by Mary Nichols
He put his hand under her elbow. ‘Lean on me, it will help you along.’
She complied because it made walking easier. It was only then as they faced about to go back the way they had come that she realised her chaperon had disappeared. ‘Where is Rose?’
‘Wherever she is, I’ll wager Joe Bland is not far away,’ he said.
‘Oh, but we cannot go back without them.’
‘Joe knows the time. They will join us directly.’
‘Are you not concerned?’
‘Why should I be?’
‘They are unchaperoned.’
He laughed. ‘My dear Miss Draper, so are we.’
‘Yes, but…’
‘It is their business, Miss Draper. I would not dream of interfering.’
‘A fine employer you are.’
‘No more than you.’
She remembered her circumstances just in time. ‘I am not Rose’s employer, my lord. We are friends, and it is as a friend I am concerned.’
‘Because if Joe Bland is anything like his master…’
‘I never said that.’
‘No, but you were thinking it.’
‘I was not! I would have fallen if you had not caught me.’
So, she knew what he meant. He smiled. ‘No need to worry. Here they are.’
Joe and Rose were strolling back in animated conversation. It did not look as though they talked to each other in riddles, as she and Viscount Malvers seemed to do all the time. Things half-said, things implied, touches disguised as accidents, all contributing to a feeling of frustration, fear and annoyance.
‘Come, we must be going back or we shall miss the coach,’ Alex said, as they drew near.
They climbed in and this time Alex let Joe drive and he sat with the ladies. It was not a very large conveyance and they were obliged to sit very close together. Emma could feel Alex’s breeches-clad thigh against her skirt, which was too thin to resist the pressure. If she was not careful, she would explode, she thought, and could only control her shaking by hanging on to the side and looking out at the countryside, which soon changed to the townscape of squalid houses and mills belching smoke and terrible smells she was in no hurry to define.
The carriage was being loaded as they arrived and in no time at all the short interlude was over and they were once more on the open road, travelling northwards. But the relationship between the four of them had subtly changed. They were no longer strangers and that would probably make his lordship more likely to quiz her. She must be very careful. He might very well be a friend of Sir George Tasker; he would certainly know him by name and her masquerade must be maintained.
Chapter Four
The journey from Manchester to Kendal would have been far more enjoyable, passing as it did through pleasant hilly country dotted with grazing sheep on hills alive with purple heather, if Emma had not been so busy worrying about her finances. When she had paid their dues at the inn and bought two inside tickets to Kendal she was left with less than eight guineas of the twenty her mother had given her, and she would have to give seven to Rose for her return journey. It brought home to her the precariousness of her position. Everything depended on Mrs Summers, a lady she did not remember ever having met. She could not arrive on her doorstep penniless and would have to find a jeweller in Kendal and pawn her pearls before she ventured a step further.
‘You are quiet, Miss Draper,’ Alex murmured. ‘Do you perhaps have something weighing on your mind?’
Startled out of her reverie, she looked across at him, wondering what lay behind the question. ‘Nothing of any significance, my lord. I was just wondering what my new employment might be like.’
‘Is it a situation you have not experienced before?’
She paused and decided it would do no harm for him to think she was a gentlewoman fallen on hard times. She would test him with half a secret. ‘No. And your comments about my unsuitability have set me thinking.’
‘Oh, dear, I wish I had never spoken. I did not mean to undermine your confidence. Of course, you will do the job admirably and your new mistress will soon not be able to part with you. But why do you have to do it at all?’
‘I have to earn my bread, my lord. Everyone does, surely? Even you must work to make your estate profitable in order to maintain your family and those who work for you. And your man must work and Rose must work. Where’s the difference?’
‘You are right of course. But for you…’ No, he would not suggest she was a lady who should never be required to be anything other than decorative. ‘Is there no other way? Surely there must be a young man in the background, one able to look after you?’
‘You mean someone to take pity on me and marry me? How condescending! Do you think I would agree to marry someone simply because he feels sorry for me? I have my pride, Lord Malvers.’
‘No doubt of that,’ he agreed wryly. ‘But what I meant was that you are beautiful enough to take your pick.’
‘I am flattered you think that, my lord, but a man who married simply because his bride was beautiful would probably live to regret it. You would surely not be so foolish?’
He laughed. ‘No, my dear, I would not be so foolish.’
‘There you are, then! For once we are in agreement.’
There seemed to be no answer to that and he realised she was not going to tell him the whole truth, though he was beginning to believe she was being forced into taking employment. But why so far from London? Was that her home, or had she been simply passing through when he saw her at the Swan with Two Necks? What was driving her? He mused on the pros and cons of that as the horses cantered on.
When they stopped for supper at Preston, he settled the ladies at a table in the dining room and then took Joe on one side, ostensibly to discuss with him what to order. ‘Have you learned anything from Miss Turner?’
‘Not a thing. She’s loyal, I’ll give her that. I do know she’s anxious to see Miss Draper safely at her destination so that she can return to her mother. Apparently Mrs Turner is expecting her eighth any day now, and Rose has to go home to take over the household while she is laid up.’
