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“Are you looking for this?” Miranda asked, the diamonds twinkling in her palm.

Stepping to the other side of the table, she fastened the necklace around Lady Pelton’s neck.

“The spirits tonight are the products of deceit and subterfuge, Lady Enderby, as we have proven. As for Barone, he will give back the purse and leave London. He and his wife will not dare to try their games in the realm of Albion again.”

“And who are you to dictate to Barone, eh?” Barone asked, moving towards Miranda.

Adam was about to interpose himself between the two, but Miranda brushed past him and stretched her hands upward in a flowing, arcane gesture. Her eyes blazed with anger as she raised her voice.

“Do you wish to know who I am, monsieur ? I am a Wodesby of the Woad, a Daughter of Merlin and if that does not suffice for you, I claim the boons of Blood and Kin to The de LaFaye of France.”

Madame Barone blanched. “You are a relation of the Comte de LaFaye, mademoiselle ?”

“Etienne, Le Comte , is my cousin, Madame. Though our two countries are often in conflict, I am sure that a malediction upon a worm like your husband would not impinge on Etienne’s sense of patriotism,” Miranda said.

Madame Barone grabbed her husband’s arm. “Come, cher , we must leave at once.”

“But our equipment,” Barone protested.

“Equipment, Philippe can make for us new,” his wife said, dragging him along.

“But that one,” she glanced nervously back over her shoulder at Miranda.

“That one needs no wires or devices to summon demons. The Gypsies, even they speak the name of LaFaye with respect. We shall bother your friends no more, Lady,” she declared with a bob of her head.

“The purse!” Miranda demanded, raising her hands and waving them in a complex gesture. “I warn you, a curse, once placed, cannot easily be undone.”

Madame Barone produced a bag of coins and spilled it upon the table. “I promise you, it is all there. Everything we took tonight. I beg you, mademoiselle , let us go in peace.”

“I take your word, Madame,” Miranda said. “And in the event that your husband forgets himself, I have three hairs from his head. I pray that there will be no need to send them on to my cousin Etienne.”

“ Non, non , Mademoiselle, I assure you,” Madame Barone said, her face grey as ash. With a final tug, she pulled the shaken conjuror from the room, slamming the door shut behind them.

“Three hairs indeed!” Adam said with a hearty laugh, regarding her with undisguised admiration. “You have hummed them completely.”

“Actually, I only did get two hairs,” Miranda admitted shamefacedly. “Enough to make Barone decidedly uncomfortable, but not sufficient for a full-blown malediction.”

“You are a witch?” Ropwell asked.

“Of course she is!” Lady Enderby declared stoutly. “All the Wodesbys are.”

Adam saw Miranda’s stricken look and knew that she was about to explain that witchcraft was not the destiny of every Wodesby.

However, they were all distracted by the sound of a sob.

Lady Pelton was standing in the corner weeping softly, touching her necklace as if uncertain of its reality.

“I would have given it up gladly,” she sniffed.

“A few words were all that I wanted. I had thought that first postponement of the séance the night of Lady Enderby’s party was destined.

Tonight . . . when Pelton and I would have been married half a century, it would have meant the world to me to speak to him. ”

“But you would not have heard the words that you longed for, Lady Pelton,” Adam began.

“Yes, I know now that Barone was a fraud,” she said, her nose twitching like a rabbit’s as she sniffed. “And I thank you, milord and you, Miss Wilton, for saving dear Pelton’s gift from that rogue’s hands. At least I still have something left to barter when I find a true seer.”

Adam caught Miranda’s troubled look.

“You would do this again?” Miranda asked.

“I must speak to Pelton,” the older woman said desperately. “All those years we were together, I never once told him how much that I loved him, how happy he made me; and then, I woke one morning to find him gone.”

“I am sure he knew,” Adam murmured.

“How can you be so certain, when I am not?” Lady Pelton asked, doubt in her eyes.

“How many of us keep our feelings to ourselves, in our heads, but never give them voice, always assuming that those we love understand what is inside? Many a marriage have I seen fail not because of words, but because of silence.”

“And that is all that you wish?” Miranda asked.

“No more than that,” Lady Pelton said quietly. “It may seem naught to you, but it is everything to me.”

