Miss Tolerance was dismayed. At some point after her father had declared her dead, she had ceased to consider what effect her obstinate hold on corporeal health might have had—or the irritation the villagers’ substantial affection for her might have caused him. As she had never seriously considered returning to Briarton, it had never occurred to her that her father—and her brother—would have dragged their stubborn vengefulness out for a full dozen years. She could well appreciate the landlord’s precarious situation: whatever his pleasure in welcoming her back, she could not force the man to endanger his livelihood. Still, mindful of the hour and of the fact that Versellion was waiting in the yard with their horses, she pressed on. “One night, Thomas? Surely my brother will not know—”
“He’ll know, Miss Sarah. If I let you stay, my wife will have to know of it, and she’ll want to see how you are after all these years. Once that’s done, she’ll tell Mary Lewes and Mrs. Cropsey at the house, and Nurse Bolton and old Peter, just to set their hearts at ease, you know. Before you can pour water, it’d be all over, and I out of the house.”
Laid out so baldly, Miss Tolerance could not but admit the truth of the matter. “But Thomas, we’re sorely tired. Is there a house, a barn, even, where I might safely look for shelter for the night? I can pay.”
Apparently relieved that his visitor was amenable to common sense, the landlord considered. At last, and reluctantly, he told her he could think of nothing, for every location nearby which might have afforded suitable shelter was either owned by Sir Adam Brereton or held by someone to whom his disfavor would be cataclysmic. “I’d try the Birmingham road, Miss Sarah. Sorry I am to send you back that way.”
Miss Tolerance clasped the landlord’s hand. “Thank you, Thomas. I’m sorry to have put you in any difficulty. And sometime, when you think it safe, will you give my love to Nurse, and Peter and Mrs. Cropsey and the rest? And Mrs. Thomas, of course? Tell them I am well and … they need have no fear for me.”
“I will at that, miss. But now—”
She nodded. “I know. Go!”
She joined Versellion in the shadow of the stable, mounted quickly, and turned her horse. Once they were out of the yard, she whispered, “We must go on.”
“No room?” Versellion asked.
“The intervention of melodrama: Briarton would have been a perfect hiding place except that my brother has enjoined his tenants from giving me shelter.”
She could not see the earl’s expression, but his voice was very dry. “Your brother is an aficionado of melodrama?”
“I had never credited him with so much imagination. One learns.”
“Then let us go back to the Birmingham road and put up at an inn there.” It was not the first time that evening that Versellion had suggested such a thing. Miss Tolerance renewed her objections.
“I cannot advise it, Versellion. The chance that you might be found—”
“Do you seriously propose that whoever sent those brawlers after me could trace us here?”
“It is unlikely they would look in a town this size and off the main roads. That is why I proposed we come here. But on a well-traveled posting road—”
“If I use a name other than my own? Miss Tolerance, I believe it’s worth the risk to have some supper and sleep in a real bed.”
Miss Tolerance kept her voice low. The clear, soft night air was peculiarly carrying, and she had no wish to wake the occupants of the cottages they passed.
“My lord, you are a well-known political figure. Despite the country air, some of these people do read the London papers, some might have heard you speak on some occasion. There is a chance your face might be known. You are riding a remarkably handsome horse from your well-known stable, and ostlers who take no notice of a face will recognize a horse like that. It would be the work of a few moments for someone seeking us to describe both the horse and the rider, and you would be under attack again.”
“It seems to me that with sufficient money, a landlord’s discretion could be bought,” Versellion said.
“And with sufficient money, a searcher could buy it back again,” Miss Tolerance parried. But her resolve was weakening. It was late, and fatigue born of grief, too little sleep, and several sorts of exertion was telling upon her. The notion of a bed and a bite to eat was very attractive.
“If we don’t go to a posting inn, but one of the smaller hostelries—Miss Tolerance, you look to be weaving in your saddle. I must insist. You will scarcely be able to help me if you are exhausted.” Without looking to see if she followed, Versellion turned his horse east, toward the post road. After a moment, Miss Tolerance followed suit.
