We fairly caved into each other after that, and for some moments we only breathed. I was well aware that this was a strange state — for some years I’d grown used to men who wanted me out right away. In fact, I myself usually wished to make a quick exit.

With Luke, all of that was different. His skin on mine was so potent, so sweet, that I felt we might well never leave the bed.

It was only after one of my arms, which had been slipped between us in a rather painful position, began to lose feeling that we moved apart. And even then, we did not move far.

I touched his face, hoping that he would hold me again, but he only kissed my hand and began to speak.

“My sister wishes to see you,” he said. “Of course, I told her about seeing you at the opera. She had despaired of ever seeing you again, much as I had, and Alice, she wished to be remembered to you right away. Indeed, I quite forgot, though I think the omission is forgivable enough,” he said, running a hand over my body. “You will drive me to distraction.”

In that moment, I froze, wondering whether I could believe him. Of course he had wished to say something of his sister, but was that only because he wished to remind me of my place — my place as a former governess?

Misinterpreting my silence, he began to speak of our wedding long ago. “That night after we married was the best of my life,” he said, and I looked on him with sadness.

“It was the best of mine, at least then,” I told him, though that was not strictly the truth. It was the best night I had ever passed, or likely would ever pass.

“I thought that we should never be able to get out of bed,” he said, and the open sweetness of his face made me want to hit him.

Recalling those days made me bitter in an instant. It was as if our whole encounter had been a piece of sweetened fruit, and the memory of our wedding night had been a handful of salt that Mr. Barlow had thrown onto it, ruining all of the sweetness.

“Well,” I told him, “I am more than able to get out of a bed now.”

And I was. I was also able to dress easily, even when a man was staring at me.

“Please,” he told me. “Will you not hear me out, dearest Alice?”

When he said my name, I felt the same shudder of delight that I had felt the night before. But it was soon mixed with anger. The day that I left, he had hardly been able to bring himself to use my name, much less call me “Mrs. Barlow.” And by sending me away, he had lost all the interim years that could have been spent with me. And with our child. The talk of Lillian was nonsense, for he could have included me in his family many years ago, if that had been his true wish.

“You are an engaged man,” I told him. “I prefer to seek out only married men and widowers. I shan’t protest your annulment, and you are more than free to marry Miss Gadson as soon as you wish.”

Before he could say anything else, I had walked out of the hotel and down to the center of the city as fast as my legs would carry me.