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She seemed more vulnerable, and he sensed something he had never felt in
her before, though he wouldn't have known how to express it. She seemed
tamer, and somehow smaller. Not physically, of course, but in some odd,
intangible, spiritual way. She seemed just the merest trifle less
daunting.

She lay awake for a long time that night, wearing Victoria's nightgown,
and lying in her bed, huddled as far away from him as she could.

It was the first time Olivia had ever slept with a man, and if it hadn't
been so terrifying she would have thought it was funny. She was afraid
that at any moment he would discover that they had switched places on
him, and he would throw her out of his house in I her sister's
nightgown. But he did nothing of the sort. Instead, he lay looking at
her in the darkness, wondering if he should reach out to her, but not
daring to. She had her back to him, and he suspected she was crying.

And finally, he settled for a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Are you awake? " he whispered. She nodded but didn't answer.

"Are you all right? " he whispered again, and she smiled, but he
couldn't see it.

"More or less, " she said softly. "I keep thinking about her." That was
true. It was all she had thought about since that morning.

"She'll be all right. She's very capable, " he said sensibly.

"And she'll come back when she's ready. She's not going to disappear
forever." He didn't realize that the woman he was talking about was his
wife, which was just as well, Olivia thought sadly.

"What if she gets hurt? " Olivia shared her fears with him, and he dared
to move a trifle closer.

"She won't. The Indians are all pretty tame out there now. In fact, I
think most of them are in circuses and sideshows. And they haven't had
an earthquake in nine years. I'd say she'll make it through the summer."
He smiled at her back, but didn't touch her.

"What if they have another earthquake? Or a fire? Or a war ..

." It was all she could think of "In California? I don't think we're
likely to go to war with California." He pulled her over to face him
then, and as he had thought, she was crying. She looked like a lovely
child in the moonlight.

Why don't you go to sleep and stop worrying. Perhaps your father will
send investigators after her, and they'll bring her home in a few days.

" But she couldn't tell him they wouldn't find her. Victoria was going
to be far, far from California. And Olivia wished she had never let her
go there. She was thinking of sending a telegram to the ship telling her
that she had changed her mind, and she had to come home now.

Olivia knew she could still send the telegram before they reached
Liverpool.

Thinking about it reminded her of the German U-boats she had heard were
outside the British harbors. She wondered what she had been thinking of
when she agreed to let her sail to Europe. Just thinking about it made
her cry harder, and without considering the danger of it, she let
Charles pull her into his arms and hold her. She could smell the soap on
his neck, and the aftershave he wore. He had obviously shaved before
he'd come to bed, which Olivia thought was a surprising nicety and
something she'd never thought of, and she was amazed at the strength and
warmth of him as he held her, and then finally she pulled away and
looked up at him in embarrassment. He was, after all, only her
brother-in-law, and not her husband, although he didn't know it.

"I'm so sorry, " she said awkwardly.

"It's all right." He looked surprised too, and he didn't tell her he had
liked it. She went back to her side of the bed again, and a little while
later, they both fell asleep until morning.

They got up and dressed separately, and Olivia was relieved to find that
he was extremely polite and their arrangement very civilized.

He was not overly personal with her, and she didn't see him again until
he was fully dressed at breakfast. Victoria was right, in some ways this
was easy. Geoffrey was still in a gloom understandably, and he didn't
even want to go to Croton, but he had to. The maid and the cook were
both off, and there was nowhere else they could leave him. But he said
he didn't want to go to Croton without Ollie, not even to see Grampa.

It was a long, solemn drive, while Olivia thought about what to say to
her father. She had rehearsed it a thousand times, but she still wasn't
prepared for the look of grief he wore when she told him. If she had
shot him he might have looked less pained and less stricken.

And she was grateful that Charles was standing beside her. Together,
they helped him into a chair, and Charles poured him a brandy. And as
her father sipped it, he looked at them both in despair, and then
directly at his daughter.

"Did I do this to her? I asked her just the other day, " he mused, "I
asked her if I had made her terribly unhappy. This isn't a life for a
young girl, but she always said that this was all she wanted. And I let
her do it because it's so easy for me .. . I would have missed her
awfully if she'd left me .. . and now she's gone .. ." He was actually
crying, and Olivia wanted to tear her heart out. And then he truly
stunned her when he looked straight at Charles. "I think she might have
fallen in love with you, if we'd let her. But we didn't of course." He
looked away and they all knew what had happened, as the real Olivia
stood there gasping.

"Father, I'm sure that's not true. She never said anything ..

." She was morfffieds and sure she was blushing but no one seemed to
notice.

"She didn't have to, " he interrupted her, wiping his eyes and taking
another sip of brandy. "It was easy to see. I'm a man. I know.

But it was more important to save you at the time, so I chose to ignore
it." Charles' lips were set in a thin line and he made no comment, and
Olivia didn't have the courage to look at him again for several moments.

