She did not turn. Branded on her mind was the vision of Lord Henry's naked perfection, overlaid with the conventional gloss of how utterly she had humiliated herself and that she would never be able to face him again as long as she lived.

She did not see the rabbit hole, did not realise her danger until she had tripped headlong into the gra.s.s and nettles to lie still, winded, with tears of pain and embarra.s.sment stinging her eyes and the sound of Lord Henry's footsteps drawing ever closer.

Chapter Eight.

QyssQ roily brushed the tumbled hair out of her eyes and hastily attempted to sit up. A sharp pain shot through her ankle as she tried to put her weight on it. At the same time, tiny stinging patches of nettle rash seemed to rise on every exposed bit of skin.

With a groan she lay back in the gra.s.s.

The blue sky was abruptly blotted out.

"What the h.e.l.l do you think you're doing?" Lord Henry March night demanded, with something less than his customary aplomb.

Even through her pain and misery, Polly was aware of relief that he had taken time to dress before he had followed her. He was not, perhaps, as immaculately turned out as usual, but there was something powerfully attractive about the sight of such casual dishevelment. Polly turned her head away with another groan. To be able to think of nothing but Henry March night's attractions at a time like this argued a disordered intellect.

Henry's gaze took in her tumbled hair and the lines of pain on her white face, and his tone changed abruptly.

"You're hurt!" He stretched out a hand and Polly flinched back, trying to scramble to her feet. She saw the angry colour come into his face at her reaction, though his voice remained level.

"I a.s.sure you that you can trust me. Lady Polly. I am not so far gone in debauchery as to take advantage of a de fenceless woman! Besides, what were you intending to do--get up and hop away from me? Attack me with your parasol, perhaps?"

He had gone down on one knee beside her in the gra.s.s now.

"This is no time to be missish." He had taken her ankle in his hand now and was exploring it with gentle fingers warm against the silkiness of her stockinged foot.

Polly closed her eyes in an agony of confusion and mortification. Still shocked and aroused by their confrontation in the fishing-house, she found his touch almost unendurable.

But there was nothing remotely suggestive in Lord Henry's behaviour.

"You have sprained your ankle," he said in matter- of-fact tones.

"I doubt that you could walk on it even if you wanted to! I will take you back to the Court. It is not far." He scooped her up in arms that made nothing of her weight.

Polly had started to feel very unwell. The heat and the pain were making her head swim and the colours all seemed too bright and blurred.

She turned her head against Lord Henry's shoulder, forgetting for a moment her earlier discomfort in his presence.

"Oh, no, you cannot! I cannot allow--' Her qualms surfaced again before they had gone more than twenty steps. Lord Henry did not even slow his pace.

"Indeed? Can I not?" He sounded grimly amused. "And how do you intend to stop me?" He settled her more comfortably in his arms.

"Close your eyes, if you cannot bear to think of being in my arms!"

After the bright glare of the sun, the cool entrance hall at Dilling ham Court was blissfully shaded. Polly, who had been lulled into comparative peace by the gentleness with which Henry had carried her, opened her eyes with reluctance. Medlyn was hurrying across the hall towards them, his brows almost disappearing into his hair at the sight of Polly clasped close to Lord Henry yet again. It was beginning to look like a habit.

"Lady Polly! Lord Henry! Whatever has happened, sir?"

"Lady Polly has fallen and hurt her ankle," Lord Henry said tersely.

"Send someone for the doctor please, Medlyn, and if you could show me to Lady Polly's room " Put me down! " Polly hissed in a mortified whisper.

"Certainly not," Lord Henry said, in exactly the same terse tone.

"Do not be so foolish! You cannot stand!"

"I can try!" Polly said obstinately, her mouth set in a tight line.

Lord Henry looked as though he would have liked to have slapped her if he had had a hand free.

"Pray do not martyr yourself Fortunately, the drawing-room door opened at that moment and the Dowager Countess and Nicholas Sea grave came out into the hall, stopping dead at the sight in front of them.

"Polly!" the Dowager Countess said faintly.

"What on earth " Lady Polly has sprained her ankle," Lord Henry said again, with commendable patience.

"If someone could show me to her room?"

"Of course." Nicholas Sea grave had recovered himself and now appeared to be trying to suppress some amus.e.m.e.nt as he considered his sister's flushed face and her unwilling rescuer.

"Bring her this way, March night! Has Medlyn sent for the doctor? Oh, good... Here..."

Polly's pillows were soft beneath her head. She could feel her mother fussing around her as Sea grave steered Lord Henry out of the room.

"Wait..." It came out as a croak. She opened her eyes. Despite her mortification, there really was something she had to say.

"Thank you, sir," Polly said, reluctantly looking at Lord Henry, and for a moment she saw the expression in those dazzling grey eyes soften as he smiled at her. It made her feel quite weak, and not from sickness.

"At your service. Lady Polly. I hope that you will be feeling better shortly..."

"We're indebted to you for your help yet again, March night," Sea grave was saying pleasantly, shaking his hand.

"A gla.s.s of something before you go, perhaps? If you come down to my book room..." The door closed behind them.

There was a moment of silence, then, "Polly," the Dowager Countess said imperiously, "I demand that you tell me what is going on!"

Polly's lashes flickered. For a moment she hesitated, but it really was easier to pretend that she had fainted. She gave a little sigh, turned her head on the pillow, and lay still. She heard the Dowager Countess sigh with exasperation.

"Polly Sea grave! I vow and declare that you are the most trying child sometimes!"

Polly vouchsafed no reply.

"So," Lucille said, patting the bed beside her to encourage her sister-in-law to sit down, 'you may now tell me precisely what happened between yourself and Harry March night! " It was a week since Polly's accident and she had proved a poor patient.

She had kept to her room for the first day or two, resting her ankle as the doctor had instructed, but the enforced inactivity had begun to bore her and she had begged Sea grave to carry her down to the drawing-room, where she could at least have some company. And on this particular morning, she had hopped into Lucille's bedroom as her sister- in-law was taking her morning chocolate.

Lucille was much better. The morning sickness that had brought her low whilst travelling had now receded and she looked radiant. She fixed Polly with a wicked look over the rim of her chocolate cup.

"Do not seek to cozen me! Oh, I know the story you have told your mama!

But it stretches my credulity too far to believe that you happened to be strolling by the river and tripped, and Henry March- night was just pa.s.sing and was able to rescue you when you fell! So? " Polly hesitated. She could not deny that it was heaven to have Lucille back to confide in. The Dowager Countess was very kind under her starchy exterior, but it would have been impossible to tell her mother the story of what had really happened. And since Lucille had been shrewd enough to guess at the fabrication. "Well," she said cautiously, 'it was true that I was walking by the river.