Polly was about to say that she would be more than willing so long as the words were not too difficult when she caught Nick's eye, reminding her that she must give no indication of her true background. "I am at your service, sir," she said instead, the carefully formal response concealing both the quickening of excitement at the prospect of entering a playhouse at long last, and an apprehensive sinking at the knowledge that the moment had come to put to the test all that she believed she possessed. What if she was wrong, if she had no aptitude, if Master Killigrew rejected her? It was a prospect that afforded a most dreadful void of hopelessness- the void that she had fought so long and so hard to escape. "I will fetch my cloak." She went into the other chamber.

Nicholas picked up his own cloak from the chair in the parlor, slinging it around his shoulders. "You do not object if I accompany you, Thomas?"

"If you think she will not be distracted by your presence," spoke the manager of the king's company, no longer concerned with formal courtesies that were irrelevant to the making of a business decision.

"On the contrary, she will be less apprehensive," responded Kincaid, with a dry smile that encompassed his understanding both of Polly's feelings and of Killigrew's position. "The situation will be quite strange for her, and I would not have her ill at ease if I can prevent it."

Killigrew looked a little surprised. Such gentle concern was unusual in a court where the softer emotions were derided as lack of sophistication, as lack of understanding of the realities of a world where no man could be truly called friend, and only fools put their trust in another's word. The women were as hard-bitten as their menfolk, as quick to take advantage of another's disadvantage, as eager to bring about another's downfall if it would mean their own advancement,

and as unscrupulous as to the methods they used in such work. If Lord Kincaid was going to cast a protective umbrella over his protegee, it would give rise to much comment, and not a little contemptuous amusement.

Nick had little difficulty in guessing the other man's thought processes. He shared them, indeed, and his rational self found his present obsession with the well-being of a seventeen-year-old miss a matter for considerable incredulity. But since he seemed to have little control over his feelings at the moment, he was obliged to accept love's shaft and follow where it led him.

It led him now into the bedchamber, where Polly had been closeted in search of her cloak for an inordinate length of time. He found her sitting on the bed looking like a paralyzed rabbit, hands clasped tightly in her damask lap, eyes gazing sightlessly into the middle distance.

"Perhaps I cannot do it," she said without preamble as he came in, closing the door. "Perhaps I have been mistaken all these years, and I cannot act at all. What will I do then, Nicholas?"

Nicholas reviewed his options rapidly. He could imagine the pit of desolation into which she was staring as the moment of trial loomed. For so long she had seen only one way out of the vicious and complete impoverishment of the destiny she had been dealt. If this way failed, she could at this moment see only a return to that destiny. He could offer her reassurance that he would not permit that, whatever happened in the playhouse; he could be hurt and accusatory at her failure to trust him; or he could put the steel back into her spine by stinging her into a resurgence of her old confidence.

"Are you telling me you mean to cry off?" he demanded, no sympathy in his voice. "For weeks you have made my life wretched with your constant importuning that I arrange a meeting for you with Master Killigrew. You have lost no opportunity to. demonstrate this talent you insist that you have. Am I now to believe that the whole was a sham?"

Polly had stood up in the middle of this speech. The color

ebbed in her cheeks, but her eyes had focused again, her lips were set. She picked up her cloak. "You will see that it was not a sham!" With that, she brushed past him and marched into the parlor. "I am ready to accompany you, Master Killigrew." Without waiting for either of them, she continued her march out of the parlor and down the stairs.

"Mistress Wyat appears to be of a somewhat tempestuous temperament," observed Killigrew, drawing on his gloves.

"Only when provoked," Nicholas responded with a smile. "In general, she is of a most sunny disposition."

They were obliged to follow her impetuous progress along Drury Lane, since she showed no inclination to slow for either of them, and to catch her up would require a hastening of their own speed that was hardly consonant with the dignified lassitude of the courtier.

Polly waited for them when she reached the steps of the playhouse. The march in the cold air had served to clear her head, enabling her to view Nick's intervention in a new light. "That was done deliberately, was it not?" she asked when he reached her. There was a slight smile in her eyes, and when he nodded she laughed. "I beg leave to tell you, my lord, that your tactics are most underhand."

"But most effective," he countered, grinning.

"Aye." She sobered, saying, "I am most grateful… for that, and all else."

"I am amply recompensed," he said softly. That same intensity caught them again, held them in breathless acknowledgement of its force.

Master Killigrew, who had gone up the steps to unlock the great door, turned to see what was delaying them. He saw the naked emotion flickering between them, an almost palpable current. He drew in his breath sharply, then the force receded, freeing the lovers from its grip. Nick gestured courteously to the steps, and Polly came up ahead of him.

The door swung open, and Polly found herself in the king's playhouse. They had entered from Drury Lane by what she would soon call the stage entrance, and stood now in a dark passageway. "The tiring rooms are there." Kil-

ligrew pointed to the left as he pushed through a door ahead. Polly, following him, stood for the first of what would be countless times upon the stage of the Theatre Royal.

She stood and stared. A glazed cupola covered the pit that stretched below in front of the stage; there were boxes, ranged in galleries, to the side and the back of the theatre. She tried to imagine those seats filled. Why, there must be seating for at least four hundred souls. How lonely and exposed one would feel on this tiny, bare wooden platform. She shivered as cold despair threatened again.

Killigrew had gone to one side of the stage, where he picked up a sheaf of papers and began rifling through them. "This scene, I think."

"What play have you in mind?" Nick, with considerable interest, came to peer over Tom's shoulder. "Oh, Flora's Vagaries." He chuckled. "I could not have chosen better myself."

"Why do you not read Alberto?" Killigrew offered the suggestion casually, as if he had not drawn the conclusions that he had about Lord Kincaid and Mistress Polly Wyat. "You will perhaps find it less uncomfortable, Mistress Wyat, if Kincaid plays opposite you."

"I am no actor," Nick demurred.

"You have no need to be. Just read the lines. We will leave the acting to the lady." Killigrew, smiling, crossed the stage to where Polly still stood, taking in her surroundings, seemingly unaware of this exchange. "I will tell you a little about Flora," he said, and she shook herself free of her reverie. "She is a most sprightly young lady, not one to be dominated by circumstances or individuals, and most particularly not by men." He watched her as he drew the word picture of one of the stage's most engaging and daring heroines. "She is the ward of a foolish boor, a lout, who would keep both her and his daughter incarcerated to prevent their falling under the eye of love or lust."