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had destroyed her first marriage.

      “And these are Jemmie’s bairns,” Jasmine was continuing. “Our eldest, Patrick, then Adam, and Duncan. We had a little lass, but lost her almost two years ago. She caught measles and died a month after my dearest grandmother. She was named for that lady, and for Janet Leslie. Janet Skye.”

      “I remember my great-grandmother, Janet,” Cat told Jasmine. “We called her Mam. She was a very formidable woman.”

      “As was my grandmother,” Jasmine replied.

      “Is it true you were once in a harem?” India Lindley suddenly burst out.

      Cat turned to look at the girl. She was easily on the brink of womanhood, and every bit as beautiful as her mother with black hair and the most wonderful golden eyes. “Yes,” she answered. “I was in the harem of the sultan’s grande vizir.”

      “Which sultan?” India persisted.

      “There is only one sultan,” Cat said. “The Ottoman.”

      “Was it exciting or awful?” India’s eyes were alight with unbridled curiosity.

      “Both,” Cat told her.

      “India!” Jasmine was mortified by her daughter’s outrageous behavior, but then, India was so damned headstrong, and always had been.

      “My mother was raised in a harem,” India volunteered.

      “Was she?” Now it was Cat’s turn to be intrigued.

      “My father was the Grande Mughal of India,” Jasmine explained. “My mother was English. She is married to the earl of BrocCairn.”

      “I remember your mother,” Cat replied. “Velvet is her name. She stayed with us at Hermitage years ago. You don’t really look like her, do you?”

      “I have some of her features, but I am mostly a mixture of my maternal grandmother and my father,” Jasmine answered.

      That would indeed account for the slightly Oriental tilt of Jasmine’s unusual turquoise eyes and the faint golden tint of her skin, Lady Stewart-Hepburn thought. She let her gaze wander to the pert India. The girl had skin like milky porcelain and a faint blue sheen to her midnight-colored hair, but where had she gotten those eyes? They were like a cat’s. Gold, not amber, and with tiny flecks of black in them. The older woman settled herself into a chair by the fire. France in April was a chilly place. The fuss of her arrival had died about her. Her children and their mates had ensconced themselves about her on a settee, a chair, and a stool. Her grandchildren were amusing themselves.

      “How old is India?” she asked.

      “She will be seventeen at the end of June,” Jasmine said, suspecting what her mother-in-law would next ask. She was not disappointed.

      “And she is not married?”

      Jasmine shook her head.

      “Betrothed?”

      “Nay, madame.”

      “You had best see to it soon then,” came the pithy observation. “The wench is ripe for bedding. Close to overripe, and susceptible to trouble, I would wager.”

      James Leslie laughed at his mother’s words. “India has nae yet met a man to attract her attention, Mother. I want my girls to wed for love. I did, and I hae never been happier.”

      “Mam had me betrothed to your father at four, and we married but moments before your birth when I was barely sixteen,” Lady Stewart-Hepburn noted. “Love was not a consideration in making the match, although I came to care for your father.”

      “But you loved Lord Bothwell unconditionally,” the duke of Glenkirk reminded his parent. “Besides, yer first marriage took place forty-seven years ago. Times have changed since then, Mother.”

      “And you would allow your stepdaughter to make an unsuitable match in the name of love?” Cat was surprised to find she was appalled. I am obviously growing old, she thought.

      Jasmine interposed herself between her husband and his mother in the conversation. “India will never choose unwisely, madame, for she is most proud, and extremely aware of her heritage. She is the grandchild of a great monarch, and her father’s family was an old and very noble one. It pleases her that my stepfather, and her stepfather, both have ties to the royal family. She adored my grandmother, Madame Skye, and was weened upon the tales of her adventures, and her relationship with Great Bess. When the time comes, India will pick the right man.”

      “Have you had no offers for her?” Cat was curious.

      “Several, but they did nae please India. In most cases, she felt the families involved were simply looking to her fortune, and nae to her,” the duke of Glenkirk told his mother. “She was correct. India can be very astute.”

      “A girl in love for the first time is not always careful or wise,” Cat cautioned.

      “Well, as no one has yet caught India’s fancy, I do not believe we have cause for worry,” Jasmine replied.

      The Leslies of Glenkirk had come to France to represent their country at the proxy marriage of the new king, Charles I, to the French princess, Henrietta Marie. King James had sickened, and died unexpectedly on the twenty-seventh of March. The marriage negotiations had already been concluded, although there was some difficulty about the princess’s religion. Charles Stuart had no time to argue with his government. He was suddenly king, and without an heir. While he did not feel he could depart his country to personally celebrate his marriage with his father newly deceased, he felt strongly that the marriage must go forward immediately, and his queen be brought to England.

      The marriage, which originally was to have been celebrated in June, was now moved forward to the first of May so Charles’s enemies in the parliament would not have time to marshall their forces, and delay or prevent the match. The duke of Buckingham was to have acted as the king’s proxy at the June celebration, but now he had to remain in England to attend the old king’s funeral, which was set for the end of April, for it was not unusual for a king to lie in state several weeks. Instead, the duc de Chevreuse would act as the English king’s proxy. Chevreuse was related to both the French royal house and the English, through their mutual ancestor, the duc de Guise. He was therefore a suitable choice, and acceptable to both sides.

      Most of the English court remained in England, but Charles had asked the duke of Glenkirk and his family to attend his wedding. It would be a far more pleasant occasion than poor old Jamie’s funeral, the duke conceded to his wife, and if his sister, the duchesse de St. Laurent, would ask their mother to come from Naples for a visit, Jasmine and the children could at least meet Catriona Hay Leslie Stewart-Hepburn.

      The young king’s reason was more personal. James Leslie himself was distantly related to Charles, and his stepson, little Charles Frederick Stuart, was the new monarch’s nephew, although he had been born on the wrong side of the blanket. Such accidents of birth did not matter to the Stuarts except where the succession was concerned. They had always welcomed, recognized, and considered their bastards legitimate members of their clan. The king wanted some of his family blood at his wedding ceremony, and the Leslies of Glenkirk would acquit themselves, and therefore the Stuarts, quite well. They were also not important enough to be missed at the official mourning ceremonies since they only rarely came to court.

      The St. Laurent château was in the countryside two hours from Paris. The Leslies had been included on the guest list for the signing of the marriage contract and the betrothal ceremony on the twenty-eighth of April, as well as the wedding on May first. They would attend with the five oldest children. The St. Laurents, Lady Stewart-Hepburn, and the two youngest Leslie children would come for the wedding only. The Lindley children, and their Stuart half-brother had been too young to participate in King James’s court when Queen Anne had been alive. She had died the year India was eleven. The queen had adored fêtes and masques. She had loved art, music, and dancing. Her dour husband had tolerated her follies, as he called them, for love of his Annie. Once the queen had died, however, James’s

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