Miranda nodded her head thoughtfully. “Yes, I can see that.” She walked away from the table weighing the situation. Mrs. Bittward, Lady Westwood and Lady Enderby gathered around Lady Pelton, clucking their sympathy as Lord Ropwell helped himself to the contents of the wine decanter in the corner.

“There will be another Barone to get his claws in her.” Adam said, following Miranda to the corner of the room

“Unless she can talk to her husband,” Miranda said, picking up a book and leafing through it distractedly. T o my dearest Loulou, the inscription read, from her furry Pelt. “Did you know Lord Pelton?” she queried.

“They made an odd pair. He was a bear of a man, as large as Lady Pelton is tiny. He was whiskered and gruff but incredibly kind to a neighbor who knew precious little about the management of a large estate.” Adam reminisced, once again feeling a sense of loss.

“Pelton had a deep voice. Rarely spoke, but when he did, his speech was marred by a stutter. So you could be sure if he had something to say, it was worth the effort to listen carefully. I owe him a great deal.”

“Could you imitate him?” she asked, an idea beginning to materialize.

“I vow, I can almost hear the gears whirring in that brain of yours. What are you thinking of, Miss Miranda Wilton?” Adam asked his eyes narrowing.

“Do you recall Uncle Ned and the missing tea-kettle?” By the suddenly wary look in those brown depths, Miranda could see that he was following the drift of her thoughts.

“Are you asking me to take part in a sham, or do you think that you can truly speak to the hereafter?” Adam asked apprehensively

“I have told you time and again that I am no witch,” Miranda said patiently. “And you may stand on principle, milord, if you so desire. But will you, nil you, I will try to assist that woman, by myself if need be, though the results might be far less effective.”

What she suggested went wholly against his principles.

But the soft sound of Lady Pelton’s weeping and the knowledge of his debt to her husband tugged at his heart.

What would it be like to love someone so fully?

Adam wondered. Dim echoes of an eight-year-old boy crying in the emptiness of the nursery reverberated.

Visions rose of his father’s growing desperation and rage as charlatan after charlatan failed to deliver the promise of eternity that he had so craved.

Yes, there would be another Barone, and another and another until they sucked the old woman dry, just as they had drained his father.

Yet, how could he lend his name, his credence to something he could not countenance without compromising his credibility?

“What is it you wish me to do, Miranda?” Adam asked.

“Tell her what she needs to hear, what your father would have wished to hear all those years ago,” she whispered, her eyes sparkling with enthusiasm.

Adam regarded her uneasily. “Would you have me transmit fantasies of your Elysian fields, Miranda?”

“They exist Adam, for everyone” she said, feeling the pain of his disillusionment.

“And though our dreams of that far country may differ, we will all reach that boundary some day and face the Light. I believe that with all my soul and I think that if you reach far enough inside yourself, you believe it too.”

“That was long ago, Miranda,” he said, with a lopsided smile, “a little boy’s wish of angels and a heaven where they served cream cakes thrice a day.”

He could not keep the wistfulness from his voice and Miranda felt a sudden desire to reach out to him, to hold the child that he had been, the child that was still a part of him though he did not realize it.

“She believes,” Miranda said, nodding toward Lady Pelton. “Can that be sufficient for now, Adam?”

“You realize, of course, that you have already all but sealed your reputation as a sorceress in the eyes of the ton,” Adam said. “No matter that you may deny it after this, word will spread.”

“What the ton thinks holds little interest for me. Besides, I will soon be leaving London” Miranda tried to smile, to hold back the sudden tide of loneliness and melancholy as she thought of herself alone in the library that had once been the center of her life.

“Those who matter will still know the truth. All the wishes in the world cannot make a hazel rod out of a willow, Adam. Now will you help me? You are the one man that no one would suspect of collusion.”

He wanted to agree, but the very reason that she cited was the most compelling consideration against his cooperation.

Adam shook his head. “To put my imprimatur on a séance, to collaborate in a deception of this kind would go against all that I have stood for these years past. I cannot, Miranda, even for Lady Pelton’s sake.

Moreover, I could not lie to assure her of an eternity that I doubt exists. ”

His look was a plea for understanding and Miranda swallowed her disappointment with a curt nod. “Very well, then. At the least, can I have your word that you will not interfere.”

“I will even leave, if that is what you wish,” Adam said.