I thought I had a real winner when I began One Touch Of Magic. The heroine is an intelligent woman, an antiquarian. Good! The hero is a former soldier, now a marquess with a social conscience. Good again! The book has a nice cast of secondary characters who actually play a part in the story and don’t just stand around decoratively. Triple good! Alas, with all this going for it, One Touch Of Magic never achieved its potential.

Sarah Iverson is a devoted antiquarian who was introduced to archaeology and antiqutities during her marriage to her older husband, Sir John Iverson. Sarah became as devoted to digging up the past as Sir John, and the two of them spent happy hours excavating Viking sites. Their most recent excavation was a site on an estate owned by Sir John’s friend, the Marquess of Ransome. When the book begins, Sir John and the Marquess have died. Sarah mourns the loss of her husband and wonders whether the new Marquess will allow her to finish the work at the excavation.

The new Marquess of Ransome is Miles Rutledge, a former major in the army. Miles is a conscientious man who worries about the plight of former soldiers, now unemployed. When Miles meets Lieutenant Patrick O’Reilly, begging in London, he resolves to use his new title, estate, and influence to help the men who have served King and country.

The excavation of the Viking village on his estate is interesting, but the site just so happens to be his most fertile farm land. Miles could use the land to give farms to former soldiers who used to be farmers themselves, men like Patrick O’Reilly. But he finds himself fascinated with Sarah and her devotion to antiquities. Miles understands that what she is doing sheds light on England’s past and is of worth, but he has promised himself that he will help his fellow soldiers and he needs the land to do it.

A good potential conflict between Miles and Sarah is swept aside when the author introduces a mystery subplot. First somebody vandalizes the excavation site and destroys some of the antiquities, then a local farmer is found stabbed to death. The dead man had earlier been involved in an altercation with Miles for threatening Sarah’s sister, Mary Ann, who objected to his trying to drown some kittens. And then there’s Nigel Hamilton, Sir John’s friend and collaborator – who is unhappy over Sarah’s taking charge of the excavation – and Mrs. Hamilton, a silly, fluffy creature who wants to return to Bath so she can chase after people with titles.

The first three quarters of the book are not bad at all. The characters, especially Miles and Sarah, are pleasant and the kind of people I would like to know in real life. The pace is leisurely, they spend time getting to know each other, and we readers get to know them.

But when the mysteries kick in, the story veers off into melodrama and never recovers. The site is supposed to be cursed/protected by Thora, the Viking witch, and in a truly silly scene she helps the good guys capture the murderer. Then, evidently under Thora’s influence, Miles and Sarah find the treasure, pledge true love, and come up with a very improbable scheme to continue the excavation while giving jobs to soldiers. I found this silly, mostly because Sarah’s plan is not at all believable.

If only the ending had been as good as the beginning, this would have been a fine Regency. Amanda McCabe has a knack for giving us very nice characters, and she leaves with a hint of a romance developing between Sarah’s sister Mary Ann and Patrick O’Reilly. The characters are interesting enough that if she does write their story, I will check it out. But I hope that in their case she leaves out the melodrama.