She would also have told herself that she had not fallen instantly in love with him. She had never been in love, and she was far too sensible to fall for a complete stranger even if he was a splendid figure of a man. She would even have said that it was not any real attraction that had bowled her over. Attraction ought never to be a purely physical thing. It was something that must grow gradually between a man and a woman as they became familiar with each other’s character.

She did not know Captain Mitford’s character.

She did not know Captain Mitford.

And yet she knew him. In the depths of her being she knew him.

As if she had known him for all eternity.

As the real world fell into place about her again and she completed her curtsy and her polite “How do you do, sir?” she did not know how long had passed. Probably not even half a minute. Although he had raised his eyebrows, no one else seemed to show any awareness that the world had stopped on its axis for some indeterminate length of time before lurching into motion again.

She felt disoriented and inexplicably frightened.

“Miss Jane Everett,” he said in a voice that was unfamiliar to her ears, though it rang a familiar chord somewhere in the region of her heart. “My pleasure. Shall we follow the others indoors?”

She might as well have walked after all. She felt breathless.

CAPTAIN ROBERT MITFORD looked at the neat little figure of Miss Jane Everett as she preceded him into the vicarage and tried to imagine that he knew her, that somewhere deep inside him there was a spark of recognition.