And it was a fear that made him feel guilty. Could he be content never to see his father again? Or his other relatives and friends? Or Allison? He had just become engaged to Allison. She was the woman he loved, the woman he had decided to spend the rest of his life with.

And yet he feared having to go back. He feared having to leave Cartref and his sense of belonging there. He feared-oh, he feared more than death having to leave Adèle. How would he ever cope with the grief of being separated from her by the insurmountable barrier of almost two centuries?

He did not fear having been projected back into the body of a desperately sick, dying man. He could be deceiving himself, of course. He knew that it was possible to be very ill and not even realize it until a chance medical checkup revealed a problem. But even so he felt convinced that he was only weak, not sick. All he needed in order to get back his full health and strength was food and rest and exercise. He was certainly in the right place for all three, despite the horror Adèle and his servants felt for his insistence on exercising.

Perhaps what cheered him most of all was that memory he had from his studies of family history. The memory of John and Adèle Chandler, who had begun their married life in the Regency era but had lived on with their children well into the Victorian age. Sometimes he wished that he had learned more about them and that his memory was sharper. But then, he decided, he did not really want to know exactly when they had died or who had died first. And he did not really want to remember how many children they had had-though he did know that it was more than one. If he was to live the life of the Regency Chandler, he did not want to know any more about his future than the fact that it was to be a lengthy one, with Adèle at his side.