“I think I’ll pass,” Ned replied with a wicked grin. “It’s much easier to debauch myself when my parents are gone.”

Caroline looked somewhat shocked.

Ned only laughed. “It’s hard to establish a rake’s reputation in the company of one’s mother.”

“Really, Ned, if you must indulge yourself in such ways, there will be plenty of time after you finish school and move into your bachelor’s lodgings.”

“No time like the present.”

“What are you going to do while we’re gone?” Belle asked eagerly.

He leaned forward with a twinkle in his eye. “Lots and lots of things you shouldn’t even think about.”

“Really? What—”

“Isn’t it a blessing,” Caroline cut in loudly, eager to change the course of the conversation, “that we have the opportunity to retire to the country for a short while with the Ridgelys, where, without the censorious eyes of London upon us, we can relax our standards of behavior. Somewhat.” The carriage came to a halt in front of the Blydon mansion, and, with the aid of her husband, she disembarked and hurried up the front steps and into the foyer.

Emma lost no time in catching up with her aunt. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing,” she said in a loud whisper.

Caroline paused for a moment. “Of course you know what I’m doing.” She patted her niece on the cheek. “Just as I know what you’re doing.”

Emma’s mouth fell open as she stared at her aunt in dismay.

“You were wise, my dear, to put that shawl back on.” With that, she swept up the stairs and into her bedroom.

The Blydons and the Ridgelys left for the country the following weekend, and much to Alex’s extreme irritation, he was not able to arrange affairs so that he and Emma could have a private coach on the trip to Westonbirt. He couldn’t even manage to get them into the same carriage. Much as Eugenia was yearning for some kind of compromising situation (which would hopefully lead to a wedding with all possible haste), she couldn’t quite bring herself to do anything that might lead to such an incident taking place in a moving vehicle.

So Alex grumbled—and not terribly good-naturedly—as he climbed into the Blydons’ coach alongside Henry, Caroline, and his mother, who had declared that the young people should have a carriage of their own so that they could have some fun without their stodgy elders.

“Young people!” Alex had exclaimed. “For God’s sake, Sophie’s expecting her second child!” And then he muttered something that Eugenia could not quite understand, although she did think she heard the word “stodgy.”

“Well,” declared Eugenia, “I daresay we won’t all be old. I asked Charlie to ride with us.”

At which point the young boy leapt into his uncle’s arms, insisting that they practice their card games along the journey.

Emma, whose feelings had been fluctuating between secretly hoping for a carriage alone with Alex and kicking herself for entertaining such a thought, was nonetheless pleased at the prospect of three or four hours of conversation and gossip with Belle and Sophie. They first went through all the young unmarried ladies of the ton, animatedly dissecting their characters, and when they were done, they started in on the unmarried men. At that point, they were only a little more than halfway to their destination, so they turned to the spicier topic of married ladies and gentlemen. They had begun discussing the various dowagers when Sophie finally declared that they were nearly at Westonbirt. Emma was more than a little relieved. Quite frankly, she was gossiped out.

Alex had told her that he’d spent most of his childhood years at Westonbirt, the ancestral seat of his family, and Emma was intensely curious about the place where he had grown up. So when the carriage rounded a corner and headed through the front gates of the estate, Emma could not restrain herself from craning her neck to see as much of the landscape as possible. The carriage, however, was not an open one, so she had to resign herself to pressing her face up against the glass windows.

“For goodness sake, Emma, one would think you’d never seen a tree before,” Belle commented.

Emma immediately sat back into the plush seat, instantly embarrassed about her overly curious behavior. “Well, I do so like the country, you know, and after three months in London, I certainly feel like I’ve never seen a tree before.”

Sophie laughed softly. “I assure you we have plenty of trees here at Westonbirt. Good climbing ones, too. And there is also a rather picturesque stream which Alex assures me is full of trout, although I don’t remember his ever bringing any home to dinner.”

Just then the wheels of the carriage ground to a halt, and a liveried footman rushed out to open the door. Emma was the last to alight, so she didn’t get a very good view of Westonbirt until she finally escaped the confines of the carriage. She was not disappointed. Westonbirt was a stately old mansion that defied the word “huge.” Built during the 1500s under the reign of Elizabeth I, its floor plan was in the form of the letter E to honor the queen. The front of the house, which faced north, was the stem of the E, with three wings jutting out in back. Row upon row of tall, thin, sparkling clean windows danced across the facade, and Emma guessed that the building must be at least four or five stories tall. As she stepped closer, she was able to inspect some of the fine craftsmanship of the mansion. Each window and doorway was bordered by exquisite stone carvings that bespoke of hours of painstaking work on the part of long-gone artisans. Emma was awed by the grace and dignity of the Ashbourne ancestral home.