‘And yet she consents to come all this way with Miss Draper. Is she being well paid for her trouble?’
‘Don’t think so. From what I gather, Miss Draper don’t have a feather to fly with.’
‘I want you to do something for me, Joe. When we reach Kendal, I want you to see Miss Turner safely home. I fancy it will set Miss Draper’s mind at rest to know her friend has an escort. And while you are down south, go back to London and put your ear to the ground…’
‘What am I to be listening for?’
‘Rumours of runaways, absconding wives or missing heiresses, servants running off with the family silver…’
‘I don’t reckon they’ve done that. They ain’t got two groats to rub together atween the pair on ’em.’
‘No,’ he said, remembering that glimpse of petticoats. If a servant stole her mistress’s clothes, she would hardly don the underwear and continue to wear her own shabby gown over them. ‘But you know what I mean.’
‘And what will you be a-doin’, while I’m doin’ that, Major, if I may make so bold as to ask?’
‘Working on Miss Fanny Draper. If that is her name, which I doubt. Between us we’ll crack this mystery.’
Joe laughed and tapped his nose.
‘And don’t you be so insolent, man. Remember who pays your wages.’ If he meant to sound severe, he did not succeed and, laughing, Joe went back to the ladies, who were whispering together, as he and his master had been. Alex, following him, noticed it too and wondered what they were saying that needed such intense concentration.
‘Ladies,’ he said, affecting joviality. ‘Do you wish to rack up here for the night or go on? I only ask because it will be necessary to arrange for a room if you decide to stay.’
‘No, we go on,’ Emma said without hesitation. ‘The sooner we reach our destination, the better. Do you stay?’
He wondered whether that would please or disappoint her. ‘I am no less anxious than you to reach my destination.’
He stopped speaking as a waiter brought them food and set it on the table.
‘There is so much of it,’ Emma said, eyeing the dishes with a mixture of dismay and longing.
‘There are four of us, Miss Draper, and Joe always has a prodigious appetite and I must confess to being peckish. Surely you are not going to say you are not hungry? It is some time since we ate last and since then we have had a walk in the fresh air and a long journey.’ He paused and smiled at her, a gentle smile of understanding. ‘Go on, Miss Draper, eat something. It will only be wasted if you do not.’
All Emma could think was that her mother, sheltered as she always had been, could have had no idea of the cost of fares and food in coaching inns when she sent her off on this adventure. ‘To please you and stop you nagging, I will take a little,’ she said, helping herself to a small pork chop, a few slices of roast chicken and some vegetables from some of the dishes. He poured everyone a glass of wine and, lifting his glass, proposed a toast. ‘To life’s little journeys,’ he said. ‘And may they all end happily.’
‘Amen,’ she said, with feeling, as she raised her glass.
It was growing dusk as they returned to the coach and fully dark before they had been on the road more than half an hour. The food and the wine must have eased her mind as well as her hunger, for Emma found her whole body giving way to weariness and could not keep her eyes open. She put her head back and allowed herself to doze.
He sat and watched her in the gathering gloom relieved only by the light from the lantern attached to the outside of the coach. She looked vulnerable like that, her head lolling, her bonnet awry and her hair coming down from its pins. It occurred to him he had never seen her without that monstrous bonnet and had no idea what her hair was like. What little of it that peeped from beneath the hat seemed to be dark; certainly her eyebrows were. Unaccountably he was filled with tenderness for her, a devout wish to protect her from harm, which did battle with his determination to steer clear of allowing any woman into his heart. Could he turn his back on her when they reached Kendal and forget he had ever met her?
What else could he do? She would never take money from him and he would not insult her by offering it. It was strange that he should think that now, whatever he had suspected at the beginning of this journey. What had made him change his mind? Her frailty? No, never that. He laughed inwardly at his own folly. He was anxious to see his ill uncle and he ought to remember that and not worry himself over a woman he had met less than three days before.
Would his aunt know what to do about her? That would mean persuading Miss Draper to go with him. On what pretext? She was so wary of him, so ready to curl herself into a ball and display her prickles like a threatened hedgehog—he would have to be very convincing. And what would his aunt and uncle make of him arriving at a sick bed, with a waif in tow?
He gave a grunt of annoyance at himself. He was turning soft. He was never like that in his soldiering days. Then he knew what he wanted, knew how to get it too, would never have dreamed of listening to a counter-argument when convinced he was in the right. Since he had set off on this journey he had done nothing but argue and try to placate. She was either very naïve or very clever.
She stirred when they pulled into the King’s Arms in Lancaster, mainly because it was such a busy place, all hustle and bustle as people went in and out and horses were led out from the stables and hitched to waiting coaches. The lanterns the ostlers and grooms were carrying cast moving shadows across the interior of the coach, waking her. ‘Where are we?’ she murmured.
‘Lancaster,’ he answered as Joe and Rose disappeared in the direction of the inn looking for refreshment. ‘We are here for fifteen minutes. Do you wish to go inside?’
‘No, I don’t think I’ll bother.’
