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“Please, Mrs. Whitley.”

“What business is it of yours whether or not I choose to grant my husband a divorce—if he even wishes for one?”

“He does,” said Mrs. Barnes.

Adele studied her, a worrying thought coming over her. “You wish to marry him?”

A laugh burst like a breaking dam from Mrs. Barnes. “Goodness, no! I cannot think of anyone less suited to me.”

“Then who?” she asked.

“My daughter.”

“Elizabeth?” Adele asked, stunned. “Why, she hardly knows Guy.”

Mrs. Barnes looked away. “They have come to know one another over the past year.”

Adele set her watering can down. “When?”

“While you were in mourning and Guy was out.”

“I see.”

Mrs. Barnes pressed a hand to her temple. “Please, Mrs. Whitley. You must understand the difficulty I am in.”

“I don’t understand it at all, nor am I particularly inclined to,” Adele said.

“You see,” said Mrs. Barnes, ignoring Adele’s commentary, “whether Guy and Elizabeth marry is no longer a matter of choice.”

Adele stilled, understanding immediately. “He has compromised her?”

Mrs. Barnes gave a hesitant nod.

“Is she…” Adele swallowed. “Is she with child?”

Mrs. Barnes closed her eyes a moment as though bracing herself for humiliation. “Yes.”

The news was like a punch to Adele’s gut, not because of some latent desire to have a child of her own but because of the betrayal.

“You knew,” she said.

“Not at first,” said Mrs. Barnes. “I am not a fool. I could see that there was something of a flirtation there, but I thought it was innocent enough until a few months ago. I watched him approach Elizabeth with more familiarity than I thought their acquaintance merited. I found out that Elizabeth and Guy had happened to meet while out riding one morning after your ball and developed a habit of meeting on the bridle paths.”

Adele could not help but remember the way Guy had happened upon her while riding along the Arroyo Seco trail not long after she arrived. Away from her parents’ expectations, she had decided that perhaps there was something more appealing about his ambition than she had first allowed herself to admit.

“I saw Guy dance with Elizabeth at the charity ball in the spring, and I thought nothing of it. He was a friend doing a kindness,” Mrs. Barnes continued. “Now I realize I should have paid greater attention to what was in front of me.

“When you came to call upon me last month—when I had Mrs. Guthrie say I was not at home—I was with Elizabeth. She had been unwell off and on for a few weeks, but I did not realize why until things came to a head that morning.”

“She was suffering from morning sickness,” said Adele.

Mrs. Barnes nodded. “It was what gave her away. When I pressed her, she confessed everything. That the early morning rides had continued, but that they had become something altogether more serious.”

“And now you wish for Elizabeth and Guy to marry.”

“It is the only way to protect my daughter,” said Mrs. Barnes.

“Elizabeth could marry someone else. A man who is not already married, for instance,” Adele shot back.