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beyond the reach of the law or my own personal revenge."
"But his honor and reputation are not dead."
"Be honest with yourself, Augusta. It is you who are afraid of what may be concealed
in that poem. You are fearful of having the brother you have placed on a pedestal
knocked down to the ground."
"Why is the poem so important now that the war is over?" She glanced back over her
shoulder, searching his face.
Harry met her gaze. "For the last three or four years of the war there was a mysterious
man called the Spider who worked for the French doing very much what I did for the
Crown. We believed him to be an Englishman partly because his information was so
accurate and partly because of the way he operated. He cost the lives of many good men
and if he is still alive I would have him pay for his treason."
"You want revenge on this man?"
"Yes."
"And you will ruin our relationship as husband and wife to get it."
Harry went still. "I do not see that our relationship should be affected by this business.
If it is, 'tis only because you allow it to happen."
"Aye, my lord," she muttered. "That is the way to go about it. How very clever of you.
Blame me for whatever ill feelings arise because of your cruelty."
Harry's anger flared once more. "What about your cruelty to me? How do you think it
makes me feel to know that you have chosen to defend your brother's memory rather than
give your loyalty to your husband?"
"It seems a great chasm has opened up between us, my lord." She turned around to
confront him fully. "Whatever happens, nothing can be the same between us again."
"There is a bridge across that abyss, madam. You may stand forever on your side, the
side of the brave, dashing Northumberland Ballingers, or you may cross over to my side,
where your future lies. I leave the decision entirely up to you. Rest assured I will not take
the poem from you by force."
Without waiting for a response, Harry turned and let himself out of the bedchamber.
A polite, frozen calm settled over the household during the next two days. The grim
atmosphere was all the more noticeable to Harry because it contrasted so sharply with the
weeks of flowering warmth that had preceded it.
It was the marked change in the mood of everyone at Graystone that brought home to
Harry just how much of a transformation the household had undergone during the time
Augusta had been its mistress.
The servants, always a punctilious, well-trained lot, had, since Augusta's arrival,
begun to go about their duties with a cheerfulness that Harry had never before noticed. It
had brought to mind Sheldrake's comment on Augusta's habit of being kind to staff.
Meredith, that miniature scholar of serious mien and obedient temperament, was
suddenly painting pictures and going on picnics. Her simple muslin dresses all seemed to
have grown flounces and ribbons lately. And she had begun to wax enthusiastic on the
subject of the characters in the novels Augusta was reading to her.
Even Clarissa, that dour, sober-minded female of irreproachable character who had
once devoted herself to her duties as a governess, had altered. Harry was not precisely
certain what had happened during the few weeks of his marriage, but there was no doubt
that Clarissa had definitely thawed toward Augusta. Not only had she thawed, she had
been showing definite signs of having developed some passionate enthusiasm that, in
another woman, might have signaled a romance.
Lately Clarissa frequently excused herself from some planned outing or from joining
the family in the drawing room after dinner to rush upstairs to her own bedchamber.
Harry got the impression she was working on a project of some sort, but he hesitated to
inquire. Clarissa had always been an intensely self-contained, unapproachable female and
he had always respected her privacy. It was, after all, something of a Fleming trait.
Harry was quite certain there was no romance in Clarissa's narrow, constrained world
of the schoolroom, but the unfamiliar sparkle in her eyes had made him exceedingly
curious. He had attributed that change, along with all the others, to Augusta.
But during the two days following the outbreak of hostilities with Augusta, the
household visibly altered once more. A frigid, correct atmosphere reigned. Everyone was
painstakingly polite and formal, but it was obvious to Harry that the inhabitants of
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