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Lord Purfoy took Eliza’s hand and bowed, his voice still languid but less sardonic than before.

‘I am sorry, Miss Eliza, to have caused you such injury. I hope you are truly on the mend. If you and Mrs Wolfe are attending the Bassett crush, then I shall break my usual habit and hope you may keep one dance for me. Much as I prefer the card tables, I owe you that at least.’ With a rueful smile he brought her fingers briefly to his lips, then was quickly down the front steps and away.

‘Off to his club, no doubt. Thank goodness he’s rich and skilled enough at cards and dice not to be beggared long ago by his habits,’ Alick Wolfe said, his arm around his wife’s waist as he watched his friends depart.

Eliza looked at him and thought his good humour and generosity of spirit drew everyone to him, his humanity as large as his frame.

* * *

That night Eliza did not sleep well. Her conscience troubled her; the kinder everyone was, the more she felt at home and the more urgent it became to end her imposture and face the consequences.

She determined she would tell Corinna in the morning after she returned from her ride with Taz.

As the dawn light seeped through her curtains, she climbed out of bed.

It was too early for Polly with her pitcher of hot water so Eliza decided she would scramble into her clothes and wash on her return.

She had never worn the appropriate apparel for riding before and was amazed by how voluminous her skirts were to prevent her legs being glimpsed as she rode in a decorous side-saddle.

She shuddered to think how inappropriate her clothes had been in the circus; what would Mrs Wolfe and her friends think of her once she told them the truth?

Eliza picked up her hat and tiptoed down the stairs, out into the garden and on to the mews.

The Wolfe stables were intercommunicating with Lord Purfoy’s next door and Eliza weaved her way through the morning activity of mucking out and saddling the horses for their morning exercise.

She found Taz with Lord Purfoy’s elegant black stallion.

He looked up at Eliza’s approach. ‘Morning, miss. Keep away from Horatio’s back legs. ’E’s an ugly customer until exercised.’

Eliza was struck again by the noble grandeur of this horse; she moved close to his head and offered her hand. ‘I’ve never seen a finer stallion.’

Taz’s beady eyes peered at the girl who then put her cheek on Horatio’s neck. ‘M’lord’s pride and joy. Loves ’im better than anyone.’

‘Can I ride him?’ she asked shyly, her heart beginning to speed at the thought.

Taz rarely showed astonishment but his wizened face looked shocked. ‘Lawks! Miss Eliza, don’t even consider it! No one rides that prancer but m’lord! I’m only allowed on ’is back in the mornin’ ’cause the boss’s abed ’til noon.’

He then gestured to a handsome bay with dark eyes: ‘’is lordship doesn’t own any ladies’ palfreys but ’is most amenable mount is Clio.

She’ll not mind the saddle.’ A stable boy emerged carrying a side-saddle and proceeded to buckle it round the horse’s belly.

Eliza laughed as the horse nuzzled her ear, and said to Taz, ‘How do I manage that preposterous thing?’

He turned his all-knowing eyes towards her and winked.

‘I know ye’re a fine ’orsewoman just by yer demeanour.

Ye’ll soon learn.’ Then without ceremony he offered his hand and in one deft movement Eliza was in the saddle.

‘Crook that right knee over the pommel.’ He grabbed her lower foot and slipped it into the stirrup.

Now she understood how necessary it was for a lady to have the voluminous skirts of a riding habit fall in ample folds over the legs, revealing only the most modest portion of booted ankle. ‘There, miss! What ya think?’ he asked.

It was the first time Eliza had sat in any kind of proper saddle and it felt odd to have her movement so restricted. But she was blessed with natural balance and athletic strength and easily settled into this new constraint. ‘It’s very good to be on a horse again.’ Her face was shining.

Taz led her up and down the yard, watched with some interest by the stable boys who recognised a natural horsewoman in the way she sat and moved with the gait of the horse. ‘I’m getting used to it.’ Eliza smiled down at him.

‘Just remember to sit up straight.’ Taz, as small and wiry as a jockey, sprang up onto Horatio’s back, a horse standing at a good eighteen hands and restive as he sidled and pranced.

Within moments the horse was relaxed and leading Eliza and Clio out onto Davies Street, heading for Grosvenor Square and the Park.

It was early and the morning was crisp, the horses’ breaths wreathing in the cold air as they trotted in through Grosvenor Gate.

There were a number of young bloods exercising their steeds and grooms mounted on their masters’ hunters but all eyes were drawn to Horatio and Taz, both well known.

Lord Purfoy was proud of his reputation for having the best horses in London.

When a friend had ribbed him about the expense of maintaining such a high-bred stable, he had dismissed him with an airy hand.

