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       ANNE HERRIES,

      winner of the Romantic Novelists’ Association Romance Prize 2004, lives in Cambridgeshire, England. She is fond of watching wildlife, and spoils the birds and squirrels that are frequent visitors to her garden. Anne loves to write about the beauty of nature, and sometimes puts a little into her books, although they are mostly about love and romance. She writes for her own enjoyment and to give pleasure to her readers.

      Contents

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

       Chapter One

      September 1560

       ‘C ome, Mistress Catherine, a visit to the fair will do you good on this bright day. And besides, I do not like to see you downcast, sweet Cousin. My good Aunt Elizabeth would have driven you out into the sunshine before this, I dare swear.’

      Catherine Moor laid down her embroidery with a sigh. She would as lief have sat quietly over her work, though others had already left for the delights of the fair that had come to visit, but she knew only too well the determination of her cousin Willis Stamford. Both Willis and her aunt, Lady Helen Stamford, were concerned for her, believing that it was time she put aside her grief for her beloved mother. Lady Elizabeth Moor had died of a putrid inflammation of the lungs in the spring of the year 1560, and it was now September of that same year.

      Catherine no longer spent hours weeping alone in her bedchamber, but the ache of loss was constantly present and she had no real wish to visit a fair, even though she had always loved them when her parents had taken her. However, Willis would give her no peace until she acquiesced, which she might as well do with a good grace since she knew him to be a kind-hearted lad, some five years her senior. Most lads of his age would not have concerned themselves with a girl of barely eight years.

      ‘Will you wait a moment while I fetch my cloak and purse, Cousin?’

      ‘Martha has your cloak ready in the hall,’ Willis replied, smiling at her. ‘And you will have no need of your purse, as it is my pleasure to treat you to whatever you desire. You shall have sweetmeats, ribbons and trinkets, as many as you shall please.’

      ‘Then I can only thank you, Cousin.’

      Catherine stood up, brushing the stray threads of embroidery silk from her grey gown. Her dress was very simple, the full skirts divided over a petticoat of a paler grey, and the laced stomacher braided with black ribbon. More black ribbons attached the hanging sleeves to a plain fitted bodice and were her only ornament apart from a tiny silver cross and chain that her mother had given her just before she died.

      Martha, her nurse and comforter since Lady Moor’s death, was waiting to fuss over her in the hall, clucking like a mother hen with a chick as she tied the strings of Catherine’s cloak and warned her not to stand in a chill wind.

      ‘You take good care of her, Master Willis, and don’t let her overtire herself.’

      ‘Trust me, good mistress,’ he replied and planted a naughty kiss on Martha’s plump cheek. ‘I shall let no harm befall my cousin, I do promise you.’

      ‘Get on with you, you wicked boy!’ cried Martha, blushing at his teasing. ‘Or I’ll take my broom to your backside.’

      The threat was an idle one, as both Catherine and Willis were well aware. Martha’s heart was as soft as butter straight from the churn, and Willis knew exactly how to twist her round his little finger.

      ‘I hope it will not tire you to venture as far as the village,’ Willis said after they had been walking for some minutes. He glanced anxiously at Catherine’s pale face. She had been ill with the same fever that had carried off her mother, and though long recovered, he knew his mother considered her still delicate. ‘Perhaps we should take a short cut through the grounds of Cumnor Place?’

      ‘Do you think we ought?’ Catherine turned her eyes on him. They were wide and of a greenish-blue hue that made Willis think of a clear mountain pool he had drunk from on a visit to the Welsh hills as a young boy…deep and mysterious and deliciously cool. ‘Will the lady of the house not mind us using her grounds as a short cut?’

      ‘Poor Lady Dudley never leaves her bed they say. She has a malady of the breast and is like to die soon enough…’ Willis stopped abruptly, wishing he had cut his tongue out before saying those words to his cousin. He hastened to repair his slip. ‘Though I dare say that is merely gossip and the doctors will make her well again.’

      ‘You need not protect me, Willis.’ Catherine’s serious eyes turned to him and he thought how lovely she was; the wind had whipped a few hairs from beneath the neat Dutch cap she wore so that they clustered

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