She hoped he was right. It was she who had insisted upon removing the earl from the vicinity of London. The entire night, when they slowed to a pace which allowed conversation, Versellion had argued against the flight. He disliked to leave Town in the midst of a negotiation with the Prince; surely he could be adequately guarded in his own home; was not Miss Tolerance refining too much upon an incident which might well turn out to be casual robbery?
“‘There’s no money if he lives,’” Miss Tolerance had quoted. “Your absence, even in the midst of negotiations with Wales, will doubtless serve your party and the nation better than your death.” She had no objection in principle to his returning to London, but did not believe it could be safely accomplished that night. “In the morning, when we can hire a chaise and outriders, you might return safely. But for the moment, I beg you will believe that your life is in jeopardy.”
She could not be sure that Versellion was not humoring her, as a healthy man with a sniffle might humor the cosseting of his doctor. Still, he rode along beside her, at an hour and under conditions which surely must have him questioning his sanity.
In a little less than an hour they had crossed the Birmingham road and were riding west, in search of an inn at which the Earl of Versellion would be unknown, and in which the sheets were likely to be aired and free of vermin. At last Versellion turned into the yard of a moderate hostelry and dismounted. After a moment, as a groggy ostler was taking the reins of his horse, Miss Tolerance dismounted as well. She insisted that the earl stay outside while she bespoke rooms; she wanted to check the safety of the inn, and she did not believe Versellion truly understood that the peril he faced might be immune to the remedies of money and position.
The landlady took Miss Tolerance as she presented herself—as a young man—and was ready enough to provide a room. But only one. The inn was near full, and not even the promise of a substantial tip could change that fact. Lucky, indeed, that the gentlemen did not have to bed with strangers, the woman said irritably. If the young gentleman and his uncle could not manage to share, they had as well take their custom elsewhere and let a respectable woman go back to her bed. Unwilling to make herself and her client more conspicuous by departing, Miss Tolerance took the room. She fetched in her “uncle,” who had been cooling his heels in the inn yard, and they were escorted to a small chamber which faced the rear of the building.
“I have given our name as Watson,” Miss Tolerance murmured under cover of the landlady’s mutterings about gentry who arrived in the deep of night. “I am your nephew Samuel.”
Versellion nodded and together they went in and up to the room.
“Well, Sam, I think this will do,” Versellion said. He asked the landlady if her kindness would extend to a bite of supper, and while she offered nothing more than a plate of bread and cheese, her tone was less aggrieved, and she asked if the gentlemen required brandy-and-water or small beer to take with it.
Climbing the steps in the rear of the parade, Miss Tolerance was aware that the silence between herself and her client had changed from that of pleasant companionability to something more awkward. It occurred to her now that her situation could easily become intolerably difficult. She wondered if similar thoughts had occurred to the earl.
She and Versellion were bound by ties of commerce only, and yet the earl knew her history—or a
t least that part of her history which included her ruin. He might easily assume that she had had and continued to have a string of lovers stretching back a decade, and he might decide it was only reasonable to make himself part of that company. Without recourse to vanity, Miss Tolerance sensed that the earl found her attractive. If he chose to presume upon her history and make advances to her, the choices open to her were few and unpleasant. A Fallen Woman who defended herself against rape would find few sympathizers—particularly if her attacker was rich, titled, powerful, and handsome.
Of course—the landlady had taken a great ring of keys from her apron and was unlocking the door of a room at the far end of the hallway, facing the rear of the inn—of course, Versellion might not want anything more than a solitary bed for the night. If she spoke to forestall his advances, she risked giving her employer a disgust of her manners and a very poor idea of her intellect. Miss Tolerance found she was loath to do that. She balled her hands in the pockets of her coat and frowned.
