No; such a ruse would only work in the first blush of life, if the child had uninvolved, aristocratic parents who could afford to pay a nurse to do most of the child-rearing. Once they had grown enough to develop distinctive individual features, exchanging the infants would no longer be an option. Etraya would have had to simply live with her sin.
He knew enough of her character to guess that it would have plagued her sorely ever since then.
‘Etraya,’ he said firmly. ‘Did you tell them what you had done?’
‘I told Lena,’ she said, and repeated the words twice more, her voice shaking.
‘Not Navvy?’
‘No! I couldn’t… couldn’t face it.’
‘When did you tell Lena?’
‘A year ago. I couldn’t keep it from her, she was so angry. I thought she had to know. I thought if I confessed, I might be forg
