Free Fortune's Mistress by Mary Chase Comstock

however. He had not stopped think ing of its mistress since he first encountered her in the stone circle. He had found his way to that enchanted place immediately on his return from Edinburgh. The legends of virgins turned to stone might terrify the villagers into forsaking its environs, but he found the circle peaceful, and always left it with a lighter heart and a renewed sense of hope. Now that sense of hope had become personified.
    The image of Mrs. Glencoe, crowned with flowers, had possessed him ever since he first spied her. Most women would have looked fool ish thus arrayed, but she did not. She looked utterly natural, as if she were one of the fairy folk believed to inhabit the region.
    It was little wonder that he had not immedi ately noticed her widow’s weeds. Her face invited the eye like a cameo framed in silk. Her movements were liquid, her form gently feminine. She was undeniably beautiful, achingly beautiful. But there was an intriguing mystery about her as well, which held his mind in thrall.
    To begin with, he was almost certain he re membered something of her from his previous life in the ton. Her face and manner, at any rate. Her family name would doubtless come in time, whether he wished it or not. For all his efforts, he was still unable to purge the myriad memories of his former life in that glittering superficial circle.
    Mrs. Glencoe was indeed a cipher. Like him, she seemed to have left that life behind, but what was she doing here at the end of the world? Even if, as rumor held, her husband ’s family had cast her off, what of her own family and acquaintance? Could she possibly be as entirely alone as appearances suggested? He shook his head thoughtfully. Something was not right here.
    He pulled t o the side of the road for a moment, to allow a cart to pass the other way. Caught up in his analysis of his new acquaintance, he almost failed to return the farmer’s greeting. They exchanged a few civil words, but he could scarce have reported what they were, so distracted was he.
    Venables had not entered Rosewood Cottage intending to examine it for clues to the owner ’s life; nonetheless, he had done so, and been disconcerted to find not the slightest hint of Mrs. Glencoe’s past. There seemed to be no mementos, no memorabilia. No miniature of the husband in evidence. No regimental sword or sash. Not even a twist of his hair in some frame or other, and she wore no locket. Though he saw no particular value in such displays, he knew about widows. He had often marked how, love or no, they raised what monuments they might as a way of affirming their station, despite the dusty imprint of death.
    And just a s there were no clues to the departed Captain Glencoe— so local gossip held his rank— neither were there signs by which one might read his widow. Venables knew the house had been purchased largely furnished, and remembered enough of the place to determine which pieces were the additions of the new owner. A few chairs, some framed lithographs of country scenes. There were books, but he had been unable to scan their titles. In short, anyone might live there.
    The only thing which struck him as out of the ordinary were the several vases, overflowing with haphazard arrangements of bright flowers. Their transition from the garden to the drawing room had not transformed them into rigid arrangements, as was the custom in most houses.
    Venables smiled as he thought of her reaction to his gift. He had been racking his brains trying to settle on a way to make an impression upon her—none of the artifices he had once used among ladies of the ton would do—when he came upon the motherless litter in a corner of the barn. Their little faces appealed to his heart, and he wondered if hers would be touched as well.
    He had been entirely uncertain as to what he might expect from her when the basket ’s contents were revealed. But he had seen her transform from a staid widow to a delighted girl, almost as if