And during the final days, when the marquess had already called on her papa, and she knew the day and hour when he would pay his addresses to her, she had longed for Algie. Her dear, undemanding, kind, safe friend! She had neglected him so much. She had come to London convinced that she would marry him one day. And what had happened? She had grown to contemplate marriage with another man, and she had fallen in love with a third man. She had all but forgotten about her faithful neighbor.

She had not refused the marquess. She had not accepted him either. She had told him only that she did not know, that she was quite unable to make a decision at that time. He must consider her answer to be no, she had said, because she could not expect him to accept such an indefinite answer. But he had smiled at her in his charming way, raised her hand to his lips, and assured her that such an answer suited him admirably, since he had promised to spend the summer at Tunbridge Wells with his sister and would prefer to leave the celebration of his betrothal until the autumn.

She was fortunate, Rachel thought. She might still make that advantageous marriage, but she had the summer during which to sort out her feelings, to put behind her a foolish and pointless infatuation, and to find out exactly what her feelings for Algie were.

All she knew now, at the start of her first evening back home, was that she was happy. She was back with Algie again, and safe. And she had met Mr. Gower once more without the earth shattering at her feet.

Chapter 5

It had been a successful evening, Rachel judged a few hours later. Algie's cook, unused to catering to large numbers, nevertheless always seemed able to rise to the occasion. And Algie had entertained them all before the ladies left the dining room with a farewell speech to Vicar Ferney, his words expressing the affection they all felt. The old man had looked delighted to be reminded of several little anecdotes about incidents that might have been embarrassing or even annoying at the time they happened. There had been a great deal of laughter at the table, and they had all risen at Algie's bidding to drink a toast, first to the vicar who was leaving them and then to the man who was to take his place.

Rachel, warmed by her renewed fondness for Algernon, had found herself able to drink both toasts with equal goodwill. And afterward she and Celia had sung the songs they had practiced in London for the occasion, and other guests had also played or recited or sung for the entertainment of the nodding old vicar. They had even smiled through his lengthy speech of thanks, knowing that it was the last time they would be called upon to sit through one of his orations and well aware of the fact that his heart was in the right place even if he had not been granted the gift of interesting eloquence.

The Misses Farraday, spinster daughters of the old vicar's predecessor, had suggested cards eventually, and Algie, ever good-natured, obliged them. Most of the guests joined while Vicar Ferney and David retired to the library to discuss some last-minute business. Rachel was left to her own devices, it being an accepted fact in the neighborhood that she did not play cards and that when she was forced into doing so she played so badly that no one at her table could enjoy the game.

She slipped from the house, not even stopping to ask that a footman fetch her shawl. The night would be warm, she was sure, after such a hot day. She had smelled the roses as soon as she had got down from the carriage earlier. Algie had a rose garden at the east side of the house, a maze of pathways, trellises, and blooms.

She was home, Rachel thought happily, and she could finally put from her the madness of the previous few weeks when she had fancied herself in love with David Gower. It was not a pleasant feeling to be in love. It was so much more comfortable merely to love. To love Algie.

She had no difficulty in finding her way in the darkness. The moon was bright, and though there was no color in the blooms she passed, there was fragrance enough to give them infinite beauty. She breathed in their heavy scent and seated herself on a wrought-iron seat. She lifted her face to the sky and closed her eyes.

Oh, yes, she thought, these were the best of times, these moments when she was in the grip of a powerful and aching yearning, when she was aware of her own insignificance in comparison with the vastness of the universe. It was at such times that her physical being seemed almost a hindrance. She wanted to be out there, part of it all. She wanted to dance, to lift her arms to the sky, to worship the loveliness around her with the motions of her body. But on this particular night she did not give in to the urge. She sat quietly listening to the peace around her.

***

David Gower had just escorted the old vicar to the room he was to occupy for the night. He was to leave the vicarage the next day. All his personal effects were shut away in boxes and trunks. Algernon had persuaded him to stay the night at the Hall. And he was weary, the old man confided to David after he had explained the workings of the parish to his successor for surely the tenth time in the past three days. The party had been delightful; he was touched and honored. But such excitement was not for old men. David had persuaded him to retire quietly, promising to make his good-night greetings to the company gathered in the drawing room.

Yet finding himself alone, David was reluctant to rejoin the company immediately. He would steal some time for himself. After all, no one would know that he and the vicar were not still busy in the library.

And so it happened that the outdoors lured David, and the scent of the roses took him also in the direction of the rose garden. This part of Singleton Hall he would miss. He must see about planting some rosebushes in the garden of the vicarage. He had noticed that there were no flowers there at all. He stopped in order to take a partly open bloom gently between two fingers, cupping it in his palm. How exquisite, he thought, though it looked black against his hand instead of the deep red that he knew it must be.

He found his eyes focusing suddenly beyond the flower on the still form of Lady Rachel, seated on one of the garden benches. His first reaction was to believe that she held herself so still in the hope that he would not see her there. But when he looked more carefully, he could see that her head was thrown back and her eyes closed. She was unaware of his presence. She looked almost as if she were deep in prayer, though a more normal attitude of prayer would be a bowed head. He withdrew his fingers with unconscious care from around the red rose.

