Excerpt from AN IMPROPER LOVER

When the tea arrived, Harriett left her parents to their
attempts at a civil conversation and wandered out into the
grounds. She had played here as a child when Aunt Elizabeth
was alive. It had been a very lively place then. She wandered
along a path through the trees dressed in their summer green,
recalling how she'd made up stories and narrated them to an
audience of birds. A stately old oak tree she used to climb as a
child caught her attention. She paused, remembering that
Pendleton lay on a rise...