When the door closed upon the landlady, who had gone to fetch the bread and cheese, the earl raised the candle she had left behind high and inspected the room. There was a bed, a chair and a stool, a cupboard, and a small table which held basin and ewer and a chamber pot below. A small window stood open to the moonlight and a light breeze.
The landlady returned with the trencher, said good night, and bustled away. In silence the earl cut some bread and cheese while Miss Tolerance shot the bolt on the door. When he handed her the trencher, she took some cheese, but between exhaustion and tension, she had very little stomach for it. They ate in silence, looking neither at each other nor the room, but at the fine view of moonlit fields and the back of the stables.
“I will sleep in the chair,” the earl said at last.
Miss Tolerance had been about to make a similar offer. “’Tis kind of you to offer, my lord, but I can take the chair. Were I a male retainer, you would have taken the bed as a matter of course. You need not scruple—”
“What an autocrat you think me!” To Miss Tolerance’s relief, he did not seem offended. “I would at least have offered to toss a coin for the bed, or shared it, as our landlady intended. That is clearly not suitable. Now, if you will not let me treat you with the courtesy to which your gender and station entitle you, permit me to observe that you saved my life this evening. It makes sense that I would wish my protector to be well rested in case I have further need of her aid.” Versellion paused. “You will meet with no ill treatment at my hands.”
Miss Tolerance heard this frank acknowledgment of her predicament with powerful relief. She looked out the window, tears starting in her eyes, and fought to control her voice. After a moment she said briskly, “My station does not generally entitle me to such courtesies, but there is sense in what you say, and great kindness, for which I thank you. May I suggest, however, that I am more accustomed to sleeping in hardship than you?”
“Miss Tolerance, one night of privation will not unman me, I promise you.” He smiled at her. “We are both tired. Please. If you will not honor a civil request, I shall have to order you as your employer.”
“My client, sir.” Miss Tolerance smiled. “Well, if you mean to do this, I think you will be more comfortable on the floor. Sufficient padding”—she opened the cupboard, which proved to be stocked with several blankets—“should make you an agreeable couch.”
Working together, they made up a rough bed upon the floor. As soon as the work was done, however, the awkwardness descended upon them again. Finally Miss Tolerance sat on the bed and removed her boots and coat. Clad in shirt, waistcoat, and breeches, she stretched out upon the bed and made a show of closing her eyes.
“Good night, sir,” she murmured.
He returned the salutation. She heard rustling as he settled into his bed. He blew out the candle and the room was instantly shadowed.
Miss Tolerance was on the verge of sleep when she heard Versellion mutter, “Damn!”
“Are you uncomfortable, sir? I will be happy to change with you,” she told him.
“Stay where you are, Miss Tolerance. I’m only damning my own stupidity. I had meant to examine the fan, but I’ve blown out the candle and have no fire to light it again.”
“In the morning, sir,” Miss Tolerance suggested. She turned on one side and closed her eyes. As sleep took her, she was wondering how they would manage the use of the chamber pot come morning.
Miss Tolerance slept poorly. Exhausted though she was, the unaccustomed noises of another person in the room troubled her sleep, and her anxiety that they might be pursued made it impossible for her to fully relax. Sounds of an arrival in the inn yard, an hour or so after dawn, brought her fully awake. Her hair had come unpinned as she slept; she wound the braid up again and pinned it in place, pulled on her boots, and crept from the room to stand in the shadow of the door at the top of the stairs. One look was sufficient to assure her that the man speaking in indistinct tones to the landlady was Jerry, the attacker who had fled the scene of their fight the night before.
She returned to the room, shot the bolt on the door, and knelt to shake the earl awake. “Versellion!”
His hand came up to cover hers. His eyes opened.
“We’re discovered. We’d best run now, if we can. God knows what story your friend from last night has told our hostess.” She pulled her hand away and stood.
