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much less highly spirited animals. But I draw us away from our subject.” He fidgeted with his waistcoat and cleared his throat. “Pray continue, Elizabeth.”
    “As I was saying, this young man came too close to us in his phaeton and locked wheels with our coach. Aunt Waddie decided it would be safer for us on the ground,” she said looking apologetically at her aunt. “What with the rocking and jarring the coach was doing as they attempted to right things, she may have been correct.”
    “And this kind, elegant émigré,” Lady Madeline broke in, “was kindly assisting us down, but Elizabeth could not wait until I had introduced myself. She had to step down by herself.” While she spoke Lady Madeline realized what was different about her niece. She was no longer wearing her spinster’s cap. What was it the Frenchman had said about it ? she tried to recall.
    “If he had not hit me,” Elizabeth took up the tale.
    “Hit you? ‘Pon my soul,” Sir Henry exclaimed.
    “He didn’t hit her. The coach was jerked about the instant she stepped out.”
    “He hit me and I fell,” the young woman insisted. “That was when the box containing your hair powder came open.”
    Lady Waddington gave a small laugh. “It was such a scene, Henry. This billowing white cloud. Like snow but not nearly as pleasant.”
    “And he had the nerve to insinuate I should apologize,” Elizabeth said, her anger returning.
    Aunt Waddie shook her finger at her niece.
     “If you had not sat upon his lap so long, the comte could not have said anything to you.”
    With a bewildered shake of his head Sir Jeffries signalled for silence. “Let us make some sense out of this,” he said, rising. “You,” he looked at Elizabeth, “you say this man struck you?”
    “I suppose it wasn’t actually on purpose... and not much of a blow,” she amended beneath her uncle’s something-must-be-done-now glare.
    “You then sat upon his lap... in the street?”
    “I did not tell him to fall beneath me,” she replied defensively.
    “The comte was most gracious,” Lady Madeline offered. “He tried to catch Elizabeth and didn’t say anything about the powder. Not even when she threw what was left of it in his face.”
    Rolling his eyes, Sir Henry lowered his frame slowly into his chair. “Perhaps it would be best if I did not understand the whole of this,” he said, looking from his niece to his sister. “Do I dare ask the man’s name?”
    “A French émigré cannot be of too great a consequence,” Elizabeth said in a subdued tone. Her conduct, on the retelling, did not seem as proper as it had at the time.
    “He was a very nice gentleman, if somewhat overdressed,” her aunt told Sir Henry. “And titled.”
    “Overdressed, you say?” As he rubbed his chin a new possibility occurred to him. “His name?”
    “Comtede Cavilon,” Lady Waddington told him.
    “Not Cavilon! You didn’t throw hair powder on the Comtede Cavilon... not in the middle of the street... in front of others?” Sir Henry demanded of Elizabeth, now ramrod straight in his chair.
    “You know the comte?” Lady Waddington asked shakily, taken aback by her brother’s tone.
    “All London knows the man. He is one of the most eligible bachelors in the city, and one of the wealthiest.
    “Oh, Elizabeth, such behaviour... and in London.”
    “I did not know you cared so about... society... and the power of another’s wealth,” Elizabeth said, her throat tightening beneath the condemnation she read on her uncle’s features.
    “It is not his money I care about, dear girl, but his influence in society. Your... ways...” he searched for the proper word and failed, “are accepted in Ashford, but here in London I fear... The comte could make it deuced uncomfortable for you,” he ended weakly.
    “I would like to see him try.”
    “I would not,” Sir Henry returned sternly. “You are old enough to know the consequences, Elizabeth. We must make amends.” He turned to