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taking the air?”
    “Just a little stroll on the cliff top, sir,” she responded, curtsying.
    “Don’t blame you. All those dusty books must give you a headache,” he commented cheerfully.
    “Oh, I doubt Mistress Hathaway finds the books in the least dusty, and I should be most surprised to find they gave her a headache,” Peregrine declared with a conspiratorial smile at the lady, even as he doffed his own hat. “Mistress Hathaway and I find libraries most stimulating places to spend time. Is that not so, ma’am?”
    Alex felt words of eager agreement rush to her tongue, as an answering smile set her eyes dancing andher lips moving. And then she bit back the words, swallowed the smile. “I’m sure your scholarship far exceeds mine, Mr. Sullivan. I merely do what I am employed to do.”
    Perry felt a wash of disappointment. He had sensed that she had been about to say something quite different. His pleasure in seeing her again so soon had surprised him, as had the ease with which he had slipped into the chatty, companionable ease they had adopted in the library. Mistress Hathaway, however, seemed to have forgotten that. She was avoiding his eye now and had taken a sideways step on the path as if to increase the distance between them.
    “Will you come in for a moment, Mistress Hathaway? My mother was asking after you just the other day. She would enjoy a visit, if you could spare the time, ma’am.” Marcus’s smile was cajoling. He spent much of his time finding entertainment for his parent, and it was true that the Dowager Lady Douglas had expressed curiosity about the Abbey’s librarian after meeting her at dinner a week or so earlier, when the dowager had been dutifully invited to the Abbey by the current Lady Douglas to join a select gathering of local society.
    Alexandra hesitated. She was curious herself about her stepmother, whom she’d only met the one time, and she knew that Sylvia would be agog to hear her sister’s opinions of the lady who had supplanted their own mother. But if she went in, she would find herselfin the company of the Honorable Peregrine again. And her earlier unease had come back in full force the moment she’d seen him on the drive. It sounded farfetched, and yet she couldn’t deny the conviction that the gentleman’s company was dangerous. Not only did he seem to see too much, but she found it very difficult to maintain her charade under the inviting gaze of those penetrating blue eyes. Perhaps she was imagining it . . . no, she wasn’t.
    “Do come in,” Marcus urged, seeing her hesitation. “Just for a few moments. My mother is an invalid and sees so few people.”
    The hesitation had been her undoing. An instant refusal on the grounds of a pressing engagement with Sir Stephen would have been sufficient excuse, but now it would appear so churlish as to be discourteous and would certainly draw unwelcome attention to herself. She really had no choice but to satisfy Sylvia’s curiosity.
    “Of course, I should be delighted to call upon Lady Douglas, sir.” She bobbed a curtsy.
    Marcus beamed and offered her his arm up the path to the front door. Perry followed, reflecting that it would be interesting to see how the reclusive Mistress Hathaway conducted herself on a social visit. She had not shown herself to be much of a conversationalist at the whist table the previous evening. He knew she could more than hold her own in a private conversation, but he suspected that no one else at Combe Abbey had experiencedthat spirited tongue. Why? Why did she keep it on a leash?
    Marcus ushered Alexandra into the hall. “Is Lady Douglas down, Baker?”
    “She came down to the yellow drawing room an hour ago, sir. May I take your cloak, ma’am?”
    “Thank you.” Alex let the butler assist her with her cloak and then accompanied her stepbrother to a cheerful, firelit salon at the rear of the house.
    “Mama, I have brought you a visitor.” Marcus ushered Alexandra ahead of him