106. Love's Dream in Peril by Barbara Cartland Page B

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    Lord Ranulph’s face fell.
    “You cannot miss the event of the Season.”
    “I – did not like the way she laughed at me.”
    “Lady Ireton’s ball will be the best of the Season. You must not fret over a few humorous words spoken in jest. She is a charming hostess.”
    The horses tossed their heads and pranced along by the trees and Adella racked her brains for some way to get out of going to this ball.
    And then Lord Ranulph said in a quiet voice,
    “Please, Miss May – Adella. I should so much like to dance with you.”
    She had not heard him speak in this way before and somehow the gentleness of his tone was harder to resist than when he was being more insistent. She did not want to go to Lady Ireton’s ball, but suddenly it seemed unkind and ungenerous to refuse.
    Lord Ranulph had given her the beautiful gift of the fine horses and he had obviously chosen them for her very thoughtfully.
    And now he was speaking so gently and asking so earnestly.
    “I – will think about it.” Adella replied.
    Lord Ranulph caught her hand in his and kissed it swiftly before he released it.
    Then he said no more, but sat beside her, gazing out over the green grass as they drove through Hyde Park.
    *
    “Digby, Digby! Hoorah!”
    A chorus of happy young voices greeted the weary trainee lawyer as he entered the Judge’s house in Mayfair, where he had now been living for two weeks.
    “You’re so late!” said Ned, the Judge’s third son, who was too young to be sent away to school with his two elder brothers. “We’ve been waiting for you for hours!”
    “I had a lot of work to do,” Digby said, thinking back over a long day of running from the Chambers to the Court with bundles of important papers.
    And now he was here, he should really go straight to his attic room and spend time studying before dinner.
    “You should have remembered that you were going to take us out,” complained Agnes, who was just a year or so younger than her brother.
    “You promised,” added little Katy, who was almost but not quite the youngest.
    Peter, the baby of the family, who had not long been able to walk, had nothing to utter but delighted cries of “Digby, Digby, Digby!”
    And he threw his little arms around Digby’s knees, so there was absolutely no chance that he could escape and run upstairs to his room.
    “We must go now,” Agnes said, with an anxious expression. “Or Nanny will chase after us to go to bed.”
    The children stood in a line in front of him, gazing up with beseeching expressions and Digby put down his heavy bag stuffed with legal books on the hallstand.
    “All right, all right. I surrender.” he said. “Let go, Peter, old chap, that’s the ticket.”
    “Horsey!” the little boy shouted and then chortled with happiness as Digby hoisted him onto his shoulders.
    “Quickly, now!” Digby said, shepherding the four delighted children across the road and through the little iron gate that led into the tree-lined garden, which formed the heart of the Square.
    “Oh, wait – look!” Agnes cried, seizing his hand.
    A groom was walking along the road towards them leading two small white ponies.
    “Please – can’t we stop and talk to them?” Agnes asked.
    “Would you mind awfully if the children admired your ponies for a moment?” Digby asked.
    The groom tugged on his cap politely.
    “Not at all, sir.”
    “Oh, they are so sweet!” Agnes cried, patting the ponies’ noses. “Like little fairy horses!”
    “Agnes, don’t be so silly,” Ned retorted. “I think they look just like Ancient Roman chariot ponies. I bet they’d win lots of races.”
    Katy pushed close to stroke the ponies.
    “I wish we could have a pony,” she sighed. “Why won’t Papa let us have one?”
    “Well, I’d better get on,” the groom said.
    “Whose ponies are they?” Katy asked, reluctantly stepping back onto the pavement.
    “The young lady at No. 82,” he replied. “She’s not much use for ’em now