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Mr Brabazon had never been this close to such a young human before and he found the intimacy and unpredictability of the very young unsettling. Sybella was by her son’s side in an instant and gazed in horror at the sticky stain on her guest’s beautiful buckskins. ‘Oh, no! I am so sorry. I should have intercepted him.’

Her guest wafted a languid hand. ‘Don’t concern yourself, Mrs Lovatt. My valet will deal with it.’ He stood up to take his leave.

‘Let me see you out, Mr Brabazon. Perhaps James can come with me and have sight of your horses?’

‘Of course,’ he said as he bowed over her hand. ‘My ward has asked me to pass on a request that you and your sister might do us the honour of paying a visit to Shotten Hall. Perhaps at three the day after tomorrow?’

Beamish appeared from the back of the house and without ceremony handed the departing visitor his beaver hat and the voluminous driving coat. Sybella was not experienced enough with fashionable male attire to recognise the handiwork of the tailor known as the Great Weston, but it was self-evident that this coat was of the finest fabric and style. Despite her misgivings about the character of the man, she was very struck by how tall and stately Mr Brabazon seemed in his full driving rig. His expression was inscrutable as he looked at her standing with James, the boy’s hand tightly held in hers. They followed him out to the portico.

John, Mr Brabazon’s groom, was as small and wiry as a jockey. His weather-beaten face had smile lines where most people’s smiles would never reach. He led up the horses and curricle. Sybella heard a great sigh escape her son. ‘Sweet-goers,’ he said appreciatively under his breath. She felt him pull forward, desperate to get closer, but managed to hold him back as Mr Brabazon sprang up into the curricle and called to his groom, ‘Spring ’em!’ The high-strung horses leapt forward. John expertly caught the side of the curricle as it swiftly passed and in one light acrobatic movement swung himself up beside his master. Mr Brabazon turned to salute Sybella and James before setting off down the drive apace.

The Carey sisters had last been to Shotten Hall when they were small girls and their father was acquainted with old Mr Brabazon. Having been dismissed, she was sure, as country dowds, Sybella was determined that they would show themselves off to their best advantage. She had asked George if he could spruce up her father’s light curricle. She hoped that two of the chestnut carriage horses would make a handsome enough pair to put to harness.

She then hurried Lucie upstairs to get dressed in her new forget-me-not-blue muslin afternoon dress and she would wear her favourite outfit, the sea-green driving habit her husband had asked his own military tailor, Meyer, to make her when she was first married. She knew it was extremely flattering, with its full skirts nipped into her small waist by a close-fitting jacket embellished with silver frogging and two rows of silver buttons. In fact, when Captain James had first seen her wearing it, he had suggested they should delay their departure for London for a few hours: her cheeks were warm at the memory.

Sybella was a skilled horsewoman. Scooping her heavy skirts over her arm, she was handed into the curricle by Gem. She took the reins with Lucie beside her and Gem, releasing the chestnuts’ heads, scrambled up behind. They swept into the drive of Shotten Hall at five minutes to three and approached the sprawling Tudor mansion at a rapid trot. The parkland on both sides was overgrown; the waist-high grass littered with great branches which age, neglect or storm had sheared off the ancient oak trees that had stood sentinel for centuries, offering shade and shelter to generations of sheep and deer.

Lucie had seen the magnificent façade of the house more recently but at a distance through the fringing woodland: now they both saw it spread before them in its full grandeur with its stone-mullioned windows, octagonal tower and crenelated battlements. The front door swung open slowly just as the sisters approached. A very grand butler greeted them, bowing. He was so unlike the usual country servants that Sybella thought Mr Brabazon must have brought him down from London with him.

