Nellie sniffed, but buttoned her lip.

Alathea shooed the others off, then headed up the stairs, Nellie on her heels, lighting her way.

"So what happened?" Nellie hissed as they reached the gallery.

"Shh!" Alathea gestured down the corridor. Nellie grumbled but held her tongue as they passed Alathea's parents' rooms, then Mary's and Alice's, eventually reaching her room at the corridor's end.

Nellie shut the door behind them. Alathea untied her cloak, then let it fall-Nellie caught it as she stepped away.

"So now, my fine miss-you're not going to tell me he didn't see through your disguise?"

"Of course he didn't-I told you he wouldn't." He wouldn't have kissed her if he had. Sinking onto her dressing table stool, Alathea pulled pins from her hair, freeing the thick mass from the unaccustomed chignon. She normally wore her hair in a knot on the top of her head with the strands about her face puffed to form a living frame. It was an old-fashioned style but it suited her. The chignon had suited her, too, but the unusual style had pulled her hair in different directions-her scalp hurt.

Nellie came to help, frowning as she searched out pins in the silky soft mass. "I can't believe after all the years you two spent rollin' about the fields that he wouldn't simply look at you, veil and cloak or no, and instantly know you."

"You forget-despite the years we spent 'rollin' about the fields,' Rupert has barely seen me for over a decade. Just the odd meeting here and there."

"He didn't recognize your voice?"

"No. My tone was quite different." She'd spoken as she would to Augusta, her tone warm and low, not tart and waspish as when she normally spoke with him. Except for those few breathless moments… but she didn't think he'd ever heard her breathless before. She couldn't recall ever feeling so nervous and skittish before. With a sigh, she let her head tip back as her hair finally fell loose. "You're not giving me sufficient credit. I'm a very good actress, after all."