HAD WE NEVER LOVED

Specialist in 18th-century English novels of romantic suspense —all ``i' the vein'' and crackling with marvelous period slang- -Veryan offers a second round of a new series concerning the dirty work of ``the infamous League of Jewelled Men,'' a secret society dedicated to restoring the Stuart line to the throne. Again, their target is a titled landowner—here, the sire of one of a quartet of friends met in Time's Fool (1991)—and, as always, there's romance, this time between a lordling and a lovely (most unsuitable) lass. Viscount Horatio Glendenning—chum of Gideon, hero of Time's Fool (now on his honeymoon)—suffers as much from love as from a dastardly plot. For Horatio's love is a gypsy girl, Amy Consett. To be sure, Amy was stolen at birth (and she might be of blue blood), but now she's also adept at pinching purses, flipping a knife, and ripping off a street jargon of a Cheapside persuasion. Plus she's beautiful. Horatio is nursed by Amy after being robbed and knocked about, lives in the forest, then finally returns home to find his father the earl—as well as the rest of his family—threatened with the Tower, and himself with execution as a traitor. Salvation hinges on the recovery of a jewelled pin. Two of Horatio's friends, Lieutenant James Morris and the acerbic August Falcon (inevitably, two of the next League targets), help, but it'll be Amy and her artist ``uncle'' who save the day—and Amy is due, of course, for a Pygmalion transformation. Adorable Amy is tiresome—the aristocratic lasses offer more pep and wit—but, still, this is a busy, jolly series.