Nell snorted. "Shouldn't take you long. If you're to sit down with gentlemen from London, it's either the pink taffeta or the jonquil silk."

"The jonquil silk, then. And I'll want you to do my hair."

"Naturally." Nell closed the wardrobe doors. "I'd best give a hand downstairs but I'll be back to pretty you up."

"Hmm." Antonia leaned her head against the window-frame.

Nell swallowed her snort and headed for the door. Hand on the knob, she paused, eyeing the slim figure by the window with open affection. Antonia did not move; Nell's eyes narrowed, then her features relaxed. "Should I warn Master Geoffrey to come to the table prepared to be civil?"

The question jerked Antonia from her reverie. "Heavens, yes! I forgot about Geoffrey."

"That's a first," Nell muttered.

Frowning at the bedpost, Antonia didn't hear. "Be sure to warn him not to come to table with his nose in a book."

"Aye. I'll make the matter plain." With a grim nod, Nell departed.

As the door clicked shut, Antonia turned back to the garden, letting her senses slide into the sylvan beauty. She loved Ruthven Manor. Coming back had felt like coming home; at some instinctive level she had always belonged, not at Mannering Park, but here-amid the gentle rolls of the Downs, surrounded by trees so old they stood like massive sentinels all around the house. Those feelings and her affection for Henrietta had both influenced her decision.

Given Geoffrey was soon to enter the world, it was time for her to do the same. At twenty-four, her prospects were few; prosaic consideration had brought her here.

Philip, Lord Ruthven, had yet to take a wife.

Antonia grimaced, her unprecedented nervousness very fresh in her mind. But there was no place in her scheme for faintheartedness; this afternoon, she'd taken the first step. Playing out her part was now inevitable-aside from anything else, she would never forgive herself if she didn't at least try. If Philip didn't see her in that light, so be it.