David took a step backward. He had no wish to intrude on someone who was so obviously concentrating on something beyond herself. He knew the value of such moments. But even as he began to turn so that he might make his way quietly to another part of the grounds, Lady Rachel opened her eyes and saw him. She was not startled. It seemed almost that he was part of her dream or her prayer or whatever it was that held her so rapt.

"Do you ever feel that you are imprisoned inside yourself?" she asked. "That you wish to get out and cannot?"

He smiled and strolled forward to stand before her. "Yes," he said. "It is the yearning of the soul for the absolute, I believe. Most of the time we are too busy to feel it. And perhaps that is just as well. It can be a frustrating feeling at the same time as it exalts the mind, can it not?"

Rachel gazed up at him with wide, dreamy eyes. "Is it death?" she asked "Is it a death wish I have?"

David clasped his hands behind his back and looked gently down at her. "In a sense, yes," he said. "But you must not begin to think you have a morbid mind. I have seen people die. It has been part of my training. And you know, there is often fear, bitterness, defiance at first. But almost always toward the end I have been awed to watch acceptance and peace, even a kind of radiance come to the dying person, as if he realized at last that it is foolish to cling to the body when he might be free to face the joy of eternity."

"But I do not wish to die!" Rachel said, looking more herself as she gazed up at the man who was standing before her. "I would not be able to see the moon and the stars or to smell the roses if I were dead. And I would not be able to feel and to wish and to wonder. I sometimes believe it is better to wonder than to know. Will not heaven be a rather dull place?"

He laughed softly. "I don't know," he said. "I may be a clergyman, but I have experienced only what is this side of the grave, you know."

"I forgot that," she said. "There is something about you-I do not know what it is. One imagines that you must know everything. I think if I were in great trouble I would come running to you, convinced that you could set everything right."

His smile had faded. "I am glad if I inspire confidence," he said. "It is part of my calling to do so. But you must not set me on a pedestal. I am but a man. No more." Rachel rose to her feet to stand in front of him. "And no less."

"I know," she said softly, and her hand rose quite of its own volition, it seemed, and she touched her fingertips to his cheek. "Yes, I know that."

He raised his own hand and covered hers, holding it against his cheek. "Sometimes I wish I were less so," he said, his eyes looking deeply into hers.

Rachel shook her head. But she said nothing, merely stared back, mesmerized by the night and the near-trance out of which his appearance had drawn her and by his quiet presence now so close to her.

There was no surprise whatsoever in his kiss. She had never been held thus against the full, warm length of a man's body. And she had never been kissed thus, with lips that trembled against hers and moved over them, parting and persuading hers to do likewise. She had never known a kiss in which tongues as well as lips embraced. She had never had a man's hands explore her back and her hips, cup and caress her breasts. And she had never felt a man's heartbeat quicken, his breath grow hot and quick against her face and throat. She had never known more than the brief, passionless meeting of her lips and Algie's in the sheep meadow. But nonetheless she knew no surprise.

She had known this would happen to her one day. Not with her mind. But she had known. This was right. This was the way it must be. It was all inevitable. She had always known that this would be the culmination of it all. And she had known this would be the man. She had sensed it as soon as she had set eyes on him on Bond Street that morning. She had known that they would love each other, that heaven and earth could not prevent this moment.

She surrendered to the inevitability of her love, making no coy endeavor to avoid the intimate meeting of their clothed bodies, obeying without shrinking the eager demands of his hands, his mouth, and his tongue. Her mind, which had been still in a half-trance when she rose to stand before him, awoke fully at his touch. She knew against whose body she pressed her own. She knew who was kissing her and wanting her with a hot physical urgency. And she could feel neither dismay nor guilt nor shame.

She was with the man she loved, the man she had always been meant to love, the man she had recognized at their first encounter. Nothing else mattered at that moment. Nothing else existed.

Rachel found herself gazing up into the shadowed eyes of the man who held her, her head bent back over his arm. She could not see if his eyes registered ardor or dismay. "David," she said, and she knew quite clearly what she said. Her mind deliberately formed the words. "I have always loved you. There is only you."

He did not immediately answer. He did not release her. She was still pressed to his warm length. Her head still rested comfortably against his strong arm. But he had gone away from her. She felt his withdrawal.

"I cannot say I am sorry," he said carefully. "An apology would imply that I feel regret. Perhaps I do feel sorrow for myself, that I have given in to a temptation that I thought in my pride I had under control. I had determined never to touch another woman-or even think of her in this way-until I had asked her to be my wife and she had consented. I have done you a great wrong, my dear, and knowing that, I shall suffer greatly for this night's indulgence."

"I can marry you," Rachel said eagerly. "We love each other, do we not? And once one admits to love, nothing else matters. I will be happy with you. It does not matter that you do not have rank or fortune. Those things are quite unimportant. And I will make you happy, David. You will see."