Jenny shook her head and smiled. "You will be needed in Hawkesmoor, Ariel, but someone must stay here to help the people in these parts. But I had an idea. Something that came to me while I was with Mother a minute ago." She looked up at the earl, standing at Ariel's shoulder. "I hope you will help, my lord, because my mother had… had some feeling for you that I don't understand. But-"

"My dear Jenny, you have only to ask."

"Well, I was thinking that perhaps we could train other people to help the sick… the way Mother trained me and Ariel. We would perhaps have to pay people if we're to take them away from their regular work, but Mother would live always in the hands of others."

"Oh, yes," Ariel breathed. "How perfect, Jenny. I will help you. I can use the money from the racing stable, and we'll set up a school for midwives and herbalists."

Simon ran a somewhat distracted hand through his hair. Somewhere between breeding racehorses and running a training program for would-be midwives and apothecaries, his wife might find time for him.

He cleared his throat a mite plaintively and Ariel looked up immediately, her eyes on fire with her enthusiasm. "Oh, yes," she said with instant comprehension. "I must be a wife too, of course."

"I shall be eternally in your debt, madam wife." He offered a mock bow and proffered his arm. "Perhaps now might be a good moment?"