Love Alters Not by Patricia Veryan

Captain Anthony Farrar, why so much the better!
    Having restored the parchment to her bodice, she glanced out of the window again. The drivepath was turning in a gradual easterly swing, and above some distant woods she could see chimneys and a high-peaked tower with a large weather vane atop it. Charmed, she turned to the left-hand window. Some distance ahead of them a rider was cantering down the steep slope of a hill. The horse he bestrode was a magnificent grey, but not too well broken to judge by its caperings. The rider swayed with lithe grace to the movements of his fiery steed, glancing back from time to time to where a golden spaniel followed, all ears and feet.
    At the foot of the hill, the horse shied and launched into a gallop. The rider pulled him in sharply. The grey reared, forelegs flailing, then bucked furiously and for some seconds did all he might to unseat the man. The spaniel trotted up and sat down, watching pantingly. The grey made a bared-teeth grab for his owner’s knee, and the heavy riding crop was brought down hard. The horse shook his head and stood quiet, but stamped at the ground as if to express some vestige of defiance.
    From the box, Dimity heard Carlton scream, “Jolly good, sir!”
    The rider looked their way and started the big horse to intercept them, and this time he obliged his mount, coming at the gallop. The carriage slowed and stopped. Dimity, quaking with nervousness, heard a deep voice raised in question, and the mumble of the coachman’s reply. The rider, who had been temporarily out of her range of vision, came up to the open window and looked in.
    He could not be Anthony Farrar, as she had first feared. Her brothers had unfailingly referred to him as a “miserable little worm,” and this man was tall and well-built, with the lazy graceful carriage of the athlete. She eyed him uncertainly as he bent to look in at her.
    She guessed him to be in his late twenties. He wore no hat, and his thick hair was powdered and tied back. The sun-bronzed, fine-boned face was enhanced by a pair of vivid green eyes wide set under heavy, brown eyebrows. The nose and chin warned of inflexibility; the mouth was generous and well shaped, but with a haughty droop. He said with a sneer, “Mr. Deene allowed you to face it out alone, I take it.”
    Irritated by both look and manner, she said, “Then you should not, sir.” The green eyes widened and the sardonic mouth relaxed slightly, and she went on, “I am a widow.”
    â€œRegrettable,” he said, the ice returning full measure. “I’d prefer to have dealt with a male rascal.”
    He made no attempt to keep his voice low, and Dimity heard Carlton’s wrathful squeak and the muffled rumble of a man’s laugh. “Since I mean to deal only with Captain Farrar,” she retorted disdainfully, “ your preferences are not pertinent.”
    He drawled, “I have been remiss. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Anthony Farrar.”
    Dimity gave a gasp. “Miserable,” certainly. But—“a little worm”? Piers and Perry must have been wits to let! Feeling decidedly hardly done by, she exclaimed an indignant, “Oh!”
    Carlton’s voice called, “Sir—are you my Uncle Anth’ny?”
    Farrar had been about to speak, but at this he closed his mouth with a snap and glanced up at the box. “Most decidedly— not !” he declared unequivocally. And bending to the window again, added, “Take my advice, ma’am, and go home. There are no pullets for plucking here!”
    â€œHow fortunate,” Dimity retaliated. “I had scarce expected an eagle, but to have to fleece a pullet would be extreme degrading.”
    He looked briefly surprised, then amused. Resting one hand against the side of the coach, he leaned nearer. “You’re a pretty doxy, but—”
    The grey, who had been behaving quite well, suddenly screamed and,