They were shown into the drawing room with another deep bow. This was an imposing room, its smaller Tudor casements having been replaced in the most recent modernisations by tall sash windows that washed the lofty space with light. Over the mantelpiece, a portrait of an impressive gentleman, wearing the embroidered court clothes of the last century, dominated the room. Lucie gazed up into the haughty face beneath the powdered wig and turned to Sybella. ‘Is this the old Mr Brabazon whom Father knew? Old Money-Bags Brabazon, wasn’t he called?’ As she said this, she realised the door was open and an astonishingly elegant man, with the face in the painting, was standing surveying the scene.

‘Yes, indeed, he is,’ the current Mr Brabazon said with his usual composure.

He entered the room and bowed over Sybella’s proffered hand. His lazy gaze had flickered over the vision of his neighbour in full fig, and he smiled. Sybella felt that her flattering outfit had somehow redressed the balance of power, as she hoped it would. She turned to Lucie, already embarrassed at being overheard with a vulgarity on her lips, and introduced her. This was the first time Anthony Brabazon had seen the younger sister, the bold saviour of his ward. Struck by her remarkable beauty, his mind was disturbed by a troubling thought, but not a ripple shadowed the impassive depths of his civility. ‘May I ask for some tea for you both, or ratafia? My cousin is on his way to join us. I’m afraid his progress is inevitably slowed by the fact he cannot yet put any weight on his leg.’ He waved the sisters to the sofa and drew up his own chair beside a second placed conversationally opposite them.

‘This is a handsome house. We hardly remember it from childhood.’ Sybella gazed down the length of the room to the far window, which gave tantalising glimpses of a lake.

‘Yes, it is. It holds all kinds of mysteries. It dates from the Middle Ages and then became a Recusant house during Queen Elizabeth’s reign. There are hidden priests’ holes and even a chapel behind a sliding wall on the upper floor.’ At this moment, the butler appeared, bearing a tray with decanters of ratafia and burgundy and four glasses. As Mr Brabazon was passing the glasses to his guests, a cheerful voice hailed them and Lord Lynwood, supported by his loyal valet, Simon, hopped into the room.

‘Ah, my guardian angel and her beauteous sister! What an honour to have bestowed on us. Miss Carey, Mrs Lovatt.’ He bowed to them both before subsiding into the chair beside his cousin. His merry eyes surveyed them approvingly.

‘How are you faring, my lord?’ Lucie asked him solicitously.

‘Oh, not well, not well. My cousin’s company is so dull and scolding compared to the delightful entertainment at the Manor. It’s enough to give one a fit of the blue devils!’ He laughed, looking across at Mr Brabazon, whose countenance had softened into a semblance of humour.

‘It’s been a trial too for me, being in the company of this scapegrace for more than a day.’

‘Well, surely you’ll soon be back in London?’ Sybella enquired.

‘The sooner the better.’ Lord Lynwood sighed. ‘The most amusing thing that has happened here was young James’s desecration of my cousin’s best buckskin breeches!’

Sybella expostulated, ‘Please don’t remind me of that awful visit!’

Lord Lynwood let out a triumphant shout of laughter. ‘You see, Ant, you have a lowering effect on everyone’s spirits!’

‘No, no, it was I who was entirely in the wrong. I should have bundled James out and back to Nurse.’

‘Well, the real victim in all this was my valet, Dewsbury. On sight of the breeches, he almost succumbed to an apoplexy.’

The young man turned to his cousin, a mocking smile enlivening his handsome face. ‘At least you weren’t described by the scamp as “dicked in the nob”, and what else was it, Miss Carey? I know, he suggested I was “fuddled”!’

‘An infant of rare perspicacity, it seems.’ Mr Brabazon turned his cool eyes on Sybella, who was mortified to hear for the first time this latest faux pas of her son’s.

‘He didn’t really say that, did he?’ Her hand flew to her face.

Lucie attempted to reassure her sister. ‘I’m afraid he did, but he was just parroting George’s opinion of anyone trying to climb a tree in top boots.’

‘George sounds a sensible fellow, if rather more forthright than one might hope.’ This time, Mr Brabazon’s eyes looked at Sybella with a glint of real amusement, whether at her discomposure or her son’s scampery, she could not be sure.