‘Not the first he’s ruined, neither,’ her maid, Lydia, had told her, giving her a look. Even the thought of him filled her with shaking fury. They were engaged and he had betrayed her with a chambermaid. Then she would expose him for the lecherous, double-dealing, false-hearted, despicable, craven little villain that she now knew him to be. There, she took up station at the crossroads, positioning herself in a grove of young birch, ready for the London coach, certain that he would be on it. Once she was away from the house, she spurred her horse to a gallop, crouched close to his neck as she took the old green road through the forest and up on to the common. The grooms had not risen when she stole from the stables, and thin layers of mist wound themselves round her horse’s legs like skeins of discarded muslin as she crossed the bridge over the lake. Sovay rode out early while the dew was still wet on the grass.
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