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The women passengers who, on his instructions, had climbed out to make the load lighter, stood by complaining tearfully of the shock they had suffered.

  The cart that had caused the trouble had been pulled onto the verge, the stagecoach horses had quietened down and the passengers were once again reluctantly getting back inside the coach, when the Marquis was aware that a very pretty young girl was looking at him admiringly.

  She was plainly but tastefully dressed and he thought from her appearance that she was a lady.

  At the same time there was no doubt that she was making no effort to get back into the coach, but was just looking up at him wide-eyed, with an expression that the Marquis could not help feeling was very flattering.

  “You can continue your journey now,” he said and, because he thought it would please her, he raised his tall hat.

  “You were wonderful! Wonderful!” she exclaimed. “I thought when we almost overturned, I would be crushed to death!”

  “I am glad you have been saved from such an unpleasant fate,” the Marquis replied.

  “By you!”

  As she spoke, the guard of the stagecoach shouted,

  “All aboard! Or we’ll leave without you!”

  It was obvious he was speaking to the girl, as everybody else had resumed his or her seats.

  “They are waiting for you,” the Marquis said.

  The girl turned her head.

  “I will walk, thank you,” she said in a clear, youthful and, as the Marquis noticed, educated voice.

  “Do you live near here?” he enquired.

  He looked around as he spoke in surprise and could see no sign of any houses.

  “It is only a little over a mile,” the girl replied, “and I have no wish to listen to the whining and complaining there will be from the other passengers.”

  “I can understand that,” the Marquis said, “so may I suggest as I am travelling in the same direction that I give you a lift in my phaeton?”

  He saw the expression of delight in her eyes before she exclaimed,

  “May I really come with you? It would be very exciting!” The Marquis smiled and walked to where his horses were waiting.

  He helped the girl into the seat beside the driver, then went round to the other side of the vehicle to take the reins from Ben.

  As they drove off, he realised that she was looking at him in a rapt manner as if she could hardly believe her eyes. “Do you always travel by coach?” he asked.

  “Yes, every day,” the girl replied. “My teacher lives in the next village from ours and it’s the easiest way for me to reach her.”

  “And what does she teach you?” the Marquis asked. “French. She was an émigré years ago, and she has, Papa says, a perfect Parisian accent.”

  The Marquis looked surprised.

  “Your father is a good judge of French?”

  “Papa is an expert on languages of all sorts, but especially French, Italian, Greek, and of course Latin.”

  She saw the astonishment in the Marquis’s eyes and laughed.

  “Does that sound strange to you?”

  “It does rather,” the Marquis admitted, “because I would not expect to find a language scholar in the middle of such rural surroundings.”

  “No, I suppose not, but Papa writes books. Rather dull and very erudite.”

  “Which means, I suppose, that you don’t read them?”

  “Not if I can help it, but my sister reads them and encourages Papa to keep writing even though it makes very little money.”

  The Marquis smiled at the ingenuousness of it and at that moment saw ahead of him the cottages of a small village and the tower of a grey stone Church.

  “Is this where your home is?”

  “Yes,” his passenger replied. “It is next to the Church. You will see the gateway and, please, drive in through it. I do want my family to be impressed by your horses and of course, by you!”

  The Marquis laughed and, when they reached the gateway, he drove in even though it required quite a feat of skilful driving.

  It was only a short distance to the front door of a low attractive house, which, because it was adjacent to the churchyard, he felt must be the Vicarage.

  He was just about to say goodbye to his passenger, when, as he drew his horses to a standstill, she alighted with the swiftness of a bird in flight and ran in through the open front door.

  He could hear her shouting,

  “Ajanta, Ajanta, come quickly! Darice – come and see how I have been driven home!”

  Because he felt amused by the commotion he was causing, the Marquis attached his reins to the running board, noted that Ben was already at the horses’ heads and stepped down.

  As he walked through the front door into a small oak-panelled hall, he heard a voice in the distance say, “What are you talking about, Charis?”

  “I have been rescued – rescued from a terrible accident by the most exciting man with superb horses! And a phaeton, which is smarter than anything you have ever seen before! Oh, Ajanta, do come and meet him!”

  There was a pause before the Marquis heard the same voice say,

  “What do you mean – rescued? The last time it was a bull you were saved from and the time before that it was a ghost!”

  “This time it was an accident!”

  The Marquis waited, then he heard footsteps coming towards him and a moment later the girl who had been his passenger appeared pulling by the hand another taller and very much lovelier edition of herself.

  He had thought the girl to whom he had given a lift was exceedingly pretty, but he was for the moment spellbound by the beauty of her older sister.

  She was wearing an apron and he thought she must have been cooking, but nothing could disguise the gold of her hair, the vivid, almost startling blue of her eyes, and a fair skin that made him think of the petals of a flower.

  The Marquis fancied himself as a connoisseur of beauty as of everything else that was good in life.

  He knew as he faced the young woman, who was called Ajanta, that he had never seen in London, Paris or anywhere else anybody so lovely.

  He had taken off his hat on entering the house and now, standing with it in his hand, he waited with a faint smile on his lips for what he thought would be the introduction.