“My friend from—” Comprehension drove the sleep from Versellion’s eyes. “They found us here? My God! And my apologies, Miss Tolerance. I did not take your warning seriously enough.” He had his boots on and picked up his coat.
Miss Tolerance had her hand upon the door, hoping to discover a back stairway that would take them to the kitchen and thence to the back gardens. The sound of heavy footfall on the landing, and the landlady’s expostulations, decided her against it. She took up her coat, went to the window, and looked out hurriedly. There was a dormer just to the right below them, and the stable at a few yards’ distance from that. With luck they could drop to the dormer roof, slide down far enough to jump to the ground, and take their horses from the stable.
She turned around to find Versellion leaving coins on the table. “To settle the shot,” he explained. “Are we climbing down?” He did not seem dismayed by the idea.
“I think we—”
She was interrupted by a hard knocking on the door. Miss Tolerance took up her sword in its hanger, slung the whole over her shoulder, and motioned Versellion to the window. To his credit, he went through without a murmur, dropped lightly onto the dormer, and was on the ground before Miss Tolerance was out the window herself. She dropped to the earth just beside him and they ran for the stables. Above them, continued knocking persuaded her that their departure had not yet been discovered. At the door of the stable, Miss Tolerance crept around the sill, letting her eyes adjust to the dim light.
As she expected, another man was guarding their horses, a short, blocky fellow. She did not recognize him from the attack the night before; there was a chance he was merely a stableboy. She could not afford to assume so, however. She moved forward in the shadows until she was behind the man, and in one movement she had his arm doubled behind him and her pocketknife at his throat.
To her captive she murmured, “Be silent and I shan’t hurt you. Move, and …” She did not finish, letting the man’s imagination provide a suitable admonition. “Sir,” she called, as loudly as she dared. Versellion appeared at once. “That rope, if you please? Thank you. Now, our horses.”
As Miss Tolerance tied the man and gagged him with her own handkerchief, Versellion saddled the horses, brought them to the stable door, and mounted his own.
A crash, and the landlady’s scream of outrage, suggested that their tracker had at last broken into their lately vacated room. Leaving the guard on his knees amid the straw, Miss Tolerance swung up on her horse; at her nod, Versellion crashed through the stable door into the yard, and thence to the road. Miss Tolerance was directly behind him. The
re were several shouts of “Stop!” but Versellion set a racing pace. He led them down the road for a quarter mile and then, after a bend which blocked them from the view of any pursuer, took off over a field toward the cover of a wood ahead of them.
They rode hard for a good half hour. At last, Versellion slowed his mount to a walk.
“Do you think we’re followed?”
Miss Tolerance shook her head. “I think they will have tried, but—no. I do wish I’d had the presence of mind to loose the other horses in the stable. That would have made us certain of it.”
The earl grinned. “I seem destined to adventure in your company, Miss Tolerance.” More soberly he added, “This would not have been necessary had I trusted your instincts a little further.”
There was no need for Miss Tolerance to agree. “I think we might stop a few minutes now and rest the horses.”
They found a clearing and tethered their horses to crop the grass. Miss Tolerance sat under a tree and took off her hat to wipe her brow. Her braid, unpinned again, fell heavily across her shoulder. As she undid the braid and combed her fingers through her hair, she became aware that Versellion was watching her.
“The perils of hard riding,” she said briefly. Quickly she braided her hair and pinned it thoroughly.
Versellion smiled. “You should find more occasions to wear your hair down, Miss Tolerance. It suits you.”
Miss Tolerance flushed. Versellion did not appear to notice her discomfort, for he had taken the long-sought fan from his pocket and opened it in the sunlight. He turned it this way and that, opening and closing it, holding it flat before his eyes and sighting down its length as he might down the barrel of a hunting rifle. It was a pretty toy, Miss Tolerance reflected, but there was nothing about it to indicate why two people had lost their lives for its sake.
Miss Tolerance cleared her throat. “My lord?”
Point of Honour (Sarah Tolerance) Page 15
