"Take your hands off her!" Freyja commanded, lengthening her stride. "You uncouth villain. Let her go."

They sprang apart and turned identically startled faces her way. And then the girl-wise wench-screamed again and made off down the hill as fast as her feet would carry her and did not look back.

Freyja did not slow her pace. She strode onward until she was almost toe-to-toe with the villain, drew back her arm, and punched that assaulter of female innocence in the nose.

"Ouch!" he said, his hand jerking up to cover the offended organ. And then his watering eyes focused on her. "Well, now, I thought I recognized that gentle feminine touch. It is you, is it?"

He was fashionably dressed in a blue riding coat with buff breeches and shining top boots, a tall hat on his head. But with a shock of recognition Freyja noticed the long limbs and perfectly proportioned body, the very blond hair beneath the hat, and the very blue eyes of the man she had last seen diving from her inn window three nights ago. Adonis and devil all rolled into one. She drew an audible breath.

"Yes, it is I," she said. "And I am sorry in my heart now that I did not reveal your hiding place in the wardrobe to that gray-haired gentleman and abandon you to your fate."

"No, you are not, are you, sweetheart?" he asked, having the gall to grin at her, watering eyes and reddening nose notwithstanding. "How unsporting of you."

"You dastardly, cowardly villain," she said. "You wretched debaucher of innocence. You are beneath contempt. I shall report you and have you run out of Bath and away from the company of respectable people."

"Will you?" He leaned a little toward her, his eyes dancing with watery merriment. "And whom will you report, my charmer?"

She swelled with indignation. "I shall discover your identity," she said. "You will not be able to show your face outdoors in Bath again without my seeing you and finding out who you are."