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something from the Cathedral?”
    â€œNo, you prying miss! He asked that I collect a package from the jeweller in Canterbury. And so long as I was playing messenger for him, why should I not use a little time for my own pleasure and proceed to the Cathedral?”
    â€œBecause you know very well he would not approve, you saucy creature.”
    Naomi’s rich chuckle sounded. “Oh, he would have made a fuss and forbade me, I do not doubt. Now, he cannot, can he?”
    Her friend shook her head. “Faith, but you never cease to astound me. You are so fearless. I should be quite terrified of his anger.”
    â€œPerhaps because you are so gentle. August guards you like any fierce gladiator, and your papa adores you and I doubt has ever spoken to you in anger. My life has been … different.”
    Miss Falcon saw the wistfulness that came into her friend’s eyes, and her kind heart was touched.
    Twenty years earlier, when Simon Lutonville was an impoverished younger son, living at the Manor on his brother’s charity but with no expectations of ever becoming the Earl of Collington, two friends had stood by him. One of these had been Mr. Neville Falcon, and it was through his good offices that Lutonville had been appointed secretary to Count Leonardo Paviani, then one of the wealthiest and most influential men in the world of finance. Lutonville’s gratitude to Falcon had kept the two families close for some years. Throughout her early childhood, Naomi had played with and adored Katrina, and had been teased by, and quarrelled with her domineering older brother. When Count Paviani returned to Italy, and Mr. Lutonville began to spend more time out of England than in it, he sent for his wife and two daughters, and the childhood friendship might have been forgotten had not Naomi and Katrina been faithful correspondents.
    Remembering those letters and what she had thought to read between the lines, Katrina had seldom referred to the period of separation, and when she’d done so Naomi had been reticent and quickly changed the subject. Intuition whispered that her friend was troubled today, and reaching out to clasp her hand, Katrina asked, “Was it very bad, dearest? You never speak of those years in Rome.”
    â€œOf course it was not bad.” Naomi’s head tossed upward, but then she met Katrina’s concerned gaze and her defences crumbled. She looked down at her plate and muttered, “It was horrid. I had lost you and—and all my friends.”
    â€œThank goodness that you had your sister, at least. Oh, la! I did not mean—”
    â€œI know just what you meant, Trina,” said Naomi with a rueful smile. “And ’tis true that Joan and I were not close friends. Faith, but she gave me five years, and found me dull. Mama talked to me, but she never heard whatever I had to say. And Papa—well, you have seen how much he is changed.”
    â€œYes. But I had thought it was only since he became a peer and returned to England. Or that perhaps it was because—Well, August and I are not good ton. ” She cut off Naomi’s immediate and angry denial by remarking quickly, “How very lonely you must have been. I suspected that was so at first, but later your letters made it sound as though you had such a jolly time.”
    â€œAfter dear Count Paviani died and made me one of his principal beneficiaries, I had a—” Naomi shrugged. “Oh, I suppose ’twas a jolly time. Certainly, it was better than the first year.” She gave a faint, defiant smile. “Even if it did win me a reputation for wildness.”
    Katrina said hesitantly, “Your parents seem to have kept you so very close at first. Did they not put a check on you when you—er—”
    â€œFlouted parental authority at last and began to make some friends of my own? When I sang with the crowds going to the opera? Or danced with Prince diFaggioli in