  But before the girl to whom he had given a lift could speak, Ajanta said,

  “I understand from my sister that she has been involved in an accident from which you rescued her?”

  “The stagecoach collided with a cart,” the Marquis explained. “There was a great deal of commotion, but I don’t think that anybody was injured.”

  “He sorted it all out as if he was a magician!” Charis enthused. “Then he brought me home in his phaeton. Come and look at it, Ajanta!”

  She pulled on her sister’s hand as she spoke, but Ajanta did not move.

  “First I must thank the gentleman who has rescued you,” she said. “Thank you, sir. It was very kind of you to bring my sister home. She has a propensity for getting into situations from which she has to be rescued.”

  “So I heard you say,” the Marquis smiled. “But this incident, I assure you, was not as formidable as being chased by a bull.”

  “Charis was not chased,” Ajanta replied. “She merely thought she might have been, but luckily there was a student passing who brought her home safely.”

  There was no doubt that Ajanta was amused that her sister had been what she thought of as ‘saved’ and the Marquis said,

  “I am glad that she is so lucky or perhaps, as you think, resourceful.”

  Ajanta gave him a little smile as if she appreciated the subtlety of her sister’s adventures, then she said,

  “I am sure, sir, that you wish to be on your way and we can only thank you for your kindness.”

  “On his way?” Charis echoed. “That is very inhospitable of you, Ajanta. Surely it would be polite to invite the gentleman to have luncheon with us?”

  The Marquis saw the amusement
in Ajanta’s eyes vanish and he was surprised when she said stiffly,

  “I think, Charis, you should thank this gentleman for his kindness, then go and wash your hands.”

  “Of course I want to thank you,” Charis said to the Marquis. “But I am sure, as it is luncheon time, that you would like to have something to eat before you travel any further.”

  The Marquis was just about to refuse and say that he had already had luncheon when he saw the expression on Ajanta’s face and it surprised him.

  She was so lovely that he thought it was almost his right that she should admire him and be impressed with him in the same manner as her sister was.

  And yet this country girl was, although he could hardly believe it, looking at him in an uninterested manner and was clearly anxious for him to leave as quickly as possible.

  Because it piqued him, he replied,

  “It is kind of you and, although I am not hungry, I would be very grateful, after all the dust of the road, if I could have a drink.”

  “Of course you can,” Charis cried triumphantly. “What would you like?”

  “It is a question of what we have,” Ajanta said coolly. “I am afraid, sir, it is a choice between lemonade or cider.”

  She spoke as if she was quite certain he would refuse both, but the Marquis said,

  “I should be delighted to accept a glass of cider, if it is not giving you too much trouble.”

  He thought for a moment that Ajanta would say it was, but instead in a tone that was almost defiant, she replied,

  “I will fetch it for you, sir. Charis will show you into the dining room.”

  “I will,” Charis agreed.

  She pulled off her unfashionable bonnet as she spoke and the Marquis saw that her hair was fair and very long, not as gold as her sister’s, but still exceedingly pretty.

  He wondered who could possibly have sired such beautiful children and thought it would be amusing to meet their father.

  Then, as if his thought communicated itself to Ajanta, he heard her say to somebody in the distance,

  “Go and tell Papa that luncheon is ready and tell him to come at once or he will be late for the funeral he is taking this afternoon.”

  As she spoke, there was the sound of feet running down a passage and a moment later another girl, very much smaller, but exceedingly pretty as well came into the room.

  She stopped for a moment to look at the Marquis before running on.

  “That was Darice,” Charis explained. “Come into the dining room. You are sure you are not hungry?”

  “Quite sure, thank you. I will be very content with the cider your sister is bringing me.”

  The dining room was a square room with a large oval table in the centre of it, covered, the Marquis noticed, with a linen cloth that was spotlessly clean.

  The table was laid for four people. Charis brought up a chair and put it beside the one at the top of the table.

  “You had better sit next to Papa,” she said, “and I will sit next to you, because I want to talk to you. But if Papa starts on his pet subject, I shall never get a word in.”

  “I cannot believe you are ever silent for long,” the Marquis teased.

  Charis laughed and as she did so her fair hair, which reached down to her waist, rippled as if with little golden waves.

  The Marquis was looking at her when Ajanta came into the room carrying a stone jug in one hand and a large dish in the other.

  The Marquis took the stone jug from her knowing it would contain the home-brewed cider that many farmers made especially for their workmen.

  As he set it down on the sideboard, Ajanta put the dish she was carrying on the table and left the room.

  Charis fetched a tumbler and, as the Marquis poured himself out some cider, Darice came back holding the hand of a man who looked, the Marquis thought, exactly as he might have expected the father of such exceptionally beautiful children to look.

  The Vicar when he was young must have been amazingly handsome and even now with his hair turning white and lines on his face, he was an outstandingly good-looking man.

  “How do you do, sir,” he said to the Marquis. “I hear from my youngest daughter that you have rescued Charis from some unfortunate occurrence.”

  “An accident with the stagecoach, Papa,” Charis said before the Marquis could reply.

