I had tried, in my own way, to comfort him, braving a charge of trespass by visiting the stables of the manor house, when the stableboy was gone. I had brought treats for the ailing stallion, and talked to him, and done my best to cheer him, but though he recognized me he had no will to change, his dull, sad eyes compounding my own grief.

And then one day, while I was visiting the stables, both horse and I heard someone whistling outside, and even as I started guiltily I knew the whistle was familiar....

And Evan Gilroy had come boldly round the stable door. As recognition flashed between us, he had raised a warning finger to his lips. 'Take care, mistress,' he murmured softly. I would not have known him but for the eyes, and his voice. He was completely transfigured, with fashionable whiskers and a periwig that cascaded to his deliberately stooped shoulders. 'I've come to collect Navarre,' he told me, in a voice both plain and firm. His eyes moved past me to the horse, and I watched his expression change. 'Oh, Christ,' he said, softly, 'what have they done to you?'

I understood his meaning. Navarre had been so nearly an extension of his handsome owner, that it seemed a brutal desecration of Richard himself, that his animal should be so used after his death.

Evan moved past me to stroke the stallion's neck. At the touch, Navarre's ears had twitched, turning to catch the familiar voice. The liquid eyes had shown a glimmer of something akin to hope, and a faint tremor of excitement rippled through the horse's muscles, beneath my calming hand. I almost sobbed aloud, to see the transformation.

And so it was done. Our parting had been a brief one, with little time for talk.

'What news of Rachel?' I had asked him. 'Is she with you?"

'She is not. I left her safely with my people, north of Bristol. We have been married these eight months.'

'Oh, Evan,' I could not keep the pleasure from my voice. 'I am glad.'

'Would you could share our happiness,' he said, gently. 'You know he loved you,'

'Yes.'

'He meant to marry you.'

'I know.'

He had smiled at me then, a small tight smile that pained him. 'Rachel and I are bound for the north,' he told me. 'For Scotland. We think to make a new start there, away from all the shades that haunt us here.'

I had forced a smile, and wished him well, though my heart had ached within me. And then he had left, upon the great gray stallion, and I thought I saw some remnant of the old pride in the horse's gait.

The theft was soon discovered, but the thief was never found. While Arthur de Mornay's men had searched the local road, Navarre was galloping free upon the highway to Bristol, bearing Evan Gilroy upon his back, and with him, my love to Rachel. I would not see them again.

The recollection made me smile sadly, and close by my shoulder I heard John give a heavy sigh. I turned to face him, and found him looking down at me with mingled wonder and frustration.

'You are a riddle, cousin, that I one day would unravel.' He bent and kissed my cheek. 'You will not work too hard, while I am in the village? You seem to tire easily, these days.'

'The curse of age.' My smile deepened. 'But for your sake, I will not overtire myself. I would but stand a little longer, and watch the fields awhile.'

John looked at me again, hesitating as if he would say something, or ask a question, but then the moment passed. Smiling, he turned and left me, and I swung my gaze back over the wide, rolling carpet of gold and green, blaming the dazzling sunlight for the sudden misting of my vision....

Sharply, intrusively, the loud and brutal ringing broke the silence. I blinked, and was no longer Mariana, but Julia again, with the shrill voice of the telephone calling me through the open kitchen door. It seemed to take a very great effort to move my feet from the spot on which they stood, as though I had somehow taken root there and could not be shifted. The phone went on ringing while I walked slowly back to answer it.

'You took your time,' my brother's voice teased, and I slumped against the wall, rubbing my forehead with tired fingers.

'Yes, well,' I answered. 'I was busy.'

'Gardening, again?' 'Something like that.'

'Are you all right?' His tone sharpened. 'Your voice sounds queer.' And then before I could reply, 'You've been back again, haven't you? What's happened now?'

'I'll tell you all about it, Tom, I promise. Only not now. I don't want to talk about anything, now. I just want to go to bed, and sleep.'

'Do you need company? I could shuffle my sermons a little, and come down. Or maybe Vivien—'

'No.' The flat refusal sounded rude, but I couldn't help it. 'I don't want anyone, Tom. Really I don't. I just want to be alone.'

'But Julia—'

'Oh, Tommy, please!' I lost my patience, briefly. 'Just leave it, can't you?'

He left it, and rang off with an apology. 'Ring me when you're feeling better, love,' he invited, and I felt like an ungrateful shrew as I replaced the receiver.

I wandered back into the kitchen and stood looking out the window at the place where I had been standing, there in the garden where a sad young woman had stood and watched and grown old, waiting for a lover who never came.

Or perhaps, I thought, he had returned to her after all, as he had come to me in the beginning—a tall, silent figure on a gray horse, slipping in and out of the shadows beneath the sheltering oak, tantalizingly near yet ever out of reach.