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“Hello, sweet William!” Helene said, holding out her arms. He let go of his nurse’s hand and walked one step alone, toppling toward her like a falling star. She scooped him up and tickled him for a moment, and then kissed him all over his curly little head. He smelled wonderful, like bread-and-milk pudding and baby.

“This was very clever of you,” Helene observed, giving William’s mother a narrow-eyed glance.

“I know,” said Esme happily. “I expect you’ve consigned me to the dungeon, darling, and Lord knows I deserve to be.” She turned to Ivy. “I think William will be just fine with us for a short while, Ivy, if you’d like to greet Mrs. Crewe.”

William’s nursemaid curtsied and took herself out of the sitting room with dispatch. “Ivy is in love with one of my grooms,” Esme said. “Now she’ll peek out the door and drive the poor lad to distraction.”

“How could you do such a thing?” Helene scolded, although it was difficult to sound severe when William’s giggles filled the air. “How dare you tell Rees that I was intending to get myself with child?”

“It was the most practical solution,” Esme said, looking not at all repentant. “I gave a lot of thought to illegitimate children two years ago. Miles and I hadn’t lived together for ten years, and there he was in love with Lady Childe. But I decided finally that it made far more sense to approach my own husband than to bear an illegitimate child, and the same is true for you.”

“You should have simply told me,” Helene scolded. “As it was, I was positively mortified. You should have seen Mayne’s face when—”

“No, wait!” Esme cried. “You mustn’t describe what happened last night until Gina arrives. She said she’d be here early, and she threatened me with murder if I allowed you to begin the tale without her. We are both quite moribund with curiosity. And Helene, we must instruct your butler that you’re not receiving for at least an hour. You do realize that all of London will be here this morning, don’t you?”

“Of course I do,” Helene said irritably. “Why would I be wearing this drafty garment if I didn’t know that? Every scandal-mongering matron from here to York will be on my doorstep.”

“Matrons!” Esme cried. “Who cares for such trifles? All the men in London will be here, which is why it matters that you look exquisite. Do you know, I think that lip color is more suited to you than anyone I have ever known? It makes your mouth look as ripe as a berry.”

“You sound like the worst kind of flatterer. The foolish things were said to me last night! I danced with Gerard Bunge and he kept sighing, and saying that I looked like a tree-nymph in springtime.”

“What a coincidence,” Esme said acidly. “So did he.”

At that moment, Harries announced the Duchess of Girton, Esme announced she was positively starved, and William fell over and bumped his head against a table, so the conversation proper didn’t start again until Ivy had borne William downstairs for a consolatory pudding, and Harries had been instructed to bring sustenance, and deny entrance to anyone for one hour.

“Now tell me all!” Gina said gaily. The Duchess of Girton had beautiful green eyes and pale red hair. She could turn in a heartbeat from being the most composed, regal woman in London, to being doubled over with fits of wicked laughter. “Helene, darling, you look so elegant! I sent a message to Madame Rocque this morning for an appointment. After hearing about your gown from at least four different women last night, I want precisely the same. Although I promise to order it in a different color,” she added.

Helene couldn’t help smiling. “How is Max?”

Gina wrinkled her nose. “A despot. I do believe he’s the only child in all England who doesn’t sleep at night. Now he’s teething, and he must have his mama at night or he screams so loudly that even the staff can’t sleep. Cam says I must just leave him, and then he’ll get used to Nurse, but I can’t bear his cries.”

“William howls his head off during the night sometimes,” Esme said cheerfully. “I must be a very unnatural mother, because I leave him to Ivy.”

“I wish I could do that,” Gina said.

“Much more important,” Esme told Gina, “is the fact that just before you arrived last night, Mayne swept Helene into the music room, and Rees came pounding after her, and the next thing I heard, Mayne had come out with a brow like thunder, as they say.”

They both turned and looked expectantly at Helene.

“I got my monthly this morning,” she blurted out.

“Oh, what a shame,” Esme said softly, winding an arm around her shoulder.

“I’m a little worried that I may be barren,” she said, and her voice shook.

“You are not barren,” Gina said. “I was married for several months before I found myself in a delicate condition and”—she colored—“there was no lack of the necessary activity.”

“The idea is absurd!” Esme said. “But I would suggest that you choose a more private setting for your next encounter with Rees.”

“I live in anticipation,” Helene said with a curl of her lip.

“I don’t know why you’re so preoccupied with the idea that Helene must reconcile with her husband,” Gina said to Esme. “It’s almost as if you wish Helene to return to her husband simply because you reconciled with Miles.”

“Nonsense,” Esme said tartly. “But Helene wants to have a child, and Rees is the obvious choice. If she finds herself in an interesting condition due to the efforts of some other man, who could say how Rees will react?”

“I don’t even care,” Helene said. “I would retire to the country and raise my baby.”

“But I would miss you,” Esme pointed out. “We would both miss you, and you would miss us. You would miss London.”