for perhaps the dozenth time that day.
“Did Mama tell you that Diana and I are going to make our come-outs next month?” Sally asked.
“Yes, she did.”
“You can be our escort, Alex. Perhaps you will even find a girl you want to marry yourself.”
Alex’s eyes went to Diana. “Perhaps,” he said.
Dinner that evening was a festive affair. It was a welcome home dinner for Alex and both Margaret and Maria were allowed to join the family at the table. Diana and her mother were also present. Lady Standish explained to Alex that since his father had died she had invited her cousin Louisa and her daughter to join her for dinner every evening. “It would have been too sad, with just Sally and me.”
The Sherwood women lived in a cottage on the Standish estate and had done so for the past eighteen years. Lady Standish had invited her cousin Louisa to make use of the house when her husband had been called to military duty in India. Mr. Sherwood had eventually attained the rank of colonel and after India he had been called to the Peninsula, where he had perished in the Battle of Corunna.
The Sherwoods were not in the same social or financial class as the Earl and Countess of Standish, but because the two women were close friends, the Sherwoods had often taken part in the activities of Standish Court. The earl had been very tolerant of his wife’s cousin, but he had been more aware of the gap between the two families than his wife had been. Both women knew that if the earl had been alive, Diana would not have been making her come-out with Sally.
So Alex sat around the table that night with six females. It was a distinct change for a man who for the past three years had known masculine companionship almost exclusively.
“You must sit down with Billings and go over the estate books,” Lady Sherwood said to her son as the soup course was served. “I think he is a good man, but your papa was scrupulous about keeping up with all of the estate accounts. I believe there is also something that needs to be done with the property in Derbyshire.”
How different my life is going to be, Alex thought. All my life, all I wanted was to be a soldier. Now that’s over and I’m an earl. He let his eyes roam around the familiar but somehow strange-looking room. Then he looked back at his mother.
“I’ll talk to him, Mama,” he said.
Lady Standish gave him a grateful smile. “It is so good to have you home, my son.”
“Alex said he would get me a new pony, Mama,” Maria said. “Candy is too dangerous.”
“Good, good,” said Lady Standish. “We can’t have you breaking your bones, Maria.”
“What do you think is going to happen in France, Alex?” Mrs. Sherwood asked.
Alex looked at her. She was still very attractive but she had never been the beauty her daughter was. “We have Napoleon on the ropes, ma’am,” he replied. “He is going to have to abdicate.”
“Does that mean the king will come back?” Diana asked.
Alex turned his eyes to her. She was dressed in a simple ivory evening dress that set off the pure white of her skin. It gave him a shock of physical pleasure just to look at her. She was even more beautiful than the image he had carried in his heart for all those years. “He said Louis has been waiting patiently in England for this chance for a long time.”
“Well, I hope they set up a government more like ours, with a parliament that gives the people some power,” Diana said. “It would be a shame for France to have gone through all it has only to end up with the same old Bourbons again.”
Alex smiled at her. “Still a revolutionary, eh Dee?”
“I wouldn’t call it revolutionary to wish for a governing parliament,” Diana replied soberly.
“I don’t think France will ever be the same again,” Alex said. “The revolution has left its mark, that’s for certain.”
“Well, I think that’s a good thing,” Diana replied decidedly.
Sally said, “When do you think we can leave for London, Mama?”
“I would like to have our ball before the end of April,” Lady Standish replied. “That means we will have to be in London several weeks earlier, to make plans and to buy clothes.”
Sally smiled. She had golden curls and sky-blue eyes like Alex. She said now, “It is going to be such fun, isn’t it, Diana?”
Diana smiled back. “Yes, it is.”
“What’s all this about a ball?” Alex said.
“We must have a ball to introduce the girls to society,” his mother said. “You will be the host, of course.”
He frowned. “I don’t know about this, Mama. I’ve been away at war for the last three years. I don’t know anything about balls.”
“You won’t have to do a thing,” his mother assured him. “Louisa and I will do it all. All you need to do is be there and stand in the receiving line with us. Oh, and dance with each of the girls, of course. And with as many other ladies as you can.”
Alex’s frown remained. “I had no idea when you called me home that I was going to be thrust into the middle of London’s social whirl.”
“It is your proper place,” his mother said. “You are the head of the family now, Alex. You have responsibilities.”
I