He moved to sit beside her. ‘I’ll fetch you something, if you like, a drink or something to eat.’
‘No, thank you. What time is it?’
He took his watch from his pocket and leaned across her to consult it by the light of the coach’s lantern. ‘Eleven o’clock.’
‘Have I been asleep all that time?’
‘I think so, it’s difficult to tell in the dark. You must have been very fatigued to manage it in that uncomfortable position.’
‘It has been a very long day.’
‘Yes. I have to admire your fortitude, Miss Draper.’ And then, apropos of nothing at all, added, ‘How is your foot?’
‘My foot?’ She hoped he had forgotten that stumble and the intimacy of their embrace. ‘It was nothing. I have made a full recovery and no damage done.’
‘Good. You know, I meant what I said. If your position as a lady’s companion does not suit, I will do what I can to help you.’
‘Why should you do that, my lord? I am nothing to you. A travelling companion and one that has caused you no end of inconvenience.’
‘Inconvenience, certainly not!’
She chuckled. ‘Not inconvenient to be soaked to the skin on top of a coach when you could have travelled inside in comfort; not inconvenient to find yourself shepherding a couple of silly women into inns and hotels and making them eat because they are too foolish to think of it themselves; not inconvenient to have to go to the trouble of hiring a carriage because those two same silly women took it into their heads to want to walk in the fresh air. And then to have one of them stumble…’
‘Not inconvenient,’ he repeated, taking hold of her hand. She did not withdraw it and he was encouraged to go on. ‘A privilege and a pleasure. But forgive me, I am curious about the reason for your journey. You have never travelled by public coach before, I’ll take an oath on it. That is why I admire your fortitude.’
‘I told you: I am going to take up a position as a companion.’
‘Hmm,’ he murmured. ‘As far away from London as possible.’
She was startled. ‘What do you mean by that, my lord?’
‘I mean I am on to you, my dear.’ She shrank from him, but he still had hold of her hand. He lifted it to his lips, looking at her over the top of it, testing her reaction. He could not see clearly, but he could tell by the widening of her eyes and her little gasp of shock that he had hit a nerve. ‘What are you afraid of? Are you afraid I will take you back to face your demons? Or that I will ravish you, here in this coach, with everyone coming and going around us?’
‘Don’t be silly.’
‘You were the silly one a moment ago. Now I am to join you. Two silly people holding hands in the dark.’ He opened her hand and put his lips to the palm and then brushed them up to her wrist, sending shock waves all up and down her spine and into her belly.
She had to stop this right now. He must think she was either a little innocent whom he could manipulate or a demi-rep of the kind who would pick up a perfect stranger in a coach and go with him for whatever she could get out of him. Before she could stop herself, she had said it aloud.
He laughed. ‘Which is it, Miss Draper, the innocent or the demi-rep?’
‘I will not dignify that question with an answer.’
‘Let us try something else then, something which will undoubtedly tell me the truth.’
His arm was about her and his lips on hers before she had any idea of what he intended. She struggled, but he held her firmly and then she realised she had no more fight left in her. She was tired of struggling, tired of pretending. Her mouth softened and she let the sensations that coursed through her have their way. His kiss, featherlight at first, deepened and she surrendered to a soaring giddiness that made her cling to him and took no heed of time and place, or the possibility that Joe Bland and Rose might return at any moment.
He found himself wanting her, wanting her so badly he could hardly contain himself. And even when he finally lifted his mouth from hers, breathless and unsatisfied, he still did not know the answer to his original quest
ion: innocent or demi-rep? Was her response instinctive or the clever strategy of one experienced in the art of dalliance? And her quiet hiss of ‘How dare you, sir?’ told him no more.
Nor was he to learn any more because Rose and Joe returned and, seeing them sitting side by side, drew their own conclusions and sat opposite them. They were obliged to remain side by side all the way to Kendal, being thrown against each other with every bump in the road, each smouldering with anger and resentment, mixed with a fierce longing for more time. Time they did not have.
It was half past one in the morning when the coach slowed to enter Kendal and turned in under the arch of the Woolpack where it stopped. Alex opened the door, jumped down and turned to hand Emma down. As soon as she was in the yard she marched ahead of him into the inn. After two days she had lost her nervousness about entering such places and seemed able to find her way about them like a seasoned traveller, which was as well, she told herself, because she meant to disdain all attempts to help her. His assistance came at too great a price: the loss of her pride and her dignity, not to mention the surrender of her secret. His quizzing her about the reason for her journey worried her. He had never mentioned Lord Bentwater to her, but she dare not risk him not knowing the gentleman.
If she could have found her way to Mrs Summers there and then, she would have done so, but she could hardly arrive on her doorstep in the early hours of the morning, dishevelled and penniless. She did not fancy sitting in the parlour all night, even if such a thing were allowed, so a bed for the remainder of the night was called for. She went into the parlour and marched purposefully up to the counter and gave the bell on its top a good shake.
‘I need a room for the night,’ she told the woman who answered its summons. ‘For me and my friend.’ She nodded at Rose, who had just entered the room behind her.