  “Oh, dear, not another one!” the Vicar exclaimed. “They travel far too fast down these narrow lanes. I have said so a dozen times.”

  “I agree with you,” the Marquis said, “but I was fortunately able to put things right and your daughter is none the worse.”

  “I am glad about that. May I know your name?” “Stowe,” the Marquis replied.

  He was so used, when he said his name, to a look first of surprised recognition, then of admiration, that it was unexpected when the Vicar said,

  “I am very grateful to you Mr. Stowe and I hope you will join us for luncheon. My name is Tiverton.”

  As he spoke, Ajanta had come back into the room carrying a pile of plates.

  “We have already asked Mr. Stowe, Papa, if he will join us for luncheon,” she said, “but he says he only wants a glass of cider.”

  “That seems very inhospitable,” the Vicar declared. “I wish I had something stronger to offer you, but I am afraid I cannot afford a good claret. When it comes to alcohol, I dislike anything but the best.”

  The Marquis smiled.

  “I agree with you, and I am very content with cider which I am sure is locally brewed.”

  “From our own apples. I find – ”

  “Please, Papa, sit down,” Ajanta interrupted. “As you know, luncheon is late today because we were waiting for Charis, but you must not be late for the funeral.”

  “Funeral?” her father questioned. “Have I a funeral this afternoon?”

  “You know you have, Papa, for Mrs. Jarvis. You cannot forget it.”

  “No, I must not do that,” the Vicar agreed, as he seated himself in his chair at the top of the table.

  As the Marquis sat beside him, he was certain from the way he spoke that forgetting funerals and other Services was something the Vicar was prone to do.

  “I understand, sir,” he said politely, “that you write books.”

  An eager expression came into the Vicar’s face.

  “I am at the most interesting part of the one I am writing now and it is exceedingly annoying to be called away.” “What is it about?” the Marquis enquired.

  “I am compiling all the religions of the world. It’s a very interesting subject, very interesting indeed! And this will be my sixth, no, – seventh volume!”

  “When Papa was writing about the Greeks, I was christened Charis,” a voice beside the Marquis interposed. “And your sister?”

  The Marquis looked at Ajanta as he spoke and, because she had her back to the window, she seemed to have a halo of light round her golden hair.

  He thought she looked like a Greek Goddess, but for the moment he could not place the name.

  “Ajanta was born when Papa was writing about the Indian religions,” Charis informed him. “Darice, when he was doing the Persian and Lyle when he was writing about Catholicism in France.”

  “You have certainly set yourself a formidable task, sir,” the Marquis said to the Vicar.

  “It’s very interesting, Mr. Stowe, I assure you.”

  “And does your son wish to follow in your footsteps?”

  “No, indeed,” the Vicar replied. “Lyle is at Oxford at the moment and I am afraid his tastes are not very erudite, in fact as his reports tell me, not at all scholarly.”

  “I am sure Lyle will do very well when he has been there a little longer,” Ajanta said.

  The way she spoke, which was obviously in defence of her brother, made the Marquis aware that he meant a great deal to her.

  She started to serve the food she had prepared for her family seated round the table.

  The Marquis was aware that it was rab
bit stew and, from the aroma of it, well cooked with herbs, onions and fresh mushrooms.

  Although he had already eaten too much to want any more, he almost regretted that he could not taste it.

  He, however, sipped his cider and was amused by this homely scene around him.

  Then he was aware that Darice was looking at him as admiringly as Charis had and he thought that she was exactly like a small pink and white Boucher angel.

  He smiled across the table at her and she asked,

  “Are you very very rich?”

  “That is not the sort of question you should ask,” Ajanta corrected sharply.

  “Why not?” the Marquis enquired just to be argumentative and to Darice he said, “what makes you think I am rich?”

  “Because you have four horses and horses are very very expensive to buy and keep.”

  The Marquis laughed.

  “That is true enough, as I know to my cost.”

  “I am afraid,” the Vicar said, “all my family want to ride, but, as we can only afford one horse for riding and one to take me in a gig round the Parish, they have to take it in turns.”

  “And Darice cheats!” Charis informed him. “Because she makes Ajanta give up her turn to her.”

  Darice looked across the table at her sister before she said quietly, looking, the Marquis thought, more than ever like a small angel,

  “That is not only an unkind thing to say, but sneaky!” “Darice is right,” Ajanta said, “and we have no wish to bore Mr. Stowe with our family problems.”

  “But I am interested,” the Marquis protested.

  He spoke as if he was challenging Ajanta and she looked down the table at him in a manner that made him think she accepted his challenge, as she replied coldly,

  “I cannot imagine why.”

  “Very well, I will tell you why,” the Marquis replied. “I have never in my life, though I have travelled a great deal and met a great many people, ever encountered a family of three young women who are so astoundingly and breathtakingly beautiful as you are!”

  As he was speaking directly to Ajanta, he saw first a look of astonishment in her eyes, then one he could only interpret as disapproval.

  She did not, however, get a chance to speak because Charis gave a cry of pleasure.

  “Do you mean that?” she asked. “Do you really mean we are prettier than anybody you have ever seen before?” “That is what I said,” the Marquis answered.