"I'm certain you're wrong. She would have told me, " Olivia said, trying
to save the last of her dignity in absentia.

"Did she tell you about this? " he boomed at her and she shook her head
miserably. She truly was unhappy. "Then don't think you know it all,
Victoria Dawson." She was aghast at the idea that Charles would think
she had run away because she loved him. That was awful, and she knew
she'd have to dispel that as soon as possible, for her own sake.

But Charles seemed to share her opinion.

"I think it's impossible to know why people do things like this, sir.

The mind is a secret place, and the heart even more so. And twins share
an unusual bond, we both know that. We've all heard stories of how close
they are, how much they know about each other, how they sense things
other people can't even imagine. Maybe it was just too much for her that
Victoria has her own life now. Maybe she's trying to find herself and
become her own person.

"In a convent? " He looked appalled. It was not the fate he wanted for
his daughter. "I threatened you with that, " he said unhappily to the
twin he thought was Victoria, but wasn't, "but I didn't really mean it."

"I thought you did, " she said honestly. They both had.

"I couldn't have done that to you." But instead, he had forced Victoria
into marriage, and that was why she had run away now. That was the truth
of it. But Olivia couldn't tell him.

As Charles had said, Edward vowed to put investigators on it, and he
asked Charles to see about it himself in the city on Monday morning.

They gathered up all their letters from her, for Charles to give them,
and Olivia promised to rack her brain over the names of the girls they'd
gone to school with ten years before to see if anyone lived in
California, but of course there wouldn't be any.

And when they left the library late that afternoon, Bertie was waiting
with Geoffrey in the kitchen, and they were both crying. Bertie had
gotten her letter too, and she was so distraught that she never looked
carefully at the twin standing before her. And after a quick kiss on the
cheek, Olivia hurried outside to wait for them. She didn't want to be
around her longer than she had to. She never even went to her own room,
she was afraid that if she did, she might give something away to one of
them, and there was too much at stake now.

Edward Henderson offered to have them spend the night, but Charles said
that they had to get back, or he did at any rate. He had to be in court
the next morning. And he wanted to contact the investigators for them as
soon as he could on Monday. But he told Victoria she could stay there
with Geoff, but she didn't want to. Without her twin, being at Henderson
Manor would depress her. And she was frankly afraid that Bertie would
discern who she was, once she calmed down again, and Olivia needed more
time to perfect her deception. So far neither of the Dawsons had
suspected anything of what had happened.

Her father cried again when she kissed him good-bye, and she felt
terrible. Bertie was standing next to him, and he waved as they drove
away. Geoff hadn't even wanted to ride his horse. He had just gone to
look at him in the stable.

"I wonder if she had any idea everyone would be so dsstraught over her,
" Charles said as they drove away, feeling sorry for her father. But he
had taken the news better than Charles expected. Charles made no comment
at all on the fact that Edward thought she was in love with him.

He put it aside as an old man's delusion.

"I don't think she could have imagined how sad we'd all be, or she
wouldn't have done it, " Olivia said supposedly about herself, but
thinking about her sister. She was missing her terribly, and felt the
pain with each day they drifted further apart. The idea of sending a
telegram and asking her to come straight home again was sounding better
and better to her.

It was after nine o'clock that night when they got home again, and none
of them had eaten dinner. Olivia told Geoff to put his pajamas on, and
come back to the kitchen for soup. She put an apron on then, and went to
see what they had in the larder, and ten minutes later she had chicken
stock on the stove, with vegetables, and there were thick slabs of
buttered toast, and a fresh salad.

"How did you do all that so fast? " Charles looked surprised.

"You've been keeping secrets from me." He smiled cautiously, never sure
of her humor or her temper.

"More secrets than you know, " Olivia said with a smile, but Charles
didn't look pleased by her remark, and he sat down to dinner in silence.

Geoff came back downstairs then, and he livened up a little bit, as he
ate the soup, and the toast, and had a second helping of the salad.

"This is good, Victoria, " he said, sounding surprised, and then he
glanced at her with a shy smile. But Olivia wouldn't let herself be too
warm to him tonight, for fear that he would discover who she was.

Instead she turned away from him, and then handed him a plate full of
chocolate cookies.

"Did you make these? " He looked even more surprised, but this time she
laughed and shook her head.

"No, the cook did, " she said honestly.

"I like Olhe's better, " Geoff said, munching one, and playing with his
puppy.

Olivia cleaned up the kitchen while Charles took Geoff up to bed, and
she joined them upstairs half an hour later. Geoff was already in bed by
then, and as she stood in the doorway looking at him, she couldn't help
thinking how lucky her sister was, and she didn't even know it.

She was on a ship somewhere on the way to God knew where, when she could
have been at home, in this cozy house, with her husband and stepson.

"Can I tuck you in? " she asked Geoff casually and he shrugged.