Free The Admiral's Daughter by Judith Harkness

resolution, than one so forbidding.”
    Lord Ramblay now turned to her with a little smile in his eyes, and replied: “Resolution, my dear Miss Trevor, is only the means by which the human will is carried out. Whether that will be thought beneficial or hateful depends upon the persons affected by it. A man can only do what he thinks right in his own conscience. If he does really abide by that one code, then I shall never think ill of him.”
    â€œEven if his conscience makes him cruel!” thought Maggie. She saw now what her cousin’s position was. He would always defend his father in the end, no matter what he might say otherwise to be civil. To her and her father, he might admit the late Viscount’s mistake—but in his own heart, he agreed with him. This idea persisted in Maggie’s thoughts while she went upstairs to change her dress, and only enforced her opinion of Lord Ramblay. If he would be civil, then so would she—but more allegiance than that she would not give him. And at whatever cost, she wasmore than ever determined to discover the true story of his marriage to Captain Morrison’s friend. Hitherto she had only thought her cousin cold and indifferent, but if she found out he had been really cruel to his wife, she would have every reason to hate him.
    It was a little with the look of a battling goddess that Maggie descended the stairs some while later. Her dark hair was knotted up upon her head and fell down in little tendrils on her neck. Her shoulders and bosom were bare above a mauve silk bodice, and all she lacked to look the part of a vengeful deity was a raised bow and arrow. But Maggie, try as she would, could never look absolutely threatening. There was that in her eyes, and about the quizzical lines of her mouth, that more nearly approached impudence than acrimony.

Six
    MAGGIE SAW AT ONCE that the group was smaller than she had expected. Instead of the twenty or thirty souls she presumed a Viscount would assemble for a week’s hunting, there were barely a dozen mortals ranged about the conservatory. The apartment itself was smaller and more cheerful than any other room she had so far seen in the castle, with high windows and a multitude of flowering trees growing in pots, giving the effect of a summer garden. A group of instruments stood in one corner, and the row of chairs about them gave evidence that the room was sometimes used for music. None of these was in use at the moment, though a very pretty young woman was sitting before the pianoforte and pretending to play, while three gentlemen stood about the instrument admiring her. The young lady threw back her head and laughed as Maggie came in the door, and she saw that one of the three gentlemen who instantly joined in was Lord Ramblay. He stood with one arm resting upon the instrument and the other hand upon his hip. He did not laugh so heartily as the others, but there was a smile upon his lips that suggested a great delight at the playfulness of the young lady. So enthralled was he, indeed, that he did not notice his cousin had walked in, and Maggie stood for some moments alone, in the middle of the room, before anyone seemed to see that she was there. Such an entrance was calculated to dash her spirits a little, and indeed to make her feel almost awkward. She could not very well shout across the room nor stamp her foot to draw attention to her presence. And so she stood, the crimson mounting in her cheeks, until the young lady’s mimicry of the song was done and a little round of applause had died away. Then she started across the room to where Lord Ramblay stood, but was saved at the last moment from the humiliation ofannouncing her own presence by his turning about at that instant and exclaiming:
    â€œWhy, it is Miss Trevor! I had not expected you to join us so soon. Are not you weary from your journey?”
    â€œVery weary,” smiled Maggie, “of sitting in a carriage for ten hours. But