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countess’s shoulder at her daughter. “So this is Lady Eleanor? Diana has told me so much about her. What a pity that she is not more ravissante —so unfortunate for a girl about to come out.” She continued archly in French which Eleanor had no problem translating: “Such a shame when all the beauty belongs to the mother and none to the daughter.”
    Lady Acton leaned forward and kissed the dowager countess on both cheeks, her lovely features in marked contrast to the lines of perpetual discontent on the other face.
    “Then how very gratifying for you,” she said, also in perfect French, “that in your case it’s the other way around.”
    Lady Augusta didn’t hesitate for a moment, though she returned to her native tongue. “Diana was the belle of last season, indeed. She was drowned in offers, but I believe Lord Ranking will be brought up to snuff this spring and he is to be Duke of Maybury. It would be a most appropriate match for the heiress of Hawksley Park.”
    “He has such a drooping air about him.” Lady Acton smiled. “So very elegant. I’m sure he and Lady Diana will be very happy.”
    Eleanor squeezed Diana’s arm and gave her a supportive smile, but the countesses had changed the subject.
    “Major Sir Robert St. John Crabtree sends his compliments,” Lady Augusta was saying. “And will no doubt call tomorrow. He’s the very model of courtesy. A most amiable neighbor.”
    “Then we’ll look forward to an enchanting morning, unless it should rain. We can hardly expect casual visits in bad weather.” Lady Acton sank gracefully into a chair by the fire. “On the other hand,” she continued lazily, “I believe him to be very indifferent to weather. Don’t you remember, Augusta, how the major escorted Miss Harrison from Vauxhall in that appalling storm last summer? She was almost hysterical, had forgotten her umbrella, and Sir Robert gave her his cloak. So very gallant! He was soaked to the skin.”
    “A most inelegant scene!” Lady Augusta sniffed as the maid came in with the tea tray. “Blanche Harrison should have shown more restraint. I have very little patience with any young lady so incommoding a gentleman—no doubt only about some girlish trifle.”
    A dish of tea was offered and taken, and nothing more was said about the amiable major. Eleanor was left to wonder if she had imagined the fleeting look of genuine pleasure and anticipation on her mother’s matchless face.
    At last the girls were released from the drawing room and Eleanor could go up to her room to wash and change for dinner.
    “Who’s this Major Crabtree?” she asked Diana as they went up the great marble staircase.
    “Oh, just a neighbor. He sports the most enormous military mustaches and has some huge fortune. Deerfield is his. See, that’s it over there, near the river.”
    Eleanor stopped by the window and looked where her friend was pointing. The slightly rolling landscape stretched away into a blue haze of fields, outlined by new plantings of trees. Near the river, she could just make out the tall chimneys of an imposing edifice of red brick. It was not a great seat like Hawksley, but it was certainly more than one might expect for the residence of a retired major.
    “Is his family well connected?” she asked.
    “I really have no idea. Who cares about Crabtree? He’s old enough to be my father. He probably made a mint in India or something. Eleanor, I know there’s no time now, but I have to talk to you about Walter and we won’t be able to escape our maids for hours. I can’t marry Lord Ranking, truly, even if Mama were to get him to offer. His nose drips.”
    “Then marry your Mr. Downe. You’ll be twenty-one in the summer. Can’t you wait until then?”
    “You don’t understand. I can’t marry without the permission of the head of the family until I’m five-and-twenty, and that’s Mama. If only I’d been born a boy! Then I’d be the earl and could marry as I liked. I wouldn’t care for