‘I have no children; my prime bloodstock are a much more rewarding way of laying waste to the cash.’

Eliza was aware of the stir her presence caused, mounted on a fine Purfoy horse and in the company of Taz, famed as the best tiger in London.

She felt entirely at home on Clio and even though using the side-saddle was a novelty and she would rather hitch her skirts up and ride astride, she felt at one with her horse.

She longed to let the reins drop and give the mare her head.

As if Taz could read her mind, he said sternly, ‘No gallopin’ in the royal parks, Miss Eliza.

Just canter and that’s it. Anyhow, I don’t want yer fallin’ off. ’

Eliza swung round to face him with indignation. ‘I’d never fall off, Taz!’ She met his eyes which were dancing with amusement.

‘Keep yer ’at on, miss! I reckoned that.’ He chuckled to himself. ‘Just like windin’ ye up.’

Eliza laughed. She liked his manner; his lack of deference reminded her of the people she had grown up amongst. She admired him for not altering his demeanour at all when in the company of Lord Purfoy and his noble friends. Taz was immutably himself.

‘Can I canter to that copse of trees?’ Eliza asked and when Taz nodded, she dropped her reins and Clio sped up the grassy incline with Taz on Horatio beside them.

It was thrilling to share her delight in her speed and grace with her horse, so powerful beneath her, both of them feeling the fresh morning air fill their lungs.

They came to a halt by a stand of oaks and Eliza turned to Taz and said in an impulsive way, ‘Could I ever work as a groom, do you think?’

‘No, you could not!’ Taz was emphatic.

‘But why not? I really know about horses and love being with them.’

‘Well, ye’re a lady and come from the Quality.’

‘I’m no lady. And I’m not elevated in any way.’

Taz looked at her quizzically. ‘’Ow d’ye know? Ye lost yer memory, haven’ yer?’ He was watching her and Eliza suspected, as she had from the beginning, that he knew far more than he let on. She was so tempted to tell him the truth but he changed the subject.

‘Ye look like ye’ve always ridden side-saddle. Very elegant, Miss Eliza.’

Eliza titled her head in acknowledgement, her cheeks flushing. This was praise indeed from such an equine master. ‘But as you know, I long to ride without a saddle.’

Taz lost his twinkle. ‘Everything ye say, miss, is shocking in polite society. Ye had a ‘oyden upbringin’, ain’t ya?’

They were just cantering back towards the entrance to the Park when a man rode towards them, a gleam in his eye.

It was his horse that Eliza first noticed, a flashy grey with a very long tail, luminous in the light.

The rider was dark and lean-faced. He gave her a piercing look as he passed, then stopped and wheeled his horse to come alongside. ‘Do I know you, madam?’

Eliza was startled. She gazed into his face, striking in a furtive, ferrety way, and said emphatically, ‘No, sir. We have never met.’ In a protective gesture, Taz rode Horatio alongside Clio’s flank.

The man peered closer. ‘I didn’t say we’d exactly met, my dear. But that charming profile is unmistakeable. Once seen never forgotten, eh, Miss Clorinda? Although looking slightly more ladylike than when I last saw you.’ He leered.

Eliza flinched. She had not expected to be recognised and his impertinent innuendo alarmed her.

She had to brazen it out and pulled herself up to her full height in the saddle.

‘I don’t know who you have mistaken me for, sir,’ she said in her most haughty voice, ‘but I tell you again, I do not know you.’

Taz reached for his whip, tucked into his saddle, and said with fierce authority, ‘Move away, sir. Ye’re discomfortin’ the lady.’

The stranger’s vulpine eyes flickered towards him. ‘Such insolence from a mere groom. You deserve to be horsewhipped. Your master is Purfoy, is it not?’

‘No man’s me master, sir. But m’job is to care for Lord Purfoy’s horses.’

‘Well then, I’ll take my complaints to him. You can tell him you’ve crossed swords with Davenport.’ He tipped his hat to Eliza before spurring his horse into a fast trot and disappearing into the crowd of horsemen congregating around the Serpentine.

Eliza was shocked by this chance meeting; he had brutally reminded her of her duplicity and the vulnerability of her situation. She turned to Taz with a worried expression. ‘I should tell you something, Taz.’ Her voice dropped.

‘No, Miss Eliza. Ye don’t need to tell me anythin’. I already know. But ye do need to tell Mr and Mrs Wolfe.’

Eliza was astounded. ‘How do you know?’

‘When I first saw ye I suspected then ye was a circus chit.’

This answer unsettled her. ‘Oh no! Was it so obvious?’

‘Only to me.’